WASHINGTON President Donald Trump said China may have hacked the emails of Democratic officials to meddle with the 2016 presidential election, countering the view of U.S. intelligence officials who have said Moscow orchestrated the hacks. In an interview transcript published on Sunday, Trump gave no evidence backing his allegation, first made on the eve of the Nov. 8 presidential election, that China could have hacked the emails […]
(Image: Hawking.org) It’s a pet obsession that both physicist Stephen Hawking and entrepreneur Elon Musk — two people credited with pushing the boundaries of technology and science in pioneering ways — have in common: Rampaging intelligence, borne within machines, could end the human race if utilized dangerously. “I believe there is no real difference between what can be achieved by a biological brain and what can be […]
(Image: file photo) The National Security Agency is set to stop using a highly classified program that in part collected Americans’ emails and text messages without a warrant. Details of the program were largely overlooked when it was first disclosed in documents leaked by whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013. The leaks provided a small but critical window into how the US government carries out surveillance on Americans, […]
The clapping had barely subsided before comedian Hasan Minhaj cracked a joke about the elephant not in the room — President Donald Trump. “Welcome to the series finale of the White House Correspondents’ dinner,” said Minhaj, the dinner’s headliner and a senior correspondent at “The Daily Show.” “My name is Hasan Minhaj, or I’ll be known in a few weeks, No. 830287.” Within minutes of beginning his routine, […]
Ben Wilson from Pacific Crest thinks it’s unlikely that a new device will replace the smartphone for most purposes. Instead, it will be supplemented by AI-based services such as Amazon’s Alexa. The smartphone is just another iteration of the everyday experience that computers have been getting smaller and smaller for the past 60 years. We’ve already moved from mainframes, minicomputers, workstations, personal computers, laptops, and handhelds to […]
Epilepsy is a neurological disorder that affects millions of people, regardless of age, but has yet to discover why it happens and how to effectively stop it. So far, most epilepsy patients manage their seizures with prescription drugs or by using cannabis. While scientists continue to study minibrains in order to understand the origins of epilepsy and other neurological disorders, however, a team of engineering students from Rice University […]
By Drazen Jorgic | ISLAMABAD ISLAMABAD Pakistan’s Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on Saturday sacked one of his special advisers and sanctioned another bureaucrat after an inquiry into a newspaper leak, but the country’s powerful army rejected Sharif’s directive as “incomplete”. The report’s findings and recommendations threaten to reopen a rift between the army and the civilian government at a time when relations between the two have been […]
Emerging from an Hermès store in Shanghai with a shiny new watch costing “tens of thousands” of renminbi, Zhao Feifei is emblematic of a younger generation of Chinese consumers driving a rebound in sales of European luxury brands. “I’m earning more than before so I’m more willing to spend,” says Ms Zhao, who works in an internet finance company. The 30-year-old is one of the many customers […]
By Jeffrey Dastin | SAN FRANCISCO SAN FRANCISCO Amazon.com Inc’s ventures far beyond online retail, from cloud computing to movie making, are raising questions among corporate strategy experts about its focus. The Seattle-based company wowed Wall Street again this week with a 23 percent jump in sales, pushing its shares to an all-time high. But there are concerns that if blockbuster growth stops, investors may come to […]
By Girish Gupta | LOS TEQUES, Venezuela LOS TEQUES, Venezuela Hundreds of activists marched on Friday to the hilltop jail of Venezuela’s best-known detained opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez in the latest of a month of protests against the socialist government. Security forces blocked access to the decrepit-looking penitentiary next to a slum in Los Teques, an hour’s drive from the capital Caracas, as the demonstrators shouted “Leopoldo!” […]
Distribution agreement boosts Eikon’s robust research offering with economic sovereign reports London, 28 April 2017 – Users of Thomson Reuters flagship financial platform Eikon can now access Oxford Business Group’s full range of research on emerging economies, following a distribution agreement between the two firms, giving financial professionals instant access to OBG’s extensive range of reports and economic updates. OBG content is available through Eikon’s real-time and […]
Researchers have found a way to use artificial intelligence to fight a complication of diabetes that affects the eyes. (via WSJ)
Artificial Intelligence (AI) is a concept that has a long standing tradition in the realm of science-fiction, popularized by Hollywood movies and iconic writers such as Isaac Asimov. However, AI has also received increased attention in recent years following news of progress in the field and the prospect of new, tangible, innovation such as self-driving cars. The Internet has played an important role in these developments, particularly […]
British police said officers shot a woman and arrested four other people in London and nearby Kent during a counter-terrorism investigation on Thursday. All four people were arrested on suspicion of the commission, preparation and instigation of terrorist acts, metropolitan police said in a statement, adding that the incident was not connected to the arrest in Whitehall, where a man carrying knives near Prime Minister Theresa May’s […]
ISLAMABAD: The six departments tasked with deputing a representative each to the joint investigation team (JIT) that will probe the assets of Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif and his family have submitted lists of proposed names to the Supreme Court. The apex court, in its April 20 judgement, had given the Federal Investigation Agency (FIA), National Accountability Bureau (NAB), Securities and Exchange Commission of Pakistan (SECP), State Bank […]
By Phil Stewart and Yara Bayoumy | WASHINGTON WASHINGTON When U.S. Defense Secretary Jim Mattis greeted Saudi Arabia’s foreign minister at the Pentagon last month, the first thing he did was joke about the time “the Iranians tried to murder you.” Mattis’ reference to a foiled 2011 plot, denied by Iran, was a telling sign of how much more aligned President Donald Trump’s administration is with Gulf […]
Google parent company Alphabet reported first quarter financial results Thursday that came in above estimates. The tech giant reported non-GAAP earnings were $7.73 per share on a revenue of $24.8 billion, up 22 percent year-over-year, when including traffic acquisition costs (TAC). Wall Street was looking for earnings of $7.40 per share with $24.2 billion in revenue. Net revenue excluding TAC was expected to be $19.81 billion. Alphabet […]
ISTANBUL: A Russian naval intelligence ship sank off Turkey’s Black Sea coast after colliding with a vessel carrying livestock on Thursday and all 78 personnel on board were evacuated, Turkey’s coastal safety authority said.The ship, identified as the “Liman,” collided with the Togo-flagged “Youzarsif H,” the coastal safety authority said on its website.Turkish authorities dispatched a tugboat and three fast rescue vessels, it said. Turkish shipping agency […]
JERUSALEM Israel’s Patriot anti-aircraft missile system shot down an aerial target over the Golan Heights on Thursday, the Israeli military said. Israeli media said residents in the northern Israeli town of Safed reported seeing two missiles being launched and of explosions occurring afterwards. It was initially unclear whether the target, which media said was an unmanned drone, was shot down over Syria or Israeli-controlled territory. The incident […]
By Kylie MacLellan and William James | LONDON LONDON Armed British officers arrested a man carrying knives near Prime Minister Theresa May’s office in London on Thursday on suspicion of preparing an act of terrorism. The 27-year-old man was detained by counter-terrorism officers on Parliament Street, a stone’s throw from the parliament building and May’s Downing Street office, during a stop-and-search in an ongoing security operation, police […]
Growth in cable and internet customers and the box office strength of films, including the latest instalment in the Fifty Shades of Grey series, powered better than expected quarterly revenue and profit at Comcast. Net income at the largest US cable group, which owns the NBC TV networks and the Universal Pictures film studio, jumped 20 per cent to $2.6bn, or 53 cents a share, in the […]
A recent Saudi government and security shake-up aims to strengthen King Salman’s increasingly powerful son against a royal rival and to bolster ties with Washington, analysts and diplomats say. Royal decrees at the weekend saw a number of allies of Deputy Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman moved into key positions and another son of the king named as ambassador to Washington. The goal, a foreign diplomat told […]
ISTANBUL A Russian naval intelligence ship sank off Turkey’s Black Sea coast after colliding with a vessel carrying livestock on Thursday and all 78 personnel on board were evacuated, Turkey’s coastal safety authority said. The ship, identified as the “Liman”, collided with the Togo-flagged “Youzarsif H”, the coastal safety authority said on its website. Turkish authorities dispatched a tugboat and three fast rescue vessels, it said. Turkish […]
By John Irish and Matthias Blamont | PARIS PARIS A top aide of far-right presidential candidate Marine Le Pen raised doubts on Thursday about a French intelligence report accusing Syria’s leadership of a toxic gas attack, a position directly opposed by her centrist rival Emmanuel Macron. A declassified report published on Wednesday showed that French intelligence had concluded that government-backed forces had launched a sarin nerve gas […]
