Apple

Just moments after Apple announced its new iCloud service, the company's iOS App Store and iTunes Store were dynamically updated with a new "Purchased" tab for re-downloading software and content, and iTunes 10.3 was released for Mac and PC.

The iTunes 10.3 beta can now be downloaded direct from Apple. Content purchased can now be re-downloaded on any device -- including Mac, PC and iOS -- at no cost. The new iTunes also includes the iBookstore for Mac and PC, allowing for "an unabridged browsing and shopping experience."

Apple announced on Monday that Mac OS X 10.7 Lion will be available only in the Mac App Store, and the operating system upgrade will be available for just $29.99.

While Apple has publicly acknowledged that they are tracking a summer release window for their upcoming Mac OS X Lion release, sources have indicated to 9to5Mac that Apple may surprise customers with a Tuesday, June 14 launch of the next-generation Mac operating system. Our sources could not confirm with certainty that the launch will take place that day, but due to a mixture of chatter from several sources we believe the June 14th date is a strong possibility.

A software programmer who wrote a jailbreak application that would replace and improve upon Apple's own iPhone notification system has been hired by Apple, AppleInsider can confirm.

Apple's computers have been able to avoid most serious hacking attacks, but that era may be over.

As Steve Jobs and his colleagues prepared for this week's developers conference, the company was also taking steps to stop a malware "phishing" program. The ploy, says technology columnist Rich Jaroslovsky of Bloomberg News, uses an infected website to install a piece of software on Apple computers.

Supply of Apple's Time Capsule hardware is reportedly becoming scarce in the days ahead of Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference, a sign that a new version of the product could be just around the corner.

Contract prices for NAND flash -- the solid-state memory found in devices like the iPhone and iPad -- is said to have fallen "rapidly" in May following lackluster demand from major purchasers like Apple.

Chip prices for NAND declined more than 15 percent, and about 20 percent in the spot market, in May following "lackluster demand," according to Taiwanese industry publication DigiTimes. Apple remains the largest buyer of NAND flash, but demand did not pick up "as aggressively as usual in the second quarter," the report said.

The Security Update 2011-003 that Apple released on Tuesday directly addressed the Mac Defender malware threat in two ways: it changed the way malware files are detected by enabling automatic daily updates, and included code to remove at least two of its variants. Despite this, malware developers had a version available that skirts past Apple's protections within about eight hours.

No sooner does Apple try to thwart the hackers going after the Apple operating system when they strike once again.

On Tuesday, Apple released an update designed to detect and remove a malware program going by the name of Mac Defender. However, less than eight hours after the update was released, a new variation of it appeared online - and this incarnation isn't detected by the update.

Russian digital forensics toolmaker Elcomsoft said that it's the first forensics company to have successfully cracked the data security scheme of the iPhone 4. What that means is that digital forensic investigators will be able to circumvent, in many cases, the hardware-based encryption introduced by Apple with iOS 4.

Elcomsoft, however, said that its related tool for cracking iPhone 4 encryption, released Monday, will only be made available to law enforcement agencies, intelligence agencies, and professional forensic investigators.