Author: SKYNEWS

Google illegally maintained an online search monopoly, a US court has said, in one of the biggest rulings against the company’s market dominance. The tech giant has been successfully sued in federal court by the US Justice Department and states which argued it remained the most used internet search engine by paying smartphone makers billions to make Google the default on browsers and devices. Money blog: US recession fearThis created anti-competitive barriers to entry for potential new or smaller search engines and further entrenched Google’s position, the government and 38 states and territories, led by Colorado and Nebraska, argued.Regulators in…

Banksy has revealed a new piece of art in west London.The famous street artist’s latest work features a silhouette of a goat, perched on top of a wall. It is done in his signature stencil-style and a CCTV camera is nearby, at times pointed at the animal, as rocks fall down below it. Image: Members of the public look on at the new Banksy artwork. Pic: PA It is thought the artwork is based near Kew Bridge, in Richmond.Banksy posted the art on his Instagram – which is how he has previously claimed his work. This comes around a month…

Stock markets around the world have dropped sharply on Monday amid fears the US economy may be heading for a recession.The UK’s FTSE 100 was down more than 2% in early trading on Monday, while the FTSE 250 fell more than 3%. Other exchanges in Europe, including in France, Germany, Portugal and Spain, fell by similar levels.It follows much steeper drops in Asia earlier today – and further falls are expected in the US when markets there open later.Japan’s Nikkei 225 share index was down more than 12% at the close on Monday – its biggest fall since “Black Monday”…

A Disney Channel child star has told Sky News that she “broke down in tears” after learning a criminal had used artificial intelligence (AI) to create sexual abuse images using her face.Kaylin Hayman, who is 16 years old, returned home from school one day to a phone call from the FBI. An investigator told her that a man living thousands of miles away had sexually violated her without her knowledge.Kaylin’s face, the investigator said, had been superimposed on images of adults performing sexual acts.”I broke down in tears when I heard,” Kaylin says. “It feels like such an invasion of…

Dame Shirley Bassey, Sir Tom Jones and Bonnie Tyler are just some of the musicians to have called Wales their home.This week, the talents of the land of song are on full display at one of Europe’s largest music and poetry festivals, the National Eisteddfod. But concerns have been raised about the future of the country’s arts sector due to funding cuts.Proposals from the Welsh National Opera (WNO) would see its orchestra made part-time and musicians’ pay cut by 15 per cent.More than 11,000 people have signed a petition calling for the proposals to be scrapped. Image: To paraphrase Dame…

A French DJ who performed at the Paris Olympics opening ceremony has filed a legal complaint after suffering “an extremely violent campaign” of online abuse.Barbara Butch has been threatened with “death, torture, and rape, and has also been the target of numerous antisemitic, homophobic, sexist and grossophobic insults [stigma based on body size]”, her lawyer said. Police in Paris have launched an investigation.The 43-year-old producer and activist appeared alongside a number of drag queens during a segment that has been compared with the biblical scene of the Last Supper.In it, Butch wore a silver headdress that looked like a halo.…

Morrisons has turned some of its supermarket freezers up by 3C.The grocery chain says the move is part of a trial to cut carbon emissions, but has insisted the measure will not impact food safety. It said the current industry standard of putting freezers at -18C was set almost 100 years ago and had not been updated since, despite improvements in refrigeration technology.Money latest – follow for updatesFreezers in 10 stores across the country have been changed, taking into account the weather and supply routes, with plans to roll out the temperature change to other outlets. According to the supermarket,…

The discovery of a half-a-billion-year-old slug with spines has shed light on the origins of animals like oysters and octopuses, researchers have said. The new fossil, called Shishania aculeata, reveals that the earliest molluscs (animals that do not have a backbone) were flat, shell-less slugs covered in a protective spiny armour. Underneath, the animal was made up of a muscular foot, like that of a slug, and would have used it to crawl across the seabed, experts suggest in a new study.The species was found in well-preserved fossils from eastern Yunnan Province in southern China and dates back to a geological…

An arrest warrant has been issued for the actor who played the green ranger in the Power Rangers film franchise over an alleged parking dispute, police say.A truck linked to a man, identified as Hector David Rivera, was parked in a spot for people with disabilities at a shopping centre in Nampa, Idaho, when a man confronted him, city police spokesperson Carmen Boeger said. The victim, a man in his 60s who uses a walking frame, took pictures of the licence plate of a pickup truck that was parked in the disabled spot.Video shows a man push the victim to…

Sir Paul Marshall, the hedge fund tycoon and GB News shareholder, is closing in on a deal to buy The Spectator, one of Britain’s most influential political media titles.Sky News has learnt that Sir Paul, the co-founder of Marshall Wace, has emerged as the leading contender to buy The Spectator, which is part of an auction process which also involves the Daily and Sunday Telegraph newspapers. Sources close to the process said the City financier’s Old Queen Street Ventures vehicle could strike a deal to buy the magazine as soon as this month.A transaction for The Spectator, which was first…