Google and France signed an agreement Friday resolving a dispute with French news websites that sees the U.S. Internet search giant setting up a 60 million euro fund to help old media adapt to the digital age.

"France is proud to have reached this agreement with Google, the first of its kind in the world," the French president's office said on Twitter after Francois Hollande and Google chief Eric Schmidt signed the accord.

The Wall Street Journal has become the second major U.S. media organization to accuse Chinese hackers of targeting its computers in an apparent effort to spy on journalists covering China.

The announcement on Thursday came a day after The New York Times said hackers, possibly connected to China's military, had infiltrated its computers in response to its expose of the vast wealth amassed by a top leader's family.

BlackBerry's new smartphone platform launched this week faces an uphill battle winning back corporate and government users who helped spawn the "crackberry" culture, analysts say.

The Canadian-based firm, which rebranded itself with the launch of its BlackBerry 10 platform, must stem the loss of its core customers and win over those who migrated to the iPhone or Android devices, according to industry watchers.

Facebook on Thursday began letting social network members in the United States send friends gift cards for purchases at participating shops or restaurants.

The move came as the world's leading social network seeks ways to expand how it makes money from its 1.06 billion monthly users, the majority of whom access the social network from smartphones or tablet computers.

Twitter's unmatched platform for public opinion is emboldening Gulf Arabs to exchange views on delicate issues in the deeply conservative region, despite strict censorship that controls old media.

The authorities have been attempting to limit the damage by handing out jail terms to some whose tweets have been deemed offensive in the Muslim states, including in Bahrain, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia.

YouTube confirmed on Wednesday that its evolution as an Internet stage for video may include subscriptions to content that creators believe people will pay to see.

"We have long maintained that different content requires different types of payment models," a YouTube spokesman told Agence France Presse.

Internet companies will soon have to find a way to protect user privacy to avert a "clash" which could lead to increased government regulation, eBay chief executive John Donahoe said Wednesday.

"There's going to be, at some point in the next few years, a trigger point," Donahoe told a New York breakfast meeting organized by The Wall Street Journal, noting the need for "a national dialogue about what is acceptable or not."

Facebook is increasing its revenue from mobile with more users now accessing the social network via smartphones and tablets than from personal computers, but Wall Street remains unimpressed.

The company on Wednesday reported a $64 million profit in the fourth quarter of last year, a steep drop compared with $302 million 12 months earlier, while revenue grew 40 percent to $1.585 billion.

The New York Times said Wednesday it had fallen victim to hackers possibly connected to China's military, linking the attacks to its expose of the vast wealth amassed by a top leader's family.

The hackers have over the past four months infiltrated computer systems and snatched staff passwords, and their probing has been particularly focused on the emails of Shanghai bureau chief David Barboza, the newspaper said.

BlackBerry launched its comeback effort Wednesday with a revamped platform and a pair of sleek new handsets, along with a company name change as part of a move to reinvent the smartphone maker.

Canadian-based Research in Motion said it had changed its name to BlackBerry as it launched the BlackBerry 10, the new platform aimed at helping the firm regain traction in a market now dominated by rivals.