Category Archives: Technology

US and UK unveil sanctions against Chinese state-backed hackers over alleged ‘malicious’ attacks

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The US alleges the individuals were working as a front for Beijing in an indictment and sanctions announcement

Hackers backed by China’s government spy agency have been accused by the US and UK of conducting a years-long cyber-attack campaign, targeting politicians, journalists and businesses.

The operation saw political dissidents and critics of China targeted by sophisticated phishing campaigns, according to the US, which resulted in some emails systems and networks being compromised.

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Tory MPs urge tougher action on China after cyber-attacks

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Senior Tories say ministers not holding China to account after Beijing targeted elections watchdog and politicians

Tory MPs have urged ministers to take a tougher approach towards China after the security services confirmed Beijing-backed hackers were responsible for a cyber-attack targeting the UK elections watchdog and a surveillance operation on British politicians.

The Chinese ambassador will be summoned to explain his country’s actions, which resulted in Beijing allegedly accessing the personal details of about 40 million voters, held by the Electoral Commission.

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China cyber-attacks: this growing threat to UK security will not go away

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With the Electoral Commission the latest target on a list that includes the economy and supply chains, experts warn of data-gathering ‘on an industrial scale’

In March last year an integrated review of the UK’s defence and foreign policy said it would protect the country’s “democratic freedoms” from Chinese state attacks.

A few months later the Electoral Commission confirmed why democratic institutions and processes were on the threat list as it revealed that a cyber-attack – by a then unidentified assailant – had accessed the data of 40 million voters.

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EU investigates Apple, Meta and Google owner Alphabet under new tech law

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Technology groups face hefty fines if they are found guilty of breaching Digital Markets Act

Apple, Google’s parent company and Meta are being investigated by the EU for potential breaches of the bloc’s new laws designed to police anti-competitive behaviour by big technology companies.

The trio face significant fines if they are found guilty of breaching the Digital Markets Act (DMA), a landmark piece of regulation that came into force on 7 March and is aimed at increasing choice for online consumers.

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How Facebook Messenger and Meta Pay are used to buy child sexual abuse material

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Court documents and interviews detail the products’ role in alleged exploitation – and how some payments go undetected

When police in Pennsylvania arrested 29-year-old Jennifer Louise Whelan in November 2022, they charged her with dozens of counts of serious crimes, including sex trafficking and indecent assault of three young children.

One month earlier, police said they had discovered Whelan was using three children as young as six, all in her care, to produce child sex abuse material. She was allegedly selling and sending videos and photos to a customer over Facebook Messenger. She pleaded not guilty.

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Nearly 4,000 celebrities found to be victims of deepfake pornography

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Channel 4 News finds 255 British people including its presenter Cathy Newman to have been doctored into explicit images

More than 250 British celebrities are among the thousands of famous people who are victims of deepfake pornography, an investigation has found.

A Channel 4 News analysis of the five most visited deepfake websites found almost 4,000 famous individuals were listed, of whom 255 were British.

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Elon Musk’s Neuralink shows brain-chip patient playing online chess

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Noland Arbaugh, paralyzed after diving accident, received implant in January but experts caution that procedure is in early days

Elon Musk’s brain-chip startup Neuralink live-streamed its first patient implanted with a chip playing online chess.

Noland Arbaugh, the 29-year-old patient who was paralyzed below the shoulder after a diving accident, was playing chess on his laptop and moving the cursor using the Neuralink device.

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Reddit shares priced at $34 in largest IPO by social media company in years

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Platform to make its debut on New York stock exchange on Thursday with a market value of $6.4bn

Reddit will enter a new era as a publicly traded company with a market value of $6.4bn after the social media platform’s initial public offering was priced at $34 per share.

The price, announced late on Wednesday, came in at the top of the target range set by Reddit’s investment bankers as they spent the past few weeks gauging investor demand for the stock. It sets the stage for Reddit’s shares to begin trading Thursday on the New York stock exchange under the ticker symbol RDDT in the largest initial public offering by a social media company in years.

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Swedish composer becomes Spotify’s most-famous musician you’ve never heard of

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Johan Röhr’s 2,700 songs have been streamed 15bn times and have more plays than Britney Spears or Abba

A “secret” composer who has released music under hundreds of different names has been identified as Sweden’s most-listened-to artist on Spotify – pulling in more plays than Britney Spears or Abba.

Johan Röhr, a Stockholm-based musician, has been unmasked as the person behind more than 650 different artists on the streaming service who have been played 15bn times, making him Sweden’s current most-played artist.

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Criminal fraud trial of UK tech tycoon Mike Lynch to begin

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Co-founder of Autonomy charged with 16 counts of wire fraud, securities fraud and conspiracy in 2011 sale of company to HP

A British technology tycoon once lauded as “Britain’s Bill Gates” was the “driving force” behind a “massive” years-long fraud, prosecutors alleged, as his criminal trial got under way in San Francisco on Monday.

Prosecutors said Mike Lynch, co-founder of the UK software company Autonomy, ruled the firm “with an iron fist” before its blockbuster takeover by Hewlett-Packard in 2011.

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Nearly half of UK families excluded from modern digital society, study finds

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Exclusive: Lack of online skills and access creates digital divide that amplifies other exclusions, says report

Almost half of UK families with children lack the online skills or access to devices, data and broadband required to participate in today’s digital society, research shows, with an expert saying this divide is an “amplifier of other exclusions”.

Research shared exclusively with the Guardian found that 45% of households with children did not meet the threshold. Families from low socioeconomic backgrounds in deprived areas and households outside London were among those who were less likely to meet it. Households from minority ethnic backgrounds and those with disabled parents were twice as likely to fall below it.

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Apple to pay $490m to settle claims it misled investors over sales in China

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Company denied that Tim Cook deceived investors when he said iPhone sales were strong weeks before revenue warning

Apple has agreed to pay $490m to settle a class-action lawsuit led by the UK’s Norfolk county council.

The class action alleged chief executive Tim Cook misled investors about a steep downturn in iPhone’s sales in China that culminated in a jarring revision to the company’s revenue forecast.

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Canada conducts national security review of Chinese-owned TikTok

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Industry minister says review of popular video app that is planning to expand in country has been ongoing since September 2023

Canada is conducting a national security review of Chinese-owned TikTok’s proposed expansion of the popular video app in the country, the industry minister, François-Philippe Champagne, said on Friday.

In a teleconference from Italy after meeting with his G7 counterparts, Champagne said the review under the Investment Canada Act had been quietly initiated in September last year.

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Vulnerable man pleads with UK government to block extradition to US

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Diogo Santos Coelho from Portugal faces a 52-year sentence for alleged cybercrime relating to RaidForums site

A vulnerable autistic man is pleading with the UK government to block his extradition to the US on cybercrime charges where he faces a 52-year sentence for alleged offending that began when he was a child.

Diogo Santos Coelho, who has been assessed as at very high risk of suicide, said he had been groomed and exploited online by adults from the age of 14 into committing the alleged crimes, which relate to the website RaidForums.

In the UK and Ireland, Samaritans can be contacted on freephone 116 123, or email jo@samaritans.org or jo@samaritans.ie. In the US, the National Suicide Prevention Lifeline is at 988 or chat for support. You can also text HOME to 741741 to connect with a crisis text line counselor. In Australia, the crisis support service Lifeline is 13 11 14. Other international helplines can be found at befrienders.org

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McDonald’s hit by ‘technology outage’ in UK, Australia, Japan and China

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Fast food chain working to resolve problem but denies it has been hit by cybersecurity attack

McDonald’s restaurants in multiple countries including the UK and Australia have been hit by a “technology outage”, which the fast food chain denied had been caused by a cybersecurity attack.

Australia, the UK, Japan and China were among the markets where services were affected, with restaurant, drive-through and online orders hit.

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Growing safety concerns over lithium-ion batteries after four fires in one day in NSW

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Firefighters responded to blazes set off by an ebike, an EV charging station, a garden hedger and a loose battery in a garbage truck

Lithium-ion batteries sparked four fires in just one day in New South Wales this week, amid growing concern over the rise in battery-related blazes.

One man was taken to hospital and a 10-storey apartment block was evacuated after an ebike battery exploded in Bankstown in Sydney’s south-west on Thursday, while firefighters also responded to blazes set off by an electric vehicle charging station in Berkeley, a garden hedger in Lake Macquarie, and a loose battery in a garbage truck passing through Silverwater.

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Steven Mnuchin putting together investor group to buy TikTok

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Ex-treasury secretary tells CNBC of plans a day after US House passes bill giving app’s owner six months to divest or face US ban

Steven Mnuchin is putting together an investor group to try to buy TikTok, he told CNBC on Thursday.

The former US treasury secretary’s comment comes just a day after the US House of Representatives passed a bill that would give the short-video app’s Chinese owner ByteDance about six months to divest the US assets or face a ban. If it did not, app stores including the Apple App Store and Google Play would be legally barred from hosting TikTok or providing web-hosting services to ByteDance-controlled applications.

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Russia suspected of jamming GPS signal on aircraft carrying Grant Shapps

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RAF jet was taking defence secretary back to UK from Poland, and flying near Russian exclave of Kaliningrad

Russia is believed to have jammed the satellite signal on an RAF aircraft carrying Grant Shapps back from Poland, according to government sources.

Defence sources said there was no danger to Shapps, who was travelling back to the UK, though they called it a “wildly irresponsible” act of electronic warfare.

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Australian computer scientist is not bitcoin creator Satoshi Nakamoto, high court rules

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Judge says evidence for his conclusion that Craig Wright did not create bitcoin is ‘overwhelming’

Satoshi Nakamoto, the pseudonymous creator of bitcoin, is not the Australian computer scientist Craig Wright, a high court judge has ruled, ending a fractious two-month trial in London.

In a highly unusual decision, the presiding judge, Mr Justice Mellor, issued the verdict within seconds of the case concluding, promising to issue a “fairly lengthy written judgment” in due course.

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