NEWS

The Shadowserver Foundation and Eye Security would not disclose which firms were affected.

A sweeping cyber espionage operation targeting Microsoft server software has compromised about 100 different organisations over the weekend.

Two of the organisations that helped uncover the attack announced their findings on Monday.

On Saturday, Microsoft issued an alert about “active attacks” on self-hosted SharePoint servers, which are widely used by organisations to share documents and collaborate within others. SharePoint instances run off of Microsoft servers were unaffected.

Dubbed a “zero-day” because it leverages a previously undisclosed digital weakness, the hacks allow spies to penetrate vulnerable servers and potentially drop a backdoor to secure continuous access to victim organisations.

Vaisha Bernard, the chief hacker at Eye Security, a Netherlands-based cybersecurity firm which discovered the hacking campaign targeting one of its clients on Friday, said that an internet scan carried out with the Shadowserver Foundation had uncovered nearly 100 victims altogether – and that was before the technique behind the hack was widely known.

“It’s unambiguous,” Bernard said. “Who knows what other adversaries have done since to place other backdoors.”

He declined to identify the affected organisations, saying that the relevant national authorities had been notified.

The Shadowserver Foundation confirmed the 100 figure and said that most of those affected were in the United States and Germany and that the victims included government organisations.

Another researcher said that, so far, the spying appeared to be the work of a single hacker or set of hackers.

“It’s possible that this will quickly change,” said Rafe Pilling, director of threat intelligence at Sophos, a British cybersecurity firm.

A Microsoft spokesperson said in an emailed statement that it had “provided security updates and encourages customers to install them”.

It was not clear who was behind the ongoing hack. The FBI said on Sunday it was aware of the attacks and was working closely with its federal and private-sector partners, but offered no other details. Britain’s National Cyber Security Centre said in a statement that it was aware of “a limited number” of targets in the United Kingdom. A researcher tracking the hacks said that the campaign appeared initially aimed at a narrow set of government-related organisations.

Potential targets

The pool of potential targets remains vast. According to data from Shodan, a search engine that helps to identify internet-linked equipment, more than 8,000 servers online could theoretically have already been compromised by hackers.

Those servers include major industrial firms, banks, auditors, healthcare companies and several US state-level and international government entities.

“The SharePoint incident appears to have created a broad level of compromise across a range of servers globally,” said Daniel Card of British cybersecurity consultancy, PwnDefend.

“Taking an assumed breach approach is wise, and it’s also important to understand that just applying the patch isn’t all that is required here.”

On Wall Street, Microsoft’s stock is about even with the market open as of 3pm in New York (19:00 GMT), up by only 0.06 percent, and has gone up more than 1.5 percent over the last five days of trading.

A federal court has begun hearings in a pivotal case as Harvard seeks to force the United States government to return $2.6bn in federal funding frozen earlier this year.

A lawyer for Harvard, Steven Lehotsky, said at Monday’s hearing that the case is about the government trying to control the “inner workings” of Harvard. The funding cuts, if not reversed, could lead to the loss of research, damaged careers and the closing of labs, he said.

President Donald Trump’s administration has battered the nation’s oldest and wealthiest university with sanctions for months as it presses a series of demands on the Ivy League school, which it decries as a hotbed of liberalism and anti-Semitism.

Harvard has resisted, and the lawsuit over the cuts to its research grants represents the primary challenge to the administration in a standoff that is being widely watched across higher education and beyond.

The case is before US District Judge Allison Burroughs, who is presiding over lawsuits brought by Harvard against the administration’s efforts to keep it from hosting international students. In that case, she temporarily blocked the administration’s efforts.

At Monday’s hearing, Harvard is asking her to reverse a series of funding freezes. Such a ruling, if it stands, would revive Harvard’s sprawling scientific and medical research operation and hundreds of projects that lost federal money.

A lawyer for the government, Michael Velchik, said the government has the authority to cancel research grants when an institution is out of compliance with the president’s directives. He said episodes at Harvard violated Trump’s order combating anti-Semitism.

Judge questions basis for government’s findings on anti-Semitism

Burroughs pushed back, questioning how the government could make “ad hoc” decisions to cancel grants and do so across Harvard without offering evidence that any of the research is anti-Semitic.

She also argued the government had provided “no documentation, no procedure” to “suss out” whether Harvard administrators “have taken enough steps or haven’t” to combat anti-Semitism.

“The consequences of that in terms of constitutional law are staggering,” she said during Monday’s hearing. “I don’t think you can justify a contract action based on impermissible suppression of speech. Where do I have that wrong?”

Velchik said the case comes down to the government’s choosing how best to spend billions of dollars in research funding.

“Harvard claims the government is anti-Harvard. I reject that,” Velchik said. “The government is pro-Jewish students at Harvard. The government is pro-Jewish faculty at Harvard.”

Harvard’s lawsuit accuses the Trump administration of waging a retaliation campaign against the university after it rejected a series of demands in an April 11 letter from a federal anti-Semitism task force. A second lawsuit over the cuts filed by the American Association of University Professors and its Harvard faculty chapter has been consolidated with the university’s.

The April letter demanded sweeping changes related to campus protests, academics and admissions. For example, the letter told Harvard to audit the viewpoints of students and faculty and admit more students or hire new professors if the campus was found to lack diverse points of view.

Harvard President Alan Garber has said the university has made changes to combat anti-Semitism but said no government “should dictate what private universities can teach, whom they can admit and hire, and which areas of study and inquiry they can pursue”.

Monday’s hearing ended without Burroughs issuing a ruling from the bench. A ruling is expected later in writing.

Trump’s pressure campaign has involved a series of sanctions

The same day Harvard rejected the government’s demands, Trump officials moved to freeze $2.2bn in research grants. Education Secretary Linda McMahon declared in May that Harvard would no longer be eligible for new grants, and weeks later, the administration began cancelling contracts with Harvard.

As Harvard fought the funding freeze in court, individual agencies began sending letters announcing the frozen research grants were being terminated. They cited a clause that allows grants to be scrapped if they no longer align with government policies.

Harvard, which has the nation’s largest endowment at $53bn, has moved to self-fund some of its research, but warned it can’t absorb the full cost of the federal cuts.

In court filings, the school said the government “fails to explain how the termination of funding for research to treat cancer, support veterans, and improve national security addresses antisemitism”.

The Trump administration denies the cuts were made in retaliation, saying the grants were under review even before the April demand letter was sent. It argues the government has wide discretion to cancel contracts for policy reasons.

The research funding is only one front in Harvard’s fight with the federal government. The Trump administration also has sought to prevent the school from hosting foreign students, and Trump has threatened to revoke Harvard’s tax-exempt status.

Finally, last month, the Trump administration formally issued a finding that the school tolerated anti-Semitism – a step that eventually could jeopardise all of Harvard’s federal funding, including federal student loans or grants. The penalty is typically referred to as a “death sentence”.

Despite being wrongly deported and returned to the US, lawyers say Abrego Garcia again faces expulsion.

Lawyers representing Kilmar Abrego Garcia have asked a judge in Tennessee to delay his release from jail, in a bid to avoid deportation.

The filing on Monday was the latest turn in the case of Abrego Garcia, who was wrongly deported to his native El Salvador by the administration of President Donald Trump in March, but later returned to the US in June following a Supreme Court order.

Abrego Garcia has been held in jail since his return, as he faces smuggling charges related to a 2022 traffic stop.

His lawyers have dismissed the charges as “preposterous” and an effort by US officials to demonise Abrego Garcia, who has become a cause celebre for opponents of Trump’s mass deportation drive.

At the same time, they believe that if Abrego Garcia is released ahead of his trial, he will be detained by immigration agents and deported, according to the Monday filing.

They requested that any release of Abrego Garcia be delayed by 30 days so he can “evaluate his options and determine whether additional relief is necessary”.

US District Judge Waverly Crenshaw Jr is expected to soon rule on whether to free Abrego Garcia, after another judge ruled he could be released as he did not pose a flight risk.

Plan to deport

The Trump administration has long maintained that Abrego Garcia, a resident of Maryland, was a member of an MS-13 gang, a claim his lawyers have said was based on faulty information.

Abrego Garcia has never been convicted of a crime or had the claims adjudicated in court.

He was among those loaded onto a deportation flight to El Salvador under the 18th-century Alien Enemies Act, which the Trump administration has argued allows for the swift deportation of alleged gang members.

Administration officials later admitted that Abrego Garcia had been wrongly deported due to an “administrative error”, as an immigration judge in 2019 had shielded Abrego Garcia from deportation to El Salvador. The judge determined he faces threats of gang violence in his home country.

Still, for several months, the administration refused to return Abrego Garcia, who came to the US in 2011 without documentation.

Trump officials have since said that the immigration judge’s 2019 order only applies to El Salvador, and have maintained that they can legally deport Abrego Garcia to a third country.

Last month, the US Supreme Court ruled the Trump administration could deport individuals to far-flung third countries, including war-torn South Sudan, until a legal challenge to the practice makes its way through the lower courts.

Abrego Garcia’s wife, meanwhile, has filed a lawsuit against the Trump administration in Maryland. His lawyers have requested that he be transferred to state custody while the criminal and civil cases proceed.

Gaza’s health ministry says 18 people have starved to death in the last 72-hours, including four children. Experts say the famine is predictable and planned. This is how some people are trying to stay alive.

A body has been found in a lake during a search for a missing mother.

Rachel Booth, 38, disappeared in the early hours of Saturday after she was last seen by her family in the village of Barnton in Cheshire.

Cheshire Police earlier said officers had found a body which they believed to be Ms Booth in a lake in Oakmere after “extensive searches and appeals in the area”.

The body has not been formally identified but Ms Booth’s family has been informed and was being supported, the force said.

Police said there were not believed to be any suspicious circumstances and report would be prepared for the coroner.

After she disappeared, CCTV footage showed Ms Booth at Sandiway Garage of the A556 near Northwich at about 03:50 BST on Saturday.

Wild Shore Delamere, which offers outdoor activities at its lake nearby, had closed while the search commenced.

Barcelona agree deal to sign England international Marcus Rashford on an initial loan deal from Manchester United.

Barcelona’s already impressive front line is about to be boosted by the signing of Marcus Rashford.

Rashford is in Barcelona to complete a move from Manchester United, a person with knowledge of the transfer told The Associated Press news agency on Monday.

The person was not authorised to speak about the transfer publicly and did not want to be named.

The loan deal would give the 27-year-old England forward, once considered among Europe’s top talents, a chance to revive a career that has stalled in recent years after he fell out of favour at United and ended last season on loan at Aston Villa.

Spanish media said the one-year loan would give Barcelona an option to buy Rashford for about $35m.

Barcelona had the best attack in Spanish football and one of the most prolific across Europe last season but had been trying to add another piece to the front line to go along with young star Lamine Yamal, Raphinha and veteran Robert Lewandowski.

Rashford has spent his entire career at United, scoring 138 goals in 429 appearances and winning five major trophies, including two FA Cups and the Europa League.

But he struggled to consistently live up to the hype that surrounded him when he burst onto the scene as a teenager in 2016 – managing 20 goals or more only in three seasons. In his past two seasons at United, he scored a combined 15 goals and added another four in 17 games on loan at Villa.

Barcelona won the Spanish league title with 102 goals, 24 more than runners-up Real Madrid. The Catalan club also led the Champions League in goals with 43, five more than champion Paris Saint-Germain, before being eliminated by Inter Milan in the semifinals.

Bedouin families leave Druze-majority city after truce in the southern province halts bloody clashes between the communities.

The Syrian government is evacuating hundreds of Bedouin families trapped inside the southern city of Suwayda, where a fragile ceasefire is holding after Druze and Bedouin fighters fought for a week.

The first Bedouin families left on Monday on buses and trucks accompanied by Syrian Arab Red Crescent vehicles and ambulances. They were taken to nearby Daraa as the government plans to evacuate 1,500 people.

“At least 500 people have already left on 10 buses this morning, and more are expected to exit Suwayda in the next few hours,” Al Jazeera’s Mohamed Vall said about noon (09:00 GMT) on Monday in a report from the capital, Damascus.

The clashes between the Druze minority and Bedouin clans, which began on July 13, killed nearly 260 people and threatened to unravel Syria’s post-war transition. The violence also displaced 128,571 people, according to the United Nations International Organisation for Migration.

Israel intervened and launched air attacks on Syria’s Ministry of Defence buildings in the heart of Damascus. Israeli forces also hit Syrian government forces in Suwayda province, claiming it was protecting the Druze, whom it calls its “brothers”.

Vall said some Bedouin families were evacuating the province voluntarily.

“There are seven districts of Suwayda that are inhabited partly or … mostly by Arab Bedouins, and they are all under threat – or they feel under threat – and some of them are willing to leave [on their own],” he said.

Syrian Interior Minister Ahmad al-Dalati told the SANA news agency that the evacuation process will also allow displaced civilians from Suwayda to return as efforts for a complete ceasefire are under way.

“We have imposed a security cordon in the vicinity of Suwayda to keep it secure and to stop the fighting there,” al-Dalati told the agency. “This will preserve the path that will lead to reconciliation and stability in the province.”

According to the United Kingdom-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor, the ceasefire agreed on Saturday says the Bedouin fighters will release Druze women they are holding captive and leave the province.

After talks for a captives swap fell through late on Sunday, the observatory and activist groups in Suwayda reported hearing what they said were Israeli air strikes and helicopters over villages where some skirmishes took place between the Bedouins and the Druze.

The Israeli military said it was “not aware” of any overnight strikes in Syria.

Meanwhile, an initial Syrian Arab Red Crescent convoy entered Suwayda on Sunday, carrying UN humanitarian assistance, including food, water, medical supplies and fuel, the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said.

Interim Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa has tried to appeal to the Druze community while slamming its factions loyal to spiritual leader Sheikh Hikmat al-Hijri who have been involved in the clashes. He promised to hold accountable perpetrators of targeted attacks and other violations.

The Druze minority largely celebrated the downfall in December of the al-Assad family, which ruled Syria for 53 years.

But al-Hijri, who had some allegiance to deposed President Bashar al-Assad in the past, and his supporters have taken a more confrontational approach with al-Sharaa, contrary to most other influential Druze figures.

Unification ministry in Seoul says allowing individual tours will not violate international sanctions.

South Korea is considering allowing individual tours to North Korea as it studies ways to improve relations with its neighbour, a spokesperson for South Korea’s Ministry of Unification says.

“The government is formulating and pursuing North Korea policies with the goal of easing tensions on the Korean Peninsula and improving inter-Korean ties with various measures under consideration in the process,” the ministry said in a statement on Monday.

The announcement was made as Seoul takes more steps to ease tensions with its northern rival after the election of President Lee Jae-myung, who has pledged to improve strained ties with Pyongyang.

In a bid to ease tensions, Lee suspended anti-North Korea loudspeaker broadcasts along the border and ordered a halt to leaflet campaigns criticising the North’s leaders by anti-Pyongyang activists.

Koo Byung-sam, spokesperson for the Unification Ministry, which handles inter-Korean affairs, refused to comment on a “particular issue”. But he said he understood individual tours were not in violation of international sanctions, according to a report by the Reuters news agency.

South Korea’s Dong-A Ilbo newspaper also said Lee’s administration is considering resuming individual trips to North Korea as a negotiating card to reopen dialogue with Pyongyang.

It reported that Lee mentioned the proposal during a National Security Council meeting on July 10. The government subsequently began a review of the plan, the report added, quoting a senior official.

Tourism is one of a narrow range of cash sources for North Korea that are not targeted under United Nations sanctions imposed over its nuclear and weapons programmes.

Citing anti-Pyongyang broadcasters, South Korea’s Yonhap News Agency also reported on Monday that the National Intelligence Service this month had suspended all of its decades-old broadcasts targeting the North Korean regime.

Lee said he will discuss further plans with top security officials to resume dialogue with North Korea, which technically is still at war with the South after the 1950-1953 Korean War ended with an armistice and not a peace treaty.

North Korea recently opened a beach resort in the city of Wonsan, a flagship project driven by leader Kim Jong Un to promote tourism. But the tourist area is temporarily not accepting foreign visitors, according to a note on Wednesday by DPR Korea Tour, a website operated by North Korea’s National Tourism Administration.

North Korea’s tourism industry appears to be struggling even after it lifted COVID-19 border restrictions, allowing rail and flight services with Russia and China.

Asked if South Koreans would travel to Wonsan, Koo said North Korea first needs to open the area to the outside world.

South Korea once ran tours to North Korea’s Mount Kumgang area but suspended them in 2008 when a South Korean tourist was shot dead by a North Korean soldier.

Reuters

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Adolfo Macias, who was recaptured in June after escaping from a prison last year, will appear in a New York state court on Monday.

Ecuadorean gang leader Adolfo Macias Villamar, also known as “Fito”, is set to appear in a federal court in the United States, where he will plead not guilty to international charges of drug and weapons trafficking, his lawyer says.

The Ecuadorean government on Sunday extradited the notorious drug trafficker, a month after he was recaptured following a 2024 escape from a maximum-security penitentiary, the country’s prison authority said.

Macias, the leader of the Los Choneros gang, was serving a 34-year sentence at a prison in Guayaquil for a slew of crimes, including drug trafficking, organised crime, and murder.

The flight transporting Macias landed in New York state on Sunday night, the report said. His lawyer told the Reuters news agency that Macias “will plead not guilty” before the Brooklyn federal court on Monday.

Details of the handover to the US government and the extradition were not specified. The US government has yet to issue an official statement following the extradition.

The US Attorney’s Office had filed charges in April against Macias on suspicion of cocaine distribution, conspiracy and firearms violations, including weapons smuggling.

The former taxi driver turned crime boss agreed in a Quito court last week to be extradited to the US to face the charges.

He is the first Ecuadorean extradited by his country since a new measure was written into law last year, after a referendum in which President Daniel Noboa sought the approval of moves to boost his war on criminal gangs.

Ecuador, once a peaceful haven between the world’s two top cocaine exporters, Colombia and Peru, has seen violence erupt in recent years as rival gangs with ties to Mexican and Colombian cartels vie for control.

Cult following

Soon after Macias escaped from prison in January 2024, Noboa declared Ecuador to be in a state of “internal armed conflict” and ordered the military and tanks into the streets to “neutralise” the gangs. The move has been criticised by human rights organisations.

As a drug lord, Macias cultivated a cult status among fellow gang members and the public.

While behind bars in 2023, he released a video addressed to “the Ecuadorian people” while flanked by armed men. He also threw parties in prison, where he had access to everything from liquor to roosters for cockfighting matches.

Macias’s Los Choneros has ties to Mexico’s Sinaloa cartel, Colombia’s Gulf Clan, which is considered the world’s largest cocaine exporter, as well as Balkan mafias, according to the Ecuadorian Organised Crime Observatory.

His escape from prison prompted widespread violence and a massive military and police recapture operation, including government “wanted” posters offering $1m for information leading to his arrest.

On June 25, Macias was found hiding in a bunker concealed under floor tiles in a luxury home in the fishing port of Manta, the centre of operations for Los Choneros. Noboa declared he would be extradited, “the sooner the better”.

“We will gladly send him and let him answer to the North American law,” Noboa told CNN at the time.

More than 70 percent of all cocaine produced in the world now passes through Ecuador’s ports, according to government data. In 2024, the country seized a record 294 tonnes of drugs, mainly cocaine.

Jamie George, a titan of the 2017 tour in New Zealand, starts at hooker after he was drafted in from the England camp in Argentina.

Blair Kinghorn is back from injury and has been chosen in his favoured position at full-back.

Both wings are Scottish, with Darcy Graham, one of the many who have been called up as cover, on the right wing and Duhan van der Merwe on the left.

Fin Smith and Ben White are the half-backs, just as they were in the rout of AUNZ.

Pierre Schoeman and Finlay Bealham pack down either side of George in the front row, with James Ryan and Scott Cummings renewing a partnership that faced the Waratahs in game three in Australia.

Jac Morgan will start at blindside for the first time on tour, with Josh van der Flier and Henry Pollock making up the back row.

Ewan Ashman, Rory Sutherland, Tom Clarkson and the latest call-up, Gregor Brown, all fill the bench as coach Andy Farrell throws a protective blanket over his first-choice players. Mack Hansen, who has been battling injury, is not included.

The relevance of this game is limited given that so many of the 23 are firmly out of Farrell’s thinking for Saturday’s second Test.

There are points of interest, however.

Kinghorn might well be playing for a starting place given that Hugo Keenan was hit-and-miss in the first Test. Kinghorn is probably favourite to take over.

Might Farrell be a bench contender on Saturday if he performs well on Tuesday, maybe at the expense of Marcus Smith?

Garry Ringrose, who is fit again, was having a storming tour before getting concussed against the ACT Brumbies in Canberra.

Does Farrell dare to break up the Scottish midfield by picking Ringrose ahead of Huw Jones? If not, does he bring Ringrose on to the bench for Saturday ahead of countryman Bundee Aki?

The Lions back row performed wonderfully in Brisbane so it is impossible to see a change there, but what about the back-up?

It was Earl on Saturday and it might well be Earl again, but Morgan, having played at seven throughout the tour, is now being given a shot at six. He is fighting for a place in the 23.

Tuesday’s opponents will be captained by the veteran Kurtley Beale.

The fly-half is one of six indigenous players, with the rest of the squad made up of men with Pacific Islands heritage.

It is the first game of its kind, a celebration of First Nations, Samoan, Tongan, Fijian and Cook Island culture.

Tonga-born prop Taniela Tupou and Fiji-born wing Filipo Daugunu have been released from the Australia camp to play for a team coached by Australia 1999 World Cup winner Toutai Kefu.

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Here are the key events on day 1,243 of Russia’s war on Ukraine.

Here is how things stand on Monday, July 21:

Fighting

• The Ministry of Defence in Moscow said Russian forces seized the village of Bila Hora in Ukraine’s eastern Donetsk region, according to the state RIA Novosti news agency.
• A Russian attack on the village of Sveska in Ukraine’s Sumy region killed a 78-year-old woman, according to Governor Oleh Hryhorov.
• Six more people were killed in Russian attacks on Synelnykove and Pavlohrad in the Dnipropetrovsk region, as well as Kostiantynivka, Pokrovsk and Raiske in the Donetsk region, according to local governors.
• Another Russian attack on Ukraine’s Zaporizhzhia and Vasylivka districts wounded three women, Governor Ivan Fedorov said, adding that Russia launched 457 attacks on 18 settlements in the region on Sunday.
• In total, Ukraine’s Air Force said it shot down 18 of 57 Russian drones overnight into Sunday.
• In Russia, Moscow Mayor Sergei Sobyanin posted eight separate updates over 24 hours on Telegram saying that several Ukrainian drones “flying towards Moscow” had been shot down. “Emergency services are working at the site of the debris fall,” he said in each case.
• In total, Russia’s Ministry of Defence said that Russian forces shot down 216 Ukrainian drones in the 24 hours to 11:20pm Moscow time (20:20 GMT) on Sunday.

Politics and diplomacy

• Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Russian President Vladimir Putin was ready to move towards a peace settlement for Ukraine, but that Moscow’s main objective was to achieve its goals. The comments came days after United States President Donald Trump gave Moscow a 50-day deadline to agree to a ceasefire or face tougher sanctions.
• Ukraine’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs urged an Italian concert venue to cancel a show with Russian conductor Valery Gergiev’s performance, saying it was part of Russian efforts to use “culture as a tool of propaganda”.
• Ukraine imposed sanctions on exiled Russian journalist Yulia Latynina, Ukrainian blogger Andrii Serebrianskyi and former Ukrainian lawmakers Natalia Korolevska and Hennadiy Balashov, among others, claiming they had helped spread Russian propaganda, the Kyiv Independent reported.
• Rosneft, Russia’s biggest oil producer, slammed European Union sanctions on India’s Nayara Energy refinery as unjustified and illegal, saying the restrictions directly threatened India’s energy security.