⚡️🇺🇸🇨🇺 Trump has said a US-Cuba deal could be done easily

Donald Trump has said the U.S. is talking to Cuba, its leaders should ​agree to a deal and that could easily be done, ‌a White House official said on Friday, reiterating the U.S. president's previous remarks after Havana confirmed that negotiations were under way.

"As the President stated, ​we are talking to Cuba, whose leaders should make a deal, ​which he believes 'would be very easily made'," the White House official said, on condition of anonymity.

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🧑‍⚖️ Adobe pays $75 million to settle US lawsuit over termination fees, subscription cancellations

Adobe said it ‌will pay $75 million to resolve a U.S. government lawsuit accusing the Photoshop and Acrobat maker of harming consumers by concealing hefty termination fees and making it difficult to cancel subscriptions. The company said it will also provide $75 million of free services to ​customers, in addition to making the $75 million payment to the U.S. ⁠Department of Justice. Court approval is required.

In a June 2024 complaint, the Justice Department and ​Federal Trade Commission accused Adobe of burying termination fees for its popular "annual paid monthly" ​subscription plan, sometimes reaching hundreds of dollars, in the fine print or behind text boxes and hyperlinks. They also said Adobe made cancelling subscriptions a hassle.

Adobe was accused of violating the Restore Online Shoppers’ ⁠Confidence Act, a 2010 law barring merchants from imposing charges, including for automatic subscription renewals, without disclosing material terms clearly and obtaining customer consent.

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🇺🇸 Trump signs orders aimed at easing mortgage access, home costs

President Donald Trump signed two executive orders on Friday aimed at making homeownership more affordable.

- One of the orders is aimed at easing access to mortgage credit and directs the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau to tailor mortgage rules to make it easier for smaller banks to “facilitate more affordable lending.” It also calls for bank regulators to revise guidance to focus on “prudent underwriting” and to support construction lending by community banks.

- The second order is designed to ease environmental rules to speed up development and infrastructure projects. It directs the Environmental Protection Agency and Army to review and revise “stormwater, wetlands, and other water-related permitting requirements” in a bid to lower costs and to “streamline Federal regulatory approvals and increase home insurability.”

It also directs agencies including agencies Commerce, Housing and Urban Development, Transportation and the Federal Housing Finance Agency to eliminate “unduly burdensome rules and reform programs that constrain residential development and housing affordability.”

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⚡️🇺🇸🇪🇨Trump administration finalizes Ecuador trade deal to cut tariffs

US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer on Friday signed an agreement finalizing a trade deal with Ecuador, reducing tariff rates on a number of goods traded between the two economies.

“President Trump is unlocking commercially meaningful market access for American farmers and manufacturers, opening Ecuador’s market of over 18 million consumers to U.S. agricultural and industrial exports,” Greer said in a statement.

Under the agreement Ecuador commits “to reduce or eliminate tariffs in key sectors for the US,” including on health products, chemicals, motor vehicles, machinery, information technology and “certain agricultural products.” The country also agreed to require transit visas for Haitians, Cubans, and other nationalities who are deemed to pose a high risk of undocumented migration to the US.

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🎮 The FBI is looking for victimized Steam users who downloaded games with hidden malware

The FBI is investigating a hacker suspected of publishing several video games laced with malware on the popular PC games store Steam. The FBI believes the threat actor primarily targeted users between the timeframe of May 2024 and January 2026.

The FBI listed the following games suspected of being developed by the same cybercriminal: BlockBlasters, Chemia, Dashverse/DashFPS, Lampy, Lunara, PirateFi и Tokenova. Multiple malicious games discovered on Steam over the past two years have distributed information-stealing malware designed to harvest credentials, cryptocurrency wallets, and other sensitive data from players' devices.

One of the most notable cases involved BlockBlasters - initially uploaded to Steam as a clean program, cryptodrainer malware was later added to the game. After downloading the game, streamer Raivo Plavnieks (RastalandTV) reported losing more than $32,000 from his cryptocurrency wallet. Blockchain investigator ZachXBT later estimated that attackers stole roughly $150,000 from 261 Steam accounts.

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🇺🇸 Tariff refunds should go to workers of companies as bonuses, Greer says

US Trade Representative Jamieson Greer called on companies seeking refunds for the almost $170 billion in tariffs overturned by the Supreme Court to give any money they receive back to their workers.

“If I were these companies, and somehow they get this windfall, the most important thing and the smartest thing they should do is give it as bonuses to their workers,” Greer said.

It’s unclear if the federal government has the power to mandate such a move. 🤔 The tariff revenue is being held by the US Treasury Department and the government is working on a system to help process the wave of refund requests and issue payments electronically, saying that the work on a web-based portal that is part of that project is 70% complete.

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🇬🇧🇮🇪 UK, Ireland renew defense pact in bid to boost security ties

The UK and Ireland refreshed a 2015 memorandum on defense with a new, specific focus on maritime security, cyber defense, information sharing and joint procurement initiatives, Ireland’s defense department said. The agreement also includes “training, education and staff exchanges.”

The pact has a particular focus on protecting critical undersea infrastructure. It includes an agreement that the two countries will “coordinate more in terms of protecting subsea cables, protecting gas connectors and other connections on the water, which is critical to economic security and to jobs.”

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🧠 German scientists revive frozen brain tissue after week-long deep freeze

Brain death has always been final — until German researchers proved otherwise. Researchers at Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg successfully revived mouse brain tissue after freezing it for a full week, marking the first time adult mammalian neural circuits have functioned normally after cryopreservation.

The team used an optimized vitrification process that transforms brain tissue into a glass-like state without forming ice crystals — the microscopic daggers that typically shred cellular structures during freezing. Scientists stored mouse hippocampus slices — the brain’s memory center — at temperatures between -130°C and -196°C using non-toxic cryoprotective agents.

After thawing the brain slices in warm solutions, microscopy showed that neuronal and synaptic membranes were intact, and tests for mitochondrial activity revealed no metabolic damage. Electrical recordings of neurons showed that, despite moderate deviations compared with control cells, the neurons’ responses to electrical stimuli were near normal.

Hippocampal neuronal pathways still showed the synaptic strengthening or ‘long-term potentiation’ that underlies learning and memory. However, because such slices naturally degrade, observations were limited to a few hours.

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🇷🇺🇮🇷 Russia sends 13 tons of humanitarian aid to Iran via Azerbaijan

Russia’s Emergency Situations Ministry said that it has sent 13 tons of humanitarian aid to Iran via Azerbaijan after Tehran requested help due to rising civilian casualties and damage to hospitals and ambulance infrastructure. The aid delivery was carried out on the orders of President Vladimir Putin.

"Due to the destruction of numerous hospitals and emergency medical stations, as well as the large number of wounded, including women and children, the Iranian side has requested the supply of medical supplies from friendly countries, including Russia," - the ministry said.

It includes medicines, first-aid kits and other medical supplies. The aid was flown by Il-76 cargo aircraft to Azerbaijan, then transferred by truck to Iran via the Astara border.

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🇻🇪🇨🇴Venezuela and Colombia discuss security as Rodriguez calls for end to US sanctions

High-level Colombian officials met with their Venezuelan counterparts in Caracas on Friday in what acting Venezuelan President Delcy Rodriguez said were ‌productive meetings, as she called for a end to U.S. sanctions against her country. The meeting also was focused on energy cooperation, security and trade.

"And I want to take this opportunity to also send a message to the president of the US, Donald Trump, to make it ​clear that unilateral coercive measures against the Venezuelan people affect the peoples of our Latin America," said Rodriguez. "The call is for sanctions against Venezuela to be lifted."

Rodriguez has been seeking to attract investors in oil and mining as she attempts to stabilize the country. The Trump administration on Friday authorized Venezuela to sell fertilizers and other petrochemicals to US companies, further loosening sanctions.

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🇨🇳 Zhejiang, Geely deepen ties to build world-class auto cluster

China’s Zhejiang provincial government signed a new strategic cooperation agreement with automobile group Geely. The focus will be on smart manufacturing, new‑energy vehicles and connected‑car technologies.

Geely, China’s third-largest automaker by vehicle sales, is a key player in Zhejiang’s automotive ecosystem. Zhejiang Geely Holding Group Co. was designated as a lead company to drive integration across the automotive value chain. The expanded pact is intended to accelerate industrial upgrading and support Zhejiang’s goal of building a world‑class automotive and auto‑parts manufacturing cluster.

#BRICS

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🤖 ‘Not built right the first time’ — Musk’s xAI is starting over again, again

Elon Musk said he intends to rebuild his xAI, after a series of departures sparked uncertainty about the company’s employee turnover and trajectory. Guodong Zhang, an xAI co-founder who oversaw its image generation product, has departed the company. Haotian Liu, who worked closely with Zhang, has also left xAI.

“xAI was not built right first time around, so is being rebuilt from the foundations up,” - Musk said in a post on his X.

On Thursday, Musk hired two senior employees from Cursor, a leading AI coding startup that is currently in fundraising discussions at a US$50 billion (RM196.15 billion) valuation. Musk admitted that xAI is behind on coding.

“Many talented people over the past few years were declined an offer or even an interview at xAI. My apologies,” - Musk posted on X. “Baris and I are going through the company interview history and reaching back out to promising candidates.”

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🇺🇸 US withdraws draft rule that called for global AI chip permits

The US Commerce Department has pulled a draft regulation that would have restricted exports of AI chips to anywhere in the world without US approval. However, the Office of Management and Budget’s website changed on Friday to say that an interagency review process for the rule had concluded and that the measure had been withdrawn, without providing other details.

A Trump administration official said late Friday that the now-withdrawn rule was a draft and that any discussions regarding the proposal were preliminary. 🤔

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🇨🇳 China challenges Neuralink with world’s first commercial approval for brain implant

In a first for China, Neuracle Medical Technology (NMT) has reportedly secured approval for its plantable brain-computer interface (BCI) system. Designed to restore motor function in patients with spinal cord injuries, the technology has received regulatory approval for commercial sale.

BCIs are devices designed to directly connect a brain to a computer. NMT’s device sits on top of the brain cortex, which reduces damage risk. It works by reading signals from this part of the brain, which is known to control movement. The device then converts those signals into hand movement commands. So a patient might think something like “close hand,” and this is then interpreted and acted upon on a robotic/prosthetic “hand.”

If the technology can be scaled, it could eventually prove revolutionary for medical sciences. Apart from restoring motor function, it could also be used to help restore speech, vision, or even be used to treat debilitating diseases like epilepsy or Parkinson’s.

#BRICS

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🤖 FAA approves a massive pilot program that will let electric air taxis fly across 26 states as early as this summer

The U.S. Transportation Department (DOT) and the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) greenlit a sprawling, three-year pilot program. It authorizes a handful of pioneering aerospace companies to operate their next-generation electric aircraft in real-world conditions across 26 states. Essentially, these companies will be authorized to operate commercial air taxis.

The DOT is talking about electric vertical takeoff and landing aircraft, commonly known as eVTOLs. This is a massive, passenger-carrying drone that takes off like a helicopter but cruises on wings like a traditional airplane. It is run on batteries, generate zero direct emissions, and promise to be dramatically quieter than conventional helicopters.

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