Typhoon Shanshan lashes Japan forcing millions of evacuations. Telegram’s CEO Pavel Durov is under formal investigation and banned from leaving France in a key moment for the social media sector. Nvidia’s shares tumble after results. And the new mpox strain is changing faster than expected leaving scientists struggling to keep up.
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Today, Typhoon Shan-chan lashes southern Japan as it heads towards Tokyo. French authorities charge the CEO of Telegram in a probe into organized crime on the messaging app. NVIDIA disappoints, dampening enthusiasm for other tech stocks, and the new MPOC strain is changing fast. It's Thursday, August 29th. This is Reuters World News, bringing you everything you need to know from the front lines in 10 minutes, every weekday. I'm Carmel Krimans in Dublin. What if we told my story with LEGO pieces? Let's do it! Discover what it takes to build the greatest hits with Kendrick Lamar, Jay-Z, Justin Timberlake, MT, Gwen Stefani, and Snoop Dogg. More than 5 million people in Japan have been told to evacuate their homes, as Typhoon Shan-chan lashes the southwest with strong winds and heavy rain. It's knocked out power for hundreds of thousands of people, cancelled nearly 800 flights and forced factories to close. Passengers at Hakata train station were left stranded, as screens showed lists of cancelled journeys. At least three people have been killed and many more injured. Footage shared on social media from Miyazaki shows streets full of debris from trees and buildings and roads blocked. After warning, it could be one of the strongest storms to ever hit the region. The typhoon, with gusts of up to 112 miles per hour, is moving north and is expected to approach central and eastern regions, as well as Tokyo, on the weekend. A judge in France has placed telegram boss Pavel Duraf under formal investigation and banned him from leaving the country. It's part of a probe into organised crime on the messaging app. The charges include suspected complicity in running an online platform that allows illicit transactions, images of child sex abuse, drug trafficking and fraud. Duraf has been granted bail, but must pay a $5.5 million deposit and report twice a week to police. The Russian-born billionaires' arrest at an airport near Paris on Saturday sent shockways to the world of social media. Martin Coulter covers European tech. I think other technology leaders are going to be watching this very closely. When Pavel Duraf was first arrested, it wasn't clear exactly what he was being accused of. There was speculation it could be something to do with the EU's Digital Services Act, which forces social media companies to police their platforms. We now know that Duraf was arrested in line with French law over allegations he had allowed criminal activity to take place on the app. The implication is not that he personally had anything to do with the illegal activity, but that as CEO, he had not done enough to prevent it taking place. We also have action against ex taking place in Brazil. South Korea has asked the likes of telegram to do more to clamp down on explicit content. Is this all part of a global move to be tougher on these platforms? This definitely sets a new precedent. Earlier this month, ex, which we all know used to be called Twitter, shut down operations in Brazil after an executive was threatened with arrests there. And earlier this year, Mark Zuckerberg successfully thought to have his name removed from a lawsuit in New Mexico over alleged child protection failures there. We've seen governments around the world taking a more aggressive approach towards policing social media companies, arresting one of their CEOs at an airport. That's a new precedent. While I don't think this is going to become commonplace, I think it does speak to the fact that governments are increasingly willing to take new steps to try and get social media companies to play by their rules. A Hong Kong court has found two editors of the now defunct Stan news media outlet, guilty of conspiring to publish seditious articles. Chong Hui Ken and Patrick Lam could face a maximum jail term of two years in the first edition conviction against any journalist or editor since Hong Kong's handover from Britain to China in 1997. Russia faces a challenge in retaking Ukraine held areas according to a top US spy. Deputy CIA Director David Cohen says that as Russian forces meant a counter-offensive to try to retake territory in the Kursk region, captured by Ukrainian troops, they will encounter, quote, "a difficult fight." Vice President Kamala Harris leaves Donald Trump 45-41% in a new Reuters-Ipsos poll. The four-point advantage is a jump from a one-point lead Harris held over the former president in late July and shows Harris picking up support among women and Hispanic voters. AI darling NVIDIA failed to live up to investor hopes with its latest set of results. That's bad news for the tech sector. Dara Ranasing is our market editor in Europe. Dara, NVIDIA shares tumbled even as its revenue more than doubled. What's the problem? You could say come out that there isn't a problem here. NVIDIA is considered the AI darling of the tech sector. The problem you could say is that invest expectations are just too high. So a third-quarter revenue forecast of $32.5 billion surpassed Wall Street expectations, but the result still fails to impress the most bullish investors, and there the investors have been driving this rally in not just NVIDIA shares, but the tech sector generally. It's had a knock-on effect, hasn't it, on other tech stocks? So for sure, what happens to NVIDIA is generally seen as a bellwether for the sector. So NVIDIA shares a fell overnight. They dragged other US chip makers down with them. At the Frankfurt listed shares in NVIDIA trading lower this morning in Europe, and in Asia trade we saw NVIDIA chip contractor TSMC, which is listed in Taiwan for almost 2%. Having said that, it's not completely bad news. We're seeing tech stocks in Europe this morning opening a bit higher, so that's quite a positive sign. Karakas, and supporters of Venezuela's ruling party, marching to mark the one-month anniversary of July's disputed presidential election. Counter rallies were held by opposition supporters, who questioned President Nicolas Madura's claims of victory. Voting tallies have still not been published, despite international calls to do so. The opposition published its own, showing a landslide win for its candidate, Edmundo Gonzalez. That's led Venezuela's Attorney General, Tarek Sahab, to issue a third summons for Gonzalez. Sahab says he has to testify about the website where presidential voting tallies have been posted by the opposition. It means a warrant could be issued for Gonzalez' arrest. The electoral council says it has not posted detailed tallies from the election, because a cyber attack affected its system. Scientists studying the new "MPOC strain" that has spread out of Democratic Republic of Congo say the virus is changing faster than expected, and often in areas where experts lack the funding and equipment to properly track it. Judy Steenhoyzen is a healthcare reporter. Judy, what are you hearing from the scientific community? Scientists are concerned that after a very long time, now we're seeing some rapid changes in a virus that is causing people to get really sick, and in some cases die. It's behaving differently. This is a virus that has been in Congo since 1970. Most of those cases have traditionally been transmitted from contact with an infected animal, and now, for the first time, with this particular type of virus, it's called "clade one" out of the Congo is starting to be transmitted sexually. There are a number of reasons that scientists think may be playing a role that they really don't know at this point, so one of the factors, at least they may be playing a role, is that about 50 years ago, in Africa, they ended a smallpox vaccination campaign, and smallpox is in the same family of viruses as epochs, and so what you're looking at now in Congo is a population with, at least for people who are younger than 50, no immunity to this virus, no cross-protection to this virus, and what you've got then is a very vulnerable population, particularly young kids who have been affected the most. Have scientists been able to determine what could lead the strain of epochs to mutate more rapidly? There is another change in the virus that some scientists who follow have seen. It's the sequencing. One of the markers of human-to-human transmission is this defense mechanism, viral defense mechanism that the body kicks off. In this case, it's Apobex III, so what it is doing is it appears to be accelerating mutations within this virus, and basically they're very concerned. Fever, cough, congestion, when the symptoms keep coming but you've got to keep going, you can rely on Nusinex FastMax All-in-One, just one dose of Nusinex FastMax All-in-One relieves up to nine cold and flu symptoms, helping you get on with your day. Need cold and flu relief? Get Nusinex FastMax All-in-One and done relief. It's comeback season. Use us directed. Before we leave you for today, here's our recommended read. We're taking a look at Antarctica and how it's changing, much faster than expected. Scientists are now questioning if climate change means the continent has hit a point of no return. You can find a link to it in today's pod description. And for more on any of the stories from today, check out Reuters.com or the Reuters app. To never miss an episode, subscribe on your favorite podcast player. We'll be back tomorrow with our daily headline show. (upbeat music) (gentle music)
