Author: SKYNEWS

MI6 is launching a new dark web portal to recruit spies for the UK.The secure messaging platform Silent Courier aims to boost national security by making it easier for the intelligence agency to recruit potential agents in Russia and around the world, the Foreign Office said. Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper said: “As the world changes, and the threats we’re facing multiply, we must ensure the UK is always one step ahead of our adversaries.” Image: Foreign Secretary Yvette Cooper. Pic: PA Silent Courier is accessible from Friday and enables a secure avenue to submit sensitive information to the UK relating…

Sally Rooney says she could not come to the UK to pick up an award earlier this week because she can “no longer safely enter the UK without facing arrest”.The Irish author of hit novels including Normal People and Conversations With Friends recently pledged her royalties to proscribed group Palestine Action, meaning she is at risk of committing a terror offence under UK law. Palestine Action was proscribed as a terrorist organisation in the UK on 5 July.The 34-year-old had won a Sky Arts Award, in the literature category, for her latest novel, Intermezzo, beating fellow writers Alan Hollinghurst and…

Octopus Energy Group has picked bankers to oversee the sale of a minority stake in Kraken Technologies, its multibillion pound software arm.Sky News has learnt that Octopus Energy – now Britain’s biggest household gas and electricity supplier – has engaged Goldman Sachs to handle the demerger of Kraken Technologies. The Wall Street bank will also orchestrate discussions with prospective investors about the disposal of a minority stake in Kraken, sources said on Thursday.Money blog: ESTA prices to go up – here’s how to beat the riseA deal could value Kraken in the region of $10bn, the sources added. The demerger…

Chimpanzees consume the equivalent of two human alcoholic drinks each day thanks to their fondness for ripe fruit, researchers have said.Wild chimpanzees regularly eat around 10% of their body weight in ripe fruit daily, and because the fruit often is undergoing natural fermentation – the process that turns sugar into alcohol – it means the apes are consuming the human equivalent of two cocktails daily. A team from the University of California, Berkeley, measured the alcohol content of the fermented ripe fruits consumed regularly by chimps at two sites – in Uganda and Ivory Coast. Image: A chimpanzee eating figs…

Bob Geldof has confirmed he will not be running for the Irish presidency – and says it’s partly because he’d “miss London”.Speaking to Sky News at the Sky Arts Awards on Tuesday night, the 73-year-old musician and aid campaigner said: “My kids are here, my missus is here, my homes are here. “I’d miss London. The band is here, I wouldn’t be able to play.”In Ireland, any Irish citizen over 35 can run for president – but to get on the ballot, a candidate must be nominated by 20 members of parliament or four local authorities.Geldof said: “I simply wouldn’t…

The investor which swooped on WH Smith’s high street business earlier this year is in pole position to snap up the British operations of Claire’s, the accessories retailer which collapsed last month.Sky News has learnt that Modella Capital has agreed the outline of a deal with Claire’s new US-based owner, private equity firm Ames Watson, which paves the way for it to buy the UK chain. Modella is said to have edged ahead of rival bidders in recent days including Touker Suleyman, the Dragons’ Den judge, and HMV-owner Doug Putman in recent days.Ames Watson is understood to have been seeking…

Some of the biggest US technology companies have pledged billions of pounds of investment to turbocharge Britain’s artificial intelligence (AI) industry, as the two countries announce a landmark technology deal.Nvidia, Microsoft, Open AI and Google made a flurry of announcements to coincide with President Trump’s state visit to the UK. They include plans to build data centres and invest in AI research and engineering.Money latest: Tax warning over state pension Sir Keir Starmer described the agreement, which both leaders will sign over the coming days, as “a generational step change” in Britain’s relationship with the US. The deal will see…

Hollywood actor and Oscar-winning director Robert Redford, known for films including Butch Cassidy And The Sundance Kid, All The President’s Men and The Sting, has died at the age of 89.Redford, who was also the founder of the Sundance Film Festival, the largest independent film festival in the US, died on Tuesday morning. In a statement, his representative said he was “surrounded by those he loved”, at home in “the place he loved” in the mountains of Utah. “He will be missed greatly,” she added. Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player 0:29 Redford in Butch Cassidy…

The boss of Aldermore Bank, one of Britain’s biggest challenger lenders, is leaving to run Fairstone Group, a privately owned wealth management and mortgage provider.Sky News understands that Steven Cooper, a former boss of C Hoare & Co, the UK’s oldest private bank, will be named this week as Fairstone’s chief executive. The company has set Mr Cooper the target of replicating his performance at Aldermore by doubling Fairstone’s size by 2030.Backed by investors including TA Associates, Fairstone has roughly £20bn of assets under management, and a client base of more than 120,000 people.Under Mr Cooper, South African-owned Aldermore doubled…

Google is set to invest £5bn in the UK in the next two years, to support growing demands for AI services.The announcement, which comes as Google opens a new data centre in Waltham Cross in Hertfordshire, is expected to contribute to the creation of thousands of jobs, the US tech giant said. Chancellor Rachel Reeves described it as a “vote of confidence” in the UK economy.The news comes hours before Donald Trump lands in the UK for a state visit at which he and Sir Keir Starmer are widely expected to sign a new UK-US tech deal.It also follows reports…