Category: Crime

  In 2023, the Department of Defense announced an ambitious plan to launch 1,000 satellites over the next decade. Over the same period, the National Reconnaissance Office, which runs the country’s spy satellites, plans to quadruple the size of its fleet of a couple dozen satellites.   The U.S. government can expand its fleet this quickly because satellites have become much cheaper to manufacture and easier to launch into space. Many of these new satellites are intended for surveillance, and…

Blackbaud has settled with the Federal Trade Commission after being charged with poor security and reckless data retention practices, leading to a May 2020 ransomware attack and a data breach affecting millions of people. Blackbaud is a U.S.-based company listed on NASDAQ with operations in multiple countries and a provider of cloud-based donor data management software catering to nonprofit organizations, like charities, education organizations, and healthcare agencies. The FTC’s complaint alleges that the company “failed to monitor attempts by hackers…

In a disturbing turn of events, an imprisoned Iranian, Mehdi Mousavian, has initiated a hunger strike to protest the Iranian judiciary’s plan to gouge out his left eye as a retribution for allegedly blinding a policeman during a 2017 protest. Mousavian was sentenced in 2019 to retribution-in-kind, for throwing a stone at the policeman’s eye, a sentence he vehemently denies. The policeman initially demanded an exorbitant 14 billion tomans (approximately $280,000) from Mousavian’s family as compensation. However, unable to afford…

Morgan Stanley will pay $249 million to settle a criminal investigation, as well as a related Securities and Exchange Commission probe. The SEC said the bank generated more than $100 million in illicit profits as a result of misconduct by Pawan Passi, the bank’s former head of its US equity syndicate desk, and another employee.  Morgan Stanley has been under investigation by the SEC since 2019 over its handling of block trades (a business that the bank dominates), and the…

Gonzalo Lira, a prominent commentator on the Russia-Ukraine war imprisoned in Ukraine for speech critical of the country’s government, has died after weeks of medical neglect by Ukrainian authorities. Chilean-American war commentator Gonzalo Lira died shortly before noon on January, 11, 2024 at a hospital in Kharkiv, where he had been imprisoned for eight months since he was accused of justifying Russian war efforts in Ukraine. Lira came to prominence in 2022 when he emerged as a critical voice in…

Attorneys for the Securities and Exchange Commission apologized to a judge on Thursday for misrepresenting facts used to secure a restraining order and asset freeze against a crypto firm. In a filing submitted to the U.S. District Court of Utah, in response to the judge’s order to show cause for its misstep, the SEC attorneys wrote that the commission “deeply regrets these orders” and promised to conduct mandatory training for staff members involved in the investigation. “I fully appreciate the…

SINGAPORE – The Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) has imposed a $3.9 million civil penalty on Credit Suisse for its failure to prevent or detect misconduct by relationship managers (RMs) in its Singapore branch. Credit Suisse paid the penalty to the regulator immediately after it was imposed, and as part of the settlement, also separately compensated its affected clients, said MAS in a statement on Dec 28. The RMs had provided clients with inaccurate or incomplete post-trade disclosures, resulting in…

Latvia’s former central bank governor was sentenced to six years in prison for bribery on Wednesday after a trial over the most prominent of a series of recent financial scandals to hit the Baltic country. Ilmārs Rimšēvičs, head of the Latvian central bank from 2001 until 2019, was found guilty by the Riga district court of accepting bribes and a fishing trip to Russia from shareholders of a now defunct bank. He was sentenced to six years in jail and…

Prague in Mourning: Charles University Mass Shooting Claims 14 Lives A Day Shrouded in Grief The Czech Republic’s storied capital city, known for its architectural beauty and cultural vibrancy, was overshadowed by grief as the national flag was lowered to half mast. St. Vitus Cathedral’s bells tolled in remembrance, and a requiem echoed through its historic walls. In Kostel sv. Martina ve zdi, an ecumenical prayer and moment of silence were observed, marking the profound loss felt throughout the nation….

SEOUL – South Korea’s financial watchdog has recommended imposing a fine of at least 10 billion won (S$10.24 million) each on HSBC Holdings and BNP Paribas for so-called naked short selling, which is considered illegal in the country, according to two people familiar with the matter.  The nation’s Financial Supervisory Service (FSS) made the recommendation to the Securities and Futures Commission under regulator Financial Services Commission (FSC), said the people, who requested anonymity discussing private matters.  Naked short selling is…

France’s Sapin II Law was created in 2016 to address corporate corruption and implement antibribery measures. The legislation took effect in 2017, marking a significant shift in the country’s regulatory compliance landscape. The law, which tracks closely with similar laws in the US, UK, and other EU countries, requires large companies [1] to implement a robust compliance program, including anti-corruption policies, monitoring procedures, and accounting controls.  The law also significantly changes the government’s prosecution strategies for white collar crime, particularly…

A U.S. federal court jury has decided that Google’s Android app store has been protected by anti-competitive barriers that have damaged smartphone consumers and software developers, dealing a blow to a major pillar of a technology empire. The unanimous verdict reached Monday came after just three hours of deliberation following a four-week trial revolving around a lucrative payment system within Google’s Play Store. The store is the main place where hundreds of millions of people around the world download and…

Britain has issued more than 120 financial penalties to offshore companies that have failed to comply with transparency legislation designed to uncover illicit wealth hidden in the UK property market. The Register of Overseas Entities was created after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine to help the UK government crack down on oligarchs and other kleptocrats. Individuals that own British property through offshore vehicles had until the end of January 2023 to register such entities and publicly reveal their ownership at Companies…

Genetic testing company 23andMe announced on Friday that hackers accessed around 14,000 customer accounts in the company’s recent data breach. In a new filing with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission published Friday, the company said that, based on its investigation into the incident, it had determined that hackers had accessed 0.1% of its customer base. According to the company’s most recent annual earnings report, 23andMe has “more than 14 million customers worldwide,” which means 0.1% is around 14,000. But the company…

Kentucky health system Norton Healthcare has confirmed that a ransomware attack in May exposed personal information belonging to patients, employees, and dependents. Norton Healthcare serves adult and pediatric patients in more than 40 clinics and hospitals across Greater Louisville, Southern Indiana, and the Commonwealth of Kentucky. With over 20,000 employees, more than 1,750 employed medical providers, and over 3,000 total providers on its medical staff, Norton Healthcare is Louisville’s second-largest employer, with more than 140 locations throughout Greater Louisville and…

A French juvenile court on Friday convicted six teenagers for their roles in the beheading of a teacher by an Islamist extremist that shocked the country. Teacher Samuel Paty was killed outside his school in 2020 after showing his class cartoons of Islam’s Prophet Muhammad during a debate on free expression. The attacker, a young Chechen who had radicalized, was killed by police. The court found five of the defendants, who were 14 and 15 at the time of the…