2024-07-19 20:52

CAIRO/LOS ANGELES, July 19 (Reuters) - Yemen's Houthi rebels hit and damaged a Singapore-flagged container ship with two missiles on Friday as they escalate attacks on global shipping over Israel's war in Gaza. The overnight assault on the Lobivia cargo ship came as the Iran-aligned Houthis also claimed responsibility for a fiery, long-range aerial drone strike in the center of Tel Aviv that killed one man and wounded four others. The Houthis in recent weeks have become more adept at inflicting damage on their targets. In June, the militants struck the Greek-owned Tutor coal carrier with missiles and an explosive-laden remote-controlled boat, causing it to sink. Tutor was the second ship sunk in the Houthi campaign against commercial shipping, which since November has killed at least three sailors and upended global trade by forcing ship owners to avoid the Suez Canal trade shortcut. "Their capacity, their access to more sophisticated weapons, has only increased over the course of this conflict," said Gerald Feierstein, director of the Arabian Peninsula Affairs Program at the Middle East Institute in Washington. Houthi military spokesman Yahya Saree in a television speech on Friday said the group launched the Lobivia strikes, adding that the assault also included drones. The manager of Lobivia did not immediately comment. Lobivia was in the Gulf of Aden when the missiles struck two areas on its port side, the Joint Maritime Information Center (JMIC) said in an incident report. The ship was located 83 nautical miles southeast of Yemen's port city of Aden during the attack. All crew are reported safe and the ship was returning to its last port of call, the United Kingdom Maritime Trade Operations (UKMTO) said. "The ship was transiting northeast along the Gulf of Aden when a merchant vessel in the vicinity observed 'light and blast' where the ship was located," British security firm Ambrey said. The ship appeared to perform evasive manoeuvres immediately and switch off her automatic identification system approximately an hour later, Ambrey said. On Tuesday, the Houthis hit the Liberia-flagged oil tanker Chios Lion with a drone boat, causing damage to the port side that left an oily trail that experts said appeared to be fuel. Britain and the U.S. have conducted retaliatory strikes since February, shooting down drones and bombing attack sites in Yemen. That has come at a significant cost, said Feierstein, who was the U.S. Ambassador to the Republic of Yemen from 2010 to 2013 under President Barack Obama. "We're basically spending a million dollars every time we shoot down a Radio Shack drone. That's wearing on the Navy and wearing on our supplies," he said. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/vessel-hit-by-projectiles-southeast-yemens-aden-ukmto-says-2024-07-19/

2024-07-19 20:47

July 19 (Reuters) - The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is probing executives from major oil firms, including Hess Corp (HES.N) , opens new tab, Occidental (OXY.N) , opens new tab and Diamondback Energy (FANG.O) , opens new tab over their communications with OPEC officials, Bloomberg News reported on Friday, citing people familiar with the matter. All three companies are pursuing multi-billion dollar deals which are currently under FTC review. The current investigation of communication with OPEC officials is part of the U.S. antitrust regulator's review, the report said, adding that investigators are looking for evidence of collusion over oil market dynamics. Earlier this year, FTC barred former Pioneer Natural Resources CEO Scott Sheffield from Exxon's (XOM.N) , opens new tab board on allegations that he attempted to collude with OPEC to raise oil prices. The FTC made the move as it approved Exxon's $60 billion purchase of Pioneer. Hess, in an emailed statement, said the allegations of improper communications were "baseless and without merit". Occidental, Diamondback and the FTC did not immediately respond to Reuters requests for comment. Last month, the U.S. Senate budget committee launched a probe of domestic oil producers, including Exxon and Chevron (CVX.N) , opens new tab, about any efforts to illegally coordinate oil prices with the OPEC. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/us-ftc-probes-hess-occidental-execs-over-opec-communication-bloomberg-reports-2024-07-19/

2024-07-19 20:44

LONDON, July 19 (Reuters) - Elements of Friday’s global IT outage, which grounded planes and hit services from banking to healthcare, have occurred before and until more contingencies are built into networks, and organisations put better back-up plans in place, it will happen again. Friday’s outage was caused by an update that U.S. cybersecurity firm CrowdStrike (CRWD.O) , opens new tab pushed to its clients early on Friday morning which conflicted with Microsoft’s (MSFT.O) , opens new tab Windows operating system, rendering devices around the world inoperable. CrowdStrike has one of the largest shares of the highly competitive cybersecurity market that provides such tools, leading some industry analysts to question whether control over such operationally critical software should remain in the hands of just a handful of companies. But the outage has also raised concerns among experts that many organisations are not well-prepared to implement contingency plans when a single point of failure such as an IT system, or a piece of software within it, goes down. At the same time there are also more solvable digital disasters looming on the horizon, with perhaps the biggest global IT challenge since the Millennium Bug, the “2038 Problem”, just under 14 years away - and, this time, the world is infinitely more dependent on computers. “It’s easy to jump at the idea that this is disastrous and therefore suggest there must be a more diverse market and, in an ideal world, that’s what we’d have,” said Ciaran Martin, former head of Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC), part of the country's GCHQ intelligence agency. “We're actually good at managing the safety aspects of tech when it comes to cars, trains, planes, and machines. What we're bad at is then providing services,” he added. “Look at what happened to the London health system a few weeks ago - they were hacked, and that led to loads of cancelled operations, which is physically dangerous,” he said, referring to a recent ransomware incident which affected Britain’s National Health Service (NHS). Organisations need to look around their IT systems, Martin said, and ensure there are enough failsafes and redundancies in those systems to stay operational in the event of an outage. Friday’s outage happened amid a perfect storm, with both Microsoft and CrowdStrike owning huge shares of a market which relies on both of their products. “I'm sure the regulators globally are looking at this. There is limited competition globally for operating systems, for example, and also for the large scale cybersecurity products like the ones CrowdStrike provides,” said Nigel Phair, a cybersecurity professor at Australia’s Monash University. Friday's outage hit airlines particularly hard, as many scrambled to check in and board passengers who relied upon digital tickets to fly. Some travellers posted photos on social media of hand-written boarding cards provided by airline staff. Others were only able to fly if they had printed out their ticket. “I think it's very important for organisations of all shapes and sizes to really look at their risk management and look at an all-hazards approach,” Phair said. EPOCHALYPSE NOW Friday’s outage will not be the last time the world is reminded of its dependency on computers and IT products for basic services to function. In about 14 years' time, the world will be faced with a time-based computer issue similar to the Millennium Bug called the “2038 Problem”. The Millennium Bug, or “Y2K” happened because early computers saved expensive memory space by only counting the last two digits of the year, meaning many systems were unable to distinguish between the year 1900 and 2000, leading to critical errors. The cost to mitigate the problem in the years before 2000 ran up a global bill of hundreds of billions of dollars. The 2038 problem, or "Epochalypse", which begins at 0314 GMT on Jan. 19, 2038, is, in essence, the same problem. Many computers count the passage of time by measuring the number of seconds since midnight on Jan. 1, 1970, also known as the “Epoch”. Those seconds are stored as a finite sequence of zeroes and ones, or “bits” but for many computers, the number of bits that can be stored reaches its maximum value in 2038. “We currently have a situation where there's huge global disruption, because we cannot cope administratively,” said Ciaran Martin, the former NCSC head. “We can cope in terms of safety, but we can't cope in terms of service provision when key networks go down”. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/technology/without-backup-plans-global-it-outages-will-happen-again-2024-07-19/

2024-07-19 20:41

ABUJA, July 19 (Reuters) - Nigeria fined Meta Platforms (META.O) , opens new tab $220 million, its competition watchdog said on Friday, after investigations showed data-sharing on social platforms violated local consumer, data protection and privacy laws. Nigeria's Federal Competition and Consumer Protection Commission (FCCPC) said Meta appropriated the data of Nigerian users on its platforms without their consent, abused its market dominance by forcing exploitative privacy policies on users, and meted out discriminatory and disparate treatment on Nigerians, compared with other jurisdictions with similar regulations. Meta did not immediately comment, but the FCCPC said in a statement that the company had provided some documents and have retained counsels who have met and engaged with the agency. FCCPC chief Adamu Abdullahi said the investigations were jointly held with Nigeria's Data Protection Commission and spanned over 38 months. The investigations found Meta policies don't allow users the option or opportunity to self-determine or withhold consent to the gathering, use, and sharing of personal data, Abdullahi said. "The totality of the investigation has concluded that Meta over the protracted period of time has engaged in conduct that constituted multiple and repeated, as well as continuing infringements... particularly, but not limited to abusive, and invasive practices against data subjects in Nigeria," Abdullahi said. "Being satisfied with the significant evidence on the record, and that Meta has been provided every opportunity to articulate any position, representations, refutations, explanations or defences of their conduct, the Commission have now entered a final order and issued a penalty against Meta," Abdullahi said. The final order mandates steps and actions Meta must take to comply with local laws, Abdullahi said. In May, Turkey's competition board fined Meta 1.2 billion lira following investigations on data-sharing on its Facebook, Instagram, Threads and WhatsApp platforms. Meta has faced pushback in Europe and other jurisdictions over alleged breaches of data protection laws. Meta's plan to use personal data to train its artificial intelligence models without seeking consent has come under fire in Europe. Meanwhile, South Africa's competition watchdog have announced plans to investigate whether digital platforms, including Meta unfairly compete with news publishers by using their content to generate ad revenue. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/technology/nigerias-consumer-watchdog-fines-meta-220-million-violating-local-consumer-data-2024-07-19/

2024-07-19 20:34

Cybersecurity stocks rise after outage Intuitive hits record high after quarterly results beat Travelers Companies weighs on Dow Indexes down: Dow 0.93%, S&P 0.71%, Nasdaq 0.81% NEW YORK, July 19 (Reuters) - U.S. stocks extended their slump on Friday as lingering chaos related to a global technical outage caused by a software glitch added uncertainty to an already-anxious market. The far-reaching tech outage disrupted operations across multiple industries including airlines, banking and healthcare after the glitch in cybersecurity firm Crowdstrike's (CRWD.O) , opens new tab software caused Microsoft's (MSFT.O) , opens new tab Windows operating system to crash. While the flaw was identified and fixes deployed, technical issues continue to affect some services. Crowdstrike shares slid 11.1%, while rival cybersecurity firms Palo Alto Networks (PANW.O) , opens new tab and SentinelOne (S.N) , opens new tab advanced 2.2% and 7.8%, respectively. All three major U.S. stock indexes ended in negative territory, with the Dow Jones Industrial average suffering the worst of it. On a weekly basis, both the Nasdaq and the S&P 500 logged their worst week since April, while the Dow, having reached a series of all-time closing highs earlier in the week, posted a Friday-to-Friday gain. "This tech outage adds some uncertainty and puts pressure on the overall Nasdaq," said Robert Pavlik, senior portfolio manager at Dakota Wealth in Fairfield, Connecticut. "But it won’t have much of an overall impact. Some buying will be delayed. Not only is it a summer Friday but because of the outage (investors) are in wait-and-see mode." "They're sitting on the sidelines," Pavlik added. "That's what happens to the stock market when volatility rules the day." The CBOE Market volatility index (.VIX) , opens new tab, considered a gauge of investor anxiety, touched its highest level since late April. The smallcap Russell 2000 (.RUT) , opens new tab - a beneficiary of a recent pivot away from megacap growth stocks - ended modestly lower. Nvidia shares (NVDA.O) , opens new tab led a sell-off in chips. The Philadelphia SE Semiconductor index (.SOX) , opens new tab underperformed the broader market, falling 3.1%. Elsewhere, Federal Reserve Bank of New York President John Williams reiterated the central bank's commitment to bringing inflation down to its 2% target. Financial markets have priced in a 93.5% likelihood that the Fed will enter a rate-cutting phase at the conclusion of its September meeting, according to CME's FedWatch tool. The Dow Jones Industrial Average (.DJI) , opens new tab fell 377.49 points, or 0.93%, to 40,287.53, the S&P 500 (.SPX) , opens new tab lost 39.59 points, or 0.71%, to 5,505 and the Nasdaq Composite (.IXIC) , opens new tab dropped 144.28 points, or 0.81%, to 17,726.94. Among the 11 major sectors of the S&P 500, energy shares (.SPNY) , opens new tab fell the most, while healthcare (.SPXBK) , opens new tab and utilities (.SPLRCU) , opens new tab were the only gainers. Second-quarter earnings season ended its first full week, with 70 of the companies in the S&P 500 having reported. Of those, 83% have beaten consensus, according to LSEG. Analysts now see aggregate year-on-year S&P 500 earnings growth of 11.1%, an improvement over the 10.6% estimate as of July 1. Next week, a swath of high-profile results is expected from Tesla (TSLA.O) , opens new tab, Alphabet (GOOGL.O) , opens new tab, IBM (IBM.N) , opens new tab, General Motors (GM.N) , opens new tab, Ford (F.N) , opens new tab and a host of other companies. "It's early in earns season, but things have been impressive," said Ryan Detrick, chief market strategist at Carson Group in Omaha, Nebraska. "But the big boys are starting to report next week and what we want to hear is how strong the consumer is and what's the outlook for future economic growth." Eli Lilly (LLY.N) , opens new tab advanced 1.0% after China approved its weight-loss drug tirzepatide, while Intuitive Surgical (ISRG.O) , opens new tab jumped 9.4% after a second-quarter results beat. Travelers (TRV.N) , opens new tab tumbled 7.8% on lower-than-expected growth in net written premiums. Netflix (NFLX.O) , opens new tab fell 1.5% in choppy trading after the streaming giant cautioned third-quarter subscriber additions would be lower than a year earlier. Oilfield services provider SLB (SLB.N) , opens new tab rose 1.9% after strong second-quarter profit. Declining issues outnumbered advancing ones on the NYSE by a 2.11-to-1 ratio; on Nasdaq, a 1.91-to-1 ratio favored decliners. The S&P 500 posted 27 new 52-week highs and 4 new lows; the Nasdaq Composite recorded 50 new highs and 99 new lows. Volume on U.S. exchanges was 10.54 billion shares, compared with the 11.72 billion average for the full session over the last 20 trading days. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/markets/us/futures-fall-amid-tech-rout-traders-grapple-with-global-cyber-outage-2024-07-19/

2024-07-19 20:19

ANKARA, July 19 (Reuters) - Turkey is set to send navy support to Somali waters after the two countries agreed Ankara will send an exploration vessel off the coast of Somalia to prospect for oil and gas. President Tayyip Erdogan submitted a motion to the Turkish parliament late on Friday, seeking authorisation for the deployment of Turkish military to Somalia including the country's territorial waters, state-run Anadolu Agency reported. The move came a day after the Turkish energy ministry announced that Turkey will send an exploration vessel off the coast of Somalia later this year to search for oil and gas as part of a hydrocarbon cooperation deal between two countries. Earlier this year, Turkey and Somalia signed a defence and economic cooperation agreement during Somali defence minister's visit to Ankara. Turkey has become a close ally of the Somali government in recent years. Ankara has built schools, hospitals and infrastructure and provided scholarships for Somalis to study in Turkey. In 2017, Turkey opened its biggest overseas military base in Mogadishu. Turkey also provides training to Somali military and police. Sign up here. https://www.reuters.com/world/turkey-send-navy-somalia-after-agreeing-oil-gas-search-2024-07-19/