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Louise Crabtree, 50, was bombarded with inappropriate texts, comments and gifts - including a diamond ring - by Marc Bandemer during the 14 months she worked for his finance company.

PLUS: India tries to untangle TXT marketing opt-ins; China’s AI crackdown succeeds; Australia and Boeing team AWACS, drones; and more!

Asia In Brief  Chinese web giant Baidu last week staged a livestream hosted by an AI version of local influencer Yonghao Luo and scored 13 million hits and $7.5 million of sales.…

Love and passion for sports runs deep. Sometimes, it runs so deep that parents pass that onto their kids. This is one of those stories, only taken to an absurd degree.

U.S. consumers "rank problems with public electric vehicle charging and the time it takes to recharge as their top two reasons for rejecting electric vehicles," writes the New York Times, citing figures from data analytics firm J.D. Power. But are things getting better? Automakers and charging companies are building new stations and updating their cars to allow drivers to more easily and quickly recharge their vehicles. They're also outfitting charging stations with items such as food and bathrooms, and making the devices more reliable. Because chargers are only as fast as the cars they connect with, automakers are designing new cars to absorb electricity at higher speeds. In addition, many automakers have cut deals with Tesla to allow owners of other cars to use the company's fast-charging network, the largest in the country and widely considered the most reliable. Early evidence suggests efforts to improve electric vehicle charging are paying off. In recent years, J.D. Power surveys showed about 20% of attempts to charge electric vehicles at all public stations ended in failure because of faulty chargers, long lines or payment glitches. But in the first three months of 2025, overall failure rates fell to 16%, the biggest improvement since the surveys began in 2021. "The industry is finally elevating as a whole," said Brent Gruber, an executive director at J.D. Power. The number of chargers has also increased. There were about 55,200 fast chargers in the United States in May, up from 42,200 a year earlier, according to federal data. In February, a former Phillips 66 gas station in Apex, N.C., near Raleigh, became the first "Rechargery" from Ionna, a company created by eight automakers, including General Motors, Hyundai Motors, BMW and Mercedes-Benz. Their chargers can deliver up to 400 kilowatts of juice, much more than Tesla's 250-kilowatt Superchargers. Some cars can replenish a battery in 30 minutes or less at the higher charging speeds. When connected to chargers of 350 kilowatts or more, including those at Ionna and Electrify America, another fast-charging network, a Hyundai Ioniq 5 can fill its electric "tank" from 10% to 80% in 18 minutes... Some models from BMW, Hyundai and Kia have also enabled a national "Plug and Charge" standard that lets car owners begin charging their vehicles at Ionna stalls without first having to use a smartphone app or swipe a credit card, eliminating a step that sometimes results in errors. Tesla's chargers have long worked this way for Tesla cars and now work with some other vehicles, including Rivian's SUVs and pickups. More cars and charging stations are expected to have plug-and-charge capability in the coming months... Nearly every major automaker is redesigning their cars with plug outlets and software that are compatible with Tesla chargers. Infrastructure upgrades are happening elsewhere too, according to the article.Texas-based gas chain Buc-ee's is offering "premium" charging using renewable power (working with Mercedes), while Waffle House plans to install BP Pulse fast chargers next year. J.D. Power's Gruber says that while America's federal charger program only helped construct a tiny fraction of new chargers, it did also published guidelines which helped automakers and charging companies work together and address technical problems.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Ahead of the highly anticipated wedding, Jeff Bezos and Lauren Sanchez shrugged off criticism with a wild foam party on board his $500million yacht.

It is perfect for outdoor dining

In truth, for many years there have been suspicions that this icon of French cinema was really a monster.

Labour will paralyse public services and hand more power to unaccountable quangos under plans to introduce an equality law, Kemi Badenoch warns in the Mail today.

You've probably never heard of the so-called 'socio-economic duty', and nor should you have. It's a left-over clause from the Equality Act passed by Labour in 2010.

The former Spanish number one's new title as the 1st Marquess of Llevant de Mallorca will eventually be passed down to his two-year-old son Rafael Jr.

Susilla Mercer, 44, branded Gerard Flynn's South American girlfriend Shelina Kurz 'scruffy' and 'trampy', adding: 'Penthouse to s***house does not even cut it.'

Chris Pratt turned 46 on Saturday, June 21 and shared a video to Instagram in which he pontificated on being four years away from turning 50.

The podcast, 34, took to Instagram on Sunday with the devastating news where she revealed their son had been 'born sleeping'.

Fern Britton has addressed Phillip Schofield 's departure from This Morning and reflected on their time hosting the show together after their falling out.

We're led to believe that women of a certain age simply lose interest in sex. But a survey published last week has dramatically highlighted just how wrong these assumptions can be.

How much do you know about the female body? Your body? Or your friend's, your sister's, your daughter's?

Nicola Peltz's fallout with her husband's family highlighted an unlikely alliance this week as Yolanda Hadid reportedly showed support for Brooklyn's mother Victoria.

Identifying those with mild cognitive impairment who are most likely to suffer an accelerated decline could allow them to enter clinical trials and receive extra support, researchers say.

The final resting place of the 'EdStone', the 8.5ft stone tablet on which Labour's then leader Ed Miliband had six manifesto pledges carved before the 2015 election, has long been a matter of debate.

Amid the general dissatisfaction with the state of our public services, which is the most dangerous element in this national malaise?