CTA: Countries With Entrepreneur-friendly Policies Boost Innovation, Economies

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More than 60 countries are represented at CES, the giant consumer electronics show taking place this week in Las Vegas, and the large international presence is a testament to the interest worldwide in entrepreneurship and technology. But while many governments say they support a homegrown innovation economy, policy decisions may hamper entrepreneurial growth, according to a report out this week by the Consumer Technology Association (CTA), which puts on the marquee Las Vegas technology show. Innovation factors The report looked at 12 factors to determine whether a country is an "innovation champion." They include standard indicators like a country’s tax policy, the education level of its workforce, and broadband access and speeds. Overall, Finland had the highest ranking, followed by the U.S., Canada, other European nations, Australia and New Zealand.…


Samsung Targeted by French Lawsuit Amid Alleged Labor Abuse

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Two French rights groups have filed a lawsuit against electronics giant Samsung, accusing it of misleading advertising because of alleged labor abuses at factories in China and South Korea. It's the latest labor challenge to Seoul-based Samsung, which has faced growing health complaints from workers in recent years, even as profits soar thanks to its blockbuster semiconductor business.   The unusual lawsuit filed Thursday in Paris court by groups Sherpa and ActionAid France names Samsung Global in Seoul and its French subsidiary. It is now up to the court to decide whether to take up the case.   It accuses Samsung of "deceptive trade practices," based on documents from China Labor Watch and others alleging violations including exploitation of children, excessive working hours and use of dangerous equipment and gases.…


London Mayor: ‘No Deal’ Brexit Could Cost Britain about 500,000 Jobs

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Britain could lose almost 500,000 jobs and 50 billion pounds ($67.41 billion) investment over the next 12 years if it fails to agree a trade deal with the European Union, according a report commissioned by London Mayor Sadiq Khan. Cambridge Econometrics, an economics consultancy, looked at five different Brexit scenarios, from the hardest to the softest form of Brexit, and broke down the economic impact on nine industries, from construction to finance. The study said that in a no-deal scenario, the industry that fares the worst will be financial and professional services, with as many as 119,000 fewer jobs nationwide. "If the Government continue to mishandle the negotiations we could be heading for a lost decade of lower growth and lower employment," Khan said. "Ministers are fast running out of…


China Denies It May Slow Purchases of US Government Bonds

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China is denying a published report that it may slow or even stop purchasing U.S. Treasury bonds. Sources told U.S.-based financial news outlet Bloomberg Wednesday that senior government officials recommended the action as the market for U.S. government bonds is becoming less attractive, along with rising trade tensions with the United States. The Bloomberg report triggered a decline on bond markets and a selloff of the U.S. dollar during the day. In a statement posted on its website Thursday, China’s State Administration of Foreign Exchange said the Bloomberg story was either misinformation or “fake news.” The agency says the country’s huge reserves of foreign currencies are professionally managed on the basis of market conditions and investment needs. China has the world’s largest foreign-exchange reserves at $3.1 trillion. The U.S. Treasury…


Amazon Looks to Build on 1st Season of NFL Streaming

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Amazon had a mostly successful debut into live streaming of major sports events with increased audience and an improved viewing experience in its first season showing NFL games. The question looking ahead is how aggressively will Amazon be in the sports streaming landscape? "It's too soon to say,'' said Jim DeLorenzo, the head of Amazon Sports. "We're just in the early stages here. We were definitely pleased with the way things played out. It was great to partner with the NFL on this and we were really happy with how our customers reacted to it. But it's too soon to say this impacts our strategy going forward.'' Amazon already has smaller deals with the ATP Tour to air last year's Next Gen ATP Finals and the rights to show some…


Female-led Startups Look to Cryptocurrency for Funding

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Female startup founders have a notoriously harder time securing funding than men. But new methods of financing could help close the gender gap. One of those methods lies in the buzzy technologies of blockchain and cryptocurrencies. “Cryptocurrency, being a digital platform, fundamentally erases that sort of bias and does create a sort of leveling of the playing field,” said Lisa Wang, founder and CEO of SheWorx. “Women who are savvy and are able to hop onto the train are able to raise money really quickly for their ideas.” SheWorx hosted an event last month for its New York City members dubbed “Cryptocurrency 101: Practical Advice on Getting Involved in Bitcoin & Beyond.” About 35 women showed up to learn more. “For a lot of women, they’re looking at the Bitcoin…


Disregarding Geography, Britain Hopes to Join Pacific Trade Deal

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Britain is making known its hopes to one day join the Trans-Pacific Partnership or TPP, a free trade agreement currently being negotiated by eleven countries bordering the Pacific and the South China Sea. The British government hopes trade with fast-growing economies will make up for losses that may occur after it leaves the European Union as scheduled in 2019. On a recent trip to China, Britain Trade Minister Liam Fox tentatively suggested his country could one day join the TPP. “We don't know what the success of the TPP is going to yet look like, because it isn't yet negotiated. So, it would be a little bit premature for us to be wanting to sign up to something that we're not sure what the final details will look like. However,…


Companion Robot Aims to Fight Social Isolation Among Elderly

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People around the world are living longer, and their quality of life as they grow old is changing. The World Health Organization finds the number of older adults living alone is dramatically increasing which could lead to loneliness, social isolation and depression. VOA’s Elizabeth Lee has details about a solution, a robot companion, available for homes in the not so distant future, featured at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. ...


Companion Robot Aims to Fight Isolation Among Elderly

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People around the world are living longer, and how they grow old is changing. The World Health Organization finds the number of older adults living alone is dramatically increasing, and fewer multi-generational families are living together. To help the elderly with loneliness, social isolation and depression, an Israeli company, Intuition Robotics, created a robot called ElliQ designed for older adults. Featured at the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas, ElliQ is named in part after the Norse goddess that represents old age. Described as a "she" by her founder, ElliQ is a tabletop robot that lights up when she hears her name. ElliQ does not have a face, arms or legs, but it talks and tries to keep her human companion active and engaged. "You’ve been sitting all day. You’re not…


Trump Administration Bars Oil Drilling Off Florida

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Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke has caved in to pressure from the governor and is banning oil and gas drilling off the Florida coast. "I support the governor's position that Florida is unique and its coasts are heavily reliant on tourism as an economic driver," Zinke said in a statement late Tuesday. He outright admitted that Florida's Republican Governor Rick Scott pressured him to put the state's waters off limits. Last week, the Trump administration proposed opening nearly all U.S. offshore waters to oil and gas drilling, reversing former Obama administration policies. The White House has said it wants to make the U.S. more energy independent. But environmental groups and Republican and Democratic governors from coastal states loudly object. They say oil and gas drilling puts marine life, beaches, and lucrative…


Poverty for Syrian Refugees in Lebanon Could Push Children to Marry and Work

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Nearly seven years into Syria's civil war, Syrian refugees in neighboring Lebanon are becoming poorer, leaving children at risk of child labor and early marriage, aid organizations said on Tuesday. A recent survey by the United Nations children's agency UNICEF, U.N.'s World Food Program, and refugee agency, UNHCR showed that Syrian refugees in Lebanon are more vulnerable now than they have been since the beginning of the crisis. Struggling to survive, more than three quarters of the refugees in Lebanon now live on less than $4 per day, according to the survey which was based on data collected last year. "The situation for Syrian refugees in Lebanon is actually getting worse - they are getting poorer. They are barely staying afloat," Scott Craig, UNHCR spokesman in Lebanon, told the Thomson…


Twitter, Snapchat Tie Up with Fox to Provide Coverage of FIFA World Cup

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Twenty-First Century Fox's Fox Sports is partnering with Twitter to stream a live show and Snap Inc's Snapchat to showcase stories with match-day highlights on the FIFA World Cup soccer tournament to be hosted in Russia later this year. Fox Sports would produce the show, which will be streamed from Moscow's Red Square on each match day and provide previews, recaps and near real-time video highlights for each game, the company said. Fox said the coverage of the tournament, taking place from June 14 to July 15, will be available in the United States and can be seen using the @FOXSports and @FOXSoccer Twitter handles. Fox Sports will also produce magazine-like editions of content for Snapchat's mobile-first audience, called Publisher Stories. The Publisher Stories on Snapchat will record the day-by-day…


Venezuela’s Congress Declares ‘Petro’ Cryptocurrency Illegal

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Venezuela's opposition-run parliament on Tuesday outlawed a "petro" cryptocurrency promoted by socialist President Nicolas Maduro, calling it an effort to illegally mortgage the cash-strapped country's oil reserves. Maduro on Friday said his government would issue nearly $6 billion of petros as a way to raise hard currency and to evade financial sanctions imposed by Washington. Cryptocurrency experts say Venezuela's mismanagement of its own economy, combined with the ruling Socialist Party's historic lack of respect for private property rights, will likely leave investors uninterested in acquiring petros. "This is not a cryptocurrency, this is a forward sale of Venezuelan oil," said legislator Jorge Millan. "It is tailor-made for corruption." Legislators warned investors that the petro would be seen as null and void once Maduro, who is up for re-election this year,…


Amazon’s Jeff Bezos Now World’s Richest Man

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Amazon.com CEO Jeff Bezos is now the richest person of all time, with a fortune of $105.1 billion, according to financial news outlet Bloomberg. With the stock market soaring to new heights in the first few days of 2018, Bezos' fortune rocketed upward, growing $6.1 billion in just five trading days. That happened because most of Bezos' wealth is contained in shares of Amazon.com, the online retail giant. Shares of Amazon rose 56 percent in 2017 and more than 6 percent since the start of this year. Financial news trackers differ on whether Bezos is the richest man in history, or if his nearest rival, Microsoft founder Bill Gates, holds that record. Bezos surpassed Gates briefly last year before taking the lead for good in October and crossing the $100-billion…


Oil Prices Rise to Three-Year High

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Oil prices surged to a three-year high Tuesday on rising expectations that OPEC member countries will comply with oil production cuts to the end of 2018. Brent Crude prices are headed toward $70 a barrel, West Texas Crude settled at $62.96 bbl, the highest since December 2014. But other factors could derail OPEC member agreement on production quotas, including continued expansion of U.S. shale production and the likelihood of stronger global demand.  Analysts say rapid changes in supply and demand could trigger an early exit or prompt member countries to cheat on production quotas, especially when prices start to rise. Meanwhile, the United States is increasingly less dependent on foreign oil, thanks in part to the shale boom and the influx of cheap natural gas. U.S. Energy Information Administration forecasts…


FBI Chief Calls Unbreakable Encryption ‘Urgent Public Safety Issue’

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The inability of law enforcement authorities to access data from electronic devices due to powerful encryption is an "urgent public safety issue," FBI Director Christopher Wray said on Tuesday as he sought to renew a contentious debate over privacy and security. The Federal Bureau of Investigation was unable to access data from nearly 7,800 devices in the fiscal year that ended Sept. 30 with technical tools despite possessing proper legal authority to pry them open, a growing figure that impacts every area of the agency's work, Wray said during a speech at a cyber security conference in New York. The FBI has been unable to access data in more than half of the devices that it tried to unlock due to encryption, Wray added. "This is an urgent public safety…


Democrats Vow to Force Vote on Net Neutrality, Make It a Campaign Issue

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U.S. Senate Democrats said on Tuesday they will force a vote later this year on the U.S. Federal Communications Commission's reversal of landmark Obama administration net neutrality rules and will try to make it a key issue in the 2018 congressional elections. Senate Democratic Leader Chuck Schumer said the issue will be a major motivating factor for young voters the party is courting. "We're going to let everyone know where we stand and they stand," Schumer said at a Capitol Hill news conference in Washington. The FCC voted in December along party lines to reverse rules introduced in 2015 that barred internet service providers from blocking or throttling traffic, or offering paid fast lanes. A group of state attorneys general immediately vowed to sue. A trade group representing major tech…


Smart Everything at Computer Electronics Show

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The new smart electronic gadgets on display at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas may help drive you into an increasingly connected future.     In the case of Byton, a futuristic smart car that is one of the hits of the CES - a driver steps into a high-tech sensory experience.   From a tablet embedded in the steering wheel and five hand gestures, the motorist controls the vehicle.   Sensors monitor the driver’s heart rate, blood pressure and other vital statistics.   Other features include tiny cameras instead of side view mirrors, and seats that swivel to give the car a lounge-like feeling.   Aiming for the Tesla market, the first Byton electric SUV is expected to go on sale first in China in 2019, selling for…


Vietnam Sets Up Command Center for Cyberspace Defense

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Vietnam announced on Monday the creation of a cyberspace operations command to protect its sovereignty on the Internet, with prime minister citing risks related to the disputed South China Sea and complex regional and global situations. The new unit would "research and predict online wars," the defense ministry said in report on the government website, which also reported Prime Minister Nguyen Xuan Phuc's comments. Vietnam is locked in a long-running territorial dispute with China in the South China Sea, which it refers to as the East Sea. While Phuc singled out the South China Sea, he made no mention of China. "To protect the country in the new situation, the Communist Party has set a high priority on protection of the State in cyberspace," the website quoted Phuc as saying…


Ecuador to Probe Legality of Debt Under Ex-president Correa

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Ecuador's comptroller's office on Monday announced it will open an audit of debt contracted in the last five years of the government of former President Rafael Correa to determine the legality of the operations and the use of the funds. The move follows a report by the comptroller's office revealing that some documentation relating to debt operations had been declared secret and that official reports on public debt had excluded some of the operations. President Lenin Moreno, a former Correa protege, since his election last year been has criticized the ex-president's handling of the economy and is seeking to unwind some Correa-era reforms. Correa says such efforts constitute a "coup" by Moreno. A team of economists, lawyers and businessmen will analyze debt operations carried out between January 2012 and May…


China Says It Shut Down 128,000 Websites in 2017

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China shut down nearly 128,000 websites that contained obscene and other “harmful” information in 2017, the official Xinhua news agency reported late on Monday, citing government data. Xinhua said 30.9 million illegal publications were confiscated in 2017, while 1,900 people were subject to criminal penalties, according to figures from the national office in charge of combating pornography and illegal publications. Under China's President Xi Jinping’s leadership, China has tightened censorship and controls of cyberspace as part of efforts to maintain “social stability.” But while the government says its rules are aimed at ensuring national security and stability, human rights organizations have warned that the country’s tough laws governing the internet amount to repressive measures aimed at quashing dissent. In Washington-based Freedom House’s 2017 report on internet freedom, China was designated…


Tunisian Protester Killed in Clashes with Police Over Price Hikes, Unemployment

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One person was killed Monday during clashes between security forces and protesters in a Tunisian town, a security official and residents said, as demonstrations over rising prices and tax increases spread in the North African country. A man was killed during a demonstration against government austerity measures in Tebourba, 40 km (25 miles) west of Tunis, the security official said, without giving details. The protest had turned violent when security forces tried stopping some youths from burning down a government building, witnesses said. Five people were wounded and taken to a hospital, state news agency TAP said. Tunisia, widely seen in the West as the only democratic success among nations where Arab Spring revolts took place in 2011, is suffering increasing economic hardship. Anger has been building up since the…


Trump Takes Victory Lap on Taxes with Rural Americans

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Connecting with rural Americans, President Donald Trump on Monday hailed his tax overhaul as a victory for family farmers and pitched his vision to expand access to broadband internet, a cornerstone of economic development in the nation's heartland. "Those towers are going to go up and you're going to have great, great broadband,'' Trump told the annual convention of the American Farm Bureau Federation. "Farm country is God's country,'' he declared. Trump became the first president in a quarter-century to address the federation's convention, using the trip to Nashville as a backdrop for a White House report that included proposals to stimulate a segment of the national economy that has lagged behind others. His Southern swing also included a stop in Atlanta for the national college football championship game. Joined…


Google Faces Lawsuit Accusing It of Discriminating Against Conservative White Men

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Two former employees of Google have accused the tech giant of discriminating against conservative white men, in a class action lawsuit filed Monday.   One of the accusers, James Damore, was fired from the company last year after writing a memo defending the gender gap in Silicon Valley tech jobs as possibly a matter of biological differences between men and women.   Damore and David Gudeman, another former engineer at the Google, filed the suit at the Santa Clara Superior Court in California, alleging discrimination and retaliation.   The two argue in their suit that Google uses illegal hiring quotas to fill jobs with women and minority applicants. "Google's management goes to extreme — and illegal — lengths to encourage hiring managers to take protected categories such as race and/or…


As Growing Economies Jostle for Power, What Post-Brexit Role for Britain?

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As Britain’s 2019 exit from the European Union edges closer, it is looking to carve out a new role for itself on the world stage. Many analysts say it could struggle to retain its influence as other world powers demand greater representation in global bodies like the United Nations. But the British government insists it is looking to build global alliances beyond Europe. "Britain punches above its weight" - a boxing analogy once used by a former foreign secretary to describe his country’s role on the world stage, and often repeated since. But the punch could be losing power, says Luke McDonagh of City University London. “Leaving the EU means that the UK could now be seen as a medium-sized economy in an increasingly polarized world where there are massive…


Scientists Breeding Climate Change Resistant Coral

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Coral reefs support nearly a quarter of all marine species, but because of climate change, half of the world’s reefs have disappeared in the past 50 years. With that problem not going away, scientists are looking for ways to make better coral that can resist the rising temperatures. VOA's Kevin Enochs reports. ...