Business, Financial & Legal - Page 61

At least 12 people are dead, countless are missing and trapped, in massive flooding that has swept through Zhengzhou, the capital of Henan Province. There are some people trapped on trains down in the subway, in water that is up to their necks... scary footage, check it out:

The massive floods demolished roads, railways, airports, highways, buildings, subway systems, and everything in between. It swept away cars, buses, people, with some videos showing a father getting to his son in the flood, and then they were swept away in the flood. I haven't attached that video, but you'll be able to find it online if you search for it.

We don't know how many people are trapped in the city's subway, but the numbers should be large given there's 7 lines and 148 stations. The video above shows people stuck in water that is up to their shoulders, which is horrifying and I can only imagine what those people went, and are still going through.

An absolutely gigantic explosion in China has rocked the area, with an aluminum alloy unit in Dengfend Power Group Co Ltd in China's central Henan province exploding due to "flooding water" entering the plant.

There are massive floods in China right now, with a river close to the plant exceeding the warning water level -- once that occurred, a factory wall was collapsed. Dengfeng Power Group Co Ltd shut the power off immediately, evacuated everyone out of the plant, but at 6AM local time water entered the high-temperature solution and then kaboom.

The plant itself houses an annual capacity of 60,000 tonnes of alloy rods, high-silicon aluminum alloy, and titanium products. The company says that no one was hurt or killed in the blast -- shockingly -- with the Chinese government performing a safety inspection afterward.

China has taken a few steps closer to the abyss, with the US and its allies in the UK, EU, and other countries have accused China of a global cyberespionage campaign.

Microsoft servers have been victims of purported cyberattacks from China earlier this year, and now a new joint effort between NATO members including the European Union, Australia, New Zealand, Japan, and others are joining forces to stop Chinese state-sponsored cyberattacks. This is all happening barely a week from the World Economic Forum-led Cyber Polygon 2021 event.

On top of this, we have the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI), the National Security Agency (NSA), and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency released a new advisory list. On this list are 50 tactics, techniques, and producers that Chinese state-sponsored hackers use.

Tesla CEO Elon Musk has begun his first day in court defending himself against a lawyer representing Tesla's own board members.

Musk entered a lawsuit with board members over Tesla acquiring SolarCity back in 2016. The lawsuit alleges that Musk strong-armed "Tesla's board of directors into depleting the company's assets with the $2.6 billion all-stock deal for SolarCity," per Reuters. At the time the deal was struck between SolarCity and Tesla, Musk held a 22% stake in the company, which has led some shareholders to claim that Musk's true intention behind acquiring SolarCity was to just bail himself out of the company.

Additionally, the lawsuit claims that Musk forced Tesla to pay more for SolarCity and "misleading shareholders about the company's deteriorating financial health." Musk defended himself in court and stood by his decision to acquire SolarCity (which later became Tesla's solar power division, Tesla Energy) by saying that his benefit from the deal was negligible as there was no cash exchange and that the merger was merely to add SolarCity's sustainable energy to Tesla's batteries.

On Monday, Tesla CEO Elon Musk has called a lawyer representing Tesla shareholders that he was a "bad human" and that some of his questions were "tricky and deceptive."

Musk appeared on trial to defend Tesla's acquisition of SolarCity in 2016, a solar power company that was founded by Musk's cousins, which later became Tesla's solar power division, Tesla Energy. Tesla shareholders filed a lawsuit against Musk in 2017, claiming that Musk had pressured Tesla board members to effectively bail out SolarCity in a $2.6 billion deal. Reuters reports that at the time, Musk held a 22% stake in the firm.

According to CNBC, Musk has denied that he benefited from the deal, saying, "Since it was a stock-for-stock transaction and I owned almost exactly the same percentage of both, there was no financial gain." During the court session, Musk frustrated opposing attorney Randall Baron who said to Musk that he was holding up the trial by giving long responses to his questions. Musk replied by saying, "I think you are a bad human being", to which Baron asked Musk if he was being "derisive".

Jennifer Zeng has posted an alarming new tweet, bringing attention to an even more alarming video that was uploaded to a Chinese military channel called Liu Jun Tao Lue which threatens full-scale nuclear war with Japan.

The video proposes that the CCP would punish Japan beyond description if the country was to use a single soldier, plane, or ship -- and that not only would it return fire, but it would start a "full-scale war against Japan". First, they would drop nuclear bombs, they would drop nuclear bombs continuously... until Japan declares "unconditional surrender for the second time".

The CCP wants to squeeze Japan until it bleeds out, as it would target their ability to endure a full-scale war. China knows that Japan can't afford a full-scale war, so it would be foolish for the country to send troops to the Taiwan Strait.

I don't think many people believe the narrative fed to us that John McAfee killed himself, and now even his wife Janice McAfee doesn't believe he took his own life.

Janice explained: "I do not accept the 'suicide' story that has been spread. Words cannot describe how enraged I am at the fact that I had to hear the news of John's death via a DM on Twitter. And now it's being conveniently reported that there was a 'suicide note' found in his pocket, something that was not mentioned when I collected John's belongings from the prison".

"I blame the US authorities for this tragedy. Because of these politically motivated charges against him, my husband is now dead. His last words to me were 'I love you and I will call you in the evening. Those words are not words of somebody who is suicidal".

Cyber Polygon 2021 kicked off this year once again, this year the training drill and event will react to a "cyber pandemic" and global response to ransomware.

With the months leading up to the annual Cyber Polygon event we saw many ransomware attacks in the real-world, large attacks even taking down the US east coast oil supply. Cyber Polygon 2021 will have governments, worldwide authorities, executives from some of the largest companies in the world, and speakers that talk about risks, their experience on tackling ransomware on a global scale, and more.

Strategic digital risk management company BI.ZONE, part of Sber's ecosystem, with full support from the World Economic Forum (WEF) where the last big scale event like this was Event 201. Event 201 took place in October 2019 and simulated a coronavirus outbreak, which then happened in the real-world weeks later and we're now living in that current world.

A newly disclosed Pentagon report on nuclear operations states that there is "increased potential" for a nuclear conflict between the US and Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran.

The report mentions that both Russia and China have constantly been stockpiling nuclear weapons and expanding their already vast weapons for the last ten years. As for North Korea, the Pentagon report states that the nation is testing out long-range missiles that are capable of reaching the United States.

The Pentagon report is from 2020 and was disclosed on Tuesday. It says that the United States has attempted to negotiate with these countries about reducing the number of nuclear weapons being developed. However, the report states that "no potential adversary has reduced either the role of nuclear weapons in its national security strategy or the number of nuclear weapons it fields. Rather, they have moved decidedly in the opposite direction."

President Trump was pretty much memory holed and removed from social media earlier this year, but he's not sitting on his hands at all -- far from that in fact.

President Trump has announced that he is suing Facebook, Google, and Twitter -- and their respective CEOs in Mark Zuckerberg, Sundar Pichai, and Jack Dorsey. Trump said at a news conference in Bedminster, New Jersey: "We're demanding an end to the shadow banning, a stop to the silencing, a stop to the blacklisting, vanishing and canceling". He added that "we are asking the court to impose punitive damages".

The major argument that President Trump is pushing is that being suspended from his various social media accounts is an infringement on the First Amendment, that free speech wouldn't be stomped on by the government. President Trump added: "The Founding Fathers inscribed this right in the very first amendment to our Constitution because they knew that free speech is essential to the prevention of, look ... the prevention of horror".

A former Microsoft employee may face deportation back to his home country if he's found guilty of stealing $10 million in Xbox gift cards.

According to a report from Windows Central, Vologymyr Kvashuk used his position as infrastructure tester at Microsoft to give himself $10.1 million worth of Xbox gift cards. Kvashuk reportedly discovered a bug in Microsoft's e-commerce code when he found that that Microsoft gave digital goods to the buyer even if they used a fake credit card.

Kvashuk then wrote a program essentially printed money to himself as it allowed him to mass-withdraw virtual gift cards from Microsoft. Prosecutors said that the scheme devised by Kvashuk "singularly responsible for global fluctuations in the price of Xbox gift cards on reseller markets." As previously mentioned, Kvashuk may face deportation back to Ukraine after he completes his prison sentence in 2027. Additionally, Kvashuk is required to pay back $8.3 million.

TSMC is in the final stages of the business side of things with its upcoming US chip facilities, with the latest reports stating that contracts for clean room supplies teases that we're not far from TSMC's new US-based fab construction beginning.

The new US-based fabs are being built in Arizona, with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC) joining Intel in the state of Arizona and making some of the world's best chips. Clean room supplies are required right as you're going to -- drum roll please -- need a clean room.

A clean room is the central part of a fab -- a place that has absolutely zero dust, because a single tiny speck of dust can ruin a microcircuit -- and a microcircuit has nanoscale features that are smaller than dust. So dust in a clean room, is a very big deal. Getting to the clean room stage means we're close to TSMC kicking things off in the US with its fabrication plant.

Facebook has reached another milestone in its history as a social media platform, as the company has closed above $1 trillion in market capitalization.

Facebook is now the fifth company in the United States to reach the milestone and will now join other companies such as Microsoft, Apple, Amazon, and Google's parent company Alphabet in the small circle. The increase in Facebook's value came after an antitrust complaint proposed by the US Federal Trade Commission was dismissed. This dismissal by the court caused Facebook's share price to close up 4.2% at $355.64.

In May 2012, Facebook debuted its IPO with a market cap of $104 billion, and in the following years, that number grew before it took a 19% drop in 2018 after a number of non-favorable news stories were published - Cambridge Analytica being the main one to note. Since July 27, 2018, Facebook has managed to increase its user base, and ultimately the amount of revenue it makes as a company, as its stock price has risen 90% since that July of 2018.

Amazon has put forward an official motion asking Lina Khan not to involve herself within any proceedings that involve Amazon on the basis of her past statement regarding the company.

Amazon has filed a recusal motion against the new Federal Trade Commission (FTC) Commissioner Lina Khan, asking the new FTC chair to separate herself from any future regulatory proceedings involving the FTC and Amazon. "[Federal ethics rules] require recusal when a new Commissioner previously has expressed views that go beyond general policy commentary and has made statements about specific factual and legal issues relating to a particular company."

Adding, "Chair Khan has made numerous and highly detailed public pronouncements regarding Amazon, including on market definition, specific conduct and theories of harm, and the purpose, effects, and legality of such conduct. Indeed, she has on numerous occasions argued that Amazon is guilty of antitrust violations and should be broken up."

Robinhood has been ordered to pay $70 million in penalties over their outages, as well as misleading communication and dodgy trading practices.

The Financial Industry Regulatory Authority (FINRA) is a self-regulatory organization that oversees brokerage firms and their registered representatives -- slapped Robinhood with a $70 million fine. This is split between a $57 million fine and $13 million in restitution to thousands of customers.

FIRNA explained: "FINRA considered the widespread and significant harm suffered by customers, including millions of customers who received false or misleading information from the firm, millions of customers affected by the firm's systems outages in March 2020, and thousands of customers the firm approved to trade options even when it was not appropriate for the customers to do so".

CD Projekt Group's securities fraud lawsuit is moving forward and the company has received official claims from plaintiff's representation.

CD Projekt Group is getting sued in a class-action lawsuit that alleges securities fraud. Shareholders allege that CD Projekt purposefully withheld Cyberpunk 2077's controversial performance on PS4 and Xbox One, which led to a significant controversy that plummeted stocks. Investor losses from the stock dive are the catalyst for the securities fraud claims.

Now CD Projekt says it has received a copy of the claims made by the plaintiffs. Four securities fraud lawsuits have been filed, but the cases have been combined into one case in order to expediate the process.

In recent images and videos of Kim Jong-un, it appears the leader has slimmed down, but according to the country's state television, he is "emaciated".

For those that don't know, "emaciated" defines as 'abnormally thin or weak, especially because of illness or a lack of food.' The state television is forbidden to comment on the leader's personal live, which suggests that the comment was pre-planned. If the comment made in a report by KCTV was pre-planned, it would seem that Kim Jong-un has dropped the weight and the comment to show his devotion to his nation that is currently suffering from food shortages on top of an apparent economic struggle.

Here's what a resident of the capital that remained anonymous said in the KCTV report, "Seeing our respected general secretary looking emaciated breaks our people's hearts the most. Everyone is talking about how their tears welled up immediately." It seems that the drop in weight by the leader is an effort to portray that he is just like the struggling people living in the streets of his country, who are, by his own admission, experiencing a "tense" food situation.

If you're an AdBlock or AdBlock Plus user then you might have noticed something weird going on with your web browsing experience over the last few days.

AdBlock and AdBlock Plus users have had the content of major websites wiped from their web browser, with these sites including the likes of Twitter, Amazon, Wikipedia, and others. The company has said that the problem "has already been fixed" without detailing exactly what happened.

It is definitely an interesting "error" to happen, so maybe it was a trial run for something AdBlock has planned for the future. Or maybe it was just one of those niggly bugs, that happens to wipe content from users' web browsers for some of the latest websites on the internet.

John McAfee reportedly took his own life in his prison cell in Spain, very similar to how Jeffrey Epstein took his own life in his prison cell in New York.

If you aren't a "conspiracy theorist" or don't read these topics in the media, they've probably gone over your head -- if they have, then I would suggest diving into this if you are of a curious mind. Those that are, might have noticed that McAfee has been talking about Epstein for years since his "suicide" and now McAfee's "suicide".

If we follow the white rabbit, there's a tweet from McAfee from December 1, 2019 at the top of the post -- where he said: "Getting subtle messages from U.S. officials saying, in effect: "We're coming for you McAfee! We're going to kill yourself". I got a tattoo today just in case. If I suicide myself, I didn't. I was whackd. Check my right arm".

John McAfee reportedly committed suicide while in jail on June 23, moments later his Instagram account had a new post with a simple image and a single letter: Q.

But then not long after the post about Q hit his Instagram account, McAfee's Instagram account was deleted. Facebook-owned Instagram, who definitely isn't biased and has nothing to hide, has not responded to requests from Business Insider for comment (and we're totally not surprised).

Instagram did tell Business Insider that it was "looking into" the post, as we don't know who is operating McAfee's Instagram account. It could be anyone, hell it's probably President Trump or James Woods, whoever it is has definitely started pushing back.