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Cyber attack thwarted by flipping 'kill switch' but experts fear new blitz

Europe and Russia were left reeling today by a malicious global cyber attack that used leaked NSA tools to exploit a vulnerability in Microsoft Windows and spread ransomware across networks around the world.

Tens of thousands of users from London to St. Petersburg logged on yesterday to find ominous threats to delete their suddenly encrypted computer files unless they cough up $300 or more in Bitcoin payments to the unknown perpetrators, security experts and intelligence officials told ABC News today.

A message saying “Oops, your important files are encrypted” flashed across screens all over the world. According to The New York Times, experts estimated that before the last affected computers are unlocked, victims could collectively pay more than $1 billion to the attackers.

The attack appears to have been thwarted by private cyber security researchers who identified and triggered the malware’s "kill switch," which halted the attacks before it spread throughout U.S. networks, a senior U.S. intelligence official confirmed, but it is unclear whether, the official said, a modified attack will soon be launched.

"That is a huge concern right now," said Darien Huss, a senior security research engineer at Proofpoint who was among the researchers who helped disable the virus, called "WannaCry," told ABC News today. "It would not be very difficult at all to re-release this ransomware attack without a kill switch or without an approved kill switch that only they can activate."

Huss is also worried about copycats, who could "take the exploit code that was used in this attack and implement it into their own virus."

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http://abcnews.go.com/US/cyberattack-thwarted-flipping-kill-switch-experts-fear-blitz/story?id=47396119

Zimbabwe's wet season helps with bumper crops

Latest  Braking News  Zimbabwe's wet season helps with bumper crops

Maize crop damaged by heavy rains in Chivi, Zimbabwe [Aaron Ufumeli/EPA]

A country able to export excess food following good spells of rain and a concerted effort by the government.

A year after a state of emergency was declared in Zimbabwe, the country is now able to export excess food.

Lat year, the Command Agriculture program was launched in response to the shrinking agricultural output and drought.

This provided finance, seed, fertilizer and pesticides. The goal was to make Zimbabwe self-sufficient in maize and the move was a success.

I would say, frankly speaking, there may be elements of food insecurity, but there is no hunger," said Bishow Parajuli, the UN resident coordinator in Zimbabwe.

We were facing lots of challenges when the drought came in but the proactiveness of the government and strong partnership addressed all issues of famine and hunger.

Of course, there's food insecurity, malnutrition issues and that is what we are working on at the moment

READ MORE: Zimbabwe floods killed 246, made thousands homeless

The 2016-17 rainfall season in Zimbabwe officially ended in the first week of April and this season's rainfall was in excess.

This contributed greatly to an abundant crop in many areas of agriculture but, as is often the case, came in flash-flood amounts.

The country's Vice President Emmerson Mnangagwa said that for the first time in almost two decades, Zimbabwe will produce enough maize to be able to export the grain.

Now the problem is where to store saleable produce - for future use or export. Dry storage is surprisingly necessary as conditions even in late April have been wet, following a surprisingly humid and windy March.

The agricultural situation did not look so rosy during the heavy rains.

In January, the downpours were damaging crops and washing away topsoil and dirt roads. The tobacco cash crop was turning yellow through nutrient leaching and maize stems were flattened by storm gusts.

Damage to roads and bridges from fast-flowing floodwater cut off access to markets.

Zimbabwe last experienced such conditions in 1999.

Details more by

http://www.aljazeera.com/news/2017/04/zimbabwe-wet-season-helps-bumper-crops-170425103107492.html

France urged to reject Le Pen in presidential vote run off

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France urged to reject Le Pen in presidential vote run-off

(CNN)France's defeated political establishment has begun to rally against the far-right leader Marine Le Pen as she goes head-to-head against political novice Emmanuel Macron in the final race for the French presidency.

As Le Pen celebrated the highest-ever voting tally for her Front National party, candidates knocked out in the first round began to endorse Macron, who ended his insurgent campaign with a result that confounded expectations.

Macron, a pro-European centrist, took first place with 23.9%, while the anti-immigrant, anti-EU Le Pen came second at 21.4%, with 97% of polling stations declared on Monday. Both go through to a runoff on May 7 after emerging top of a fractured field of 11 candidates in the first round.

The result amounted to a comprehensive rejection of traditional politics in France. It is the first time since the establishment of the fifth French Republic in 1958 that no candidate from the two main political parties of the left and right has made it into the second round of the presidential vote.

Macron goes through to the second round as the clear frontrunner, with most voters expected to switch to him from mainstream defeated candidates. Le Pen, meanwhile, faces an uphill struggle.

The French stock markets rose on Monday morning, and the euro jumped to its highest level since November against the dollar as investors bet against the chances of Le Pen winning.

There was relief in Europe, too: Michel Barnier, the European Union's chief Brexit negotiator, described Macron as a patriot.

The chief of staff for German Chancellor Angela Merkel said that the result showed France and Europe could win together" and added: The center is stronger than the populists think.

Francois Fillon, the mainstream Republican candidate whose campaign foundered amid corruption allegations, emerged swiftly from his defeat with words of support for Macron.

I promise you, extremism can only bring unhappiness and division to France, he said, describing the National Front as a party of violence and intolerance.

We have to choose what is preferable for our country, and I am not going to rejoice. Abstention is not in my genes, especially when an extremist party is close to power," he said. There is no other choice but to vote against the far right.

He argued that Le Pen's economic and social programs would bankrupt the country, particularly if France dropped the euro as its currency, as the far-right leader has threatened.

The Socialist Party's candidate, Benoit Hamon, also warned against a Le Pen victory. I appeal to you in the strongest terms to beat the National Front by voting for Emmanuel Macron, even though he is not part of the Left, Hamon wrote on Twitter.

Hamon secured just 6.4% of the vote, a disastrous showing for the Socialist Party, whose candidate Francois Hollande won the presidency in 2012 but whose popularity has sunk during his term.

French Prime Minister Bernard Cazeneuve tweeted his support for Macron, calling on voters to back him in the second round to combat the National Front's disastrous project to take France backward and to divide the French people.

But far-left candidate Jean-Luc Melenchon has refused to say who he would back, criticizing both candidates for having no stance on the environment or the future of civilization, and who both challenge the welfare and social accord of the country.

More Details

http://edition.cnn.com/2017/04/24/europe/french-presidential-election/index.html