Month: January 2026

A 26-year-old Malaysian has been deported from Australia after border authorities found over 100 images of child sexual abuse material (CSAM) on his mobile phone.
The man arrived in Sydney and was selected for a device examination by the Australian Border Force (ABF).
“On his phone, officers allegedly found over 100 images of CSAM, including anime and AI-generated pictures,” the ABF said in a statement.
“The man was detained for questioning then sent back to Malaysia. This also resulted in the…

Strict new legal restrictions holding digital platforms, internet service providers and children’s caregivers responsible for preventing children from accessing offensive material, are now effect in the UAE, entering into force on 1 January.

North Korea is producing enough nuclear material a year for up to 20 weapons, South Korea’s President Lee Jae Myung said on Wednesday.
“Even now, nuclear materials sufficient to produce 10 to 20 nuclear weapons a year are still being produced” in North Korea, Lee told reporters at a new year news conference.
At the same time, the North is continuing to improve its long-range ballistic missile technology aimed at striking the US mainland, Lee added.
“At some point, North Korea will have secured…

French shipbuilder OCEA is looking for a local partner and site in the Philippines to establish its first shipbuilding venture in Asia, under a France-backed patrol boat programme that Philippine Coast Guard leaders say could be a “game changer” for maritime enforcement.
The project, which combines local shipbuilding, French-backed financing and technology transfer, is expected to significantly expand the coastguard’s fleet at a time of growing operational demands in Philippine waters.
“OCEA ……

Updated guidance issued by the UK Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) on international transfers of personal data provides welcome clarity on the steps that organisations must take to determine whether they are making a “restricted transfer” of personal data to countries outside the UK, according to data protection law experts.

Bangladesh’s student leaders, one of the main driving forces behind the mass protests that brought down former prime minister Sheikh Hasina in 2024, now face an uncertain political future.
Despite their central role in the uprising, the youth movement has been granted only a small share of parliamentary seats under a new electoral alliance led by Jamaat-e-Islami – an Islamist party that was long politically marginalised but has re-emerged as a central player.
Under the agreement, the student-led…

When Singapore’s trade minister Gan Kim Yong revealed that locals owned nearly 90 per cent of registered retail businesses in the city state while Chinese nationals came in second at a distant 3 per cent, the figures drew mixed reactions from the public and analysts.
The discourse online centred on what the statistics implied – critics felt that though the proportion of foreign-owned entities, especially from China, might be minuscule, most could actually be big brands with multiple outlets,…

‘Workable” solutions that enable transparency over the content and data used to train AI models and allow rightsholders to opt their works out from being used for that purpose, have yet to be found, UK ministers have admitted, despite the government previously indicating a preference for those measures to be built into a package of AI-related reforms to UK copyright law.

Japan’s Tokyo Electric Power (Tepco) will delay the restart of its Kashiwazaki-Kariwa nuclear power plant, which was originally scheduled for Tuesday, public broadcaster NHK reported on Monday, after an alarm malfunction.
It would have been the first reactor restart for Tepco since its Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant was hit by a powerful tsunami in 2011.
The company had planned to restart Unit No 6 at Kashiwazaki-Kariwa on Tuesday and Unit No 7 around 2030, as Japan seeks greater energy…

Philippines President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr said on Monday that a “significant” discovery of natural gas had been made near the country’s sole producing offshore site.
About 2.8 billion cubic metres (98 billion cubic feet) of natural gas was found 5km (three miles) east of the Malampaya Field near the island of Palawan, Marcos said, or enough to provide power to 5.7 million homes for a year.
The Philippines has some of the region’s highest energy costs and faces a looming crisis as the Malampaya…