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India's private carrier IndiGo is in talks with Airbus Group to order 200 additional A320neo jets valued at about $20.6 billion, Bloomberg reported, citing people familiar with the plans. _0"> The deal may be announced as early as next week at the Farnborough International Airshow, Bloomberg reported, adding that while IndiGo has talked with Boeing Co, the airline's preference is to stick with Airbus. ( bloom.bg/1tq7U6Q ) Sakshi Batra, a spokeswoman for IndiGo, declined to comment on the report. Airbus could not be immediately reached for comment. Reuters reported on Wednesday that Airbus is sprinting to line up preliminary orders for a revamped version of its A330 jet and is on stand-by to make an announcement at Farnborough. (Reporting by Supriya Kurane in Bangalore; Editing by Gopakumar Warrier)

Britain said on Thursday it would rush through emergency legislation to force telecoms companies to retain the data of users for a year, saying the move was vital to protect national security following a decision by Europe's top court. _0"> Communication companies had been required to retain data for 12 months under a 2006 European Union directive which was thrown out by the European Court of Justice in April. The scrapping of the directive could deprive police and intelligence agencies of access to information about who customers contacted by phone, text or email, and where and when, the British government said. British Prime Minister David Cameron said the emergency legislation would restore this capability and enshrine it in law, ensuring investigations would not be hampered and giving protection to the telecom firms from possible legal challenges. However, he stated the measure would not give the authorities any new powers to access Britons' personal data or t

European shares eased on Thursday, led down by Nordic stocks after disappointing updates from Norwegian bank DNB and Swedish construction firm Skanska. Norway's largest bank posted lower-than-expected second-quarter results, partly due to higher loan losses, while Skanska said it would significantly scale down its loss-making Latin American operations after taking a charge in the second quarter. Their shares, each down about 3 percent, were the top fallers on the pan-European FTSEurofirst 300 index, which was down 0.1 percent at 1,362.54 points by 0743 GMT. The index, which hit a 6-1/2 year highs last month, was down for the fourth out of the past five sessions as a handful of disappointing earnings updates cast a shadow on the upcoming reporting season and raised questions about a nearly 10-percent rally between mid-March and last week. "We were looking at an overextended market, so a degree of profit taking was inevitable," IG chief market strategist Brenda Kelly s

Silent Circle, a company known for mobile apps designed to thwart government surveillance, is introducing on Thursday a secrecy-cloaking phone service that lets customers make and receive private phone calls for as little as $12.95 a month. _0"> The secure, fixed-rate voice and data calling plan works on Apple iOS and Android smartphones and, eventually, on Windows Mobile systems, the Geneva-based firm said. Callers can reach 79 countries, including China, Russia, most of Europe and the Americas. Large parts of the Middle East and Africa are not covered. The service marks a sophisticated challenge not just to traditional phone carriers -- who still by and large charge steep roaming fees to international travelers when calling from outside their home market -- but also to newer, voice over Internet services that have sprung up over the past decade. For while Silent Circle undercuts major competitors' roaming costs in many countries, the service's basic attraction l

The layout of a shop, such as Apple's flagship stores may be registered as a trade mark under certain conditions, the European Court of Justice said on Thursday. _0"> Apple had sought to extend a trade mark it had registered in the United States to Germany, but this was initially refused. The ECJ, answering a question from the German Federal Patents Court, said that a store layout can be a trade mark if it departs significantly from other stores in the sector. However, the court added that this had to be assessed on a case-by-case basis by the relevant authority. (Reporting by Robert-Jan Bartunek)

U.S. security software maker Symantec Corp said it is holding discussions with authorities in Beijing after a state-controlled Chinese newspaper reported that the Ministry of Public Security had banned the use of one of its products. _0"> The China Daily reported on July 4 that the ministry had issued an order to branches across the nation telling them to uninstall Symantec's data loss prevention, or DLP, products from their systems, saying the software "could pose information risks." The newspaper also said Chinese news site Sohu.com had reported that the public security bureau had banned Symantec's DLP products from future procurement projects. ( bit.ly/1okVF3v ) Symantec spokeswoman Colleen Lacter told Reuters that her company was in discussions with the Chinese government about the matter, though she declined to confirm or deny the newspaper's account of what had happened. "The discussions are ongoing and it's premature to go into detail

European shares were back in negative territory on Thursday, a brief lift from U.S. Federal Reserve meeting minutes proving short-lived as investors worried whether markets could go it alone without the U.S. central bank's emergency support. Faith in a rally in share prices dating back almost three years has more shaky over the past month than for some time, as the Fed nears what looks like a definitive end to its programme of new money-printing. The minutes from the U.S. central bank's last meeting, published after European markets had closed on Wednesday, offered no sign it was any closer to following that with a swift rise in official interest rates to cool the economy. That boosted U.S. and Asian markets overnight. But the dominant concern at the European open was over companies' results and the economy's ability to survive without the new funds which the Fed's bond-buying has forced into the system every month. Norway's largest bank DNB added to an ina