Kenya built a reputation as a pioneer of financial inclusion through its early adoption of a mobile money system that enables people to transfer cash and make payments on cellphones without a bank account. Now, a proliferation of lenders are using the same technology to extend credit to the banked …
Italy’s prime minister-designate, Giuseppe Conte, a political novice and obscure law professor accused of padding his resume, put the finishing touches to his cabinet lineup Friday. And initial reaction from financial markets was far from approving. Italian government bond prices slumped and the country’s ailing banks saw their stock prices …
The FBI warned on Friday that foreign cybercriminals had compromised “hundreds of thousands” of home and small-office router devices around the world which direct traffic on the internet by forwarding data packets between computer networks. In a public service announcement, the FBI has discovered that the foreign cybercriminals used a …
Military veterans who were discharged for relatively minor offenses say they often can’t get jobs, and they hope a recent warning to employers by the state of Connecticut will change that. The state’s human rights commission told employers last month they could be breaking the law if they discriminate against …
Here are the highest-paid CEOs for 2017, as calculated by The Associated Press and Equilar, an executive data firm. The AP’s compensation study covered 339 executives at S&P 500 companies who have served at least two full consecutive fiscal years at their respective companies, which filed proxy statements between January …
A Portland, Oregon, family has learned what happens when Amazon.com Inc’s popular voice assistant Alexa is lost in translation. Amazon on Thursday described an “unlikely … string of events” that made Alexa send an audio recording of the family to one of their contacts randomly. The episode underscored how Alexa …
As tensions are easing over a potential trade war while negotiations between the U.S. and China continue, the uncertainty about tariffs and the eventual impact on the U.S. agricultural industry is taking a toll on U.S. farmers heading to the fields to plant this year’s crops. As VOA’s Kane Farabaugh …
The U.S. oil export infrastructure is straining to keep up as the country’s crude oil exports hit new highs and China snaps up more of it than ever before. U.S. crude production has surged to a record 10.7 million barrels a day, driven largely by growth from the Permian shale …
Brazil’s government said late Thursday that a deal had been reached with truckers to suspend a 4-day-old strike that caused fuel shortages, cut into food deliveries, backed up exports and threatened airline flights. Eliseu Padilha, chief of staff for President Michel Temer, told reporters in Brasilia that several unions that …
A jury has decided Samsung must pay Apple $539 million in damages for illegally copying some of the iPhone’s features to lure people into buying its competing products. The verdict reached Thursday is the latest twist in a legal battle that began in 2011. Apple contends Samsung wouldn’t have emerged …
When a federal jury in Alexandria, Virginia, convicted a Latvian software developer last week of running an underground clearinghouse for computer hackers, U.S. prosecutors highlighted it as an example of their commitment to combating cybercrime. “This verdict demonstrates our commitment to holding such actors accountable,” said acting U.S. Attorney Tracey …
French President Emmanuel Macron says his country will invest $76 million in African startups, saying innovation on the continent is key to meeting challenges ranging from climate change to terrorism. He spoke Thursday at a technology fair in Paris showcasing African talent this year. It is hard to miss the …
Even though the United States is one of the richest and most technologically advanced countries in the world, about 45 million Americans live below the poverty line. In Buffalo, New York, a once-prosperous city that has fallen on hard-times, one-third of its residents live in poverty. As Olga Loginova reports, …
Germany’s struggling Deutsche Bank is slashing thousands of jobs as it reshapes its stocks trading operation and refocuses its global investment banking business on its European base. The bank said Thursday it would cut its workforce from 97,000 to “well below” 90,000 and that the reductions were underway. It said …
Oceanographers often say we know much more about the surface of the Moon and Mars than we do about nearly 70 percent of our own planet. That is because most of the Earth is covered in water, most of it deeper than 200 meters. There are several initiatives to map …
Amazon, Starbucks, Vulcan and other companies have pledged a total of more than $350,000 toward an effort to repeal Seattle’s newly passed tax on large employers intended to combat homelessness. Just days after the Seattle City Council approved the levy, the No Tax On Jobs campaign, a coalition of businesses, …
This week marks six months since Zimbabwe President Emmerson Mnangagwa took office, after Robert Mugabe gave in to military pressure and resigned. During the weekend, the 75-year-old Mnangagwa told supporters that since he took over, a lot had improved. He says Zimbabwe’s annual foreign direct investment had been around $400 …
Twitter says it’s adding special labels to tweets from some U.S. political candidates ahead of this year’s midterm elections. Twitter says the move is to provide users with “authentic information” and prevent spoofed and fake accounts from fooling users. The labels will include what office a person is running for …
Ethiopia’s state-run telecoms monopoly has agreed to allow some local firms to provide internet services through its infrastructure, a move seen as spurring competition and expanding the data market, officials said. Ethio Telecom has more than 16 million subscribers of internet services in the country of over 100 million people. …
Turkey’s currency has fallen to a record low against the dollar amid concerns about an outflow of investor capital and the country’s ability to manage the situation. The lira weakened to over 4.80 per dollar on Wednesday, down some 5 percent since the previous day. The drop puts pressure …
French President Emmanuel Macron is taking on Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and other internet giants at a Paris meeting to discuss tax and data protection and how they could use their global influence for the public good. Macron on Wednesday welcomed Zuckerberg and the leaders of dozens of other tech …
The dangers posed by cybercrime are on the rise across the globe – with high profile incidents like the recent ‘Wannacry’ ransomware attack an example of the growing threat. As the adoption of Internet and mobile technology grows, cyber experts say Africa is particularly at risk, as the continent’s cyber …
Households are feeling more stable, small businesses are making money and many expect to expand and hire in the coming year, signs of continued optimism in two key parts of the economy, the Federal Reserve reported Tuesday in a pair of annual surveys. Among more than 8,000 small businesses and …
The Trump administration is preparing to publish on Thursday long-delayed proposed rule changes for the export of U.S. firearms, a State Department official said on Tuesday. The rule changes would move the oversight of commercial firearm exports from the U.S. Department of State to the Department of Commerce. The action …
U.S. civil liberties groups on Tuesday called on Amazon.com Inc. to stop offering facial recognition services to governments, warning that the software could be used to target immigrants and people of color unfairly. More than 40 groups sent a letter to Amazon Chief Executive Officer Jeff Bezos saying technology from the company’s cloud computing …
Facebook Chief Executive Mark Zuckerberg apologized to EU lawmakers on Tuesday, saying the company had not done enough to prevent misuse of the social network and that regulation is “important and inevitable.” Meeting the leaders of the European Parliament, Zuckerberg stressed the importance of Europeans to Facebook and said he …