bbc news

now the Hollywood actress Scarlet Johansson is taking legal advice after a new version of the AI bot chat GPT was released with a voice she claims is eily similar to her own chat gpt’s owners say the voice is not intended to be an imitation of the star our Tech reporter Shona McCallum reports Scarlet Johansson’s face is known across the world but it’s the Oscar nominated actress’s voice that’s under scrutiny good morning Theodore good morning you have a meeting in 5 minutes you want to try getting out of bed in the movie her she played an AI chat bot which a human fell in love with now listen to this oh Mark I’m doing great thanks for asking how about you a remarkably similar voice called sky has been used by open AI the company behind chat GPT as they released their assistant last week Scarlet Johansson revealed she had in fact been offered to be the voice of the new system an offer she declined so she was surprised at the likeness in a statement to the BBC she said when I heard the release demo I was shocked angered and in disbelief that Mr Alman would pursue a voice that sounded so evily similar to mine that my closest friends and news outlets could not tell the difference she personally criticized the company CEO Sam Alman for posting the word her on social media she took that as an insinuation that she was the inspiration for the chatbot sound despite denying it was an imitation The Firm said it was pausing it in a statement Mr ultman said the voice of sky is not Scarlet Johansson’s and was never intended to resemble hers we cast the voice actor behind Sky’s voice before any Outreach to miss y Hansen out of respect for Miss y Hansen we have paused using Sky’s voice in our products the actress is the latest celebrity to question how individually rights can remain protected in a world where artificial intelligence and deep fakes are becoming even more of a pressing threat Shauna mcallum BBC News interesting isn’t it how AI is developing and the different kind of elements to the story we do have a special uh AI program on my colleague Christian Fraser show uh the context which you can watch every evening from 8:00 p.m. UK time

CCTV footage has emerged of the rapper sha Diddy homes physically assaulting his then girlfriend Cassie ventor in the corridor of a hotel in 2016 Miss ventor made allegations of rape and physical abuse against him in a lawsuit that was settled last year comes is at the center of several civil lawsuits accusing him of sex offenses this report from Emma vardi has some distressing images ahead one time Cassie Ventura claims she suffered years of abuse in her relationship sh with P Diddy one of the most influential artists in hip hop in the CCTV footage she’s seen leaving a hotel room sha combms appears to run after her before carrying out a violent assault the full tape shows her being kicked as she lies on the ground after taking her items next the rapper seems to be seen throwing an object towards her the video obtained by the American News Channel CNN hasn’t been independently verified but lawyers for Cassie Ventura who’s not objected to it being shown say it confirms P Diddy’s disturbing and predatory behavior last month homes linked with sha comes were raided by police in what they said was an ongoing investigation into sex trafficking officers searched properties in Beverly Hills New York and Miami associated with his production company Cassie Ventura previously brought a law suit against sha comes in relation to the incident in the video said to be at a Los Angeles hotel she settled out of court but since then several others have come forward accusing him of sexual abuse sha comes has previously denied all the allegations in March his lawyers called it a witch hunt today those lawyers said they no longer represent him the video appears to corroborate one of the incidents described in Cassie Ventura’s case her ACC ations and others against P Diddy a self-proclaimed bad boy now part of a dramatic downfall for one of Hip Hop’s biggest names Emma vardy BBC News Los Angeles

we start this hour with some breaking news out of Iran State television says there’s been an accident involving a helicopter that might have been carrying president r e well with me is Sebastian Usher the BBC World Services Middle East analyst so Sebastian this news only just coming into us what do we know well we’re getting um information from various Iranian sources of the semiofficial news agencies uh that provide I mean a pretty good uh understanding of what happens in Iran but isn’t necessarily with full official confirmation so what we’ve heard is that the president RI was traveling in a convoy we’re hearing this from at least one Iranian source of three helicopters over East aaban and that one helicopter had to make what was described as a rough a hard Landing now that helicopter it has emerged over the past half an hour or so seems almost certainly to have had president RI on board not only President RI but also the Iranian foreign minister on board now this is an area where uh there it’s mountainous it’s wooded and we’re hearing from these sources but there’s particularly bad weather conditions there but it’s foggy so a major rescue operation is underway as you’d expect but at the moment there’s no clarity about what has happened to this helicopter two of the helicopters on at least one Iranian Source are reported to have arrived safely uh at their destination so there is obviously huge speculation that’s going on um I mean as as far as I can see at the moment there is emerging official confirmation that President RI was on board that helicopter but what has happened to that helicopter what state it’s in uh we don’t know as yet and would it be usual for president Ry to be using helicopters to travel around I mean he he he’s a president he he he does travel widely um it is uh not something that is unusual for him to be making his trips there there’s there’s no kind of issue about him being able to travel in any sense uh if this was the supreme leader ham that that would be a different case but president R is very much the outward-looking face of the Iranian uh government so he is you know often traveling to different locations around the world whether it’s by helicopter or by plane so that in itself is Not Unusual Sebastian Usha thank you very much for the latest and of course if there are any developments we will bring them to you on that breaking story here on BBC News and you can get more on that on the BBC News website

UK in Mery side a brutal organized crime group has been taken down by its own text messages more than 30 major criminals have been jailed after a million pounds worth of cocaine was stolen from a violent organized crime group the crime bosses wanted to murder the men they thought were responsible but police had cracked their encrypted phone up and could see what they were planning brona Monroe reports three masked men arrive outside a drug Stash House in Liverpool a fourth is pretending to deliver a parcel 4 minutes later they escape with the heighten firms cocaine hell two men in the house have been attacked with a macher and an ax right what injuries have you got mate just sit yourself down you all right there mate yeah a tril of blood leads to a manhole cover where the cocaine was hidden are you in dispute with anyone have you upset anyone lately or has anybody got a better a beef with you any information better than nothing no one from the heighten firm talks but this time the police have a secret weapon the encryption system the criminals use called anrat has been cracked detectives can see the messages they’re sending each other the grip they’re talking about is the stolen cocaine 30 kilos are gone that’s a Million worth it’s clear from the messages I’ve seen that this is a very effective criminal business High industrial scale trafficking of drugs with tentacles across the UK and internationally and obviously willing to resort to severe violence this place them for me in the upper te of organized crime in the UK Crime Boss Vincent kogin thinks he’s identified some of the cocaine robbers and he wants revenge his enforcer Paul Woodford asks how many he once killed cogins replies four dead men walk in they do business with violence it is a world where a bullet in the head is just literally another way of doing business and that’s the brutality of it it’s a world where there are no laws other than essentially what you could call the laws of the Jungle Vincent cogins and Paul Woodford were arrested before they could carry out their threats cogins has been jailed for 28 years for drug trafficking and blackmail Woodford got 24 years and 6 months in total more than 30 serious criminals linked to the Coan Heist have been convicted they’ve been sentenced to over 350 years Bruno Monroe BBC News

Ukraine says it’s foiled a Russian plot to kidnap and kill President zilinski two Ukrainian security officials have been arrested the assassination attempt was said to have been timed for President Putin’s inauguration and what was described as a present BBC has obtained this footage from the Ukrainian Security Service which claims to show the two agents admitting to the plot I’ve been speaking to our Ukraine correspondent James Waterhouse he’s in ke right now who told us more about the plot well Lucy assassination plots against President zilinski are common and they have been since the full scale Invasion when Russian power Troopers attempted to land in Kev and take him out um but this is an alleged plan which really does stand out you have the country’s intelligence service claiming to have held two serving uh Colonels in the country’s uh Security Service which is responsible for keeping institutions as well as senior officials safe and they are accused of planning to leak uh president zalinski and these other officials their movements to Moscow the details of how they’re protected by security guards as well as the addresses in which they stay and the alleged plan was for those addresses to be struck by Russian missiles but the detail doesn’t stop there these uh Colonels uh reportedly took weapons from the Ukrainian regions where they were serving which included drones mines explosives they allegedly took them to Kiev to carry out this attack now we don’t know how close these men uh got to carrying out their plan it is claimed that they were hired by Moscow as moles before the fullscale invasion in meetings in other European countries where large sums of cash were transferred it’s got it all really this plot um but it it’s also a reminder of the dangers that President zilinski a wartime leader faces in this conflict if these two men are convicted they face a life sentence in prison James how well protected is President zinski he is incredibly well protected I remember a press conference where I tried to pop to the L just before it started but president zilinski was coming in and he has a sizable detail there arm to the teeth and you can’t really move when he uh is in the room you can orally hear is motorcade moving around uh Kiev but this is a a president who is Keen to still travel around he often makes visits to the front lines some very hostile areas where he will be seen to meet troops uh and often those Journeys are made in low-flying helicopters it’s a means of Transport which is claim the live lives of other top officials when a helicopter crashed a couple of years ago in heavy fog um but he has become accustomed to the risk you know this is a guy who is willing to stay despite offers to leave Ukraine uh early on in the full scale Invasion and with this country still being in martial law with elections still on hold for now it seems he is intent on staying but of course he still is now grappling with other political domestic issues uh as part of the job that gloss of the early Invasion has worn off now he is now trying to mobilize as many men as possible for a fight that is not going Ukraine’s way at the moment James waterhous there around the world and across the UK this is BBC News

this is cancer in space we said well
what happens if you send full-blown
cancer into space will cancer go crazy
which it did the cancer hitch a ride on
a mission to the International Space
Station and it was sent there by
scientists because cells and cancer
react very differently when they get to
space if we send these manyi tumors into
space they triple in size and just 10
days and it would take 10 years to see
that on the ground so cancer becomes
unhinged in space it’s believed that the
weaker gravity acting on cells up in
space known as microgravity is the main
culprit cancer is really trying to form
its own organ or tissue and it is
invading and metastasizing spreading to
other areas in other words unrestrained
by normal tissue boundaries and that’s
what we see in microgravity but while
cancer develops in warp speed in space
it also means scientists can experiment
with possible treatments equally rapidly
and they’ve honed their focus on a
spefic specific Gene called adar1 adar1
has been on our radar for about a decade
as a cause of Cancer’s capacity to be
able to come back by cloning itself and
evading our immune system this Gene gets
switched on when cells are under stress
and has been linked to about 20
different types of cancer especially
when cancers become resistant to therapy
so we were testing if it gets turned on
can we turn off that cancer cloning Gene
with a drug if we genetically knocked
down Adar does that block these little
little mini tumors from cloning
themselves which it did and we think we
found a cancer kill switch so if we can
block Adar we can prevent cancer from
cloning itself the scientists believe
they may well have found a way to Target
this adar1 Gene through a drug called
reex anib we were able to shut down that
Adar Gene and prevent its capacity to
get these little mini tumors to clone
themselves or in other words grow in the
bi reactor so that’s what we saw in this
Mission but it’s not just the cancer
cells being studied it’s also the
astronauts themselves so this is a
uniquely talented but also committed
group of scientists that are willing to
not just help you do the experiment
they’re actually part of the experiment
they’re giving their blood so we can get
their stem cells to see how they
responded to that space FL but before we
get too carried away this drug is still
far from being available for treatment
on humans here on Earth We’re trying to
get into clinical trials before the end
of this year because there are patients
that I’ll see today in clinic that
already need this we need that kill
switch for cancer we need to stop it in
its tracks before it blasts off and so
rather than being frustrated on the
ground we’re getting really exciting new
solutions that we’re discovering from
space
e

now Dutch police have arrested several
climate activists who attempted to block
a main road in the ha those detained
included the Swedish campaigner Greta
tumber our correspondent Anna hollan was
there the final few climate activists
have just packed up their banners and
are preparing to go home earlier there
were cries cheers of You are not alone
as Greta tunberg was picked up off the
highway by Dutch police and put on to a
minibus along with hundreds of other
protesters you can see her here chatting
happily uh to fellow
activists she’s here in the ha to
announce International actions against
governments who make it cheap and easy
for large companies to use fossil fuels
by offering them tax breaks and
subsidies on excise dues Greta tumberg
described her arrest as as peaceful most
of the protesters have gone home or been
detained by police and taken away in
mini buses police are just keeping watch
to make sure that nobody else tries to
block this highway the a12 in the ha

[Music]
hello I’m Regina vial and welcome to
this hour in the past few minutes a
court in Vietnam has sentenced a wealthy
proper developer to death for defrauding
a bank of billions of dollars
67-year-old trong Milan was found guilty
of embezzlement bribing State officials
and violating Bank lending regulations
after she used her hidden ownership of
the Saigon Commercial Bank to channel
$44 billion of loans to her own
companies it’s been described as one of
the greatest Brank frauds in history
well for more on this we can go straight
to Bangkok and join our southeast Asia
correspondent Jonathan headed first of
all Jonathan if you could just tell us a
little bit more about what the court
said today and the background to this
case uh well the the Court’s been giving
enormous amounts of detail about this
case uh through its five weeks um so
everyone in Vietnam knows a lot about it
not that’s quite unusual there um
they’ve wanted the public to know about
this case um it is extraordinary the
amounts of money are absolutely stering
we’re talking about a significant chunk
of Vietnam’s GDP that this woman was
able to siphon off over 11 years of
through these um secretly channeled
loans that went through a whole bunch of
front companies and proxies to her own
companies um the prosecutors believe
that of that 44 billion perhaps 27
billion may never be recovered um that
is a staggering loss and will be very
very tough for the State Bank uh to to
to make up in terms of saving the bank
um really the authorities have sort of
blamed Chong Milan and and and have
talked about the way in which she was
bribing officials and the kind of
sophistication of this this network and
really it it is part of an ongoing
anti-corruption campaign that’s been
going for several years led by the
communist authorities who say they’re
determined to stamp it out but of course
it does raise a lot of questions which
is how was it that this woman she’s very
high-profile she’s one of the biggest
property owners in in Vietnam how was
she able to do that for 11 years and of
course officially the authorities say
well she was paying off this person and
that and hiding this and that but it is
extraordinary that it went on for 11
years without being stopped and I think
those questions still hang over whether
the Vietnamese authorities are capable
of reigning in this kind of Fraud and
Jonathan you say that this was a trial
that was followed by so many people in
Vietnam and trong Milan is a well known
property developer in the country but
now she faces the death
penalty that itself is extraordinary
normally the death penalty is not
usually handed down on women but I think
this case was so exceptional in terms of
its scale and the Damage it’s done to
Vietnam’s finances they probably felt
they needed to make an example of her
they may also be trying to encourage her
to give as much money back as as they
can get her to do this is something the
other um 80 defendants in court today
have largely done they they’re all more
minor of course but these are all the
people accused of conspiring with her
including for example a Chief Inspector
of the State Bank who was bribed 5
million dollar according to prosecutors
in order to look the other way they’ve
all pleaded guilty and offered to bring
back as much money as they can I think
the state believes that TR Milan must
have far more assets that she can return
to the state to try and make up this
massive hole in this bank’s finances
okay Jonathan head uh in Bangkok
watching that huge trial in Vietnam and
that verdict for thank you very much and
Jonathan’s written an analysis piece on
the BBC News website with more
background to