Australia’s Latitude says 7.9 million driver license numbers stolen in data theft

Australia’s Latitude says 7.9 million driver license numbers stolen in data theft
A cyber code is projected on a laptop computer in this file illustration picture. (Reuters/File Photo)
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Updated 27 March 2023

Australia’s Latitude says 7.9 million driver license numbers stolen in data theft

Australia’s Latitude says 7.9 million driver license numbers stolen in data theft
  • Australian fintech firm also identified about 53,000 passport numbers were stolen and less than 100 customers had a monthly financial statement stolen

Digital payments and lending firm Latitude Holdings said on Monday it has determined that 7.9 million Australian and New Zealand driver license numbers were stolen in a large-scale information theft on March 16.
Apart from the 7.9 million driver license numbers stolen, the Australian fintech firm also identified about 53,000 passport numbers were stolen and less than 100 customers had a monthly financial statement stolen.
A further 6.1 million records dating back to at least 2005 were also stolen.
“We are rectifying platforms impacted in the attack and have implemented additional security monitoring as we return to operations in the coming days,” Chief Executive officer Ahmed Fahour said in a statement.
Latitude shares fell 1.7 percent to A$1.19 in early trade.
The firm, which provides consumer finance services to major Australian retailers Harvey Norman and JB Hi-Fi , alerted last week that it had unearthed further evidence of information theft.
Earlier this month, the Melbourne-based company took its platform offline and said the Australian Federal Police and the Australian Cyber Security Center were looking into the attack.

Several Australian firms have reported cyberattacks over the past few months, and experts say this is due to an understaffed cybersecurity industry in the country.
Last year, some of Australia’s largest companies reported data breaches, prompting authorities to step up efforts to bolster cybersecurity and implement stricter data-sharing rules to prevent breaches in the future.
Customers who choose to replace their stolen ID document will be reimbursed, the company said in a statement.

 

 


The US and Canada saw dangerous smoke this week. It’s a routine peril for many developing countries

The US and Canada saw dangerous smoke this week. It’s a routine peril for many developing countries
Updated 12 sec ago

The US and Canada saw dangerous smoke this week. It’s a routine peril for many developing countries

The US and Canada saw dangerous smoke this week. It’s a routine peril for many developing countries
  • “This is a severe air pollution episode in the US,” said Jeremy Sarnat, a professor of environmental health at Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health

WASHINGTON: Thick, smoky air from Canadian wildfires made for days of misery in New York City and across the US Northeast this week. But for much of the rest of the world, breathing dangerously polluted air is an inescapable fact of life — and death.
Almost the entire world breathes air that exceeds the World Health Organization’s air-quality limits at least occasionally. The danger grows worse when that bad air is more persistent than the nightmarish shroud that hit the US — usually in developing or newly industrialized nations. That’s where most of the 4.2 million deaths blamed on outdoor air pollution occurred in 2019, the UN’s health agency reported.
“Air pollution has no boundaries, and it is high time everyone comes together to fight it,” said Bhavreen Kandhari, the co-founder of Warrior Moms in India, a network of mothers pushing for clean air and climate action in a nation with some of the world’s consistently worst air. “What we are seeing in the US should shake us all.”
“This is a severe air pollution episode in the US,” said Jeremy Sarnat, a professor of environmental health at Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health. “But it’s fairly typical for what millions and millions of people experience in other parts of the world.”
Last year, nine of the 10 cities with the highest annual average of fine particulate matter were in Asia — including six in India, according to air quality company IQAir, which aggregates readings from ground level monitoring stations worldwide.
Fine particulate matter, sometimes denoted as PM 2.5, refers to airborne particles or droplets of 2.5 microns or less. That’s far smaller than a human hair, and the particles can reach deep into lungs to cause eye, nose, throat and lung irritation and even affect heart function.
Sajjad Haider, a 31-year-old shopkeeper in Lahore, Pakistan, rides his motorbike to work daily. He wears a mask and goggles against frequent air pollution in the city of 11 million, but suffers from eye infections, breathing problems and chest congestion that get worse as smog grows in winter.
On his doctor’s advice, he relies on hot water and steam to clear his chest, but said he cannot follow another bit of the doctor’s advice: Don’t go out on his motorbike if he wants to keep his health.
“I can’t afford a car and I can’t continue my business without a motorbike,” said Haider.
Last year, Lahore had the world’s highest average concentration of fine particulate matter at nearly 100 micrograms per cubic meter of air. By comparison, New York City’s concentration hit 303 at one point on Wednesday.
But New York’s air typically falls well within healthy levels. The US Environmental Protection Agency’s standard for exposure is no more than 35 micrograms per day, and no more than 12 micrograms a day for longer-term exposure. New York’s annual average was 10 or below the past two years.
New Delhi, a heaving city of more than 20 million where Kandhari lives, usually tops the list of the many Indian cities gasping for breath as haze turns the capital’s sky gray and obscures buildings and monuments. It’s worse in autumn, when the burning of crop residues in neighboring states coincides with cooler temperatures that trap deadly smoke over the city, sometimes for weeks.
Vehicle emissions and fireworks set off during the Hindu Diwali festival add to the murk, and the results include coughs, headaches, flight delays and highway pileups. The government sometimes asks residents to work from home or carpool, some schools go online and families that can afford them turn to air purifiers.
On Thursday, even as a hazardous haze disrupted life for millions across the US, New Delhi still ranked as the second-most polluted city in the world, according to daily data from most air quality monitoring organizations.
Kandhari, whose daughter had to give up outdoor sports over health scares related to the bad air, said the air pollution is constant but policymakers only seem to notice its most acute moments. That has to change, she said.
“We should not compromise when it comes to access to cleaner air,” Kandhari said.
Many African countries in the Sahara Desert regularly grapple with bad air due to sandstorms. On Thursday, AccuWeather gave nations ranging from Egypt to Senegal a rating of purple, for dangerous air quality. It was the same rating given this week to New York and Washington, D.C.
Senegal has suffered unsafe air for years. It’s especially bad in Senegal’s east as desertification — the encroachment of the Sahara onto drylands — carries particles into the region, said Dr. Aliou Ba, a senior Greenpeace Africa campaigner based in the capital of Dakar.
The Great Green Wall, a massive tree-planting effort aimed at slowing desertification, has been underway for years. But Ba said pollution has been growing worse as the number of cars on the road, burning low-quality fuel, increases.
In the US, the 1970 passage of the Clean Air Act cleared up many smog-filled cities by setting limits on most sources of air pollution. The landmark regulation led to curbs on soot, smog, mercury and other toxic chemicals.
But many developing and newly industrialized nations have weak or little-enforced environmental laws. They suffer increased air pollution for other reasons, too, including a reliance on coal, lower vehicle emissions standards and the burning of solid fuels for cooking and heating.
In Jakarta, capital of Indonesia, the world’s fourth-most populous country, it’s often difficult to find clear blue sky, with power plants and vehicle emissions accounting for much of the pollution. It’s also one of the world’s largest coal-producing nations.
In one apartment building in the north of the city, between two busy ports where coal is shipped and stockpiled and where factories burn more, residents tried filtering coal dust with a net. It didn’t work.
“My family and I often feel itching and coughing,” Cecep Supriyadi, a 48-year-old resident, said. “So, when there is a lot of dust entering the flat, yes, we must be isolated at home. Because when we are outside the house, it feels like a sore throat, sore eyes, and itchy skin.”
An Indonesian court in 2021 ruled that leaders had neglected citizens’ rights to clean air and ordered them to improve it.
China has improved since Beijing was notorious for eye-watering pollution that wreathed office towers in haze, diverted flights and sent the old and young to hospitals to be put on respirators. When the air was at its worst, schools that could afford it installed inflatable covers over sports fields with airlock-style revolving doors and home air filters became as ubiquitous as rice cookers.
Key to the improvement was closing or moving heavy industries out of Beijing and nearby areas. Older vehicles were taken off the road, many replaced with electric vehicles. China still is the world’s largest producer and consumer of coal, but almost none is consumed at street level. The average PM 2.5 reading in Beijing in 2013 of 89.5 — well above the WHO’s standard of 10 — fell to 58 in 2017 and now sits at around 30. China had just one city — Hotan — in the world’s top 10 for worst air.
Mexico City, ringed by mountains that trap bad air, was one of the most polluted cities in the world until the 1990s, when the government began limiting the number of cars on the streets. Pollution levels dropped, but the city’s 9 million people — 22 million including suburbs — rarely see a day when air pollution levels are considered “acceptable.”
Each year, air pollution is responsible for nearly 9,000 deaths in Mexico City, according to the National Institute of Public Health. It’s usually worse in the dry winter and early spring months, when farmers burn their fields to prepare for planting.
Authorities haven’t released a full-year air quality report since 2020, but that year — not considered particularly bad for pollution, because the pandemic reduced traffic— Mexico City saw unacceptable air quality on 262 days, or 72 percent of the year.
In the summer months, intense rains clean the city’s air somewhat. That’s what brought Verónica Tobar and her two children out Thursday to a small playground in the Acueducto neighborhood near one of the city’s most congested avenues.
“We don’t come when we see that the pollution is very strong,” Tobar said. Those days “you feel it in your eyes, you cry, they’re itchy,” she said.
Her son was diagnosed with asthma last year and changes in temperature make it worse.
“But we have to get out, we can’t be locked up,” Tobar said as her children jumped off a slide.

 


Macron visits children wounded in knife attack

Macron visits children wounded in knife attack
Updated 10 June 2023

Macron visits children wounded in knife attack

Macron visits children wounded in knife attack
  • Macron and his wife Brigitte arrived in the southeastern city of Grenoble, where three of the children are being treated, and are to visit those who have “contributed in helping and supporting them,” the presidency said

FRANCE: French President Emmanuel Macron on Friday said the health of the preschool children badly wounded in a mass knife attack by a Syrian refugee was “heading in the right direction,” as police questioned the attacker.
Four children — aged between 22 months and three years old — were stabbed on Thursday in a playground in the Alpine town of Annecy, a normally idyllic lakeside spot popular with tourists.
While France was in shock over the blood-curdling attack, there was a deluge of praise on social media for rescue workers and a man hailed as a hero for chasing the attacker out of the area.
Prosecutors insisted they did not see a terror motive, but the rampage intensified tensions in France over immigration, with right-wing politicians seizing on the suspect’s origins.

BACKGROUND

While prosecutors insisted they did not see a terror motive, the rampage intensified tensions in France over immigration.

Macron and his wife Brigitte arrived in the southeastern city of Grenoble, where three of the children are being treated, and are to visit those who have “contributed in helping and supporting them,” the presidency said.
“Everything that I was told is heading in the right direction,” he said in Annecy after visiting the wounded toddlers in hospital, adding that news on their condition was positive.
He added after the visit: “Attacking children is the most barbaric act there is” but also made clear his “pride” over the work of rescuers.
The fourth child, a Dutch citizen, is in a Swiss hospital over the border in Geneva. She is “out of danger,” the Netherlands’ Foreign Minister Wopke Hoekstra said.
One of the victims is British and the others French.
Macron was also to meet a man named Henri who is being hailed as a hero for chasing the attacker from the playground.
“Pray for the children, I am doing fine,” he wrote on Instagram as the hashtag #MerciHenri trended on social media.
Regional prosecutor Line Bonnet-Mathis said the detention of the suspect, named as Abdalmasih H., who is under investigation for attempted murder, had been extended after a psychiatric examination.
Recently divorced from a Swedish national and in his early 30s, the suspect had previously lived for 10 years in Sweden where he was granted refugee status in April, security sources and his ex-wife said.
“He called me around four months ago. He was living in a church,” his ex-wife said, adding that he left Sweden because he had been unable to get Swedish nationality.
French Interior Minister Gerald Darmanin told broadcaster TF1 that “for reasons not well explained he had also sought asylum in Switzerland, Italy and France.”
It emerged that his application in France was rejected last Sunday as he already enjoyed refugee status in Sweden.

 


British immigration restrictions complicate Nigeria migration dreams

Suella Braverman
Suella Braverman
Updated 10 June 2023

British immigration restrictions complicate Nigeria migration dreams

Suella Braverman

LAGOS: When 28-year-old Deborah Okunawo left Nigeria for the UK on a study visa last year, going with her husband made settling down easier.
Nigeria’s erratic academic calendar, characterized by frequent and protracted university strikes, economic woes and rising insecurity forced Okunawo and thousands of others to “japa” — a word in the Yoruba language that means “to flee.”
“Migrating to a new country can bring up different challenges like cultural shocks and loneliness,” said Okunawo, a postgraduate student at the University of Lincoln in eastern England.
“Having my best person around me gives me a shoulder to lean on.”
Her husband Tosin is also able to work and earn a living to support the family.
But Nigerians who hope to emulate them have suddenly seen their plans clouded.
With the UK government keen to crackdown on net migration which has risen to record levels, restrictions have been introduced from next year, including on family members accompanying foreign students for non-research postgraduate courses.
“We have seen an unprecedented rise in the number of student dependents being brought into the country with visas,” British Home Secretary Suella Braverman said last month.
The government in London made no specific mention of Nigerian students but numbers traveling to the UK for postgraduate studies along with family members have skyrocketed in recent years.
Nigerian nationals studying in the UK grew from 6,798 in 2017 to 59,053 as of December 2022, according to the UK’s Office for National Statistics or ONS.
As those number grew, so did the number of dependents: in 2019 there were 1,586 but last year there were 60,923.
“By nationality, Nigeria saw a large increase in the proportion of sponsored study-related visas granted to dependants, from 19 percent in 2019 to 51 percent in 2022,” said the ONS in February.
In Nigeria, and among students already in the UK, there are suspicions that the new measures are targeted at them.
Braverman — an immigration hard-liner — has said foreign postgraduate students used the study route as a “backdoor to work,” and their family members put “untenable” pressure on public services.
Her get-tough approach chimes with the Conservative government’s vows to “take back control” of the country’s borders following the country’s exit from the EU.
The policy has coincided with a surge in net immigration but also labor shortages Brexit has created in areas such as agriculture, the hospitality sector, health care, science and technology and IT.
There is also the contribution that foreign students make to the British economy including through hefty tuition fees.
In 2022, they brought in nearly $42 billion ($52 billion) compared to a cost to the government of £4.4 billion, according to London Economics, a politics and economics consultancy.
Busayo Olayiwola, a 33-year-old quantity surveyor in Ibadan, southwest Nigeria, before she left for the UK with her husband, said the majority of the students and their dependents “pay tax, national insurance (contributions to the health system) without access to any public funds.”
“The country is generating a lot of money from foreign students as well,” said Olayiwola.
The British government did not comment about whether it was primarily targeting Nigerians.
But a spokesperson said immigration policies “continue to be kept under constant review to ensure they support the UK’s excellent academic reputation.”
High poverty rates, a struggling economy and 33.3 percent unemployment in Nigeria has made Britain an expensive destination for students, even for those in the middle class.
Experts, however, said the new restrictions may have an upside for the country’s economy in the coming months.
Without dependents, Nigeria may experience an “uptick in remittances” from its students in the UK.
“They may feel a greater need to financially support the families they had to leave behind,” said Subomi Plumptre, the CEO of Lagos-based investment firm Volition Capital.
But the restrictions are also leading some Nigerians to look elsewhere: several prospective postgraduate students in the commercial hub Lagos and capital Abuja said they are investigating postgraduate alternatives in places such as Canada.
More than 15,000 Nigerians were granted permanent residence in Canada in 2021, up from 4,400 five years earlier.
Wale Oni, a Nigerian who teaches at the University of Salford near Manchester, northwest England, hopes that Nigerian authorities will take a cue from the restrictions and focus on stopping the “brain drain.”
“You see UK varsities in the big cities advertising their programs and luring Nigerians in with attractive offers such as post-study work visas and opportunities to bring their dependents,” he said.
“But what plans are in place by the Nigerian government to reverse the trend?“

 


Southern India makes history with first women-only Hajj flight 

Pilots, crew members and passengers of a women-only Hajj flight pose for a photo before departing from Kozhikode on June 8.
Pilots, crew members and passengers of a women-only Hajj flight pose for a photo before departing from Kozhikode on June 8.
Updated 09 June 2023

Southern India makes history with first women-only Hajj flight 

Pilots, crew members and passengers of a women-only Hajj flight pose for a photo before departing from Kozhikode on June 8.
  • Air India Express flight from Kozhikode carried 145 female pilgrims and six crew 
  • Kerala has the highest percentage of women pilgrims traveling without a mahram

NEW DELHI: An Indian Hajj flight run exclusively by women and carrying only female pilgrims has made history, authorities said on Friday, after it reached Saudi Arabia from the southern state of Kerala. 

The Air India Express flight from Kozhikode arrived in Jeddah on Thursday night carrying 145 pilgrims. 

It was operated by Capt. Kanika Mehra, First Officer Garima Passi, and four cabin crew members. 

At the airport, the women were accompanied by Minority Affairs State Minister John Barla, who distributed their boarding passes. 

“I am very proud,” C. Mohammed Faizi, chairman of the Kerala Haj Committee, told Arab News. 

FASTFACT

Kerala this year also boasts a higher overall percentage of female Hajj pilgrims than other Indian states. 

The passengers of the special flight are part of a group of 4,000 Indian female pilgrims who this year will reach the holy cities of Makkah and Madinah on their own. 

India tweaked its Hajj policy following last year’s decision by Saudi Arabia to lift a rule that required female pilgrims to be accompanied by a mahram, or male guardian. 

Most of the Indian pilgrims who applied for Hajj in the Ladies Without Mahram category are from Kerala. 

“Without mahram, there are about 2,000 … The largest number without mahram are from Kerala,” Faizi said, attributing the high number to the level of education in Kerala and the fact that many women in the state are used to traveling to the Middle East to meet their relatives working there. 

Kerala this year also boasts a higher overall percentage of female Hajj pilgrims than other Indian states. 

“Sixty percent are women,” Faizi said. 

Muslims constitute about a fourth of Kerala’s population of 35 million. 

About 11,000 of them will be performing the Hajj pilgrimage this year under India’s quota of 175,000, and approximately 60 percent of them will be women. 


Former British prime minister Boris Johnson resigns as MP

Former British prime minister Boris Johnson resigns as MP
Updated 09 June 2023

Former British prime minister Boris Johnson resigns as MP

Former British prime minister Boris Johnson resigns as MP

LONDON: Former British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is stepping down as a member of parliament with immediate effect, triggering a by- election in his marginal seat.

Johnson had been fighting for his political future with a parliamentary inquiry investigating whether he misled the House of Commons when he said all COVID-19 rules were followed.

Parliament’s privileges committee had the power to recommend that Johnson be suspended from parliament for more than 10 days if they were to find he did mislead parliament recklessly or deliberately, potentially triggering an election for his seat.

Johnson said he had received a letter from the “privileges committee making it clear — much to my amazement — that they are determined to use the proceedings against me to drive me out of parliament.”

“I am being forced out by a tiny handful of people, with no evidence to back up their assertions, and without approval even of Conservative party members let alone the wider electorate,” Johnson said in a statement.

“It is very sad to be leaving parliament — at least for now — but above all I am bewildered and appalled that I can be forced out.”

Johnson, whose premiership was cut short in part by anger in his own party and across Britain over COVID rule-breaking lockdown parties in his Downing Street office and residence, accused the committee of acting of being the “very definition of a kangaroo court.”

“Most members of the committee — especially the chair — had already expressed deeply prejudicial remarks about my guilt before they had even seen the evidence,” he said.

“In retrospect it was naive and trusting of me to think that these proceedings could be remotely useful or fair.”

Johnson also used his resignation statement to deliver an attack on Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s premiership.

“When I left office last year the government was only a handful of points behind in the polls. That gap has now massively widened,” he said.

“Our party needs urgently to recapture its sense of momentum and its belief in what this country can do.”