M ore than 100,000 teenagers in the United Kingdom could be shut out of social media next year when a new law banning under-16s from using major platforms takes effect. The warning came from Ofcom, the UK's online safety watchdog, which said about 150,000 young people aged 16 to 17 do not have a passport or driving licence. Both documents are expected to be used to confirm age once the ban starts. The policy, which follows Australia's example, is scheduled to begin next spring. It will affect popular platforms such as TikTok, Instagram, Snapchat, YouTube, Facebook, Reddit, X and Twitch. Ofcom explained that there are four reliable ways to verify age. These include checking an official ID against a live selfie, asking a bank to confirm a customer's age, using a recognised digital ID like the Young Scot card, or estimating age through a facial scan. But the regulator stressed that a physical photo ID will still be needed as a backup, because facial scanning can miss a perso...

C ryptocurrency exchange Binance has lost over $6.3 billion to hackers linked to North Korea, in the biggest crypto theft ever recorded. According to blockchain intelligence firm TRM Labs, the entire operation took just 20 minutes. TRM Labs said the attack was carried out by TraderTraitor, an elite hacking unit from North Korea. The same group was blamed by the FBI for the $1.5 billion Bybit hack last year. The incident is being described as the largest bank heist in human history, based on the amount stolen. Binance, which has over 335 million users worldwide, has suspended deposits and withdrawals. The company, however, assured customers that their funds are safe and that it will cover all losses. Reacting to the incident, Binance co-CEO Richard Teng said initial investigation shows the attack may have started after a DevOps engineer's laptop was compromised. He explained on X that the attackers did not just use one engineer's permission and it was not a one-click action, but...

S uper Eagles striker Victor Osimhen and his partner, Stefanie, have welcomed a baby girl. The couple named their newborn Liora Audrey. The birth was announced on Thursday by Osimhen's club, Galatasaray, on its official X handle. The Turkish champions congratulated the family and wished the baby a long, healthy and happy life. The club wrote, "We congratulate Victor and Stefanie and wish their newborn baby Liora Audrey a long, healthy and happy life." As of press time, Osimhen himself is yet to announce the birth on his personal social media pages.

  P aying for goods in Nigeria just got easier for Android users. Google has launched Google Wallet, which includes Google Pay, in the country, allowing people to pay with a simple tap of their phone or smartwatch. The company announced the rollout on Wednesday, October 28, 2026. It said the service will bring fast, simple and secure digital payments to users of Android phones and Wear OS watches across Nigeria. Google said the launch is meant to keep pace with busy daily life, whether a person is buying groceries in Lagos or catching a flight out of Abuja. To start, users add supported cards from participating banks and other financial institutions to Google Pay. After that, they can make contactless payments by tapping their device at payment terminals in stores. The same cards can also be used to pay in apps and online, so shoppers no longer need to bring out a physical card at the checkout counter. But the service does more than handle payments. Google Wallet also gives users ...

C ristiano Ronaldo's 2008 season at Manchester United has been voted the greatest Ballon d'Or winning season of all time, according to the Ballon d'Or website . The Al-Nassr forward claimed the maiden B.O.A.T. Ballon d'Or of All Time award after fans worldwide chose his first Ballon d'Or year as the best. He narrowly beat long-time rival Lionel Messi, whose 2012 campaign that delivered 91 goals for club and country finished second, a result expected to reignite the long-running Ronaldo-Messi debate. France Football created the award after its latest ceremony to decide which Ballon d'Or winning season stands above the rest. Unlike the regular Ballon d'Or, which is decided by journalists from different countries, the winner was chosen by fans voting on France Football's digital platform. Only players who have won the Ballon d'Or more than once were eligible. The shortlist included Johan Cruyff, Michel Platini, Marco van Basten, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge, K...

A 31-year-old software engineer has died in the United States after she reportedly followed an AI chatbot's guidance to reduce her epilepsy medication, her family has alleged. According to a report by The New York Times, based on a wrongful death lawsuit filed by the family, Bowen Wan was found lifeless in her Seattle apartment in February. The official cause of death was a complication of epilepsy, a condition she had managed for over ten years. Wan was on a phone call with her father, who lives in China, when she suddenly went quiet. Her father believed she was having a seizure, something she had lived with for years. When she recovered, she told him she needed to rest and would call back later. Days later, when she stopped answering calls, her worried parents, Qun Wan and Meiqin Xu, asked a friend in Seattle to check on her. They watched through a video call as the friend discovered her body. What makes her death painful for her family is what they found afterwards. Wan had bee...

  H arry Kane has won the 2026 Ballon d'Or. The England captain lifted the trophy at the London Palladium and became the first Englishman to win football's biggest individual prize since Michael Owen in 2001. The ceremony was historic on its own. For 70 years the golden ball had lived in Paris, but for its 70th anniversary the gala was moved to London for the first time. The move was a tribute to Sir Stanley Matthews, the English winger who won the very first Ballon d'Or in 1956. Even the night felt dramatic, with the show starting 45 minutes late after traffic held up guests in the London rain. Kane said winning in London made it extra special. At 33, he finally silenced years of talk about his lack of silverware with numbers no one could ignore. He scored 73 goals in 65 appearances for Bayern Munich and England. Sixty-one of those goals came for Bayern, including 36 in the Bundesliga, which earned him the Gerd Muller Trophy as the world's best striker. For England, he...

T wo major tech companies are trimming their workforce as part of plans to cut costs and focus on growth areas. In the United States, Microsoft has launched a voluntary exit programme for about 60,000 employees worldwide. This represents about 27 percent of its 223,000 workforce. The move comes just days before the company is expected to release its first quarter earnings for fiscal year 2027. The company says it needs to control its operating expenses as it plans to spend about $175 billion this year on new technology, especially artificial intelligence infrastructure. The buyout offer is for employees at Level 70 and below in its software, human resources and gaming units, including Xbox and Copilot teams. It covers workers in the United States, Canada, India and the United Kingdom. Staff in data centres and sales teams are not affected. Microsoft says the plan will help protect its profit margin, which currently stands at about 46.8 percent. The same cost-cutting trend is playing ou...

A merican singer Chris Brown will not go to prison for a violent attack in a London nightclub, a court ruled on Monday. A judge at Southwark Crown Court gave Brown an eight-month jail term but suspended it for 12 months. This means he will only go to prison if he commits another offence within the next year. The incident happened in the early hours of February 19, 2023, at Tape, a private members club in Mayfair, London. Brown hit music producer Abraham "Abe" Diaw on the head twice with a tequila bottle. Mr Diaw was taken to hospital for treatment. Brown did not act alone. His vocal coach, rapper Omololu Akinlolu, joined in the attack. He also admitted his role and was given a four-month suspended sentence. Both men were ordered to pay £1,500 in costs. The judge, Tony Baumgartner, said what Brown did was dangerous. He described the attack as intense and said Mr Diaw could have been badly injured. " Hitting someone with a glass bottle was plainly dangerous," the judg...

W orld football will turn its attention to London this Monday, October 26, 2026, as the 70th Ballon d'Or ceremony holds at the iconic London Palladium Theatre. The gala, scheduled to start at 8 p.m. GMT, which is 9 p.m. in Nigeria, will be the first time the award is staged outside France since it was created in 1956. Organisers said London was chosen as a tribute to England's Stanley Matthews, who won the first Ballon d'Or 70 years ago. The move from Paris gives this year's ceremony a new feel and a different energy. The show will be hosted by football legend Thierry Henry and popular broadcaster Kate Scott. Both hosts work together at CBS Sports and are expected to welcome football's biggest names for a night of celebration. The rules for picking winners have also changed from the old calendar-year format. This year, performances were judged based on the European club season and the summer international tournaments. For the men's category, the period under rev...

O ne of the world's largest banks is moving closer to starting operations in Nigeria after the Central Bank of Nigeria, CBN, granted it an Approval-in-Principle to set up a merchant bank. The proposed bank will be known as JPMorgan Merchant Bank Nigeria Limited. Announcing the approval, CBN's Director of Corporate Communications and Investor Relations, Michael Akuka, said the decision reflects growing investor confidence in Nigeria's financial system as the country continues with reforms to strengthen stability and attract capital. He noted that the approval comes after the recent bank recapitalisation exercise which has improved the resilience of Nigerian banks. CBN Governor, Olayemi Cardoso, said the move aligns with the bank's broader reform agenda, according to Champion Newspaper . "Our objective is to build a financial system that is stable, competitive and internationally connected, one that commands confidence and can effectively support investment and econo...

L agos stood still on Saturday as street-pop star, Zlatan Ibile married his longtime partner, Davita Lamai, in a colourful traditional wedding. The ceremony, held on October 24 and tagged #DTTheUnion , was a celebration of love and culture. Zlatan, whose real name is Omoniyi Temidayo Raphael, and his bride honoured Edo tradition in stunning Benin attire. He appeared in white decorated with red coral beads, while Davita wore a deep burgundy beaded gown with a coral crown. The hall was filled with dignitaries, with a large turnout from the entertainment industry. Top music stars, Nollywood figures, popular influencers, DJs and industry executives were all present to celebrate with the couple. Videos from the venue showed guests dancing and cheering as the couple made their entrance. A day before the event, Zlatan and Davita shared pre-wedding portraits on Instagram with the caption " IT'S TIME TO MARRY ," which drew thousands of congratulatory messages from fans. The couple...

T he Federal Government has asked 15 states to urgently prepare for a possible Ebola outbreak as health officials move to stop the spread after a case was confirmed in Abuja. The Coordinating Minister of Health and Social Welfare, Muhammad Pate, made the call on Thursday while briefing the National Economic Council on Nigeria's response to the threat. As reported by Premium Times Newspaper, Pate disclosed that 21 states have already updated their Ebola emergency plans, while the remaining 15 need to act quickly and put proper response measures in place. The alert comes after Nigeria confirmed its first imported case of Ebola on October 20, caused by the Bundibugyo strain. The patient is a woman who recently arrived from Uganda. She began showing symptoms a few days after arriving and later sought care at a private hospital in Abuja. Pate said the government is working with state authorities and international health partners to strengthen surveillance, speed up laboratory testing, i...

N igeria's university entrance exam may soon look very different. The Joint Admissions and Matriculation Board (JAMB) is thinking about changing the Unified Tertiary Matriculation Examination (UTME) so that it tests critical thinking and life skills, instead of only what students have memorised in class. The board's Registrar, Professor Segun Aina, said the goal is to learn more than what candidates know. JAMB also wants to see how well they think, reason and use that knowledge to solve real-life problems. Aina shared the plan on Wednesday while a guest on Good Morning Nigeria , a programme on the Nigerian Television Authority (NTA). He said the board is reviewing how it designs its exams so they fit the needs of education today. To guide the process, JAMB has formed a committee of education experts and other stakeholders. The group will suggest how these skills can be measured. It will also decide whether they should form their own sections of the UTME or be woven into the cur...

G overnments, public bodies and media groups around the world have taken websites offline after experts found two serious security flaws in PHP, a programming language that runs a large part of the internet. A fix was released on Wednesday afternoon, and cyber-security agencies in several countries are now urging organisations to apply it quickly. Those who cannot do so in time are being told to consider shutting down their systems until the danger has passed. Some governments have already acted. Finland has temporarily closed its public government web services, while the Dutch cyber-security agency has taken its own website offline. The National Institute for Public Health and the Environment, another Dutch government body, has done the same, and the site of the Tweede Kamer, the lower house of the Dutch parliament, can no longer be reached. The US National Security Agency (NSA) posted a warning on X , saying the flaws "often provide a direct path to the server's file system ...