Google Inc on Saturday accepted responsibility for widespread internet disruptions experienced across Japan the previous day. (Japan Today)

A Japanese boy has come third in a competition to pretend playing the guitar to rock numbers. (NHK)

Police in Tokyo have arrested an unemployed 39-year-old man on suspicion of extortion after he threatened to beat up a smartphone user unless he paid money for "bumping" into him. (Japan Today)

Officials with Japan's Maritime Self-Defense Force say one of their helicopters went out of contact during a training mission on Saturday night. They say it may have crashed into the sea. (NHK)

Police in Japan are on alert for conflicts between two rival gang groups as Sunday marks two years since they split up. (NHK)

A 4-year-old girl died Friday a day after she was found unconscious in a nursery school pool in the city of Saitama, the police said. (Japan Times)

A Tokyo high school student is in critical condition after suffering heatstroke during a basketball club practice, the metropolitan education board said Friday. (Japan Today)

After a hiatus of nearly a month that was lauded by the U.S., North Korea launched three short-range ballistic missiles early Saturday, with two flying roughly 250 km and the other exploding almost immediately, the U.S. military’s Pacific Command said. (Japan Times)

A fossilized tooth of an extinct mammal thought to be a close relative of marsupials has been unearthed in central Kyushu, a find that dates back about 90 million years and may provide clues to how mammals evolved in Asia, the Mifune Dinosaur Museum said Thursday. (Japan Times)

FamilyMart Uny Holdings Co. and discount chain Don Quijote Holdings Co. said Thursday they reached a basic agreement to forge a capital and business alliance. (Japan Times)

A Japanese research team, in cooperation with NHK, has succeeded in filming a fish swimming at a depth of 8,178 meters in the Pacific Ocean -- the deepest ever recorded. (NHK)

People in Japan and China will celebrate 45 years of diplomatic relations between their countries next month in Beijing. (NHK)

Babymetal rocked the crowd at the Summer Sonic music festival Sunday (Aug. 20) in Chiba, Japan, with an exhilarating concert experience that blends J-pop idol entertainment with excellently orchestrated metal. (billboard.com)

Sticking to Japanese barbecue mainstays like sausages and yakisoba noodles would've been the smarter move. (rocketnews24.com)

Japan is the largest consumer of uni, or sea urchin, a popular and expensive ingredient in sushi and kaisen-don seafood rice bowls. Japanese are fond of the sea fruit's rich, sweet taste that comes with a faint scent of the sea. (Nikkei)

The mayor of Montreal expects Air Canada's decision to introduce direct year-round service to Japan will increase foreign real estate purchases but he's not worried it will lead to price spikes seen in Toronto and Vancouver. (ctvnews.ca)

More than 40,000 tax-free shops are ready to welcome overseas tourists to Japan -- even those who step into more rural regions. (Nikkei)

Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev on Wednesday signed a decision to designate four northwestern Pacific islands at the center of a longstanding territorial issue with Japan as a special economic zone. (the-japan-news.com)

The Health, Labor and Welfare Ministry intends to subsidize part of the costs that restaurants, cafes and other eating establishments incur to set up rooms or spaces exclusively for smoking, starting next fiscal year. (the-japan-news.com)

Toshiba and Western Digital are hashing out the terms for a sale of Toshiba Memory, eyeing a price tag of around 2 trillion yen ($18.2 billion) that would shore up the Japanese conglomerate's finances enough to maintain its stock market listing. (Nikkei)

The city of Yokohama ordered a grilled meat restaurant in the area to temporarily stop operation Wednesday after two people who had dined there turned out to be infected with the O-157 strain of the E. coli bacteria. (Japan Times)

Health officials in Saitama Prefecture said Tuesday that four more people have reported symptoms of E.coli 0-157 bacteria following a food poisoning outbreak due to potato salad sold at the Derishasu deli counters at supermarkets. (Japan Today)

The Akita Prefectural Police on Wednesday discovered another body following a fire that engulfed a two-story wooden apartment building in the city of Yokote early Tuesday, bringing the death toll to five. (Japan Times)

Kenichiro Fumita won gold in the men's Greco-Roman 59-kg division Tuesday for Japan's first medal of the world wrestling championships in Paris, becoming the country's first male wrestler in 34 years to be crowned world champion. (Japan Times)

Director Hidetaka Inazuka, known for his documentary on the double atomic-bomb survivor, has completed a new film on three Japanese children fighting a very rare and little-known disease that has left them mostly immobile since birth. (Japan Times)