Internet Watch Foundation warns Elon Musk-owned AI risks bringing sexualised imagery of children into the mainstream
Online criminals are claiming to have used Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot to create sexual imagery of children, as a child safety watchdog warned the AI tool risked bringing such material into the mainstream.
The UK-based Internet Watch Foundation (IWF) said users of a dark web forum boasted of using Grok Imagine to create sexualised and topless imagery of girls aged between 11 and 13. IWF analysts said the images would be considered child sexual abuse material (CSAM) under UK law.
The US president’s grotesque theatrics on the world stage are an opportunistic distraction from his falling domestic ratings
Of all the commandments for living under Donald Trump, the first is always this: don’t believe him. Nothing he says can be taken at face value; everything should be fed into a polygraph. Those of scrupulous courtesy can wrap it up in red ribbon, or uncork that aphorism about how the man must be taken seriously but never literally. All the same, scratch a Trump promise and underneath will glint a pretext. Scrutinise his grand plans and you find only shabby tactics.
The Manhattan Democrat turns into a Florida-dwelling Republican; the troll who demanded Barack Obama’s birth certificate will hem and haw over releasing the Epstein files. From real-estate deals to Trump University, all that this guy swears is solid gold soon settles into so much bullshit.
Shift from ‘big 5’ imports to British fish such as sprats and sardines would help diets and the planet, say researchers
Supermarkets could help to support British consumers to move away from their reliance on mainly imported seafood – the “big 5” of cod, haddock, tuna, salmon and prawns – to more sustainable, nutritious and locally caught fish such as sardines and anchovies, researchers say.
A study by the University of East Anglia (UEA), which confirmed previous research showing consumers did not eat the recommended amount of fish in their diet, suggests the UK could be overlooking a major opportunity to improve national health as well as bolstering local economies by embracing its own rich populations of nutritious small fish.
Human Rights Watch and Justice say recent legislative changes have had a chilling effect and should be repealed
The right to protest is under attack in England and Wales with laws trampling over human rights protections and more oppressive restrictions in the pipeline, two major reports have warned.
Both Human Rights Watch and the cross-party law reform organisation Justice say recent legislative changes have created a chilling effect on lawful protest and should be repealed. Their reports, simultaneously published on Thursday, also say that proposals for more curbs should be halted.
This superb winter salad uses shaved and roast pumpkin to bring a riot of textural contrast and a flash of colour to a grey winter’s day
I try to grow a few varieties of squash every season, but in the past couple of years the results have more or less failed me. I originally put that down to the lack of time and attention I’d given those poor plants, but I’m now starting to wonder if the soil in my raised garden beds overlooking Lyme Bay in Dorset is actually right for them.
I’m not giving up just yet, though, and this year I’ll be trying different varieties in a different bed that I’ve prepared and composted over the winter with seaweed mulch. As luck would have it, however, my friend Rob Corbett came to the rescue a couple of weeks ago by giving me several specimens when he delivered some wine from his Castlewood vineyard a few miles away in east Devon. If you know your gourds even a little, you will also know that squashes keep for months, which is handy, because they ideally need to cure and ripen before use. Happily, that also means you can use your crop throughout the long winter months.
Mark Hix is a restaurateur and writer based in Lyme Regis, Dorset. His latest limited-edition book, Fishy Tales, with illustrations by Nettie Wakefield, is published at £90.
Study of 1,000 products finds wet, raw and meat-free foods have substantially higher climate impact than dry kibble
Dog food accounts for 1% of the UK’s total greenhouse gas emissions, according to research that finds wet, raw and meat-rich products are associated with substantially higher emissions than dry kibble.
The analysis revealed striking differences in the environmental impact of commercial dog foods, with the highest-impact foods being responsible for up to 65 times more emissions than the lowest-rated options.
West Midlands police face MPs after barring Israeli football team’s supporters from match against Aston Villa
West Midlands police “did not do themselves any favours” when giving evidence to MPs about a decision to ban Maccabi Tel Aviv fans, a Birmingham Jewish leader has said.
The force’s chief constable, Craig Guildford, is facing growing calls from MPs and Jewish groups to resign after further details emerged about the circumstances surrounding a ban on away fans attending the Europa League match against Aston Villa at Villa Park on 6 November.
Anthony Albanese backflips after initially resisting demands for a broad national inquiry
The prime minister has confirmed his government will call a federal royal commission into the alleged Bondi terror attack, with Anthony Albanese backflipping on an earlier stance against a wide-ranging Commonwealth inquiry.
Albanese announced on Thursday the federal commission will examine four key areas, including the prevalence of antisemitism, how law enforcement will respond to antisemitism, the circumstances surrounding the alleged Bondi attack and strengthening social cohesion.
The Kansas City Chiefs said in a statement Wednesday night that they were aware of domestic violence allegations made in a series of social media posts by a former girlfriend of wide receiver Rashee Rice and had been in communication with the NFL.
The Chiefs did not mention Rice by name in their statement and said they would have “no further comment at this time”.
Abernethy Forest, Cairngorms: Thanks to a local collaborative effort, linnets, bramblings, green and goldfinches are coming to this field in joyful flocks
It’s -6C and I’m off to what has been a regular haunt recently – a field planted by a small, community-run charity, Speyside Fields for Wildlife, which works with local farmers, crofters and others to take over “spare” fields and land for wildlife-friendly crops.
Some sites are planted with annuals such as cornflower, corncockle, marigold and poppy – important sources of pollen, nectar and flowers that used to grow among the grain crops before herbicides became commonplace. Others, such as this one on a hill farm, have been planted with seed crops that benefit birds and other wildlife during autumn and winter.
Of 17 preservatives studied, higher consumption of 12 of them linked with increased risk of type 2 diabetes
Higher consumption of some food preservatives is associated with an increased risk of type 2 diabetes and cancer, two studies suggest.
The findings, published in the medical journals Nature Communications and the BMJ, may have important public health implications given the ubiquitous use of these additives globally, researchers said.
The president has vowed to kill off ‘woke’ in his second term in office, and the venerable cultural institution a few blocks from the White House is in his sights
On 30 May last year, Kim Sajet was working in her office in the grandly porticoed National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC. The gallery is one of the most important branches of the Smithsonian Institution, the complex of national museums that, for almost 200 years, has told the story of the nation. The director’s suite, large enough to host a small party, has a grandeur befitting the museum’s role as the keeper of portraits of the United States’ most significant historical figures. Sajet was working beneath the gaze of artworks from the collection, including a striking 1952 painting of Mary Mills, a military-uniformed, African American nurse, and a bronze head of jazz and blues singer Ethel Waters.
It seemed like an ordinary Friday. Until, that is, an anxious colleague came in to tell Sajet that the president of the United States had personally denounced her on social media. “Upon the request and recommendation of many people I am herby [sic] terminating the employment of Kim Sajet as Director of the National Portrait Gallery,” Donald Trump had posted on Truth Social. According to the post, Sajet was “a highly partisan person” and a “strong supporter” of diversity and inclusion programmes, which by an executive order on his inauguration day, 20 January, he had eradicated from federal agencies. “Her replacement will be named shortly,” continued the message. “Thank you for your attention to this matter!”
Despite Brussels’ pledge to ban Russian LNG by 2027, shipments to European ports increased in the last year
European governments have been accused of fuelling Vladimir Putin’s war in Ukraine as new data shows the Kremlin earned an estimated €7.2bn (£6.2bn) last year from exporting its liquefied natural gas (LNG) to the EU.
Brussels has pledged to ban imports of Russian LNG – natural gas that is supercooled to make it easier to transport– by 2027 but an analysis suggests there is yet to be any letup in the vast quantities being received at European ports from Russia’s LNG complex on the Yamal peninsula in Siberia.
Very little information has been shared about strikes in Sokoto state
Two weeks after the US carried out Christmas Day airstrikes in north-west Nigeria on what it described as Islamic State fighters, questions remain over the specific group that was targeted and the operation’s impact.
In the aftermath of the strikes, Donald Trump said in a post on his Truth Social platform that “ISIS Terrorist Scum in Northwest Nigeria, who have been targeting and viciously killing, primarily, innocent Christians” were hit with “numerous perfect strikes”.
US tech bosses are exerting leverage on EU regulators via Trump and Vance. But Europe isn’t powerless, and it isn’t alone
The US is advancing a new global order. Over the past eight decades Washington pursued – when it suited American interests – an order based on international law, liberalism, multilateralism and democratic values. The new one is based on autocracy and the use of force, and is underpinned by xenophobic nationalism.
For the transatlantic relationship this is transformative: it means that coercive action now drives policy change. Europe’s security dependency on the US is leverage to be ruthlessly exploited. Silicon Valley tech firms’ business interests converge with those of the White House, and the US instrumentalises far-right politicians in Europe to achieve its foreign policy objectives.
Armida van Rij is a senior research fellowat the Centre for European Reform
This tale of a family dealing with a kidnapped daughter is a deeply engaging, psychologically complex thriller that is a cut above the rest
A summary of Girl Taken is disheartening; a teenage girl is abducted by a man she trusted and kept for his own grim purposes in a remote secret location, and must use her wits to survive the depravities and maybe one day escape. But in full, Girl Taken, like the 2016 book Baby Doll by Hollie Overton on which it is based, is something much better. It takes the neglected parts of such stories – the sadder, quieter, far less titillating and voyeuristic aspects of what it means to take a person out of her home, her world and her life, and away from those of the people who love her – and fleshes all that out instead. It makes for a slower burn, but a much more deeply engaging and psychologically complex thriller than we customarily expect from such a setup, and – in asking what it really means to survive an act of profound violence – harrowing in a more valuable way.
Lily and Abby (played with depth and delicacy by Tallulah and Delphi Evans) are twin 17-year-olds, on the cusp of – well, everything really, as you are when you are happy teenage girls. We meet them on the last day of the summer term. Lily is set to enjoy the summer with her lovely boyfriend Wes (Levi Brown, who was so extraordinary in 2024’s This Town) and partying, and Abby is laying plans to go to university. She is the star pupil in Mr Hansen’s English class (“You can start calling me Rick now” he says as the final school bell goes) and the popular young teacher has always encouraged her ambitions.
After more than three decades together, Simon Hattenstone and his partner Diane Taylor decided to have a civil partnership. It was a beautiful celebration before the shock of the pandemic
Diane and I had been living together for more than 30 years, and our children were 28 and 26 when we got civilled. We’d never wanted to get married. It seemed a bit too pipe and slippers. It also felt like tempting fate. We were really happy without being married, so why change things? And you can’t have more of a commitment than children. But we always said if they introduced civil partnerships for heterosexual couples, we’d get civilled.
I think friends assumed we did it primarily for tax reasons – to ensure that if one of us died, the other wasn’t left in the shit. There was an element of that. But more importantly, we actively wanted to get civilled. It actually felt really romantic – tying the civil knot as an expression of love after all this time together. It was such a beautiful day, in every way. 3 January 2020, just after civil partnerships had been legalised for opposite-sex couples, and we almost made history. We were only the fourth heterosexual couple to be civilled in Haringey. Get in!
Carey hits winning runs at SCG as hosts wrap up series 4-1
There were a couple of wobbles along the way but at 2.30pm on the final day in Sydney, Australia had knocked off a target of 160 runs to win the fifth Test by five wickets and claim this Ashes series by a 4-1 scoreline.
Like their tour as a whole, there was a nagging sense of what might have been for England with a few more runs on the board, or better catching and tighter bowling earlier in the contest. But there could be few quibbles from the injured Ben Stokes as he watched the final rites from first slip.
Chen founded the Prince Group, a multinational conglomerate authorities allege served as a front for ‘one of Asia’s largest transnational criminal organisations’
Chinese-born tycoon Chen Zhi, who was indicted by the US on fraud and money-laundering charges for running a multibillion-dollar online scam network from Cambodia, has been arrested there and extradited to China, Phnom Penh said.
Chen allegedly directed operations of forced labour compounds across Cambodia, where trafficked workers were held in prison-like facilities surrounded by high walls and barbed wire, according to US prosecutors.
President Gustavo Petro called for demonstrations after Trump said he was interested in military action in Colombia
Thousands of protesters have taken to the streets of cities across Colombia to decry Donald Trump’s threats to expand his military campaign in South America into their territory, after last weekend’s deadly attack on Venezuela.
In Cúcuta, a city on Colombia’s eastern border with Venezuela, several hundred demonstrators marched towards its 19th century cathedral waving the country’s yellow, blue and red flag and shouting: “Fuera los yanquis!” (“Out with the Yanks!”)
The Barrow Creek Hotel, where UK backpacker Peter Falconio was last seen alive, has lost its liquor licence, partly because the 76-year-old publican didn’t serve food
Warning: This article contains offensive language that will be distressing to some readers
“There’s-a nothing so lonesome, morbid or drear” – the patron saint of Australian country music, Slim Dusty, long deplored – “than to stand in the bar of a pub with no beer”.
Now a 200km stretch of highway through the heart of the outback and several remote Aboriginal towns are, in Dusty’s words, so lonesome, after a historic pub was stripped of its liquor licence from the first day of 2026.
Ukrainian president says he has received no ‘unequivocal answer’ from European allies about how they would defend Ukraine if Russia attacked again. What we know on day 1,415
Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy said he has received no “unequivocal answer” from European allies about how they would defend Ukraine if Russia attacked again after a peace deal was reached. On Tuesday, European leaders and US envoys announced they had agreed key security guarantees for Kyiv, including a European multinational force that would be deployed if a ceasefire could be reached. But when asked if he was sure that European allies would step in and defend his country in the event of another Russian invasion, Zelensky said on Wednesday he had no “clear” answer on that.
“I personally very much want to get a very simple answer: yes, if there is aggression again, all partners will give a strong response to the Russians. And that’s the exact question I put to all our partners. And so far I haven’t received a clear, unequivocal answer,” Zelensky said. He said there was “political will” from Kyiv’s allies to “give us strong security guarantees”. “But until we have such security guarantees – legal ones, backed by parliaments, backed by the United States Congress – we cannot answer this question.”
UK prime minister Keir Starmer said British MPs will have the opportunity to vote on the final number of troops deployed to Ukraine should a peace deal be reached, Peter Walker reports. Downing Street could not say, however, whether the Commons vote, which would take place before deployment, would tie the government’s hands should MPs reject the prospect of British boots on the ground.
British troops would “conduct deterrent operations and to construct and protect military hubs”, Starmer told parliament on Wednesday. “The number will be determined in accordance with our military plans, which we are drawing up and looking to other members to support. So the number I will put before the house before we were to deploy.”
During the session in the Commons, the Conservative MP Ben Obese-Jecty said that “the presence of boots on the ground in Ukraine was a red line for Putin, and I worry that this potentially might be a stick that he beats us with in order to push back on any peace deal.”
Russian strikes late on Wednesday knocked out power supplies almost entirely in two regions of south-eastern Ukraine, the energy ministry said. “As a result of the attack, Dnipropetrovsk and Zaporizhzhia regions are almost completely without electricity,” the ministry said on Telegram. Ukraine’s prime minister, Yulia Svyrydenko, said impending snowfalls and temperatures plunging overnight to minus 20C were likely to compound disruptions to power and heating.
Russia attacked two seaports in Ukraine’s Odesa region on Wednesday, killing one person and injuring eight others, Ukrainian officials said. Ukraine’s seaport administration said the attacked ports were Chornomorsk and Pivdennyi, both key export arteries for Ukraine’s commodity-heavy economy. “This is yet another attack by a terrorist country on port infrastructure that is involved in ensuring global food security,” deputy prime minister, Oleksiy Kuleba, said.
Ukraine’s foreign currency reserves grew to a record high of $57.3bn at the start of January as the country continues to draw substantial flows of foreign support, the central bank said on Wednesday. Ukrainian military spending surged from around $7bn in 2021, the last year before the invasion, to a record of more than $70bn last year. The government depends heavily on financial aid to pay for humanitarian and social spending, as well as defence.
Beijing and Canberra have adopted different strategies to support policing in the Pacific nation and observers are split on which is proving more effective
At a church hall on the outskirts of Honiara, dozens of community leaders gathered for a training session organised by the Chinese police, alongside local Solomon Islands officers.
Among them is Ben Angoa, who has enthusiastically embraced the training, as well as other things China has provided: solar lighting, sewing machines, soccer balls, and even noodle-making lessons.
Analysis finds those who stopped using medication saw weight return four times faster compared with other weight loss plans
People who stop taking weight loss jabs regain all the weight originally lost in under two years, significantly faster than those on any other weight loss plan, according to a landmark study.
Weight loss medications, known as GLP-1 agonists, were originally developed as treatment for diabetes and work by mimicking the glucagon-like peptide (GLP) 1 hormone which helps people feel full.
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