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A scrambling technique scripted by two Belgians has been chosen as the proposed U.S. government standard to protect sensitive data and help spur the digital economy, the Commerce Department said. The selection of the Rijndael data encryption formula capped a three-year competition among code-cracking experts to replace the aging U.S. benchmark.

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* ASM Lithography Holding agreed to buy U.S. rival Silicon Valley Group Inc. for $1.59 billion in stock, becoming the biggest maker of machines that print circuits onto computer chips. The Dutch company’s offer values San Jose-based Silicon Valley at $42.73 a share. The market for lithography equipment is expected to rise about 30% a year to $8 billion by 2002 as demand from chip makers swells. Silicon shares rose $7.38, or 27%, to close at $33.69 on Nasdaq.

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* Kibu.com, a Web site for teenage girls that had the backing of Silicon Valley veteran Jim Clark, said it will cease operations due to the tough operating environment for consumer Internet companies.