Criminals ‘systematically’ targeting UK shops, costing £400m last year, say retailers

Criminal gangs are “systematically” targeting shops, retailers have warned, with 5.5m incidents of shoplifting detected last year, costing the industry an estimated £400m.The British Retail Consortium (BRC) has warned over “endemic” violence towards shop workers – who faced an average 36 incidents of violence involving a weapon every day last year – and said high levels of theft was causing “anxiety” among retail staff.Helen Dickinson, the chief executive of the BRC, called on police to consistently prioritise tackling retail crime and commit “dedicated resourcing” to the problem.The BRC research comes after the government put forward new legislation to back a stand-alone offence for assaulting a retail worker and to remove a £200 threshold for “low level” theft, which has a maximum six-month custodial sentence

Crypto exchange Binance may have funded Iranian entities, reports say

Shortly after Donald Trump pardoned Changpeng Zhao, the Binance founder, last fall, company employees revealed the cryptocurrency exchange may have funded Iranian entities with billions of dollars, according to a report by the New York Times.The discovery was made by a group of internal Binance investigators, who reportedly found that people in Iran had accessed more than 1,500 accounts on the crypto platform. Two of those accounts allegedly saw $1.7bn move to Iranian-backed groups that included Yemen’s Houthi militants throughout 2024 and 2025, according to the Wall Street Journal.The company investigators say they reported those transactions to Binance’s executives, but then were reportedly disciplined

Palantir deals are a threat to our data rights as UK citizens | Letters

For 100 years, the UK government has led us through existential threats, including two world wars. But instead of resisting the latest threat to democratic accountability, it has welcomed it with open arms: Palantir Technologies (NHS deal with AI firm Palantir called into question after officials’ concerns revealed, 12 February).This polarising US surveillance giant provides data-fusion and AI platforms used by by the US for immigration enforcement and by Israel in the Gaza conflict. Its software amplifies state power through militarised analytics and opaque algorithms.The current government hasn’t just surrendered citizens’ data rights to Palantir – it has paid for the privilege

Sam Altman defends AI’s energy toll by saying it also takes a lot to ‘train a human’

The OpenAI boss, Sam Altman, has tried to ease concerns about how much power is used by artificial intelligence models by comparing it to the amount of energy required by human development.“People talk about how much energy it takes to train an AI model – but it also takes a lot of energy to train a human,” Altman told the Indian Express recently while in India for the AI Impact summit. “It takes about 20 years of life – and all the food you consume during that time – before you become smart.”Despite that defense, he said that the public assessment of AI’s energy consumption was “fair”, adding: “We need to move towards nuclear or wind and solar very quickly.”Those remarks come amid growing discussion about the environmental impact of the datacenters required to power AI models – and, more generally, about technology’s possible impact on society

‘Landmark moment’: Emma Lawrence to become first woman to call NRL games

Emma Lawrence will become the first woman in NRL broadcast history to call a game, with Triple M including “one of the sharpest broadcasters in rugby league” on its play-by-play commentary team for the new season.Lawrence, one of the most respected voices in the game, will enter the domain previously reserved for men in a move the radio station called a “landmark moment”. Female voices are present across broader coverage of the NRL, but a woman has never been handed the prestigious play-by-play call before.The move follows other sports which showcase women as lead commentators for men’s matches, including Kelli Underwood on AFL and Isa Guha on cricket.Sports commentator Kate Allman said it was “a win for all women working in commentary and sport broadcasting”

Constitution Hill’s win at Southwell showed the way to a brighter future for racing

There are times when it feels as though the entirety of British horse racing exists in a state of perma-gloom, bewailing an ageing fanbase, declining attendances and a moribund, factional leadership. It is, so the narrative goes, a sport in slow but irreversible decline, waiting for the inevitable moment in 10 or 20 years’ time when someone finally comes along to turn out the lights.However, every now and again, there are moments such as the Friday Night Live! card at Southwell last week which lift the mood completely, and offer hope that a 250-year-old sport has plenty of running left to give.There were grizzled veterans of many decades on the racing beat who were struggling to recall a more uplifting day at any track as they left Southwell on Friday evening. This one certainly was