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Exclusive: US vice-president 'sympathetic' to concerns over Grok-generated pornography, says deputy PMJD Vance, the US vice-president, has agreed that it is “entirely unacceptable” for platforms such as X to allow the proliferation of AI-generated sexualised images of women and children, David Lammy has told the Guardian.The deputy prime minister said Vance, usually known as an AI enthusiast, expressed concern about how the technology was being used to fuel “hyper-pornographied slop” online when they met in Washington on Thursday. Continue reading......

But critics expressed doubt that president can implement such a move without approval from CongressDonald Trump announced a one-year cap that would limit credit card interest rates to 10% this week, in a move that has prompted mixed reaction from lawmakers and beyond.The president's social media post on Friday night said the restriction would take effect on 20 January, but he did not provide specifics on how the government would implement it or ensure that companies comply. Continue reading......

Hopes that tougher sanctions and lower oil prices could derail Putin's war effort underestimate how far the Kremlin has rewired its economyPacing inside the Kremlin last weekend, as news feeds churned out minute-by-minute reports of Donald's Trump's Venezuelan coup, Vladimir Putin may have been wondering what it would mean for the price of oil.Crude oil has lubricated the Russian economy for decades – far more than gas exports to Europe – and so the threat of falling oil prices, prompted by US plans for control of Venezuela's rigs, will have been a source of concern. Continue reading......

Demonstration follows similar actions in Poland, France and Belgium as EU states approve accordThousands of Irish farmers are protesting against the EU's trade deal with the South American bloc Mercosur, a day after EU states approved the treaty despite opposition from Ireland and France.Tractors streamed into the roads of Athlone, in central Ireland, for the demonstration, displaying signs bearing the slogan “Stop EU-Mercosur” and the EU flag emblazoned with the words “sell out”. Continue reading......

Ministers warn platform could be blocked after Grok AI used to create sexual images without consentElon Musk has accused the UK government of wanting to suppress free speech after ministers threatened fines and a possible ban for his social media site X after its AI tool, Grok, was used to make sexual images of women and children without their consent.The billionaire claimed Grok was the most downloaded app on the UK App Store on Friday night after ministers threatened to take action unless the function to create sexually harassing images was removed. Continue reading......

Elon Musk's reckless and degrading AI could be built differently. But Americans will have to speak upOver the past year, Elon Musk has made a series of protocol changes to Grok, the proprietary AI chatbot of his company xAI, which runs prominently on his social media site X, formerly Twitter. Many of these changes have been geared to make the bot more amenable to producing pornography. In August, Grok launched an image generator, branded as Grok Imagine, which featured a service geared toward creating nude, suggestive or sexually explicit content, including computer-generated pornographic images of real women. The feature, which was quickly used to create naked images of celebrities such as Taylor Swift, also allowed users to create brief videos, complete with animations and sounds.Musk also rolled out AI girlfriends on the platform: animated personas – including female characters with exaggerated breasts and hips – that interacted in sexually explicit ways with users. One of the characters, “Ani??...

Surge in 2025 sales correlates with the growth in church attendances in England and Wales, research showsFor Christian booksellers, the good news about Bibles sales has been few and far between. But in recent retail figures, there was a revelation.Sales of the good book reached a record high in the UK in 2025, increasing by 134% since 2019 – the highest since records began – according to industry research. Last year, the total sales of Bibles in the UK reached £6.3m in 2025, £3.61mup on 2019 sales. Continue reading......

Swedish producer is trying to to accelerate the process of extracting the elements vital for hi-tech productsIt is deep winter with temperatures dropping to -20C. The sun never rises above the horizon, instead bathing Sweden's most northerly town of Kiruna in a blue crepuscular light, or “civil twilight” as it is known, for two or three hours a day stretching visibility a few metres, notwithstanding heavy snow.But 900 metres below the arctic conditions, a team of 20 gather every day, forgoing the brief glimpse of natural light and spearheading the EU's race to mine its own rare earths. Despite identification of several deposits around the continent, and some rare earth refineries including Solvay in France, there are no operational rare earth mines in Europe. Continue reading......

Si'n Berry MP responds to the news that landlords claim they are being pushed out of the market. Plus a letter from Benjamin McKechnieMy heart obviously breaks for distressed buy-to-let landlords (Are UK buy-to-let landlords dying out – and should we care?, 5 January) but, if some landlords are feeling the pinch, a policy I have long pestered the government about is, by chance, tailor-made to help them. We need to replenish our decimated social housing stock, and part of the answer is what I call “buy the supply”.For years, I have called for funding to help councils increase the number of homes they can buy into their housing supply. Whether that is buying back right to buy homes, or snapping up suitable houses that are put on the market, this can achieve immediate, construction-risk-free social homes near existing schools, parks and health services. Continue reading......

US faces big challenges in trying to unlock 'tremendous wealth' from Venezuela's long-neglected oil industryDonald Trump has laid claim to billions of dollars' worth of Venezuelan crude this week, which at a stroke has handed the world's biggest consumer of oil up to 50m barrels – but his ambitions are far greater.The White House said Venezuela would be “turning over” the nearly $3bn (£2.3bn) of crude stranded in tankers and storage facilities before it is sold on the international market and after that the US plans to control all the country's oil sales “indefinitely”. Continue reading......

Experts note the blackout is unprecedented in its extent but also selective, allowing some government communicationsIran's internet shutdown, now in place for 36 hours as the authorities seek to quell escalating anti-government protests, represents a “new high-water mark” in terms of its sophistication and severity, say experts – and could last a long time.As the blackout kicked in, 90% of internet traffic to Iran evaporated. International calls to the country appeared blocked and domestic mobile phones had no service, said Amir Rashidi, an Iranian digital rights expert. Continue reading......

Richest 1% took 10 days while wealthiest 0.1% needed just three days to exhaust annual carbon budget, study showsThe world's richest 1% have used up their fair share of carbon emissions just 10 days into 2026, analysis has found.Meanwhile, the richest 0.1% took just three days to exhaust their annual carbon budget, according to the research by Oxfam. Continue reading......

Consumers advised to review paying for services such as Netflix, Apple TV and Amazon Prime if they are unusedBritons are spending up to £1,200 a year on subscription services but could save as much as £400 by killing off “zombie” memberships, according to research.Millions of households have unused or duplicate subscriptions – whether for a neglected exercise app or an unwatched Netflix account – with recurring charges quietly draining spare cash from bank accounts. Continue reading......

Platform has restricted image creation on the Grok AI tool to paying subscribers, but victims and experts say this does not go far enoughElon Musk's X has been ordered by the UK government to tackle a wave of indecent AI images or face a de facto ban, as an expert said the platform was no longer a “safe space” for women.The media watchdog, Ofcom, confirmed it would accelerate an investigation into X as a backlash grew against the site, which has hosted a deluge of images depicting partially stripped women and children. Continue reading......

Country is 'uninvestable' today, president told, but CEOs signal they are ready to spend with supportDonald Trump promised oil giants “total safety, total security” in Venezuela in an effort to persuade them to invest $100bn in the country's infrastructure after US forces toppled Nicolás Maduro from power.At a roundtable press conference at the White House on Friday afternoon with more than a dozen oil executives, including leaders from Chevron, ExxonMobil and ConocoPhilips, the US president doubled down on claims that Maduro's arrest presents American oil companies with an unprecedented opportunity for extraction. Continue reading......

The US president is weaponising tech, but his tariffs and Brexit provide a surprising opportunity to gain back digital control of our livesIt's been 25 years since I started working for the Electronic Frontier Foundation, an American nonprofit dedicated to preserving and promoting human rights on the internet. I've found myself in dozens of countries working with activists, politicians and civil servants to untangle the complex technical questions raised by the internet, and every one of our discussions ended in the same place. “OK,” they'd say, “you've definitely laid out the best way to regulate tech, but we can't do it.”Why not? Because – inevitably – the US trade rep had beaten me to every one of those countries and made it eye-wateringly clear that if they regulated tech in a way that favoured their own people, industries and national interests, the US would bury them in tariffs.Cory Doctorow is a science fiction author, activist and journalist. He is the author of dozens of books, m...

Some experts have voiced fears a tech meltdown could hit our savings and pensions – here's how to protect yourselfThe new year has started as 2025 ended – with share prices booming amid warnings from some that the growth is being driven by overvalued technology stocks. Fears of an “AI bubble” have been voiced by people from the governor of the Bank of England to the head of Google's parent company, Alphabet.Even if you have not actively invested in technology shares, the chances are you have some exposure to companies operating in the sphere. Even if you do not, a collapse could take down other companies' values. Continue reading......

Utility admits parent company paid CEO Ruth Jefferson and CFO Andy Pymer but denies bonus paymentsThe bosses of Wessex Water received £50,000 in previously undisclosed extra pay from a parent company, in the same year that the utility was banned from paying bonuses, the Guardian can reveal.Chief executive Ruth Jefferson and chief financial officer Andy Pymer were paid £24,000 and £27,000 respectively in the year to June 2025, according to a spokesperson for Wessex Water's owner, the Malaysian YTL group. Continue reading......

Many of the old challenges remain but there are a number of reasons why this time a deal of some kind could be possibleMining firms Rio Tinto and Glencore restart $260bn merger talksHere we go again. A combination of Rio Tinto and Glencore has been talked about for years and the duo held aborted negotiations at the end of 2024. With the global mining industry in deal-making mode – frenzies come along every 15 years or so – the idea of RioGlen or GlenTinto was due another whirl. On Friday, the two FTSE 100 companies said they were in “preliminary discussions” about a “possible combination of some or all of their businesses”. A full-blown tie-up would be worth about $260bn (£120bn), including debt.Many of the old challenges to a deal haven't gone away. Glencore's roots lie in trading commodities; Rio is a traditional pure miner, so the fit is culturally imperfect. Does Rio, which got out of coal as long ago as 2018 under investor pressure, really want to go back in by adding Glencore's signi...

White House is meanwhile facing questions about an apparent embargo breach over Trump's social media postHiring held firm in the US last month, official data showed, amid uncertainty over the strength and direction of the world's largest economy.Employers added 50,000 jobs to the US labor force last month, capping the weakest year of growth since the pandemic, according to data released from the US Bureau of Labor Statistics on Friday. Continue reading......