A KFC in Beijing is using facial recognition software to predict what customers will order. Software in the Chinese fast food outlet is designed to choose a suggested order by estimating the mood of the customer, along with their age and gender. For return customers it can remember what they ordered last time and suggest their favourites on subsequent visits.

Vodafone has picked Ogilvy & Mather London to replace Grey London as its lead advertising agency in the UK, meaning that it will have worked with all of WPP's main creative agency networks since 2002. The agency will become the lead in the UK part of Team Red, the global division of WPP created to handle the telecommunications giant's ad business.

Major newspapers including the "Guardian" and the "Financial Times" have joined other national papers in calling for the repeal of a controversial law that could force publishers to pay the costs of the people who sue them, even if they win.

MEPs are to vote on the first comprehensive set of rules for how humans will interact with artificial intelligence and robots. The report makes it clear that it believes the world is on the cusp of a "new industrial" robot revolution. MEPs will decide whether to give robots legal status as "electronic persons."

Plans to cut down on the "annoying" cookie banners that Web users face have been released by the European Union. Instead of giving consent to cookies on every Web site they visit, users would be able to set general preferences. The European Commission said the plans, which would also remove banners for non-intrusive cookies, would help to tackle an "overload" of such requests.

The World Bank has slashed its growth forecasts for Britain up to 2019, with no sign of recovery from a Brexit-induced slowdown. In its first update since the European Union referendum last June, the bank cut its expectations for UK growth from 2.1% to 1.2% in 2017 and from 2.1% to 1.3% in 2018. It predicted growth of 1.3% in 2019.

It's hard to imagine staff being persuaded that the postage stamp piece of sand on the South Bank of the Thames is a decent substitute for one of LA's most glamorous neighbourhoods. Still, that hasn't stopped the mobile-messaging app from choosing London as its new international base, and in a further boost, the firm will book all sales made outside the US through its new UK base.

Facebook will test "mid-roll" video advertising -- in which ads are played after a video has already started -- the BBC understands. The ads would probably first appear in Facebook videos by professional publishers, said one analyst. To date, the social network has resisted allowing "pre-roll" ads that play before a video starts.

The BBC iPlayer will be reinvented in a bid to be the top online TV service in the UK by 2020, the broadcaster's director-general Lord Hall is to say. Changes could include allowing whole series to be downloaded before they are shown on television -- as global online services such as Amazon and Netflix do. Lord Hall is announcing the plans as the BBC enters its new charter period.

Sainsbury's saw sales inched higher over the Christmas period while receiving a Black Friday boost from its recently acquired Argos brand. Britain's second-biggest supermarket reported a 0.1% increase in like-for-like sales for the 15 weeks to 7 January, while sales of wearable tech and mobile phones helped Argos rise to 4% growth. Shares rose 6%.