Top story: Ransomware risk could escalate today, experts warn
Good morning. I’m Martin Farrer and these are the top stories this Monday morning.
Security officials have warned of possible fresh disruption from the weekend’s global cyber-attack when workers return to work today and log back onto their computers. Europol, the EU-wide crime-fighting agency, and the UK’s National Cyber Security Centre said the risk from the “Wannacry” ransomware was growing despite a security researcher manging to slow its advance on Friday. One in five NHS trusts were affected and NHS Digital said it could start to impact the IT systems of doctors’ surgeries today.
The president and chief legal officer of Microsoft, whose older system software has been hit by the malware, said the attack should be a wake-up call to governments that hoard system vulnerabilities. Brad Smith said the attack – widely believed to have originated from malicious software stolen from the US National Security Agency – were the equivalent in conventional warfare of the Pentagon “having a Tomahawk missile stolen”.
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“Stop the killing” – The father of Damilola Taylor has pleaded with youths to end the “killing of innocent people” on the streets of London after he picked up a Bafta award for the TV drama about the stabbing to death of his 10-year-old son in Peckham in 2000. Richard Taylor said young people must “spread the message” to stop the spate of violence that claimed another teenage life in the capital at the weekend.
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Queen cops it – Still with the Baftas, and the BBC was the big winner at the awards with the police drama Happy Valley cleaning up, including best actor gong for Sarah Lancashire. But even she admitted that Claire Foy, who played the young Queen Elizabeth in the Netflix series The Crown, should have won. Our television commentator Mark Lawson says the judges were “regrettably safe” in their decision-making and that the royal drama ended winless despite its £100m budget.
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Hard labour – The jobs market is going to get tougher as Britain heads towards Brexit, according to a report today. The forecasting group EY Item Club says unemployment will rise from 4.7% now to 5.8% in 2019, while a separate study by HR specialists the CIPD and Adecco, the recruitment agency says employers expect to give workers a pay rise of just 1% over the next 12 months, well below inflation of 2.3%.
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Testing times – North Korea has warned the US mainland is “within striking range” of its missiles after a test at the weekend aimed at verifying that the rogue state could deliver a large-scale, “heavy nuclear warhead”. Kim Jong-un warned Washington not to “browbeat” countries that “have no nukes”, North Korea’s official news agency said.
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Waste’s gone bananas – Next time you think about throwing away some old fruit, consider this stat: Britons discard up to 1.4m bananas every day, according to figures from the government’s waste advisory body Wrap published today. Apparently, a third of consumers (30%) admit to discarding a banana if it has even a minor bruise or black mark on the skin. More than one in 10 (13%) also throw the fruit away if it shows any green on the skin.
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Lunchtime read: Remainers must forge the future
Although it might be tempting, told-you-so-style, to wallow in the grim delights of Brexit, such as the huge cost and brain drain, the real challenge for remainers is to try to influence the future direction of policy towards Europe, writes Zoe Williams. The 48% who voted to stay part of the European project should stop looking inwards to their “puffed up” opponents, she argues, and start looking outwards for inspiration in the way that the left and centrist parties have recently resisted the electoral advance of rightwing populism in France, Denmark and Holland.
Sport
Mauricio Pochettino hailed Tottenham’s 2-1 victory against Manchester United as the perfect send-off to the old White Hart Lane as they confirmed their highest league finish since 1963.
Kim Si-Woo, at 21, has become the youngest champion in The Players Championship history after a nerveless march down the Sawgrass stretch that denied Ian Poulter a fairytale story of his own. Rafael Nadal defeated Dominic Thiem 7-6, 6-4 in the Madrid Open final to win his third straight title and continue his good form heading into the French Open.
Geraint Thomas’s Giro d’Italia general classification hopes were dashed after a crash involving a police motorcycle as Nairo Quintana took the leader’s jersey with his stage nine victory. And the San Antonio Spurs coach Gregg Popovich, a prolific critic of Donald Trump, has fired another broadside at the US president over the firing of FBI director James Comey.
Business
One of Britain’s biggest companies, the miner BHP Billiton, has decided to drop the second part of its name and revert to plain-old BHP. It has come under pressure in recent weeks from activist investors but the company – which is also listed in Australia where it began life in 1885 as Broken Hill Proprietary – denies that dropping the non-Aussie part of its name acquired in amerger in 2001 is an attempt to placate its shareholders.
On the currency markets the pound was up fractionally at $1.289 and €1.179.
The papers
Unusually for a Monday there is some uniformity on the front pages – and it’s politics and hacking.
The Mail leads with “Your right to time off if relative needs care” and says Theresa May will reveal a promise to allow workers a year’s sabbatical to care for sick relatives. The Times splashes with the same story saying that the manifesto pledge will target family illness and introduce statutory child bereavement leave. The Telegraph’s version of the story leads its front and adds that May will unveil 11 pledges to enhance workers’ rights in a move to strike at the heartland of Labour support.
The Mirror meanwhile follows the massive ransomware attack from the end of last week saying “Web hackers to strike Britain again”. The FT also leads with the latest on that story saying businesses will have to brace for more such events and reports as many as 1.3m systems are still vulnerable to the malware.
The Sun splashes on an exclusive with the headline “Brady on deathbed” saying that Ian Brady, the Moors murderer, is being treated for an “end-of-life” illness.
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