“Government lawyers told Australia’s highest court on Wednesday that a world-first ban on children younger than 16 from holding social media accounts was necessary to protect developing brains. The Australian government is fighting in the High Court two constitutional challenges to the ban that took effect last year on young children holding accounts on Reddit, Facebook, Instagram, Kick, Snapchat, Threads, TikTok, X, YouTube and Twitch. The challenges were brought by Reddit, a U.S. online forum, and Sydney-based rights group Digital Freedom Project.” (11/04/26)
“Texas could soon give alligator hunters significantly more time to pursue the reptiles as wildlife officials grapple with a surprising trend: more alligators, but fewer being hunted. The Texas Parks and Wildlife Department (TPWD) is proposing to more than triple the alligator hunting season in 22 Southeast Texas counties, including Galveston, Brazoria, Chambers, Jefferson and Liberty. The season would expand from 20 to 61 days, running from Sept. 1 through Oct. 31 instead of Sept. 10 through Sept. 30. The changes, which will be discussed during a Texas Parks and Wildlife Commission meeting on Wednesday, Nov. 4, would also allow nighttime alligator hunting on private property, including private waters, and expand the methods hunters can use to capture the reptiles.” (11/04/26)
“A former U.S. government contractor has admitted passing classified intelligence to Ethiopia that officials used in military operations, the U.S. Justice Department said Tuesday. Abraham Teklu Lemma, 54, supplied secrets to senior Ethiopian officials for more than two years urging them to deploy drones against fighters battling the government, according to the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington. Lemma, of Silver Spring, Maryland, pleaded guilty Tuesday to conspiring to transmit national defense information to a foreign government. He worked as an information technology contractor at the State Department, Justice Department and National Reconnaissance Office, prosecutors said.” (11/04/26)
“A Bronx nurse and her federal agent boyfriend were found shot dead in a Riverdale apartment Tuesday night in an apparent murder-suicide, according to police and sources. Andrea Cantarini, 37, and her boyfriend, Juan Cornelio Diaz, 38 — a US Customs and Border Patrol officer stationed at JFK airport — were found with fatal gunshot wounds to their heads inside Cantarini’s apartment on Blackstone Avenue in Riverdale around 9 p.m., the NYPD said. Diaz allegedly shot and killed Cantarini, before apparently turning the gun on himself, according to the sources.” (11/04/26)
“Several regional blood banks were hit by a cyberattack on November 2, the French health ministry said on Wednesday, but there was no damage to blood products stored in the centres. The incident follows attacks that forced stores in eight European countries to throw away vast quantities of food after hackers tampered with their fridges on Monday, mirroring hacks that swept dozens of supermarkets in France three weeks ago.” (11/04/26)
“New York City Mayor Zohran Mamdani scored a legal victory Wednesday after a state appeals court cleared the way for his administration to move forward with a controversial tax on high-end second homes, according to The New York Times. The Brooklyn-based appellate court reversed a September ruling by a Staten Island judge, who found that the city mishandled the tax’s rollout and ordered officials to start over. The city appealed the decision while continuing to implement the tax, also called a pied-à-terre tax.” (11/04/26)
“Bitcoin slid to about $75,740 overnight before recovering to $77,000 as U.S. midterm returns showed Democrats taking the House and closing in on the Senate, dragging stock futures and crypto lower together. … Bitcoin was not alone in witnessing a slump as CNBC reported that S&P 500 futures traded 1.1% lower, Nasdaq 100 futures shed 2% and Dow futures fell 367 points, or 0.7%. The Kobeissi Letter noted the S&P 500 was on track to open below 7,500 for the first time since July 31 as markets priced in a Democratic victory in both chambers.” (11/04/26)
“Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky has given the country’s highest award for women to the US First Lady, Melania Trump. The Order of Princess Olha, 1st Class, was awarded to Melania Trump for her ‘significant personal contribution to humanitarian support for Ukraine’, according to the presidential decree. It comes after the end of ceasefire in Ukraine’s southern region of Kherson, which allowed for the evacuation of several hundred people from the Russian-occupied city of Oleshky. Russian and Ukrainian delegations – made up of ombudsmen who were involved in the evacuation mission as well as senior officials – are due to meet at the White House on Thursday on Melania Trump’s invitation. The White House said that Melania Trump had ‘independently initiated engagement between the two warring nations and successfully secured a ceasefire’. ‘This achievement marks an unprecedented diplomatic initiative by an American First Lady’, it added.” (11/04/26)
“Spain’s Economy Minister Carlos Cuerpo, will run the country’s Transport Ministry until the Nov. 29 election following the resignation of Óscar Puente, Prime Minister Pedro Sánchez said on Wednesday morning. … Puente resigned on Tuesday over the Oct. 28 train crash in Toledo province that killed 69 people, calling his decision ‘a matter of political dignity.’ It was Spain’s second deadly rail disaster this year after January’s accident in Adamuz, which killed 46 people.” (11/04/26)
“U.S. prosecutors have dropped all criminal charges against a Russian scientist who was tossed into an immigration jail last year after she landed at a Boston airport with frog embryos intended for her cancer research at Harvard Medical School. Kseniia Petrova, 31, spent four months in detention following her arrest in early 2025 as she returned from a vacation in France, where she had stopped at a lab specializing in splicing superfine sections of frog embryos and obtained a package of samples for research. She was questioned about the samples while passing through a customs checkpoint at Logan International Airport, then later charged with smuggling. A federal judge on Wednesday granted a request by prosecutors to dismiss those charges as well as counts alleging that she’d concealed facts and made false statements to government officials.” (11/04/26)
