15 HANOI, Vietnam — Vietnam has announced a 15-day lockdown in the capital Hanoi as a coronavirus surge spread from the southern Mekong Delta region. The lockdown order, issued late Friday night, bans the gathering of more than two people in public. Only government offices, hospitals and essential businesses can stay open. Earlier in the week, the city had suspended all outdoor activities and ordered non-essential businesses to close following an increase in cases. On Friday, Hanoi reported 70 confirmed infections, the city’s highest, part of a record 7,295 cases in the country. Nearly 5,000 are from Vietnam’s largest metropolis, southern Ho Chi Minh City, which has extended its lockdown until Aug. 1. ___ MORE ON THE PANDEMIC: — Vietnam locks down capital Hanoi for 15 days as cases rise — Thousands protest lockdown in Sydney, several arrested — AP poll: Most … [Read more...]

5 WASHINGTON - The rapid increase in coronavirus infections driven by the delta variant over the past month is turning the country's attention back to the pandemic and threatening to subsume President Joe Biden's agenda - just as the White House and its allies hoped to move on from the virus and focus on promoting the administration's other accomplishments. Inside the White House, top officials are growing increasingly anxious about the state of the pandemic and are gravely concerned about the situation spiraling out of control in some areas of the country with low vaccination rates, according to two people who work in the administration and two others in close touch with the White House. Biden's team had always expected to see additional coronavirus outbreaks, but the White House assumed the increases in infections would be "mounds" and not "peaks," according to one top administration official, who like others spoke on the condition of … [Read more...]

Taipei, Taiwan (CNN Business) As China steps up military pressure on Taiwan, the self-governing island is preparing for the next big frontier of warfare: crippling cyberattacks. Taiwan's head of cybersecurity told CNN Business this month that it is using dramatic measures to guard against technological vulnerabilities — including employing roughly two dozen computer experts to deliberately attack the government's systems and help it defend against what Taiwanese authorities estimate are some 20 million to 40 million cyberattacks every month. Taiwan says it has been able to defend against the overwhelming majority of attacks. Successful breaches number in the hundreds, while only a handful are what the government classifies as "serious." But the enormous number — and where Taiwan thinks they're coming from — has compelled the government to take the issue seriously, according to Chien Hung-wei, head of Taiwan's Department of Cyber Security. "Based … [Read more...]

Washington (CNN) On Thursday, the software company Kaseya announced that it could help unlock any of its customers' systems that were still inaccessible following a devastating ransomware attack early this month that took down as many as 1,500 businesses worldwide. But for many victims it was too little, too late. Kaseya had obtained a decryption key, the company said, that could release any file still locked down by malicious software produced by the criminal gang REvil, which is believed to operate from Eastern Europe or Russia. For the organizations whose systems were still offline three weeks after the attack, the newfound availability of a decryptor tool offered a sign of hope, especially after REvil mysteriously disappeared from the internet and left many organizations unable to contact the group. But for many others that have already recovered without Kaseya's help, either by paying off the ransomware gang weeks ago or by painstakingly restoring … [Read more...]

London (CNN Business) Just seven months after singing its praises , British Prime Minister Boris Johnson is attempting to rewrite the Brexit deal he signed with the European Union. It's a risky move that will undermine Britain's credibility as a trustworthy trading partner at the very moment that the UK government is seeking to forge economic alliances far beyond Europe to justify its "global Britain" sales pitch for Brexit, according to experts. EU officials have already rejected the UK call for a renegotiation , which trade experts say amounts to a brazen attempt to press the European Union to agree to demands that it already rejected during several rounds of talks. Other countries watching the drama unfold will proceed with caution when it comes to dealing with the United Kingdom, according to L. Alan Winters of the UK Trade Policy Observatory at the University of Sussex in England. "It certainly does raise questions about the … [Read more...]

New York (CNN Business) Major meat producer JBS USA suffered a cyberattack on Sunday. The attack affected servers supporting its IT systems in North America and Australia, the company said in a news release . "The company is not aware of any evidence at this time that any customer, supplier or employee data has been compromised or misused as a result of the situation," JBS said. "Resolution of the incident will take time, which may delay certain transactions with customers and suppliers." Defense Secretary says US has 'offensive options' to respond to cyberattacks JBS USA is part of JBS Foods , which it says is one of the world's largest food companies. It has operations in 15 countries and has customers in about 100 countries, according to its website . Its brands include Pilgrim's, Great Southern and Aberdeen Black. JBS said it is working with an incident response firm to restore its systems as soon as possible. The … [Read more...]