Welcome back to This Week in Apps, the weekly TechCrunch series that recaps the latest in mobile OS news, mobile applications and the overall app economy. The app industry continues to grow, with a record 218 billion downloads and $143 billion in global consumer spend in 2020. Consumers last year also spent 3.5 trillion minutes using apps on Android devices alone. […]
Reputed mafia ‘godmother’ arrested at Rome airport
Prosecutors allege Maria Licciardi, 70, ran extortion rackets as head of Naples-based Camorra crime syndicateA reputed top Naples crime syndicate boss was arrested as she was about to board a flight to Spain, Italian authorities said.The interior minis…
‘Italy’s fairytale’: men’s 4x100m gold continues summer of success
President among those hailing first-ever victory in relay event that takes country’s Olympic medal haul to 38 Italy continued its summer of incredible sporting success by clinching gold in the men’s 4x100m relay at the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.It was the co…
European refurbished electronics marketplace Refurbed raises $54M Series B
Refurbed, a European marketplace for refurbished electronics which raised a $17 million Series A round of funding last year has now raised a $54 million Series B funding led by Evli Growth Partners and Almaz Capital. They are joined by existing investors such as Speedinvest, Bonsai Partners and All Iron Ventures, as well as a […]
‘Now it’s continuous noise’: Italy’s Crusoe adjusts to life off his island
It is more than three months since Mauro Morandi left Budelli after living alone there for 32 yearsEvery morning, Mauro Morandi woke up to the uninterrupted sea view that only he was privy to. Immersed in nature, he was intimately in tune with the dawn…
Success of far-right Brothers of Italy raises fears of fascist revival
Political party has overtaken Matteo Salvini’s far-right League as Italy’s biggest party in opinion pollsSpartaco Perini spoke overwhelmingly about his time as a second world war resistance fighter in the days before he died. The founder of one of Ital…
Tourists evacuated from Pescara as Italy records more than 800 wildfires
Wildfires burn across Italy, Spain, Greece and Turkey in heatwave bringing temperatures above 40CAt least five people have been wounded and holidaymakers evacuated after wildfires devastated a pine wood near a beach in Pescara, Italy, as one of the wo…
The Guardian view on Fortress Europe: a continent losing its moral compass
The increasingly draconian approach to irregular migration betrays the spirit of the 1951 refugee conventionSeventy years ago, the 1951 UN refugee convention established the rights of refugees to seek sanctuary, and the obligations of states to protect…
Buried in concrete: mafia architecture – in pictures
Alessio Mamo has photographed the illegal, brutalist buildings and gaudy, now decaying, villas in the south of Italy that mafia bosses constructedWords by Roberto Saviano and Lorenzo TondoRead more on how the mafia made a killing from the destruction o…
Submarine robot captures underwater footage of ancient Roman ship laden with wine jars – video
An ancient Roman ship carrying a cargo load of wine jars, or amphorae, has been found underwater in the Mediterranean Sea off the Italian island of Sicily. The vessel was discovered during an underwater reconnaissance expedition by the island’s Re…