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A helicopter crash on top of a Manhattan office building that killed the pilot and plunged midtown into chaos on Monday afternoon is raising safety questions about choppers flying in the densely populated city.

Federal officials said they are investigating whether the pilot, who was killed after his Agusta A109E helicopter crashed on the roof of 787 Seventh Ave. in heavy fog, violated any flight rules. The pilot was the sole fatality and only person on board the private helicopter.

Helicopter pilots usually contact the tower at LaGuardia Airport in neighboring Queens when they take off from the East 34th Street Heliport, where the helicopter that crashed reportedly took off. But the pilot did not make that contact and there isn't a requirement to do so, according to a Federal Aviation Administration spokeswoman.

The helicopter was also flying in a restricted area, about a half mile from Trump Tower, according to the New York Police Department. The FAA had put restrictions on flights in that area after Trump's election in 2016.

Following Monday's crash, Rep. Carolyn Maloney, a New York Democrat whose district includes a large swath of midtown Manhattan, renewed calls for a ban on "non-essential" helicopters over New York City.

"Today, New York City experienced yet another deadly helicopter crash, this time, with our nightmare of having a helicopter crash into a building," Maloney said in a statement. "We cannot rely on good fortune to protect people on the ground. It is past time for the FAA to ban unnecessary helicopters from the skies over our densely-packed urban city. The risks to New Yorkers are just too high."

The pilot on Monday was flying in low visibility when most other choppers around the city had remained grounded.

"This was not a normal flight," said John Goglia, former member of the National Transportation Safety Board. "I think he was struggling for control and to put it down but he couldn't."

The building does not have a helipad, according to officials. Helipads on buildings have been largely banned from New York rooftops after a helicopter's rotor blade snapped off in 1977 atop what was then the Pan Am building, killing five people. Public helipads in Manhattan, of which there are now three, have been confined to the coasts of the island.

Helicopter accidents are relatively uncommon compared with other modes of transportation, but recent incidents have sparked calls for tighter restrictions.

After a tour helicopter crashed in the East River in March 2018, killing five passengers on board, Maloney and six other lawmakers wrote a letter to the FAA and NTSB to tighten safety regulations for tourism flights.

New York City officials in 2016 announced a plan to halve the number of helicopter tourism flights in the city to 30,000.

New York Yankees pitcher Cory Lidle and his flight instructor were killed in 2006 when Lidle's small plane crashed into a 42-story building on the Upper East Side of Manhattan. Eighteen people were injured in the crash.

Barnes & Noble said on Friday it had not received any other offers from prospective bidders before Elliott Management's "keep-shop" deadline.

Elliott, which offered $475.8 million to take the bookstore retailer private, had a provision that allows the hedge fund to be entitled to a payment of up to $4 million if the retailer struck a deal with a third party before the deadline. Thereafter, the breakup fee will be $17.5 million.

"I can confirm that we received no other bids before last night's (Thursday) 11:59 PM (ET) deadline," a spokeswoman for Barnes & Noble said.

Barnes & Noble investor Richard Schottenfeld said on Thursday the bookstore chain is worth more than Elliott's recent offer and he may engage in discussions with the company's board for its sale.

The U.S. bookstore chain has been exploring options for a buyout since last October, with multiple parties showing interest, including founder-chairman Leonard Riggio.

Barnes & Noble has been struggling to grow sales at its bookstores, as consumers shift to other hobbies or prefer to order books from online stores like Amazon.

Shares of the bookstore chain were down 2.6% at $6.7 in morning trading.

CBS and Viacom are expected to begin seriously discussing a merger next week, culminating months of speculation about an eventual combination, according to people familiar with the matter.

CBS is holding a meeting of board members tomorrow, and though no formal announcements are planned, the board of directors is expected to decide to increase the level of seriousness around discussions with Viacom, said the people, who asked not to be named because the discussions are private.

CBS and Viacom know each other well, which could speed along discussions over the next few weeks about an exchange ratio, board composition and management leadership positions.

Still, there are still unknowns that could bog down the talks.

Bob Bakish, the Viacom CEO, is expected to be the head of a combined company, said the people. In a typical deal, the combined company would pick a CEO then let that person fill out the rest of the management team. But here, there are several reasons why the combined company would appoint and name several other top execs at the same time as picking a CEO.

First, the CBS board lacks confidence in Bakish's team, given their dearth of experience running a broadcast network and a premium movie channel, said two of the people. (CBS owns Showtime and has help preliminary talks to acquire Starz from Lions Gate. Talks about acquiring Starz are expected to continue but may not happen until after a CBS-Viacom agreement, said people familiar with the matter.)

The CBS board particularly wants David Nevins, who was named CBS's new chief creative officer in 2018, to get a high-profile job in the new regime, said the people.

While current CEO Joe Ianniello is well-liked at CBS, his ties to former CEO Les Moonves may hurt his chances to stay at a combined company, the people said. Ianniello was first Moonves's chief financial officer and later chief operating officer.

Further, the CBS board is bracing for a possible shareholder lawsuit if a deal is consummated. Some members of the board are worried that paying a premium for Viacom and taking its CEO will be seen as overpaying for an underperforming company, one of the people said. Viacom shares are down about 58 percent over the past five years.

Taking Viacom execs along with Bakish could strengthen any such lawsuit -- the reasoning being that CBS should not take the management team of a company that has long underperformed. So CBS executives could win out over their Viacom equivalents for jobs underneath Bakish, the people said.

If Nevins becomes the chief creative officer for the combined company, Bakish could look outside CBS for a chief operating officer, two of the people said.

So -- a complicated leadership situation overall.

While Moonves's departure created a leadership vacuum at CBS, the company's streaming services have surpassed internal signup goals, with 8 million people signing up for CBS All Access and Showtime. CBS said earlier this year that its next goal is to reach 25 million domestic subscribers by 2022. That could be good news for the CBS interactive team, led by Jim Lanzone.

CBS has no plans to combine its Showtime and CBS All Access streaming services like WarnerMedia is doing with HBO and its Turner and Warner Bros. content, according to a person familiar with the matter.

Spokespeople for CBS and Viacom declined comment.

Facebook, Google and Twitter ramped up their efforts to fight fake news ahead of elections last month but "more needs to be done" in the face of ongoing threats from Russia, EU officials said Friday.

In a joint statement and report, the EU reported evidence of "coordinated inauthentic behavior" such as bots and fake accounts trying spread divisive content on online platforms ahead of the European Parliament elections at the end of May. The EU added it found "continued and sustained disinformation activity" by Russian sources aiming to influence voter preferences and suppress turnout.

"The tactics used by internal and external actors, in particular linked to Russian sources, are evolving as quickly as the measures adopted by states and online platforms," the statement said.

The EU report found it was too early to identify whether there was a "distinct cross-border disinformation campaign" targeting the European elections.

Social media platforms like Facebook, YouTube and Twitter have faced backlash from lawmakers around the world for failing to contain the spread of fake information in election campaigns. The EU said the companies have made progress in some of their efforts to fight disinformation, like hiring fact-checking teams and tightening restrictions around political advertising. But European officials added they expect the firms "to maintain momentum and to step up their efforts."

The EU said that in the days preceding elections, more than 600 groups and Facebook pages across Germany, France, Italy, the U.K., Poland and Spain were reported to have spread disinformation and hate speech. It said these pages generated 763 million user views.

Facebook has been stepping up its fight against fake accounts in recent months. In May, the company reported it removed 2.2 billion fake accounts in the first quarter of 2019, nearly double the amount from the prior quarter. Facebook also toughened its requirements around political advertising on the platform ahead of EU elections.

"Although Facebook extended its transparency to issue-based ads and Google and Twitter did not, questions remain about the effectiveness of the transparency measures taken by all signatories," the EU report said. "Furthermore, the platforms did not make sufficient progress in increasing the transparency of websites hosting ads, partly due to the lack of engagement from the advertising industry."

Facebook, Google and Twitter agreed to an EU "Code of Practice on Disinformation " in 2018, making commitments to submit monthly reports on their efforts to remove fake news ahead of the election.

"People want accurate information online and the work undertaken under the Code shows how Governments, tech companies and trade bodies can work together to tackle online misinformation. But the fight against false news will never be over. That is why we are making significant investments to remove fake accounts and clickbait and to promote high-quality journalism and news literacy," a Facebook spokesperson said in a statement Friday.

Meanwhile, a spokesperson from Twitter told CNBC in a statement that it is "deeply committed to protecting and supporting the public conversation. During the EU Elections, Twitter took proactive steps to encourage healthy democratic debate and ensure EU citizens could access credible, quality information on the service."

It further added: "We established a high-level cross-functional elections team, introduced a political campaign ads policy, and launched a new tool which enables users to report deliberately misleading election-related content. As with every election around the world, we'll continue to enforce our policies in line with our singular priority: to improve the health of the public conversation."

The European parliamentary election is the second-largest democratic election in the world, following India. The EU reported 51% of voters turned out for elections this year, the highest level in two decades. Top EU jobs – including that of the head of the European Union – are still up for grabs with a decision expected on June 18.

Google did not immediately respond to CNBC's requests for comment.

Even as analysts have called the doom of retail as Amazon's might and influence grows stronger, some have bounced back — often with the help of their online business.

A number of retailers and restaurants over the past few weeks have reported explosive growth of e-commerce sales. Lululemon on Wednesday said online sales this past quarter grew 35%. Target's online sales were up 42%, and Walmart reported 37% digital growth. Dick's Sporting Goods' online sales were up 15%. Best Buy's digital business in the U.S. grew 14.5%.

Investors have been rewarding this growth. Walmart and Lululemon shares both hit a 52-week high Thursday. Walmart's stock has gained 16% so far this year, while Lululemon's stock is up more than 42% since January. Starbucks is up nearly 30%, while Chipotle has gained 70% this year.

"Now, it's easier in some ways to be a late mover," in retailing online, Sucharita Kodali, a retail analyst at Forrester Research, said in an interview.

Timing could be what's giving companies such as Lululemon and Walmart a leg up. They didn't have to "reinvent the wheel" online, she said, but instead have been able to take "best practices" from other companies such as Amazon, which started as an online bookstore in 1995. In Walmart's case, that's included acquisitions of start-ups such as Jet.com that have given it a bench of young and experienced tech talent.

Meanwhile, what's giving these retailers such a strong muscle online is something Amazon can't match, at least today: bricks-and-mortar stores. Traditional retailers are finally getting the hang of offering services such as curbside pickup and buy online pick up in store, helping boost online sales but also cutting back on shipping costs for the company.

Lululemon, for example, spoke this quarter about expanding buy online pick up in store options. About 150 of its roughly 440 stores now offer the service, the company said, and it plans to expand the option across its entire store base by the end of the third quarter.

Much of Target's growth online has also stemmed from these services.

During the first quarter of fiscal 2019, Target said its same-day delivery service with Shipt, curbside and in-store pickup drove more than half of its 42% e-commerce sales growth and 25% of same-store sales growth. Sales at stores open at least a year were up 4.8% during the period, outpacing estimates.

The financial benefit of all this for Target is that when customers pick items up in stores, it's 90% cheaper for the retailer than when it has to ship something from a warehouse, the company has said.

"Even today, on any given day, upwards of 50% of our orders are delivered next-day and it's using our stores and their proximity as that advantage in our overall strategy," Target CEO Brian Cornell told analysts last month. "We're leveraging the fact that we're so, so close to the guest ... and convenience is a big part of our strategy."

For Walmart, much of its recent online efforts have been centered around grocery. The retailer is planning to have 1,600 stores equipped for grocery delivery and 3,100 hubs for in-person grocery pickup by the end of this year. It's said 90% of the U.S. population lives within 10 miles of at least one of its stores.

"Clearly, we think our stores are a competitive advantage," Walmart CFO Michael Dastugue told analysts at a UBS-hosted conference in March.

The best "omnichannel" retailers in the country today, meaning the companies that are best utilizing their stores to help with their e-commerce businesses and vice versa, are Walmart, Target, Home Depot, Best Buy, Macy's, Dick's Sporting Goods, Kohl's, Nordstrom, Lowe's and J.C. Penney, and in that order, according to a study by Internet Retailer.

It looked at things such as which retailers allowed shoppers to return online orders to a store, showed in-store stock status on the web, priced matched in-store offers with online promotions and even offered free, in-store Wi-Fi.

"Retailers that aren't making omnichannel a priority do so at their peril, as shoppers are demanding these services," the report said. Seventy-eight percent of shoppers check inventory online for a certain store before heading there, and 68% of all shoppers say they'll do more of this in 2019, the firm found in surveying 1,100 consumers.

Many restaurants' online businesses have also rebounded.

Restaurant digital orders have grown by 23% over the last four years, according to The NPD Group — and they're expected to keep growing. Digital sales typically result in higher average checks for restaurants. Domino's Pizza, which sees two-thirds of its orders come through digital channels, has reaped the rewards of being an early adopter.

Mobile apps represent 60% of digital orders, NPD found. Some restaurants, such as Starbucks, encourage customers to order via app through loyalty programs. About 40% of Starbucks transactions come from loyalty members.

Early on, Starbucks said mobile orders had hurt sales after they caused bottlenecks at the pickup line, but the company has since resolved these issues.

Convenience is definitely a factor propelling restaurants' digital ordering. Chipotle Mexican Grill's digital sales accounted for 15.7% of sales last quarter and doubled from a year ago. To smooth the process, the burrito maker has invested in digital pick-up shelves and special drive-thru lanes for digital orders.

The rise of third-party delivery services has also played a role in the increased number of digital restaurant orders. For once, Amazon played a relatively small role in this trend, outpaced by first movers such as GrubHub, DoorDash and UberEats. Most major restaurant chains have partnered with one or more delivery platforms to bring their food to customers' doorsteps. But earlier this week, Amazon said that it would discontinue the service to focus on grocery delivery.

AT&T said Thursday it has canceled preorders for Samsung's $2,000 Galaxy Fold and is offering $100 to customers who ordered it early.

Samsung's Galaxy Fold is one of the first folding phones and was supposed to launch on April 26, but that date was pushed back indefinitely after review units, including one tested by CNBC, broke during testing. The screen on CNBC's unit began flickering before the phone's screen stopped working entirely. Samsung says it is working on "further improvements" that will help protect the display from damage.

Samsung automatically canceled early orders that were placed through its website once it confirmed it was unable to ship the folding phone by May 31. Best Buy also canceled orders.

"While we continue to make progress in enhancing the Galaxy Fold, a new release date has not yet been announced. Because of this, we have recently contacted our pre-order customers to provide them information on their options as we move forward," Samsung told CNBC in May.

A report from Korea's Yonhap News Agency in May said Samsung was aiming to launch the phone in June. Samsung said at the time that it would announce a new release date "in the coming weeks."

Samsung was not immediately available to comment on AT&T's cancellation or to confirm a new launch date for the Galaxy Fold.

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