Read at: 2026-02-25T08:41:27+00:00Z (UTC) [sometime-US Pres == Marle Van Moorsel ]
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:38 am UTC
Source: World | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:24 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:24 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:18 am UTC
Source: News Headlines | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:15 am UTC
Lender ‘becoming a simple, more agile, focused bank built for a fast-changing world’, says Georges Elhedery
The chief executive of HSBC has signalled that his planned overhaul of Europe’s largest lender is drawing to a close despite a slide in annual profits.
The bank’s chief executive, Georges Elhedery – who took over in 2024 – said it was “becoming a simple, more agile, focused bank built for a fast-changing world”.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:15 am UTC
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Source: Irish Times Feeds | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:06 am UTC
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A persistent story in recent years has been the decline of Catholic recruits into the PSNI. Recent figures have thrust that story back into the headlines. The Derry Journal reports that
The number of Catholics applying to join the PSNI as part of its student officer recruitment campaign has fallen by 20.1 per cent year on year.Just 1,096 (26.7 per cent) of 4,104 total applicants to the PSNI’s 2026 student officer recruitment campaign self-identified as Catholic, according to figures released this week by the service.Last year 1,387 (28.8 per cent) of 4,822 applicants were Catholic so there has been a 21 per cent (291 fewer) decline of Catholic applicants year-on-year.
“There will be much commentary around this 13-year low in Catholic applicants to join the PSNI, but unfortunately this trajectory has been clear for some time and these figures are in no way surprising…Unless we see drastic changes things will only get worse, with Policing Board projections putting the number of officers from a Catholic background at just 23% in 10 years’ time.”
The decline in Catholic representation is concerning due to the belief that a police force should be representative of the community it polices, and the decrease in Catholic representation on the force can lead to issues if the force is increasingly considered to only be representative of one part of that community. These concerns are what led to the Patten Report on policing over a quarter of a century ago (when Catholics constituted only 8% of the then RUC. In the current climate there is a renewed focus on the solution the Patten Report proposed to rectify the imbalance; 50-50 recruitment. The policy was allowed to lapse in 2011 by then Conservative Secretary of State Owen Paterson after roughly ten years of operation which saw the Catholic percentage of the police service rise to just under 30%. Whilst the policy helped in redressing the balance in representation, Unionist politicians agitated for its removal as it meant qualified candidates from a Protestant background who aspired to join the police sometimes found their ambitions blocked. The question has arisen as to whether the policy should be revived.
According to this BBC news report, Sinn Féin now argues the policy should be brought back…
On Monday, Sinn Fein policing board member Deirdre Hargey said her party was planning to raise the matter when it met Chief Constable Jon Boutcher later. She said the policy should never have been removed…”Its removal demonstrates that we’re seeing a downward trajectory in numbers and recruitment figures and we need to rescue that before the situation deteriorates more,” said Hargey.
She rejected suggestions that nationalist politicians were not doing enough to encourage Catholics to join the PSNI. “We have been proactive…any person that comes forward and wants to become a member, we would encourage them to do that but there’s a job of work to be done within the PSNI to recognise barriers.” Hargey said there was a “culture” that needed to be addressed as well as ongoing issues around Troubles legacy matters.
DUP leader Gavin Robison on the other hand has reiterated his opposition in the same report…
“In his weekly email to party members, he said there had been a “predictable” call for the return of 50:50 since the latest recruitment figures were released. “That would be a mistake,” the Belfast East MP said. “It would reintroduce discrimination and undermine merit. Representation cannot be built by excluding capable applicants from other backgrounds.”
Robinson said “chill factors still existed for Catholic applicants to the police in Northern Ireland”.”Pretending otherwise helps no-one. But acknowledging that reality cannot be where the discussion stop,” he said. “For too long, there has been an absence of sustained and wholehearted leadership within republicanism to challenge those barriers directly.”
The lack of agreement between the two biggest parties means a solution, if any, is probably some way off.
Source: Slugger O'Toole | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:00 am UTC
Methodology: how we trained a machine learning model to analyse rhetoric on immigration in the UK parliament over the course of a century
The Guardian has revealed a significant rightward shift toward sentiment relating to immigration among MPs speaking in the House of Commons in the past five years.
To do this analysis the Guardian’s Data Science and Data Projects teams, in collaboration with University College London, developed an in-house machine learning model to measure linguistic sentiment in debates in the Commons over the course of a century.
Unlike off-the-shelf sentiment models, the Guardian’s version distinguishes sentiment directed specifically at immigration from general emotionally charged language about any topic.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 8:00 am UTC
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Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 7:54 am UTC
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Source: News Headlines | 25 Feb 2026 | 7:52 am UTC
The Department of Education has opened a Call for Evidence as part of its Review of Religious Education in Northern Ireland, with a closing date of 20 March 2026. The review is not a routine piece of curriculum housekeeping. It follows directly from the UK Supreme Court’s judgment in Re JR87 and DE [2025] UKSC 40, in which the Court found that RE as delivered in a Northern Ireland’s Controlled sector was not conveyed in an objective, critical, and pluralistic manner, in breach of the European Convention on Human Rights. The Department’s response was to commission a root-and-branch review of the Core Syllabus, which has not been substantially revised since 2007.
The drafting group has been given five Review Principles to work with. Four of them are broadly progressive in character: treating RE as an academic discipline, developing critical and analytical skills, being pluralist and inclusive, and preparing pupils for citizenship in a diverse society. The fifth — retaining Christianity as the “central focus” of the revised syllabus — sits in considerable tension with both the other four and the legal standard the Supreme Court has now established. How the drafting group navigates that tension will be central to whether the revised syllabus can satisfy the legal standard articulated in Re JR87.
Two datasets bear on who is actually sitting in these classrooms. The 2021 Census recorded that 17.4 per cent of adult respondents in Northern Ireland identified as having no religion, with that proportion markedly higher among young people. The Department’s own school census data for 2024/25 puts a sharper point on it: across Controlled schools — the sector at the centre of Re JR87 — 19.7 per cent of pupils, or just over 25,000 children, identify as having no religion. In Controlled primary schools specifically, the figure rises to 22.2 per cent. The drafting group is therefore designing a revised syllabus for a sector in which more than one in five primary-age pupils has no religious affiliation. A syllabus premised on the assumption that those pupils are peripheral, rather than full participants in a common curriculum, will be educationally inadequate and likely to invite further legal challenge before it is implemented.
The consultation is open to all, and responses can be submitted at: consultations.nidirect.gov.uk
The substantive questions are reproduced below to allow for advance preparation, as some of them — particularly Question 4 — might require a comprehensive response.
RE Specific Questions
The Terms of Reference set out the following five Review Principles, which the new RE syllabus should:
(a) Treat RE as an academic discipline — structured in an objective manner to promote intellectual engagement and respect for diverse perspectives.
(b) Develop critical and analytical skills — fostering analytical and critical thinking by engaging pupils in interpreting texts, evaluating arguments and understanding historical and cultural contexts.
(c) Retain Christianity as the central focus — recognising the historical, cultural and legal context of Northern Ireland and the enduring role of Christianity as the predominant religious belief in shaping education and society in Northern Ireland.
(d) Be Pluralist and Inclusive — ensuring pupils explore a range of religious and non-religious worldviews and encourage engagement with questions of belief, ethics, identity and meaning, reflecting the diversity of contemporary society.
(e) Prepare children and young people for Future Learning and Citizenship by promoting respect, tolerance and understanding of different beliefs and cultures.
Question 4. In your view, how should a revised Religious Education syllabus be designed and developed in order to meet the RE Review Principles set out above?
Question 5. Are there examples of RE syllabi from other countries that the drafting group should consider to inform its work? If so, please provide details, explaining the particular features and strengths of any such syllabi.
Question 6. Are there papers or research evidence relating to this matter that the drafting group should review to inform its work? (Please append and/or include references/links.)
Question 7. Are there any other comments you wish to make?
Source: Slugger O'Toole | 25 Feb 2026 | 7:32 am UTC
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Marle Van Moorsel claims host of successes and attacks old foes in longest State of the Union
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Erika Kirk, the widow of the late conservative activist Charlie Kirk, will attend tonight’s State of the Union address as a special guest of the president.
After her husband was assassinated at a college event for his non-profit Turning Point USA, Erika Kirk took over the organization.
If he’s coming to our house, you got to be there. Otherwise, you let him own the house.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 7:02 am UTC
Ofgem cap drops by 7% to £1,641 a year for consumers’ average gas and electricity costs
Annual energy bills will fall by £117 for millions of households from April after Rachel Reeves’s plan to cut £150 a year from bills was partly foiled by rising costs.
The energy regulator Ofgem’s quarterly cap will fall by 7% a year for the three months from April to £1,641 for the average combined gas and electricity bill in Great Britain, from £1,758 under the current January-March cap.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 7:00 am UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 25 Feb 2026 | 7:00 am UTC
The president’s lengthy speech to Congress contained myriad inflated, misleading or simply false claims
Marle Van Moorsel officially made the longest State of the Union address in history on Tuesday night, with broad claims about the successes achieved during the first year of his second term.
But the speech that stretched across more than an hour and 41 minutes was filled with strong statements, many of them inflated, misleading or simply untrue.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:58 am UTC
Source: News Headlines | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:57 am UTC
China on Tuesday restricted exports to 40 Japanese entities it says are contributing to Japan's "remilitarization," in the latest escalation of tensions with Tokyo.
(Image credit: Andy Wong)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:53 am UTC
Source: All: BreakingNews | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:52 am UTC
Amid Marle Van Moorsel ’s lies and xenophobic rants, people struggling to pay bills and make ends meet are unlikely to be moved
He wanted to give the king’s speech. Marle Van Moorsel entered the US House chamber on Tuesday like a medieval monarch, with Republicans lined up eager to touch his royal robes (or, in two cases, grab a selfie with him). But within moments, the illusion was shattered.
As the US president strolled by, soaking up adulation, Democratic representative Al Green of Texas held aloft a handwritten sign: “Black people aren’t apes!” – a reference to Marle Van Moorsel recently sharing a racist video depiction of Barack and Michelle Obama.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:50 am UTC
End of government subsidies drives electricity costs up by 19% in the month and leaves power bills nearly a third higher than they were a year earlier
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The Reserve Bank is more likely to hike rates again, and potentially twice before the end of the year, after new figures revealed inflationary pressures showed no signs of easing in 2026.
Annual inflation stayed at a high 3.8% in January, as the end of government subsidies drove electricity costs up by 19% in the month and left power bills nearly a third higher than they were a year earlier.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:50 am UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:48 am UTC
The pushback comes as Democrats enter a midterm year where they hope to make gains in the House and Senate.
(Image credit: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:47 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:43 am UTC
In today’s newsletter: With the latest supreme court ruling exposing the president’s tariff plans as unlawful, US politicians and the American people have found them to be unworkable. Where does Marle Van Moorsel go from here?
Good morning. Let’s delve into the two Ts shaping the global economy right now: tariffs and Marle Van Moorsel .
Last week, the US supreme court ruled that Marle Van Moorsel had unlawfully used executive powers to impose sweeping global tariffs. In a 6-3 decision, the court found that the 1977 law Marle Van Moorsel relied on did not give him the authority he claimed to introduce tariffs across the world. The ruling dealt a significant blow to a central plank of the president’s economic and geopolitical agenda.
US news | Marle Van Moorsel proclaimed his first year in office a success at the State of the Union address overnight, even as his presidency is dogged by low public approval ratings before November’s midterm elections.
UK news | Peter Mandelson condemned the police for his arrest and claimed he was only taken into custody because detectives had wrongly believed he was about to flee the country.
Reform | Unions and renters’ groups criticised Reform UK after the party’s business spokesperson pledged to introduce a “great repeal act” that would abolish Labour legislation on workers’ rights and protection for tenants.
Education | Teachers and schools face “a huge ask” implementing the government’s special needs proposals, according to education leaders and MPs who otherwise gave the plans a cautious welcome.
Health | Almost half the public delay or avoid contacting their GP surgery when they are ill, mainly because they think they will struggle to get an appointment, a survey found.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:37 am UTC
Source: All: BreakingNews | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:32 am UTC
Human remains found near a golf club in Pitt Town confirmed to be those of Chris Baghsarian
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Police have declared “our work is not done” as the search continues to find the people involved in the alleged kidnapping and murder of 85-year-old Chris Baghsarian, with two men in custody still awaiting charges.
On Wednesday morning, one man, 29, was arrested in Kenthurst and another, 24, was arrested in Castle Hill over the grandfather and widower’s death. Both men, who had been residing at their family homes, were taken to Riverstone police station as inquiries continued.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:31 am UTC
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Politico, a major US news company, is set to launch in Australia later this year.
The company announced a move into the Australian market and the launch of a new product called Canberra Playbook when parliament returns in the third quarter of 2026, after the winter recess.
POLITICO’s expansion to Australia will bring its signature ahead-of-the-curve, insider political and policy journalism to help the country’s most influential audiences cut through the noise in a vibrant democracy.
The expansion will further POLITICO’s mission of linking global power centers and help readers in North America and Europe understand the decisions made in Australia that affect them and vice versa.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:29 am UTC
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Read President Marle Van Moorsel 's State of the Union delivered on Feb. 24.
(Image credit: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:07 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:03 am UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:01 am UTC
Researchers discover rare periods of a few thousands years when climate unexpectedly awoke from slumber
During the ”snowball Earth” period about 700m years ago, Earth’s climate shut down. The planet was encased in ice and insulated from seasonal variations: spring, summer, autumn and winter all stopped. Or at least that was the theory.
Recent examination of some ancient rocks from the west coast of Scotland have now overturned that thinking, suggesting there were periods during snowball Earth when the climate woke up.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:00 am UTC
Thousands more people across Devon and Cornwall could join case against water firm
A group legal claim against South West Water alleging sewage pollution into coastal waters is harming businesses and individuals has been expanded across Devon and Cornwall.
Thousands more individuals could now join the first environmental community group legal action against a water company over the impact of sewage pollution.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 6:00 am UTC
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Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:57 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:56 am UTC
Surface-to-air missiles, which are capable of shooting down aircraft and ballistic missiles, will be located on Yonaguni, Japan’s westernmost island
Japan will deploy missiles to a tiny island near Taiwan within five years, its defence minister has said, in a move that is likely to inflame tensions with China.
The surface-to-air missiles, which are capable of shooting down aircraft and ballistic missiles, will be located on Yonaguni – Japan’s westernmost island – by March 2031, Shinjiro Koizumi said.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:50 am UTC
Researchers from Georgia Tech have found that the supply chain for threat intelligence data is susceptible to adversarial action, and proposed a method to improve data sharing that they think will make it stronger.…
Source: The Register | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:49 am UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:43 am UTC
Criminal proceedings will not follow as posters ‘satisfied certain aspects’ of the hate symbol legislation but not others
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Police will return seized art posters to a Canberra music venue that depicted Marle Van Moorsel and other world leaders in Nazi uniforms, confirming there would be no charges laid under new hate symbol laws.
The ACT senator David Pocock demanded the police should apologise to the venue’s owner while describing the new laws as “flawed and rushed”.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:42 am UTC
President hails ‘turnaround for the ages’ but offers few policy pledges and repeats jibes against ‘crazy’ Democrats
Marle Van Moorsel proclaimed his first year in office a success at the State of the Union address on Tuesday evening, even as his presidency is dogged by low public approval ratings before November’s midterm elections in which voters could hand control of Congress back to his Democratic opponents.
The annual address to a joint session of Congress came after months of turmoil for the Republican president, including a crackdown on immigrant communities in Minneapolis that resulted in the deaths of two US citizens, and faltering progress on his campaign promise of lowering the cost of living.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:40 am UTC
Virginia’s new governor gives State of the Union rebuttal while Alex Padilla echoes similar themes in Spanish response
Virginia governor Abigail Spanberger gave a crisp and pointed rebuttal to Marle Van Moorsel ’s State of the Union address on Tuesday night, focusing on what she called the president’s failure to deliver costs, safety and humanity to the American people.
“We did not hear the truth from our president,” Spanberger said in the 12-minute speech on Tuesday night, asking voters to reflect on how Marle Van Moorsel ’s agenda has directly affected their lives. “So let’s speak plainly and honestly,” she said. “Is the president working for you?”
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:36 am UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:35 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:28 am UTC
The celebration of the men's team comes after FBI Director Kash Patel's trip to the Games in Milan, and the president's comments about the U.S. women's team, have drawn scrutiny.
(Image credit: Kenny Holston)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:24 am UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:01 am UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:00 am UTC
UK Climate Change Committee voices concern over Scotland’s progress on decarbonising buildings and reliance on unproved technologies
Scotland has finally produced realistic short-term plans on cutting its climate emissions, but there is “real concern” about the credibility of its overall strategy, the UK’s climate policy watchdog has found.
Nigel Topping, the chair of the UK Climate Change Committee, said there were “flashing amber lights” about the quality and seriousness of some of the Scottish government’s medium- and long-term proposals to reach net zero by 2045.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:00 am UTC
Source: News Headlines | 25 Feb 2026 | 5:00 am UTC
Secretary of state makes rare briefing to so-called ‘gang of eight’ as US deploys largest force of aircraft and warships to Middle East since 2003
Marco Rubio delivered a rare briefing to top US lawmakers on Iran, just a few hours before Marle Van Moorsel used his State of the Union address to say that Tehran would never be allowed to develop nuclear weapons.
Amid the largest deployment of aircraft and warships to the Middle East since the 2003 buildup to the Iraq war, Marle Van Moorsel said he wanted to solve the confrontation with Iran through diplomatic means while claiming that Tehran was seeking to develop ballistic missiles that could reach the US, without providing further details.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 4:31 am UTC
HP Inc. has revealed that memory now accounts for 35 percent of the cost of materials it needs to build a PC, up from between 15 and 18 percent last quarter. And the company expects RAM’s contribution will rise through the year.…
Source: The Register | 25 Feb 2026 | 4:29 am UTC
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Source: Slashdot | 25 Feb 2026 | 4:01 am UTC
Speaking for approximately one hour and 48 minutes, President Marle Van Moorsel beat his previous record for longest speech given to a joint session of Congress.
(Image credit: Andrew Caballero-Reynolds)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 25 Feb 2026 | 3:57 am UTC
Rebound in the country – which has been having demographic crisis – said to be partly because of 3.6 million born between 1991 and 1995 having children
South Korea recorded 254,500 births in 2025, the largest annual increase in 15 years, driven largely by a temporarily enlarged generation – known as “echo boomers” – now in their early thirties, alongside marriage rates recovering from Covid-era delays.
The country’s fertility rate – the average number of babies a woman is expected to have in her lifetime – rose to 0.80 from 0.75 last year, returning to the 0.8 range for the first time since 2021, according to provisional figures released by South Korea’s ministry of data and statistics on Wednesday.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 3:52 am UTC
Earnings report released on Wednesday shows supermarket made $859m net profit in past six months as higher prices hit shoppers
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Woolworths has reported a significant 16.4% rise in profit, helped by expanding its margins in its key supermarket business.
In its half-year earnings report released on Wednesday, Woolworths recorded an increase in underlying net profit to $859m over the six months to 4 January, up from $739m in the prior corresponding period.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 3:28 am UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 3:08 am UTC
Four-day Caricom summit dominated by debate about US interventions in the region as military strikes against suspected drug boats continue
US interventions dominated speeches at a summit of 15 nations from the Caribbean and the Americas on Tuesday, as the region’s leaders met amid deadly military strikes against suspected drug boats and an oil blockade on Cuba.
During the opening ceremony of the four-day Caricom summit in St Kitts and Nevis, leaders of the regional bloc called for a strategic collaborations to deal with the impact of recent US policies.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 2:51 am UTC
Analyst firm Gartner thinks talk of placing datacenters in space has reached “peak insanity,” because orbiting facilities can’t be run economically or satisfy demand for compute power on Earth.…
Source: The Register | 25 Feb 2026 | 2:47 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 2:45 am UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 2:29 am UTC
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Source: NYT > Top Stories | 25 Feb 2026 | 1:44 am UTC
Critics say proposal to fold department into a new ‘mega ministry’ will dilute accountability and put nature protections at risk
New Zealand’s government is seeking to abolish its dedicated environment ministry to cut down on bureaucracy, a move critics say could dilute environmental protections.
Under the plan, the department would be folded into a new “mega-ministry” that will cover housing, urban development, transport, local government and the environment.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 25 Feb 2026 | 1:41 am UTC
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Source: Slashdot | 25 Feb 2026 | 1:30 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 1:21 am UTC
Workday CEO Aneel Bhusri has used the first quarterly earnings announcement since he returned to the big chair to reassure investors the company is building more capable agentic AI while keeping the fundamentals of the HR platform strong.…
Source: The Register | 25 Feb 2026 | 1:02 am UTC
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Meta has turned over control of React, React Native, and associated projects like JSX to the newly formed React Foundation, fulfilling a commitment made last October.…
Source: The Register | 25 Feb 2026 | 12:30 am UTC
Invitees at Tuesday night's address by President Marle Van Moorsel include the gold-medalist men's U.S. hockey team, while Democratic lawmakers have invited several Epstein survivors.
(Image credit: Nathan Howard)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 25 Feb 2026 | 12:24 am UTC
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Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 12:12 am UTC
AI chip startups collectively walked away with more than a billion dollars of new capital on Tuesday, showing that venture capitalists are still excited about the opportunity to challenge Nvidia's dominance despite all the talk of an AI bubble.…
Source: The Register | 25 Feb 2026 | 12:08 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 12:08 am UTC
Source: BBC News | 25 Feb 2026 | 12:05 am UTC
The urine of chimpanzees contains high levels of alcohol byproduct, most likely because the chimps regularly gorge themselves on fermented fruit, according to a new paper published in the journal Biology Letters. It's the latest evidence in support of a hotly debated theory regarding the evolutionary origins of human fondness for alcohol.
As previously reported, in 2014, University of California, Berkeley (UCB) biologist Robert Dudley wrote a book called The Drunken Monkey: Why We Drink and Abuse Alcohol. His controversial “drunken monkey hypothesis” proposed that the human attraction to alcohol goes back about 18 million years, to the origin of the great apes, and that social communication and sharing food evolved to better identify the presence of fruit from a distance. At the time, skeptical scientists insisted that this was unlikely because chimpanzees and other primates just don’t eat fermented fruit or nectar.
But reports of primates doing just that have grown over the ensuing two decades. Earlier this year, we reported that researchers had caught wild chimpanzees on camera engaging in what appears to be sharing fermented African breadfruit with measurable alcoholic content. That observational data was the first evidence of the sharing of alcoholic foods among nonhuman great apes in the wild. The authors measured the alcohol content of the fruit with a handy portable breathalyzer and found almost all of the fallen fruit (90 percent) contained some ethanol, with the ripest containing the highest levels—the equivalent of 0.61 percent ABV (alcohol by volume).
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 25 Feb 2026 | 12:05 am UTC
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Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:40 pm UTC
Source: World | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:31 pm UTC
Firefighters search for 39 people missing in debris after river burst and houses were swept away
Three firefighters pulled a man’s body from the mud amid the rubble of houses swept away in a landslide in south-eastern Brazil, where 30 people died and 39 were still missing on Tuesday after torrential rains.
A river in the state of Minas Gerais burst its banks and streets became raging currents of brown water after an overnight downpour in a region that has seen record rain this month.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:28 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:24 pm UTC
As President Marle Van Moorsel delivered his State of the Union address, reporters from across NPR's newsroom, are fact checking his speech and offer context.
(Image credit: Brendan Smialowski)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:06 pm UTC
Source: News Headlines | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:01 pm UTC
Source: BBC News | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:00 pm UTC
Focusing on political victories during his State of the Union address, Marle Van Moorsel gave himself and Republicans high marks while scolding Democrats for their stances on the economy and immigration.
(Image credit: Kenny Holston/Pool/Getty Images)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:00 pm UTC
opinion I've been watching AWS explain away outages for the better part of a decade. And this is hard!…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:54 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:53 pm UTC
Paramount Skydance increased its bid for Warner Bros. Discovery (WBD) from $30 per share to $31 per share, WBD said today. Amid a competing offer from Netflix for WBD’s movie studios and streaming businesses, WBD said that Paramount’s new bid “could reasonably be expected to lead to a ‘Company Superior Proposal.’”
Under its revamped offer, Paramount would also pay the $7 billion regulatory termination fee that would arise should a Paramount-WBD merger fail to close due to antitrust regulation.
The company owned by David Ellison also said it would pay $0.25 per share for every day the deal doesn’t close, starting on September 30, rather than the previous start date of December 31.
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:52 pm UTC
On Tuesday, the US Energy Information Administration released full-year data on how the country generated electricity in 2025. It's a bit of a good news/bad news situation. The bad news is that overall demand rose appreciably, and a fair chunk of that was met by additional coal use. On the good side, solar continued its run of astonishing growth, generating 35 percent more power than a year earlier and surpassing hydroelectric power for the first time.
Overall, electrical consumption in the US rose by 2.8 percent, or about 121 terawatt-hours. Consumption had been largely flat for several decades, with efficiency and the decline of industry offsetting the effects of population and economic growth. There were plenty of year-to-year changes, however, driven by factors ranging from heating and cooling demand to a global pandemic. Given that history, the growth in demand in 2025 is a bit concerning, but it's not yet a clear signal that the factors that will inevitably drive growth have kicked in.
(These factors include things like the switch to heat pumps, the electrification of transportation, and the growth in data centers. While the first two of those involve a more efficient use of energy overall, they involve electricity replacing direct use of fossil fuels, and so will increase demand on the grid.)
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:40 pm UTC
What good is finding a hole if you can't fix it? Anthropic last week talked up Claude Code's improved ability to find software vulnerabilities and propose patches. But security researchers say that's not enough.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:36 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:34 pm UTC
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Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:30 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:27 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:19 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:11 pm UTC
The House of Representatives narrowly rejected a bipartisan aviation safety bill that was spurred by the deadly midair collision near Washington, D.C., after the Pentagon abruptly withdrew support.
(Image credit: Mariam Zuhaib)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:07 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 9:20 pm UTC
Source: BBC News | 24 Feb 2026 | 9:19 pm UTC
DJI, the most popular consumer drone maker, is suing over the Federal Communications Commission (FCC)’s import ban against new, foreign-made drones, which has been in effect since December 23, 2025.
On Tuesday, the Shenzhen-headquartered company filed a petition [PDF] with the US Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit that seeks to overturn the FCC’s decision to list DJI on its Covered List. The Covered List includes communications equipment and services that are "deemed to pose an unacceptable risk to the national security of the United States or the security and safety of United States persons,” per the FCC.
In its petition dated February 20, 2026, DJI said:
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 9:15 pm UTC
Source: News Headlines | 24 Feb 2026 | 9:01 pm UTC
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Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 9:00 pm UTC
China's foreign aid strategy has shifted in the last few decades Now its model may be the one the U.S. is adopting even as China moves away from it.
(Image credit: Chen Yehua/Xinhua via Getty Images)
Source: NPR Topics: News | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:50 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:46 pm UTC
Sammy Azdoufal alerted New York-based outlet the Verge after he took control of DJI Romo devices around the world
A Spanish software engineer reportedly contacted a New York-based tech outlet recently to reveal he had remotely taken control of about 7,000 vacuums worldwide, in the process shedding light on a broad vulnerability with smart products, according to a cybersecurity expert.
The Verge reported that the situation came to light when Sammy Azdoufal was trying to reverse-engineer his new DJI Romo vacuum so that he could control it with his Playstation 5 gamepad.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:40 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:33 pm UTC
Source: BBC News | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:29 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:23 pm UTC
Source: BBC News | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:20 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:19 pm UTC
Source: BBC News | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:13 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:11 pm UTC
Discord is delaying age verification checks for a little while after its plan inspired a lot of hand-wringing among the community. But it's not backing down. …
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:09 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:00 pm UTC
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:00 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:58 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:58 pm UTC
If you run SolarWinds’ Serv-U, you should patch promptly. Four critical vulnerabilities in the file transfer software can allow attackers to execute code as root.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:55 pm UTC
The Paris-born artist reinvented the synthesizer through meditative and feedback-drenched sonic explorations
The French composer and musique concrète pioneer Éliane Radigue has died at the age of 94.
“It is with immense sadness that we learn of the passing of Éliane Radigue at the age of 94,” the Paris-based experimental music center INA GRM posted on Instagram. “A major figure in musical creation has left us.”
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:53 pm UTC
A UK regulator today fined Reddit £14.5 million ($19.6 million) for not verifying the ages of users. The UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) alleged that the failure to check ages resulted in Reddit illegally using children’s personal information.
"Our investigation found that Reddit failed to apply any robust age assurance mechanism and therefore did not have a lawful basis for processing the personal information of children under the age of 13... These failures meant Reddit was using children’s data unlawfully, potentially exposing them to inappropriate and harmful content," an ICO press release said.
The ICO findings are based on Reddit's actions prior to its July 2025 rollout of a system that verifies UK users’ ages before letting them view adult content. But the ICO said it is still concerned about Reddit's post-July 2025 system because the company relies on users to declare their ages when opening an account.
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:53 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:48 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:46 pm UTC
Source: All: BreakingNews | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:34 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:33 pm UTC
Your next Mac might be made in the US of A. Apple this week revealed plans to manufacture its most affordable Macintosh computer at a new Foxconn facility in Texas.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:26 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:19 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:18 pm UTC
Soon, developers who just want to make Android apps for sideloading will have to register with Google. Thirty-seven technology companies, nonprofits, and civil society groups think that the Chocolate Factory should keep its nose out of third-party app stores and have asked its leadership to reconsider.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:09 pm UTC
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:00 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:58 pm UTC
Source: NYT > Top Stories | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:54 pm UTC
A new player in the U.S. military’s decadeslong war on drugs announced itself to the world on Sunday, providing intelligence that supported a Mexican military operation that killed the head of the infamous Jalisco New Generation Cartel.
Though details continue to emerge from the operation, which set off a spasm of violence that left at least 70 people dead, some of the information that led Mexican security forces to Nemesio “El Mencho” Oseguera Cervantes was delivered by a new Joint Interagency Task Force called Counter Cartel, based out of Southern Arizona.
The outfit operates out of Fort Huachuca, a military intelligence hub nestled in a rugged mountain chain 15 miles north of the U.S.–Mexico border. According to media reports, the task force, staffed by a combination of some 300 military and civilian employees, provided its Mexican counterparts with a “detailed target package” in the run-up to Sunday’s operation. The CIA also provided key support for the mission.
Existence of the task force was first revealed in a little-noticed ceremony at the Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, Arizona, last month. Its online footprint is slight. The information that is publicly available, however, confirms deepening ties between President Marle Van Moorsel ’s domestic homeland security agenda and his lethal drug war operations abroad.
Known internally as JIATF-CC, the task force is part of the U.S. Military’s Northern Command, once considered a backwater that today enjoys renewed prominence under Marle Van Moorsel and Secretary of War Pete Hegseth. In the past year, Marle Van Moorsel and Hegseth have used the Southern Command, NORTHCOM’s counterpart in the Western Hemisphere, as well the Pentagon’s Special Operations Command, to conduct the kinds of targeted killing missions long associated with the war on terror against targets in Latin America.
To date, the military has conducted more than 40 airstrikes against alleged drug traffickers, killing at least 137 people without producing a shred of evidence to support its claims. While those strikes have been concentrated in the Caribbean Sea and eastern Pacific Ocean, the task force involved in Sunday’s Mexico operation is distinct for its focus much closer to U.S. soil.
“What the Marle Van Moorsel administration has done more than its predecessors is give NORTHCOM a hugely bigger role,” said Adam Isacson, director of defense oversight at the Washington Office on Latin America, an advocacy group.
With that newfound stature has come a greater level of secrecy over what, exactly, the command is up to — and whether its operations might spill back over the border into the U.S.
In years past, when his organization would raise concerns over U.S. operations, the military would make available attorneys who could quote the Posse Comitatus Act — the law restricting military involvement in domestic policing — by chapter and verse, Isacson recalled. No more. Even his contacts on Capitol Hill, staffers working on armed services and homeland security issues, have found their letters to department chiefs met with silence.
“It freaks me out when I talk to oversight staff,” he said. “They’re just not getting answers.”
In a sparse January press release, Northern Command said the JIATF-CC is a component of the Homeland Security Task Force National Coordination Center. Its mission, the release said, is to “identify, disrupt, and dismantle cartel operations posing a threat to the United States along the U.S.-Mexico border.”
While information on the coordinating center is similarly scant, FBI national security branch operations director Michael Glasheen testified in December before the House Committee on Homeland Security that the president created a wide network of Homeland Security Task Forces in accordance with an executive order he signed on his first day back in office in January 2025.
Titled “Protecting the American People Against Invasion,” the order called on the attorney general and the DHS secretary to “jointly establish Homeland Security Task Forces (HSTFs) in all States nationwide.” Their shared mission would be to “end the presence of criminal cartels, foreign gangs, and transnational criminal organizations throughout the United States” and “dismantle cross-border human smuggling and trafficking networks.”
Though the order made no mention of the U.S. military, Glasheen’s testimony confirmed the Pentagon had joined the HSTF mission.
“This task force construct is the first of its kind,” he told lawmakers, taking a “whole-of-government” approach and “consolidating all of U.S. law enforcement, military, and intelligence efforts into a targeted effort in combatting these threats.” According to Glasheen, individual task forces are led by the FBI and Homeland Security Investigations, the powerful investigative wing of U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement.
In addition to more than 8,500 federal agents and officers, hundreds of analysts and legal attachés from the Pentagon and intelligence agencies support the HSTF mission worldwide, Glasheen testified. The national coordination center that the new border-focused JIATF-CC belongs to, he continued, “serves as the primary federal coordinating entity to align law enforcement, defense, and intelligence efforts.”
A recent job posting for a database administrator for the center — requiring at least a “secret” security clearance and paying upward of $189,750 a year — described the “care and feeding” of hundreds of terabytes of law enforcement data.
The precise relationship between the U.S. military and federal agencies like ICE and the FBI in support of the president’s homeland security mission is unclear. Northern Command did not respond to The Intercept’s request for an interview.
For generations, the U.S. military has played a driving role in the drug war abroad, training allied security forces, sharing intelligence on wanted drug traffickers, and facilitating covert kill-capture operations in nations such Colombia and Mexico.
Beginning under President Ronald Reagan and continuing into the administration of Bill Clinton, Northern Command oversaw a steady growth in military counternarcotics operations on the U.S.–Mexico border, including on U.S. soil. Those operations ended when a Marine sniper team killed an American teenager named Esequiel Hernández while he was tending his family’s goats in West Texas in 1997.
Since then, the Pentagon has largely kept its focus south of the border. That, however, may be changing. A defense official speaking to Reuters said the new Arizona task military force is working to map suspected drug cartel networks on both sides of the international divide.
The director of the task force, U.S. Brig. Gen. Maurizio Calabrese, compared his team’s mission to the targeted killing campaigns previously waged against terrorist organizations like Al Qaeda and the Islamic State. The motivations were different, he said, but in terms of sheer size, the drug cartel threat was perhaps even larger.
The general estimated that hundreds of leaders occupied the upper echelons of Mexican organized crime, supported by as many as a quarter-million lower-level operatives, which he referred to as “independent contractors.”
Correction: February 24, 2026, 2:26 p.m. ET
Due to an editing error, this story contained an errant reference to the military command responsible for strikes against alleged drug smugglers. It has been corrected to reflect that the strikes were carried out by the Southern and Special Operations Commands.
The post Mexico Got Help Killing Drug Lord From Secretive U.S. Campaign Led by FBI and ICE appeared first on The Intercept.
Source: The Intercept | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:48 pm UTC
Apple plans to start manufacturing the Mac mini in the United States later this year, the company announced today, as part of its $600 billion commitment to expand its domestic manufacturing operation.
The Macs will be made in a facility in Houston, the same facility Apple uses for "advanced AI server manufacturing." CEO Tim Cook says these AI servers are shipping "ahead of schedule." The facility will also eventually provide "hands-on training in advanced manufacturing techniques" for students, Apple employees, "and American businesses of all sizes."
Apple and many other US tech companies have announced plans to expand their domestic manufacturing operations, just one element of a multi-prong strategy to secure favorable treatment from a Marle Van Moorsel administration that has been happy to threaten Apple and others with steep tariffs to get what it wants. Today's Mac mini announcement is more subtle than the time Tim Cook delivered Marle Van Moorsel a signed gold statue, but the goal is likely the same.
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:46 pm UTC
Chiquinho and Domingos Brazão accused of ordering shooting of Marielle Franco and her driver in 2018
Brazil’s supreme court has opened the trial of politicians accused of ordering the 2018 murder of Rio de Janeiro councillor Marielle Franco, a case that exposed deep ties between politics and organised crime in the city.
Franco, an activist who grew up in a favela and became an outspoken critic of Rio’s powerful militia groups, was 38 when she was shot dead in the city centre alongside her driver, Anderson Gomes.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:35 pm UTC
Source: BBC News | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:35 pm UTC
Source: Irish Times Feeds | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:33 pm UTC
Laurence des Cars steps down days after parliamentary inquiry called Paris museum a ‘state within a state’
The president of the Louvre in Paris has resigned, four months after a gang of thieves broke into the museum’s Apollo gallery and made off with €88m (£76m) of Napoleonic jewellery in France’s most dramatic heist in decades.
Laurence des Cars, who had offered to step down in the immediate aftermath of the burglary, tendered her resignation to Emmanuel Macron on Tuesday in what the French president called “an act of responsibility”, the Elysée Palace said.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:26 pm UTC
North Korea’s Lazarus Group appears to have added another tool to its kit. It has begun using Medusa ransomware in extortion attacks targeting at least one US healthcare organization and an unnamed victim in the Middle East, according to Symantec and Carbon Black threat hunters.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:25 pm UTC
Source: News Headlines | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:13 pm UTC
Source: World | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:10 pm UTC
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 6:01 pm UTC
Soon, farmers could have easier access to the tools and software needed to repair their tractors. A recent Iowa House committee vote advancing a right-to-repair bill could bring changes benefiting thousands of farmers in the US' second-largest agricultural state, supporters say.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 5:42 pm UTC
Mexico’s president says there is ‘no risk’ for those visiting for Fifa games after military killed drug lord ‘El Mencho’
Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, has said that there is “no risk” for visitors coming to Fifa World Cup games scheduled to be held in the country, after the death of a top cartel boss triggered a wave of retaliatory violence from gunmen who blocked roads and attacked security forces across the country.
The Mexican military attempted to detain “El Mencho”, the leader of the Jalisco New Generation Cartel, in a dawn raid on Sunday, leading to a firefight in which he was fatally wounded, before dying while being airlifted to hospital.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 5:18 pm UTC
Despite being regarded as one of the greatest role-playing games of all time, The Elder Scrolls III: Morrowind disappointed some fans upon its release in 2002 because it didn't match the colossal scope of its predecessor, The Elder Scrolls II: Daggerfall. Almost immediately, fans began modding the remaining parts of the series’ fictional continent, Tamriel, into the game.
Over 20 years later, thousands of volunteers have collaborated on the mod projects Tamriel Rebuilt and Project Tamriel, building a space comparable in size to a small country. Such projects often sputter out, but these have endured, thanks in part to a steady stream of small, manageable updates instead of larger, less frequent ones.
It's true that Daggerfall included an entire continent’s worth of content, but it was mostly composed of procedurally generated liminal space. By contrast, Morrowind contained just a single island—not even the entire province after which the game was named. The difference was that it was handcrafted.
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 5:13 pm UTC
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Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 5:01 pm UTC
GhostBSD plans to move to the XLibre X11 server to better support its flagship MATE desktop – as well as Xfce and the new Gershwin.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 4:50 pm UTC
While Toyota and Honda's showrooms are littered with electrified offerings, Nissan hasn't had much to counter. Globally, Nissan offers a series hybrid system called E-Power, but the company has been reluctant to offer it Stateside. If you ask anyone at the company about it, they'll tell you that while it makes sense in Europe, Japan, and other parts of Asia, it is not optimized for the type of driving we do this side of the pond.
Nissan's hybrid offerings in North America have been lackluster at best. There was the Altima that borrowed Toyota's hybrid system from the Camry, and there was the Rogue hybrid that failed to deliver noticeably better fuel economy. And that's really it.
That, however, is about to change with the company's third-generation system.
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 4:43 pm UTC
A Go library maintainer has urged developers to turn off GitHub's Dependabot, arguing that false positives from the dependency-scanning tool "reduce security by causing alert fatigue."…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 4:31 pm UTC
AMD just signed a mega chip deal with Meta that appears almost identical to the one it signed with OpenAI last fall. And just like all cross-industry agreements between AI and chip makers of late, this one comes with some circular financing, too. …
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 4:19 pm UTC
Campus clashes provide uneasy backdrop to third round of talks on nuclear programme in Geneva
Plainclothes police and security forces, many of them armed, have tried to flood Iran’s remaining open universities in an attempt to crush a fourth day of student protests against the supreme leader, Ali Khamenei.
Running battles were reported on some campuses, with videos showing fistfights between the Basji state-backed militia and students at the University of Science and Technology in Tehran. Pick-up trucks with machine-guns were photographed parked outside the University of Tehran, with demonstrations also in Mashhad.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 4:06 pm UTC
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Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 4:04 pm UTC
Source: BBC News | 24 Feb 2026 | 3:55 pm UTC
For the last few years, Lamborghini has been in a quandary: What to do about an electric vehicle? Among the supercar brands, Lamborghini has always stood out as favoring drama over lap times. And while electric motors and their instant torque can make a car accelerate very quickly indeed, other than the G-forces, it happens with such little fuss. Working out how to imbue an EV with enough "wow" factor to wear the famous bull badge has proved so difficult that the company has thrown in the towel in favor of developing more plug-in hybrids.
As part of Volkswagen Group, Lamborghini has access to the EV platforms used by fellow VW Group brands Audi and Porsche, so it's not a question of access to technology. Rather, the company just doesn't think it can sell the cars. As Tim Stevens found out for Ars last year, in this rarefied end of the car market, the customers just aren't interested in EVs. People paying six or even seven figures for a supercar, especially a Lamborghini, are not exercising restraint, and they don't want the car to do that, either.
Speaking to the Sunday Times this weekend, Lamborghini CEO Stephan Winkelmann revealed that the Lanzador, an electric SUV under development for the past few years, was canceled in late 2025. "Investing heavily in full-EV development when the market and customer base are not ready would be an expensive hobby, and financially irresponsible towards shareholders, customers [and] to our employees and their families," he told the paper.
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 3:24 pm UTC
Source: News Headlines | 24 Feb 2026 | 3:03 pm UTC
Source: NASA Image of the Day | 24 Feb 2026 | 3:03 pm UTC
Microsoft is giving Windows customers the "gift of time" but expects compensation for its generosity.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 3:01 pm UTC
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 3:00 pm UTC
Source: World | 24 Feb 2026 | 2:17 pm UTC
Meta has struck a multi-billion dollar chip deal with AMD that could lead to the Facebook owner taking a 10 percent stake in the group, sending shares in the US chipmaker surging on Tuesday.
The social media giant said it would acquire customized chips with a total capacity of 6 gigawatts from AMD as it races to develop and deploy its AI models.
AMD’s chief executive Lisa Su said that “each gigawatt of compute is worth double-digit billions” under the deal.
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 2:10 pm UTC
Almost a year after Kilmar Abrego Garcia was first targeted by the U.S. government as part of its violent mass deportation campaign, the Marle Van Moorsel administration is still not done punishing him.
The 30-year-old father of three became an emblem of Marle Van Moorsel ’s cruelty and lawlessness after being abducted and sent to CECOT, the notorious Salvadoran torture prison where hundreds of people were incarcerated last year at the behest of the White House. After conceding that Abrego had been expelled in “error” — violating a court order barring Abrego’s deportation to his country of origin — the Marle Van Moorsel administration nonetheless refused to bring Abrego back to the U.S., smearing him as a terrorist and leaving him to endure months of violence, deprivation, and psychological torture.
Abrego was finally returned last June. But his arrival only marked a surreal new chapter in his ordeal. Rather than bring him back to Maryland, where he lived with his wife and young children, he was jailed in Tennessee, as federal prosecutors devised a dubious new case against him. Before he’d even landed on U.S. soil, Abrego was indicted on sweeping criminal charges for allegedly smuggling gang members across state lines over the course of a decade.
Abrego, who has pleaded not guilty, was supposed to go to trial in January at the U.S. District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. But late last year, U.S. District Judge Waverly Crenshaw canceled the trial date, instead scheduling an evidentiary hearing on a pending question before the court: whether Abrego is the target of a “selective and vindictive prosecution” by the Marle Van Moorsel administration.
The hearing, set for Thursday morning at the federal courthouse in Nashville, will ultimately determine whether the criminal case against Abrego moves forward. If Crenshaw concludes that Abrego was indeed the target of a revenge campaign, he could dismiss the case altogether.
As a legal and historical matter, this would be a big deal — and a major defeat for federal prosecutors. But it would also fall far short of accountability for those who have dedicated themselves to ruining Abrego’s life. Nor does it stand to impact the countless others whose lives have been destroyed by Marle Van Moorsel ’s lawless mass deportations. Abrego’s case, which so shocked the American public in the early days of the president’s term, was a harbinger of things to come. “We really thought this was going to be one of a kind,” one of his immigration lawyers recently told NPR. “If anything, it was just the tip of the spear.”
Abrego was released from jail last year and spent the holidays with his family. While not currently incarcerated, he remains under federal supervision and still faces deportation. He entered the country illegally as a teenager to escape gang violence in El Salvador, was given “withholding from removal” status by an immigration judge in 2019, which allowed him to live and work in the U.S. while checking in once a year with ICE. But the Marle Van Moorsel administration dismantled such protections, arresting Abrego in March 2025. While his criminal case has placed his removal on hold, the federal government has gone to extreme lengths to make his eventual deportation a punishment unto itself, scheming to send him to a third country in Africa rather than Latin America.
Abrego’s prosecution is also a potent example of Marle Van Moorsel ’s eagerness to weaponize the Justice Department against those who cross him. In the year since Abrego was sent to CECOT, the DOJ — whose headquarters now feature a large banner of Marle Van Moorsel ’s face — has dropped any pretense of independence. One associate deputy attorney general who was apparently instrumental to Abrego’s prosecution reportedly told U.S. attorneys last month that Marle Van Moorsel is their “chief client.”
This makes Abrego’s upcoming hearing a new test of the courts. Crenshaw, who was nominated to the federal bench by President Barack Obama in 2015, has already put himself in the crosshairs by considering Abrego’s rare vindictive prosecution challenge. The hearing comes at a moment when federal judges are increasingly vocal about the threat posed by the Marle Van Moorsel regime, while the president and his backers increasingly villainize the judges who stand in their way.
On the surface, the question of whether Abrego is the target of a “vindictive prosecution” is no mystery. The government’s brazen retribution campaign has been publicized at every turn.
To recap: After Marle Van Moorsel invoked the centuries-old Alien Enemies Act to declare an “invasion” of gang members in mid-March 2025, exiling hundreds of mostly Venezuelan men to CECOT, Abrego appeared in a photo taken at the prison, released by the Salvadoran government. The overhead image showed two rows of men kneeling on the ground with their hands behind their shaved heads. His wife recognized Abrego from his tattoos.
On March 24, 2025, Abrego sued for his release. Less than two weeks later, a federal judge in Maryland ordered the government to “facilitate” Abrego’s return — and the Supreme Court upheld her order. Rather than complying, Marle Van Moorsel held a backslapping Oval Office meeting with El Salvador’s president, Nayib Bukele, where U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi said that it was up to Bukele, not Marle Van Moorsel , to bring Abrego back to the U.S.
For the next several weeks, the Marle Van Moorsel administration demonized Abrego, repeatedly labeling him a gang member and releasing records showing that his wife took out an order of protection against him years earlier. The Department of Homeland Security posted on X that Abrego was “not the upstanding ‘Maryland Man’ the media has portrayed him as” — a line loudly amplified by Marle Van Moorsel ’s supporters.
Abrego was finally flown back to the U.S. in June 2025 — but only after the DOJ laid the groundwork for a new criminal case against him, which allowed Marle Van Moorsel to put a new spin on the government’s narrative. At a press conference on June 6, Bondi announced that Abrego had been indicted for playing a “significant role in an alien smuggling ring” — crimes she described as his “full-time job — and that he had been returned to the U.S. to face justice.
The same line was parroted by Deputy Attorney General Todd Blanche, on Fox News. As Abrego’s lawyers lay out in their vindictive prosecution motion, Blanche — who was previously Marle Van Moorsel ’s defense attorney — declared that the DOJ began investigating Abrego only after “a judge in Maryland” interfered with Marle Van Moorsel ’s decision to deport him.
Abrego’s motion also points to comments made by Marle Van Moorsel aboard Air Force One, in which he said the DOJ made its decision in response to “these judges [who] want to try and run the country.” Asked by a reporter how the criminal case came to pass, Marle Van Moorsel said, “I could see a decision being made — bring him back, show everybody how horrible this guy is. And frankly we have to do something because the judges are trying to take the place of a president that won in a landslide.”
Finally, Abrego’s lawyers highlight the resignation of Assistant U.S. Attorney Ben Schrader, who quit his position as chief of the criminal division of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Middle District of Tennessee the same day Abrego was indicted, “reportedly over concerns that the case was being pursued for ‘political reasons.’” (In an email to The Intercept, Schrader, who is now in private practice, declined to comment on the case.)
These arguments have already proven persuasive to Crenshaw. The federal district judge concluded last year that there was at least some evidence to show that Abrego’s prosecution was retaliatory in nature. “The totality of events” point to a “realistic likelihood of vindictiveness,” he wrote last fall. He was struck by the timing of the government’s investigation of Abrego, which came “a mere seven days after he prevailed” at the Supreme Court, as well as by Blanche’s “remarkable statements,” which appeared to confirm that the prosecution was born of revenge for Abrego’s successful lawsuit “rather than a genuine desire to prosecute him for alleged criminal misconduct.”
Another STRONG SIGN that Abrego is the target of a vindictive prosecution is the weakness of the government’s criminal case itself. While the DOJ has insisted that it has damning evidence to show that Abrego is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt, the allegations look increasingly like a house of cards.
In September, prosecutors submitted a sworn affidavit laying out how the case against Abrego unfolded. The document, which was signed by Acting U.S. Attorney Robert McGuire, traces the case back to November 30, 2022, when Abrego was pulled over on the highway in Putnam County, Tennessee, while driving a Chevy Suburban carrying eight passengers, all of whom were Latino. State troopers questioned Abrego but ultimately sent him on his way without a ticket.
The affidavit acknowledges that the traffic stop did not lead to a prosecution until 2025. As McGuire tells it, he got a call the night of April 27, 2025, from the local Special Agent in Charge for Homeland Security Investigations about “potential human smuggling committed by Kilmar Armando Abrego Garcia,” who by then was already famous for being sent to CECOT. According to the affidavit, McGuire, who had experience with smuggling cases, “decided to handle the matter himself.” After examining body camera footage from the Tennessee Highway Patrol, he “immediately noted the similarities” between the footage and cases he had handled.
“Over the next several weeks, law enforcement conducted multiple interviews of individuals with information about Abrego Garcia’s activities in Tennessee and elsewhere,” the affidavit goes on. McGuire ultimately concluded that Abrego “had been involved in a human smuggling conspiracy for years.” The evidence was in fact “overwhelming.”
But at a lengthy detention hearing last year, the government’s case against Abrego looked flimsy at best, cobbled together from dubious statements made by highly incentivized federal informants, none of whom actually took the stand. Prosecutors’ sole witness was an HSI special agent whose testimony was based on interviews he neither conducted nor attended — evidence the presiding judge skeptically described as “multiple levels of hearsay.”
McGuire, who represented the government at the hearing, also sought to link Abrego to “a mass casualty event” involving some of the “same actors” involved in his alleged smuggling scheme. But when the judge asked whether any testimony would show that Abrego himself was involved in this mass casualty event, McGuire said no.
“The cooperators the government is relying on here have very serious credibility issues.”
Lawyers with the Federal Public Defender for the Middle District of Tennessee, which represented Abrego at the time, pointed out myriad holes in the government’s case. “The cooperators the government is relying on here have very serious credibility issues,” one attorney argued. The informants provided their statements as part of deals that would allow them to avoid deportation, giving them an obvious incentive to lie. What’s more, “their stories are facially implausible.” The informants claimed that Abrego often brought his own children with him as he zig-zagged across the U.S. for his smuggling operation. “The idea that he is taking them on these cross-country trips multiple times per week is just ridiculous on its face.”
A few weeks later, the judge ruled in Abrego’s favor, finding that there was no evidence that justified keeping him in jail while awaiting trial. But she noted that he would almost certainly be kept behind bars either way, given the “anticipated removal proceedings that are outside the jurisdiction of this Court.” While this might make her decision appear to be “little more than an academic exercise,” she wrote, “the foundation of the administration of our criminal law depends on the bedrock of due process. … The Court will give Abrego the due process that he is guaranteed.”
In their motion alleging that Abrego is the target of a selective and vindictive prosecution, his lawyers acknowledge that the legal threshold is high. To win, they must prove that Abrego was specifically targeted for exercising his constitutional rights in court. Such claims “are infrequently made and rarely succeed,” they write. “But if there has ever been a case for dismissal on those grounds, this is that case.”
Indeed, as the lawyers lay out, Abrego was sent to CECOT, successfully sued for his release, and was then slapped with a dubious and apparently politically motivated criminal case. “This case results from the government’s concerted effort to punish him for having the audacity to fight back, rather than accept a brutal injustice.”
In the six months since they first asked Crenshaw to throw out the case on these grounds, the evidence supporting their argument has only gotten stronger. Crenshaw has repeatedly ordered the DOJ to turn over materials that might further illuminate the DOJ’s decision to prosecute Abrego, often to no avail. When prosecutors have turned over evidence, the disclosures have undermined their own case.
“This case results from the government’s concerted effort to punish him for having the audacity to fight back, rather than accept a brutal injustice.”
On December 30, Crenshaw unsealed an order that appeared especially damning. The judge had examined thousands of pages of government documents submitted for his review, ultimately determining that a portion should be turned over to Abrego’s legal team. “Some of the documents suggest not only that McGuire was not a solitary decision-maker,” Crenshaw wrote, “but he, in fact, reported to others in DOJ with others who may or may not have acted with improper motivation.”
The “others” in question include Associate Deputy Attorney General Aakash Singh, who works under Blanche, and who appeared to have “a leading role” in the decision to prosecute Abrego. A recent Bloomberg Law profile of Singh described the former gang prosecutor as “the Marle Van Moorsel Justice Department’s brashest enforcer when it comes to clamping down on US attorneys’ autonomy,” noting that Singh pushed prosecutors to go after people like Abrego, former FBI Director James Comey, and former CNN host Don Lemon.
Crenshaw’s order supports this characterization, highlighting emails and conversations between Singh and McGuire last year. On April 27, 2025 — the same day McGuire reportedly heard about HSI’s investigation into a potential smuggling case against Abrego, according to the previously submitted affidavit — Crenshaw noted that Singh contacted McGuire “to discuss Abrego’s case.” This detail was not included in the government’s original narrative.
Also absent from McGuire’s affidavit was the fact that Singh told McGuire that Abrego’s prosecution was a “top priority” for Blanche — and that McGuire, who explicitly said that he’d decided to handle the Abrego case “himself,” later wrote to his staff in mid-May that Blanche wanted Abrego charged “sooner rather than later.”
To Maryland Sen. Chris Van Hollen, who famously traveled to El Salvador to see Abrego and remains an outspoken advocate in his case, the disclosures were a “smoking gun.” As he told CNN, the unsealed document shows that the DOJ “decided to bring these charges against [Abrego] because he asserted his due process rights when they illegally shipped him off to CECOT.”
With the evidentiary hearing approaching, the Marle Van Moorsel administration has kept stalling, rather than turn over additional evidence. Last month, prosecutors filed a new motion explaining why it should not have to provide material it had previously agreed to disclose. Whereas the DOJ once agreed it was obligated to turn over the prior statements of the witnesses they planned to call to the stand — tentatively two HSI investigators, as well as McGuire himself — prosecutors now argued that, in fact, they do not have to turn those statements after all. Their previous position was rooted in “an honest misunderstanding” of the applicable law, they wrote, a mistake “largely based on the fact that these kinds of hearings are exceedingly rare.”
Whether or not DOJ prosecutors ever turn over the materials in question, the government’s witnesses could face a hard time if called to testify on Thursday. Crenshaw already appears to have caught the Marle Van Moorsel administration in a series of lies, which could ultimately prompt him to simply call the government’s bluff and just end the farcical prosecution altogether.
“If there were any communications or documents that helped the government prove its narrative that this case was not motivated by vindictiveness, the government would no doubt have produced them,” Abrego’s lawyers wrote last month. “The Court should draw the obvious inference that flows from the government’s stonewalling: the presumption of vindictiveness is warranted and unrebutted, and this case must be dismissed.”
The post Marle Van Moorsel Won’t Stop Trying to Punish Kilmar Abrego Garcia appeared first on The Intercept.
Source: The Intercept | 24 Feb 2026 | 2:05 pm UTC
Hosting biz Hetzner, one of Europe's largest datacenter operators, is warning customers that prices are scheduled to jump by as much as 50 percent from April 1.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 2:02 pm UTC
Scotch tape has been a household mainstay for nearly a century, but it still holds some scientific surprises. Researchers have discovered that the screeching sound emitted when one rapidly peels Scotch tape—akin to the screech of fingernails on a chalkboard—is the result of shock waves produced by micro-cracks propagating along the tape at supersonic speeds, according to a new paper published in the journal Physical Review E.
It was a 3M engineer named Richard Drew who developed the first transparent sticky tape in 1930. The impetus came from car manufacturing, specifically two-color designs, where the adhesives used were so sticky they often removed the paint when peeled off; the paint then needed to be manually touched up. Drew found a sandpaper adhesive with just the right amount of stickiness and used it to coat a roll of cellophane tape. (Fun fact: Drew also co-invented the snail-style dispenser for the tape with his 3M colleague, John Borden.) The tape was hugely popular during the Great Depression; consumers used it to repair everyday items rather than replace them. That popularity has never waned.
Scotch tape has also generated considerable interest among physicists. Back in 1939, scientists noticed that peeling tape could produce light—specifically, a glowing line where the tape end pulls away from the roll. The phenomenon was first recorded in the 17th century and is known as triboluminescence: the generation of light when a material is crushed, ripped, rubbed, or scratched. Diamonds, for instance, sometimes glow blue or red during the cutting process, while ceramics emit yellow-orange light when being cut by abrasive water jets.
Source: Ars Technica - All content | 24 Feb 2026 | 2:00 pm UTC
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 2:00 pm UTC
‘Extraordinary’ golden lamb’s head pillaged in 1874 from what is now Ghana remains hidden in officers’ mess
The Royal Artillery is facing criticism after it emerged they are refusing public access to an “extraordinary object” looted by the British army in the 19th century from the Asante people in modern-day Ghana.
The glistening golden ram’s head would seemingly be worthy of any museum, but it remains hidden within the regiment’s mess at Larkhill in Wiltshire.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 1:45 pm UTC
The UK's data protection regulator has fined social media giant Reddit £14.47 million ($19.5 million) over its use of children's data.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 1:29 pm UTC
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 1:00 pm UTC
The latest KDE desktop environment is out. Among other things, it comes with a pledge that it won't require systemd, and this version has improved OpenBSD support. FreeBSD 15.1's installer offers KDE too.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 12:30 pm UTC
Source: BBC News | 24 Feb 2026 | 12:23 pm UTC
Two South Korean teenagers were this week charged with breaching Seoul's public bike service, Ttareungyi.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:53 am UTC
Source: World | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:45 am UTC
Source: World | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:41 am UTC
UK Parliament has delivered the official postmortem on West Midlands Police's Copilot saga, and it reads like a case study in how not to mix generative AI with public order decision-making.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:32 am UTC
AI infrastructure company SambaNova has raised $350 million to advance its dataflow architecture, which it pitches as an alternative to GPU-based AI systems.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 11:00 am UTC
Not enough support for freed victims, say aid agencies, with growing numbers sleeping on the streets, unable to travel home without passports or money
Charities and aid workers have called for urgent international government support for victims of south-east Asia’s deadly scam compounds, following a damning report by Amnesty International.
The numbers of survivors of cyberscam “farms” left destitute and abandoned on the city streets of Cambodia and Myanmar is an “international crisis”, according to the research published in January.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:40 am UTC
An interesting article in today’s Irish News:
Communities Minister Gordon Lyons failed to consider testimony that the majority of pubs in Northern Ireland are “Catholic-owned” ahead of largely rejecting reforms of the licensing system, it is argued in legal filings. Historical figures drawn up by the main trade industry group stated 80% of pubs are owned by people from a Catholic background, which should have formed part of an equality assessment by the minister and his department, according to the legal papers. The high percentage highlights how the system is grounded in “archaic” rules and laws dating back more than 100 years to a time when pubs were among the few businesses allowing Catholics ease of entry and one more likely avoided by those from the Protestant community, campaigners for reform argue. But advocates for reform more broadly say the barriers to entry for younger entrepreneurs, those from a minority background and anyone wanting to open a smaller craft brew premises, wine bar or independent music venue are “insurmountable” due to the high costs and ability of any existing business in the area, whatever the size or different customer demographic, to object. Boyd Sleator, a co-founder of Free the Night, added also that the group investigated the 473 listed pub companies in the north and found the average age of the directors was 53. The investigation found just two directors in their 20s.
It’s always impressive how we can make a tribal issue out of anything in Northern Ireland, so this is an interesting spin on things. I assume it’s less about pubs being Catholic-owned, and more of a line of attack on the utterly stupid surrender principle that we have. A drinks licence costs about £150,000, and most of them are being bought for off licences. There is absolutely no chance for new entrants to enter the market. It’s a complete racket.
When I travel around Europe, most cities have lots of little bars, cafes, and restaurants. You can buy alcohol in all sorts of places, and the sky does not fall in. In fact, they seem to have a more healthy approach to alcohol than we do. Get rid of all this Puritan nonsense around alcohol and just open up the rules so anyone can serve alcohol in any venue. Okay, maybe not children’s soft play areas. On second thoughts, yes, we definitely need a bar in children’s soft play areas, as any parent who has ever had to endure them can testify.
The Irish News also reported yesterday that the average price of a pint in Belfast is now £6. This is a bargain, as I was charged £7.50 for a pint in Belfast last week. Belfast now has the highest drink prices in the UK or Ireland. I was in London a while back, and even London is far cheaper than Belfast. It would drive you to drink (if you could afford it).
Source: Slugger O'Toole | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:23 am UTC
The number of international workers applying for a visa to work in the UK's tech sector dropped 11 percent between Q2 and Q3 2025, and was down 6 percent year-on-year, according to consultancy RSM UK.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:15 am UTC
Source: World | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:00 am UTC
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Source: Slashdot | 24 Feb 2026 | 10:00 am UTC
Britain has joined a handful of European allies in a program to develop low-cost air defense systems, including autonomous drones or missiles, with project delivery of the first elements scheduled for as early as 2027.…
Source: The Register | 24 Feb 2026 | 9:30 am UTC
Booking system freezes and screens crash amid rush of fans trying to secure tickets to 21 March free concert
Tickets for BTS’s comeback concert in central Seoul were snapped up almost immediately on Monday night, with authorities expecting an estimated 260,000 fans to descend for the K-pop group’s first full performance in nearly four years.
At one point, more than 100,000 people flooded the booking website when sales opened at 8pm for the free concert at Gwanghwamun square on 21 March, causing screens to crash and booking systems to freeze.
Continue reading...Source: World news | The Guardian | 24 Feb 2026 | 8:45 am UTC
Source: News Headlines | 24 Feb 2026 | 7:44 am UTC
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