Media tycoon Rupert Murdoch said Monday that large online platforms like Facebook should pay "trusted" news organizations as part of efforts to improve credibility and stem misinformation.

In a statement issued by his News Corp, the publishing unit which includes newspapers in the United States, Britain and Australia, Murdoch offered up his idea as a way to boost trust in online news and support journalism, using the "carriage fee" model in the cable TV industry.

"Facebook and Google have popularized scurrilous news sources through algorithms that are profitable for these platforms but inherently unreliable," Murdoch said.

"There has been much discussion about subscription models but I have yet to see a proposal that truly recognizes the investment in and the social value of professional journalism."

Murdoch's comments come days after Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg unveiled plans for the leading social network to enlist its user base to rank the quality of news sources as part of an effort to curb the spread of false news.

Murdoch said: "We will closely follow the latest shift in Facebook's strategy, and I have no doubt that Mark Zuckerberg is a sincere person, but there is still a serious lack of transparency that should concern publishers and those wary of political bias at these powerful platforms."

The 86-year-old media baron, who is executive chairman of News Corp. as well as the media-entertainment group 21st Century Fox, added that "the time has come to consider a different route."

"If Facebook wants to recognize 'trusted' publishers then it should pay those publishers a carriage fee similar to the model adopted by cable companies," he said.

"The publishers are obviously enhancing the value and integrity of Facebook through their news and content but are not being adequately rewarded for those services. Carriage payments would have a minor impact on Facebook's profits but a major impact on the prospects for publishers and journalists."

The remarks also come with most traditional news organizations struggling as readers shift to online news sources, and as digital ad revenues are increasingly going to Facebook and Google because of their dominance in the online ecosystem.

Facebook and Google did not immediately respond to requests for comment

Hundreds of protesters Monday demonstrated outside the offices of a Turkish Cypriot newspaper that aroused the ire of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan by slamming Ankara's operation inside Syria as an "occupation".

The Afrika newspaper -- which is often anti-Ankara and staunchly critical of Erdogan -- wrote on its front page Sunday: "One more occupation from Turkey."

This was an ironic reference to the 1974 Turkish invasion of northern Cyprus which is regarded in Turkey as a "peace operation" but, in the eyes of the international community, led to Turkish troops occupying the northern third of the island.

Around 500 protesters, waving Turkish flags and the flag of the breakaway Turkish Cypriot statelet, gathered outside the offices of the paper, throwing eggs, water bottles and stones which smashed the building's windows.

"Allahu Akbar! (God is Greatest!)", they shouted. Some unfurled banners saying: "Afrika newspaper must be shut down immediately." Others carried a huge banner of Erdogan.

A group climbed a flagpole outside and dismantled the newspaper's main sign on the building's balcony. Police refrained from taking action, an AFP journalist reported.

Mehmet Demirci, the Turkish ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) representative in northern Cyprus, said the newspaper had exceeded the limits of criticism.

"We condemn those who put such headlines in the Afrika newspaper and who dare to make politics over this headline," he was quoted as saying by the Anadolu news agency.

- 'Immoral'-

At the weekend, Erdogan had personally taken aim at the newspaper, criticising its headline as "immoral".

"They say the Turkish army is carrying out another 'occupation' after Cyprus. How immoral it is, how shameless it is!" he seethed.

Erdogan called on the Turkish Cypriots not to remain silent over the newspaper's controversial headline, in what some saw as encouraging the protest.

The foreign ministry of the internationally recognised Cypriot government expressed "grave concern" over the events in the north and condemned Erdogan's comments as "incitement to violence."

It "is yet another proof of Mr Erdogan's policy to consolidate Turkey's authoritarian policies in the Turkish occupied part of Cyprus, including restrictions on freedom of expression and freedom of the press," it said.

Turkish Cypriot leader Mustafa Akinci defended the paper's right to freedom of speech, saying he had often been the target of criticism by Afrika but had never told the paper to be silent.

"It is not possible to correct wrong ideas with wrong actions," he said, in reference to the protests, warning against provocations.

OSCE representative for media freedom Harlem Desir said on Twitter he condemned "the attack vandalising" the offices of Afrika adding that "media freedom must be protected and respected."

The eastern Mediterranean island has been divided since 1974 when Turkish troops invaded the northern third in response to an Athens-inspired coup seeking union between Greece and Cyprus.

The Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus (TRNC) is recognised only by Ankara.

Turkey on Saturday launched its operation with Ankara-backed Syrian rebels to root out the Syrian Kurdish Peoples' Protection Units (YPG) militia from Afrin.

Turkey views the YPG militia as "terrorists" linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party, which has fought against the Turkish state since 1984 and is designated as a terror group by Ankara and its Western allies.

Erdogan has urged national solidarity over the operation and the government has reached out to leaders of the main nationalist and secular opposition parties.

But Erdogan warned those who respond to calls for protests in Turkey will have to pay a "heavy price". The authorities on Monday detained 24 people on suspicion of disseminating "terror propaganda" on social media.

Source: AFP

Online giant Amazon on Monday plans to open a convenience store in Seattle where hungry customers will be able to grab sandwiches and go, without having to wait in line or use a checkout.

The American group unveiled the concept for its cashierless "Amazon Go" shop just over a year ago, saying the 1,800 square feet (170 square meters) store would initially offer grocery products to its own employees before being opened to the public.

Early testing however revealed bugs, leading to a delay.

In a message Sunday on its website, Amazon said it had created "the world's most advanced shopping technology so you never have to wait in line."

But if the rollout has taken some time, it's now ready to Go.

People armed with the app are able to pick up items as they roam the store and place them directly in their bags -- without the need for shopping carts or baskets.

Instead, items are automatically added onto a customer's online account when they're removed from a shelf, or taken off if the item is put back.

The system relies on a mix of cameras, sensors and artificial intelligence, according to Amazon.

Source: AFP

Laura Heffernan, previously editorial assistant at Inside Soap, has been appointed entertainment journalist at WENN. Laura will be working for Cover Media / WENN as an online news writer, creating content focused on beauty, fashion, lifestyle and entertainment news.

 Facebook announced Friday it will ask its two billion users to rank their trust in news sources, in its latest attempt to combat the spread of misinformation on the social network.

Mobile phone access was partially restored in war-torn eastern Ukraine on Friday after it was lost more than a week ago, the last major Ukrainian provider in the area said.

Almost two million people lost mobile connection in the devastated region after a Vodafone Ukraine fibre optic line was cut on January 11 as a result of fighting.

The provider sought to restore service after its workers had received security assurances from the warring parties in a conflict that has claimed more than 10,000 lives in nearly four years.

"Repair work on the restoration of communications... is completed. In the Lugansk region, communication services are provided in full," Vodafone Ukraine said in its statement, referring to the smaller of two breakaway provinces.

Meanwhile, the insurgent-controlled parts of the bigger Donetsk region still remain without a mobile connection.

"In the Donetsk region, the network does not work for reasons unknown to us. There is a possibility that the equipment is out of order or there is no power supply," Vodafone added.

The separatist authorities of the self-proclaimed Lugansk republic confirmed the restoration of mobile phone access as Donetsk leaders declared no changes in the area under their control.

The outage all but severed communication between family members living on opposite sides of the frontline splitting eastern Ukraine.

Russian-backed operator Pheonix, now the sole provider in Donetsk, only this week introduced a service that is theoretically able to place calls to Kiev-controlled regions at international rates.

The departure of Ukraine's KyivStar in 2015 and Lifecell last year left Vodafone as the only major provider in the region of some 3.5 million people.

This has left Phoenix filling the void in Donetsk, but it has only 600,000 subscribers and is already operating at full capacity.

The self-declared "communications minister" of Donetsk, Viktor Yashchenko, told the separatist DAN news agency earlier this week that 80,000 people had joined Phoenix since Vodafone went down.

An espionage campaign using malware-infected messaging apps has been stealing smartphone data from activists, soldiers, lawyers, journalists and others in more than 20 countries, researchers said in a report Thursday.

A report authored by digital rights group Electronic Frontier Foundation and mobile security firm Lookout detailed discovery of "a prolific actor" with nation-state capabilities "exploiting targets globally across multiple platforms."

Desktop computers were also targeted, but getting into data-rich mobile devices was a primary objective, according to the report.

With fake versions of secure messaging services like WhatsApp and Signal, the scheme has enabled attackers to take pictures, capture audio, pinpoint locations, and mine handsets for private data.

EFF and Lookout researchers dubbed the threat "Dark Caracal."

People in the US, Canada, Germany, Lebanon, and France have been hit by Dark Caracal, according to EFF director of cybersecurity Eva Galperin.

"This is a very large, global campaign, focused on mobile devices," Galperin said.

"Mobile is the future of spying, because phones are full of so much data about a person's day-to-day life."

Hundreds of gigabytes of data have been taken from thousands of victims in more than 21 countries, according to Lookout and the EFF.

There were indications that Dark Caracal might be an infrastructure hosting a number of widespread, global cyberespionage campaigns, some of which date back years, the report said.

Because the apps fool people into thinking they are legitimate, users give them access to cameras, microphones and data.

"All Dark Caracal needed was application permissions that users themselves granted when they downloaded the apps, not realizing that they contained malware," said EFF staff technologist Cooper Quintin.

"This research shows it's not difficult to create a strategy allowing people and governments spy to on targets around the world."

Researchers reported that they tracked Dark Caracal to a building in Beirut belonging to the Lebanese General Security Directorate.

Analysis showed that devices of military personnel, businesses, journalists, lawyers, educators, and medical professionals have been compromised, according to the report.

"Not only was Dark Caracal able to cast its net wide, it was also able to gain deep insight into each of the victim's lives," the report concluded.

Cyber security professionals consistently warn people to be wary when downloading software, avoiding programs shared through links or email and instead relying on trusted sources.

The revered head of Taiwan's semiconductor giant said cryptocurrencies would be a key driver for growth despite a bitcoin slump due to the threat of stricter regulations.

Morris Chang's Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) produces chips that power Apple's iPhones and, more recently, that enable new businesses like artificial intelligence and digital currency mining.

TSMC -- which is the world's biggest microchip producer by contracts -- announced its fourth-quarter results Thursday, saying revenue grew 5.9 percent to Tw$277.6 billion ($9.4 billion), citing new phone launches and cryptocurrency mining as key factors.

Some analysts estimate TSMC sales from producing chips used in digital currency mining could double this year to five to 10 percent of its total revenue, according to Bloomberg.

Chang warned "the price of cryptocurrency is very volatile" and said for that reason TSMC would not invest in new manufacturing capacity specifically for cryptocurrencies, but that the sector would be covered by the firm's wider high-performance computing platform.

He named high-performance computing including cryptocurrency mining as one of the drivers for future revenue growth, alongside artificial intelligence, the "internet of things" and automotives.

Chang's remarks come a day after bitcoin, the dominant virtual currency, crashed below $10,000 for the first time in six weeks following concerns of tightening regulations.

China is preparing for a new crackdown on cryptocurrency, according to the nation's state media, while South Korea's Justice Minister Park Sang-Ki indicated Seoul was preparing a bill to shut down virtual coin exchanges.

But TSMC forecast the sector would remain resilient as long as miners still make positive returns.

"The demand... has been very strong and we expect it to continue to be strong," Chang told analysts and investors at a briefing in Taipei.

TSMC is optimistic for overall growth in 2018, expecting revenue to increase by 10 to 15 percent -- more than the 9.1 percent increase in 2017 in US dollar terms.

Chang, 86, -- who is known as the "godfather" of Taiwan's semiconductor industry -- is set to retire in early June after his company's annual shareholders' meeting.

He built up the company over four decades to be come a multi-billion dollar powerhouse.

Source: AFP

Donald Trump unveiled the winners of his much-touted "Fake News Awards" late Wednesday, hours after a maverick senator from the president's own Republican party accused him of employing Stalinist language to "slur" and undermine the free press.

 YouTube on Tuesday announced ramped-up rules regarding when it will run ads with videos as it scrambled to quell concerns by brands about being paired with troublesome content.

 Roger Federer has urged his fellow professionals to act themselves and not as robots during media interviews to keep tennis interesting for the sporting public.

 Roger Federer has urged his fellow professionals to act themselves and not as robots during media interviews to keep tennis interesting for the sporting public.

An Israeli military court on Monday ordered a Palestinian teenager arrested after a viral video showed her hitting two Israeli soldiers held in custody for at least another two days.

Ahed Tamimi, 16, was ordered to be detained until Wednesday to allow the court time to decide whether she should be allowed out on bail ahead of her trial.

Prosecutors are seeking to have her kept in custody until her trial ends.

Tamimi's lawyer Gaby Lasky argued in court that her continued detention violates international conventions since she is a minor.

The teenager has been hailed as a hero by Palestinians who see her as bravely standing up to Israel's occupation of the West Bank.

Israelis accuse her family of using her as a pawn in staged provocations.

Tamimi has been charged with 12 counts including assault and could face a lengthy jail term if convicted.

The charges relate to events in the video and five other incidents. They include stone-throwing, incitement and making threats.

Her mother Nariman has also been arrested over the incident, as has her cousin Nour Tamimi, 20.

Nour Tamimi was released on bail on January 5 while Nariman Tamimi remains in custody.

Ahed Tamimi's family says the December 15 incident that led to the arrests occurred in the yard of their home in Nabi Saleh, near Ramallah in the West Bank.

Israel's military said the soldiers were in the area to prevent Palestinians from throwing stones at Israeli motorists.

A video shows the cousins approaching two soldiers and telling them to leave before shoving, kicking and slapping them.

Ahed Tamimi is the most aggressive of the two in the video.

The heavily armed soldiers do not respond in the face of what appears to be an attempt to provoke rather than seriously harm them.

They then move backwards after Nariman Tamimi becomes involved.

The scuffle took place amid clashes and protests against US President Donald Trump's controversial recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

Relatives say that a member of the Tamimi family was wounded in the head by a rubber bullet fired during those protests.

Seventeen Palestinians have been killed since Trump's declaration on December 6, most of them in clashes with Israeli forces. One Israeli has been shot dead since then.

Ahed Tamimi, arrested in the early hours of December 19, has been involved in a series of previous incidents, with older pictures of her confronting soldiers widely published.

She has become something of an icon for Palestinians who have flooded social media with praise and support.

Rights group Amnesty International called on Israel to release her immediately.

"Ahed Tamimi's ensuing arrest and military trial exposes the Israeli authorities' discriminatory treatment of Palestinian children who dare to stand up to ongoing, often brutal, repression by occupying forces," the London-based watchdog said in a statement.

Source: AFP

The media and advertising industry has a unique opportunity to assert its role in influencing and regulating the type of content that appears on our screens. 
Advertising played a crucial role in building entertainment media during the 20th century. This was pioneered by P&G’s use of daytime soap operas, which expanded to cover all broadcast media with the privatization of state television in the West. Advertising continues to bankroll the traditional and credible media as well as many of the less valuable, less transparent digital and social media. 
Advertisers, agencies and regulators must come together to reduce the harmful effect of social media on our youth and our societies. Given the ad and media industry’s massive arsenal of creative talent and lobbying power — with more than $500 billion of ad spending in 2017 — this alliance is too powerful for the tech and social media giants to ignore. 
Historically, advertisers have been selective as to where they place adverts. Most brands have boycotted programs and media that carried violent or sexual content, promoted hatred, or were culturally and religiously offensive. In the past couple of years, P&G and Unilever were among the first to start acting responsibly by cutting ad spend on social media platforms by an estimated $100 million or more. 
The moves by P&G, Unilever and other multinationals must be elevated into a coordinated effort by the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), ad agencies, media and regulators. It should become the trigger for a global campaign to fight the invasion of social media platforms into our lives. We must develop new regulations that will push tech companies to eliminate the addictive features of social media apps. 
This must become part of global brands’ corporate social responsibility policies. Over the past few years, other industries have adopted more humane and socially responsible policies. For example, restaurants are providing natural ingredients options, others are providing fully recyclable packaging, and so on. 
Data from most sources suggest that daily consumption of social media is close to three hours, depending on social and age brackets. More critically, total media consumption exceeds five hours daily and some stats estimate total media usage among teenagers at around eight hours per day! As a father, I can confirm that my kids during this holiday season were consuming more than seven hours of media a day. 
Herbert Simon, who holds a Nobel prize in economics, was once asked, “If humans consume information, what do information consume?” 
He answered: “What information consumes is rather obvious: It consumes the attention of its recipients. Hence, a wealth of information creates a poverty of attention and a need to allocate that attention efficiently among the overabundance of information sources that might consume it.” 
As we spend more time on social media, refreshing news feeds, the two most important foundations of human life are being eroded: Physical and emotional health. 
The French government decision to ban mobile phones from schools must be adopted worldwide. Advertisers can also help by stopping all advertising during school hours, which will make these time segments commercially inefficient to the media owners. 
The business community is also suffering from lower productivity due to shorter attention spans. In a recent article titled “Your smartphone is making you stupid, antisocial and unhealthy. So why can’t you put it down?” The Globe and Mail newspaper quoted the Bank of England analyst Dan Nixon as saying, “Workers who got distracted by smartphones needed an average of 25 minutes to get back on task after an interruption.” All that distraction adds up to a loss of raw brain power. Workers at one British company who multitasked on electronic media — a decent proxy for frequent smartphone use — were found in a 2014 study to lose about the same quantity of IQ as people who had smoked cannabis or lost a night’s sleep.
Many stats confirm that improved productivity of connectivity and information flow (which in the case of social media is information that adds little, if any, value to our lives), do not justify the disadvantages of shorter attention spans, weaker social ties, less family time and less physical activity.
In sum, regulators and the ad industry should not delay pulling the breaks on the “antisocial” media epidemic. It took them more than four decades to ban tobacco ads, communicate the negative effects of growth hormones and antibiotics in livestock, or ozone-damaging CFC, and so on. We should not wait another three decades to regulate social media. The advertising industry leadership and creative minds have a unique opportunity to regain relevance by partnering with clients, media owners and regulators to protect the precious moments of our family life on behalf of our children and all future generations. 

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov repeatedly attacked the US at his annual press conference Monday, accusing Washington of issuing ultimatums and failing to recognise "the reality of the emerging multipolar world".

Lavrov said the past year had not been easy from a foreign policy perspective as he took questions on Syria, Ukraine, the Korean peninsula and other global issues, in a diplomatic round-up of 2017.

"Unfortunately, our American colleagues and their allies still want to do business solely on the basis of issuing ultimatums and do not want to listen to the views of other centres of world politics," he said when asked about US President Donald Trump's position on the Iran nuclear deal.

"In fact they do not want to recognise the reality of the emerging multipolar world," Lavrov said at the press conference where relations with the United States proved to be the dominant topic.

Trump last week said that Washington would not reimpose nuclear sanctions on Iran for now, but would withdraw from the deal this year unless its terms were changed.

"(The Americans) resort to methods that are, largely, questionable and unscrupulous, in order to contain their competitors," Lavrov said.

"They use a number of these methods, from deploying a global missile defence system to unilateral sanctions, to the extraterritorial use of their own legislation or threats to resolve any international problems solely according to their own scenario."

- 'More assertive' -

Lavrov also said threats coming from Washington in 2017 had "seriously aggravated" tensions in different parts of the world, including in North Korea.

As Trump prepares to mark a year in power, Lavrov said the actions of the current US administration were in some cases "more assertive" than under Barack Obama, "despite Trump's line during the election campaign".

And Lavrov said Moscow could understand the anger of Palestinian leader Mahmud Abbas, who has denounced White House peace efforts as the "slap of the century."

Last month Abbas sent delegations to Russia and China to ask them to take on a greater role in the peace process with Israel, as Trump controversially recognised Jerusalem as Israel's capital.

Palestinians want the annexed eastern sector of the city as the capital of their future state and president Abbas has said Trump's stance means the US can no longer be the mediator in peace talks with Israel.

The United States was afraid of fair competition in various areas, including energy and the supply of gas to Europe, Lavrov said, adding that Washington was failing to contribute to the resolution of the conflict in Syria.

Russia launched a military intervention in Syria in 2015, propping up President Bashar al-Assad's regime after a popular revolt was crushed by a brutal crackdown.

Source: AFP

The British government is keeping a "very close eye" on construction and outsourcing group Carillion, a senior minister said Sunday, amid reports it could go into administration within days and critics questioning the government's own role in the crisis.

"Hopefully they will be able to work with their partners to get the working capital they need to continue providing important services," Brandon Lewis, the chairman of Prime Minister Theresa May's Conservative party, told the BBC.

"This is a business that is a going concern... Of course ministers and my colleague the secretary state of business is keeping a very close eye on it."

Carillion is a major government contractor involved in everything from schools to the multi-billion-pound High Speed Two (HS2) rail project, and employs 19,500 people in Britain.

But it has been struggling for some time and in July last year issued the first of several profit warnings.

Despite the red flags the government has continued to award the company major public contracts, including on the flagship HS2 project, leading to criticism Sunday.

Andrew Adonis, an opposition Labour peer who resigned as head of a government-backed infrastructure commission last month, said Carillion's possible collapse "raises big questions" for transport minister Chris Grayling.

Meanwhile Vince Cable, the leader of the Liberal Democrat party, called on the government not to bail out the company.

"Can't have privatisation of profit and nationalisation of losses," he tweeted.

On Friday, Carillion confirmed it was seeking ways to reduce its debt.

The BBC and Financial Times newspaper reported that the firm was holding crunch talks with government figures on Sunday.

The FT said Carillion's bankers have indicated they will only provide new funding if the government directly intervenes.

But ministers are expected to refuse, "making it increasingly likely that it could fall into administration as early as Monday", the business daily said.

The BBC cited unnamed sources saying the firm has a "matter of days" to reach an agreement with creditors.

Neither Carillion nor the government would confirm the talks Sunday.

Carillion has a wide range of public sector contracts, including providing support services for almost 900 schools and around 50,000 homes for military personnel.

The company, which also operates in Canada and the Middle East with a global workforce of 43,000, had revenues of £5.2 billion ($7.1 billion, 5.9 billion euros) last year.

In January, Britain's Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), a watchdog, launched an investigation into its market updates.

"Carillion is a major supplier to government so we are continuing to carefully monitor the situation while working to ensure our contingency plans are robust," a government spokeswoman said Sunday.

"The company has kept us informed of the steps it is taking to restructure the business."

In an update to the London Stock Exchange on Friday, Carillion said it had met with representatives of its creditor groups to present a business plan.

It denied media reports the plan had been rejected, saying it was "too early to predict the outcome of these discussions".

"Carillion continues to engage in constructive discussions with a range of financial and other stakeholders regarding options to reduce debt and strengthen the group's balance sheet," it said.

Any deal is "likely to involve the raising of new capital and the conversion of existing financial indebtedness to equity".

source: AFP

 Facebook took part this week in key talks with European police agencies on how to stop and eliminate violent and terror-related Islamic jihadist posts, in an evolving battle against such propaganda.

 Facebook's move to highlight posts from friends and family over those from brands and publications follows months of turmoil for the social network and will result in lower advertising revenue -- at least in the short-term, analysts said.

The eurozone must press ahead with much-needed political and economic reforms to make it more robust and resilient in future, the Eurogroup's new chief, Portugal's Mario Centeno, said on Friday.

Speaking at a ceremony in Paris to mark his assumption of the chair of the informal group of eurozone finance ministers, Centeno said the 19-member bloc had no time to lose in beefing up and unifying its institutional framework.

Centeno was appointed last month to take over as Eurogroup chief from Dutchman Jeroen Dijsselbloem. His term will be for two and a half years.

"The window that we have now both politically and economically should be used to complete the landscape of institutions that we have in the euro area," the Portuguese finance minister said, pointing to the banking and capital markets unions, as well "the discussions we have had around fiscal policy."

It was "very important to meet our citizens' expectations and to build a more robust and resilient euro area," Centeno said.

"The challenges we have need to be tackled now. We exited the crisis but we have to face it that the job is not yet complete. It never is."

For his part, Dijsselbloem said his successor enjoyed "strong support in the eurogroup and will push reforms, push modernization, push the strengthening of the euro zone even further."

The Dutchman, who served as the Eurogroup's head for two terms, symbolically handed Centeno the bell used to open the body's regular meetings.

During his Paris visit, Centeno met French President Emmanuel Macron and Prime Minister Edouard Philippe and was scheduled to meet Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire later in the afternoon.

A political novice when he entered Portugal's socialist government in November 2015, the 51-year-old economics professor, who does not belong to a political party, has come to personify the country's economic success.

Alternately described as a centrist and a liberal, Centeno has become one of the heavyweights in the administration of Prime Minister Antonio Costa.

Bitcoin and other virtual currencies were sent on rollercoaster rides in South Korea Thursday as the government said it was planning to ban cryptocurrency exchanges, before later backtracking.