Social media platform X (formerly Twitter) experienced a widespread outage on Monday, 16 February, leaving hundreds of users unable to access the app or load feeds across several regions, according to Downdetector. The most affected regions have been the United States, and several areas in India, where a large number of users reported problems accessing the platform, including difficulties logging in, posting tweets, and refreshing timelines, with complaints spiking on outage-tracking platforms. There were more than 23,210 reports of issues in the US with X as of 8:24 am ET (1324 GMT), according to Downdetector, which tracks outages by collecting…
Author: Oki Bin Oki
Chinese technology giant ByteDance pledged to curb a controversial artificial intelligence (AI) video-making tool, following threats of legal action from Disney and complaints from other entertainment giants. In the last few days, videos made using the latest version of the app Seedance have proliferated online. Many have been lauded for their realism. But the trend has also sparked alarm from several Hollywood studios that have accused the AI platform’s makers of copyright infringement. On Friday, Disney sent a cease-and-desist letter to ByteDance accusing it of supplying Seedance with a “pirated library” of the studio’s copyrighted characters, including those from Marvel…
Nigeria’s foreign ministry has issued an urgent warning over what it describes as the increasing illegal recruitment of its citizens to fight in foreign conflicts. It comes after Ukrainian officials said they found the bodies of two Nigerians who they said were killed in combat last year. Nigeria has not confirmed those deaths but in a statement on Sunday, foreign ministry spokesperson Kimiebi Imomotimi Ebienfa revealed that “several Nigerians who have fallen victim to such unfortunate situations were deployed to combat zones after being misled and coerced into signing military service contracts”. Kenya has issued a similar warning to its…
OpenAI hired the Austrian creator of OpenClaw, an artificial intelligence tool able to execute real-world tasks, the US startup’s head Sam Altman said on Sunday. AI agent tool OpenClaw has fascinated — and spooked — the tech world since researcher Peter Steinberger built it in November to help organise his digital life. A Reddit-like pseudo social network for OpenClaw agents called Moltbook, where chatbots converse, has also grabbed headlines and provoked soul-searching over AI. Elon Musk called Moltbook “the very early stages of the singularity” — a term for the moment when human intelligence is overwhelmed by AI forever, although…
Three police officers died following a tragic road accident along the Matuu–Mwingi highway in Kitui County. Another officer and a civilian who were onboard a police car when the accident happened were injured and admitted in hospital, police said. The accident occurred at about 2:00 p.m. on Sunday at Mwatungo area and involved a Ford Ranger belonging to Nguutani Police Station. The vehicle was being driven by Police Constable Peter Maina and had four other occupants on board. According to preliminary reports, the officers were returning from Kanyonyo where they had gone to effect an arrest. However, the suspect was…
The Democratic Party expressed grave concern over what it describes as credible reports that the Independent Electoral and Boundaries Commission (IEBC) has entered into a secret Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the Office of the President of Kenya under the guise of a data-sharing framework. In a statement signed by Justin Bedan Muturi, the party further alleged that IEBC Acting CEO Moses Sunkuli recently held meetings with officials from the National Registration Bureau to discuss the integration of voter data systems. The discussions are also said to have involved potential collaboration with private vendors, including Smartmatic. The party argues that…
Deputy President Kithure Kindiki said he is fully focused on executing his duties as he supports President Ruto to win a second term in the coming elections. The DP said he is performing his roles as the second in command and will not let go the seat as he is working hard to ensure faster delivery of all projects carried out by the government across the country. “I am the Deputy President. This seat is going nowhere and when we are done with the second term we will progress ahead in search for the higher office,” DP stated. He spoke…
The United Opposition Sunday announced that its candidate for the Mombasa governorship race in the 2027 General Election will be Nyali Member of Parliament Mohammed Ali. This meant he had ditched UDA. He is in Parliament courtesy of UDA and is a commissioner of with the Parliamentary Service Commission. Speaking in Roysambu during a roadside rally on Sunday, Democracy for the Citizens Party (DCP) leader Rigathi Gachagua said that the faction will endorse MP Ali to contest for the position and the a decision on the party ticket he will run on will soon be decided. “As United Opposition we…
Nairobi Senator Edwin Sifuna has declared that he will not cower from calling out President William Ruto’s administration, noting that it has exhibited a frail leadership that is crippling the nation. Speaking during a church service in Kitengela, Kajiado County, Sifuna vowed to maintain his censures against the State and defend the citizens in honour of the late founder of the Orange Democratic Movement (ODM), Raila Odinga. “We will not fear anything. We will continue to speak the truth so that we protect the citizens from the corruption in this country and the abductions we have witnessed. Raila told us…
AI company Anthropic announced this week it is giving $20 million to a political group campaigning for more regulation of the technology – but its main rival, OpenAI, is telling its employees it won’t be making similar donations. In a memo to staff on Thursday, OpenAI’s chief global affairs officer Chris Lehane said that while OpenAI allows its employees to “express their ideological beliefs in terms of who they support,” the company itself won’t be making similar moves anytime soon. OpenAI is not yet contributing to political action committees or 501(c)(4) social-welfare nonprofits because OpenAI wants to retain control of…
Prominent American agent Casey Wasserman is reportedly set to sell his talent company after documents linking him to Jeffrey Epstein and Ghislaine Maxwell were published in the US. Several high profile clients, including singer Chappell Roan, quit the firm this week after it emerged he flew on Epstein’s private plane and exchanged flirtatious emails with Maxwell in 2003. US media reported Wasserman told employees he had “become a distraction” as he announced his intention to sell the major LA-based agency. The 51-year-old, who has also resisted calls to stand down from his role as chair of the 2028 Los Angeles…
Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny was killed using a poison developed from a dart frog toxin, the UK and European allies have said. Two years on from the death of Navalny at a Siberian penal colony, Britain and its allies have blamed the Kremlin following analysis of material samples found on his body. There is no innocent explanation for the toxin, called epibatidine, being found in samples taken from Navalny’s body, the UK Foreign Office said. Speaking from the Munich Security Conference, Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “Only the Russian government had the means, motive and opportunity to deploy this…
The rules-based world order “no longer exists”, the German Chancellor has warned at a major security summit. Opening the annual Munich Security Conference, Friedrich Merz told other world leaders that “our freedom is not guaranteed” in an era of big power politics, and that Europeans must be ready to make “sacrifice”. He also admitted that “a deep divide has opened between Europe and the United States”. The conference is taking place on the backdrop of US President Donald Trump threatening Denmark’s sovereignty over Greenland by pledging to annex the Arctic territory and his tariffs on imports from European nations. US…
The Pentagon is sending a second aircraft carrier group – the USS Gerald Ford – to the Middle East, according to a senior administration official and three sources familiar with the matter, a move that puts pressure on Iran even as President Donald Trump has said talks with Tehran will continue. The Ford carrier strike group – the US’ most advanced – has been positioned in the Caribbean Sea for several months amid Trump’s campaign in Venezuela, which has included strikes on suspected drug boats in the Caribbean and culminated in the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in Caracas.…
A tycoon from the United Arab Emirates whose intimate friendship with the late sex offender Jeffrey Epstein was revealed in the latest release of files by the US Justice Department has been replaced in his post as head of one of the world’s largest port operators. Sultan Ahmed bin Sulayem emerged as a powerful force in global trade as the former chairman and CEO of Dubai’s DP World, which has a footprint in more than 80 countries, over the past three decades. Without naming bin Sulayem, Dubai’s Government Media Office announced Friday that DP World had appointed a new chairman…