Grandson of ex-Fiat boss faces charges over false kidnap claim

A grandson of late Fiat magnate Gianni Agnelli is facing charges for falsely reporting he had been kidnapped, according to police. 

Lapo Elkann allegedly concocted the story in order to get ransom money after running out of cash during a drug-fuelled binge, unnamed law enforcement sources told the Reuters news agency.

The 39-year-old claimed he was being held against his will in a flat in Manhattan, New York, from 6pm on Friday to 10.30pm on Saturday.

According to the New York Daily News, he rang his family and said a woman would hurt him unless a $10,000 ransom was paid.

A family representative allegedly dropped off the payment to police.

Officers said he had met a 29-year-old escort and the two took drugs before he made the false claim.

Mr Elkann and his brother, Fiat Chrysler chairman John Elkann, are heirs to Italy's biggest industrial dynasty.

It is the second time he has been linked to drug use after he nearly died of a drug overdose in 2005.

Mr Elkann, who founded a sunglasses company in 2007, was taken into custody on Sunday.

Shares in his business, Italia Independent, fell sharply after news of the arrest emerged.

He has since been released and is due in court in New York in January.

His family and his spokesman have declined to comment.

National Lottery: Thousands of online accounts hacked

National Lottery operator Camelot says it believes thousands of players' online accounts have been hacked.

The National Lottery operator said it discovered "suspicious activity" following online security monitoring on Monday.
Camelot said it believes "around 26,500 players' accounts were accessed", but fewer than 50 accounts have had activity take place since the hack.

In a statement, Camelot said: "We are currently taking all the necessary steps to fully understand what has happened, but we believe that the email address and password used on the National Lottery website may have been stolen from another website where affected players use the same details.

"We do not hold full debit card or bank account details in National Lottery players' online accounts and no money has been taken or deposited.

"However, we do believe that this attack may have resulted in some of the personal information that the affected players hold in their online account being accessed."

Some of the activity includes personal details being changed and, Camelot said, some of those details might have been legitimately changed by the players themselves.

The lottery organiser says it is contacting those players involved and helping them "re-activate their accounts security".

Camelot also says it has put a change of password in place for all the 26,500 players whose accounts were accessed and is contacting them so they can reset their own password.

The operator said it also wanted to make clear that there had been no unauthorised access to core National Lottery systems or any of its databases, which would affect draws or payment of prizes.

The statement continued: "Cyber criminals such as this are persistent, and we are continuing to monitor and protect our systems.

"We are also working closely with the National Crime Agency and the National Cyber Security Centre on an ongoing basis on this criminal matter. 

"We'd like to reassure our customers that protecting their personal data is of the utmost importance to us.

"We are very sorry for any inconvenience this may cause to our players and would like to encourage those with any concerns to contact us directly, so we can discuss it with them in more detail."

Warnings as four men kill themselves after online sex blackmail scam

Four men have killed themselves after being targeted in a new and fast-growing sex blackmail scam.

Victims are being lured into exposing themselves or committing sex acts online by pretty young women after accepting their friendship requests on social networking sites.

They then face payment demands of hundreds of pounds - or threats that recordings of their behaviour will be sent to family and friends whose contact details they have unwittingly given access to.

Martin Hewitt, of the National Police Chiefs' Council, said: "We started to see it emerging about 18 months ago.

"Last year we had about 300 offences recorded in the UK and we're now this year over 900, and I suspect there's a significant number that don't get reported because the crime is preying on people's embarrassment and their humiliation of being caught out doing something like this."

Schoolboy Ronan Hughes, 17, was tricked into sending intimate photographs of himself, then faced a demand for £3,000 to avoid exposure.

He killed himself even though he had revealed the threat to his parents and police in County Tyrone, Northern Ireland.

Daniel Perry, from Dunfermline, also 17, took his own life after threats to reveal his compromising online conversations.

Police would not reveal details of the other two suicides, but said they were both within the past year and added there could be more.

Carpenter Jon Pearn, 58, from Plymouth, admitted exposing himself online to a girl who claimed her name was Angel, but then revealed she was a man and demanded money. He refused to pay.

He said: "To me it was just one big joke - I just didn't care what they were saying at me. They weren't going to bluff me.

"Even if I was happily married, which I'm not - I'm single, so it can't affect anybody.

"Even if I had thousands of pounds I wouldn't have paid them a penny. To me they're just sad little low-lifes. Trying to bleed innocent people. 

"And then when I went to the police I was gobsmacked when the police lady told me how many people had been in just that month - 19 people in that police station alone."

Organised crime groups in the Philippines, Morocco and Ivory Coast were discovered running many of the sextortion scams, some using British girls.

Most of the UK victims are men aged 18-24, the eldest was 82 and the youngest 14. Some women have also been targeted.

Police have issued advice to victims, urging them not to pay or panic, but to shut down their social media accounts and report what has happened.

Senior officers insisted they will investigate and will not judge victims' behaviour.

Roy Sinclair, from the National Crime Agency's (NCA) anti-kidnap and extortion unit, said: "There is huge under-reporting of these kinds of offences, often because victims feel ashamed or embarrassed, but of course criminals are relying on that reaction in order to succeed.

"This is why we are launching this new campaign. We want victims and potential victims to know how they can protect themselves and to understand what to do if they are targeted.

"This is still a relatively new and emerging crime type, so the NCA and police are working with the Home Office to get a more accurate picture of the true scale."

The campaign includes a film aimed at helping victims to recognise an approach and providing online advice.

Vegan campaigners demand animal fat removed from new £5 notes

Campaigners have started a petition to urge the Bank of England to remove animal fat from the new £5 note.

There was anger among vegans and vegetarians after the bank confirmed the fivers contain tallow, a suet derivative.

Doug Maw, who started the petition, said he was "disgusted" and would not be using the notes.

"I understand old notes contain stuff as well - we can't do anything about what is in circulation - but the fact they are producing new ones is what really riles me," said Mr Maw.

"I don't think anything will happen about what has already been made, but I just hope they produce new ones without using animal fats."

Mr Maw is also trying to set up a petition on the Government site to try to force a debate on the issue in Parliament.

Some 9,000 people have signed the Change.org petition since Monday.

"Why would a piece of money ever need to contain something from an animal? ridiculous. surely theres substitutes and materials that can do the exact same thing," said one supporter, Martha McCoss.

Suzanne Bradshaw wrote: "The use of animal products is completely unnecessary.

"It's about time the bank dragged itself into the twenty first century and used a more environmentally friendly and ethical product to coat the notes."

The notes, which feature Winston Churchill and are designed to be more robust, began to enter circulation in September.

The first print run was set to produce 440 million notes, with polymer tenners coming next year and £20 notes by 2020.

A Bank of England spokeswoman confirmed animal fat is being used in the production process of the £5 note.

She said: "We can confirm that the polymer pellet from which the base substrate is made contains a trace of a substance known as tallow.

"Tallow is derived from animal fats (suet) and is a substance that is also widely used in the manufacture of candles and soap."

Regulator Ofcom orders BT 'separation' from Openreach network

Telecoms regulator Ofcom is to order a legal separation between BT and its Openreach network but stopped short of a full break-up.

Ofcom said it was proceeding with the move "after BT failed to offer voluntary proposals that address our competition concerns".

It said it still backed a form of separation in which Openreach remained a wholly-owned subsidiary of BT but warned that if this failed it could reconsider a full split.

BT shares were 1% lower in early trading.

The announcement comes hours after Sky News revealed that the telecoms giant was to name former Ofcom director Mike McTighe as Openreach's first independent chairman.

This was likely to be seen as a step in the right direction for the regulator. 

Openreach runs the UK's main telecoms network, used by BT's retail division as well as rivals including Sky, the owner of Sky News, Vodafone and TalkTalk.

Those rivals have pushed for a full separation, warning that BT benefits from a big conflict of interest.

Ofcom said creating a more independent Openreach, working in the interest of all providers, was a key part of plans to improve broadband and telephone services across the country, with better quality and greater investment.

It set out concerns about the current arrangement in July and has now said it was "disappointed that BT has not yet come forward with proposals that meet our competition concerns".

Ofcom added: "Some progress has been made, but this has not been enough, and action is required now to deliver better outcomes for phone and broadband users."

BT's proposals still fell short on "the transfer of people and assets, and the level of influence that BT Group executives could exert over the management of Openreach".

Ofcom is now proposing for Openreach to become a distinct company with its own board, with a majority of independent directors including the chairman not affiliated with BT.

The company would be guaranteed greater independence on making strategic investments and have a duty to treat all of its customers equally.

Ofcom said it was preparing to notify the European Commission of its plans but remained "open to BT bridging the gap between its proposal and what is required to address our strong competition concerns".

A consultation on the plans will take place next year.

The regulator said an earlier consultation launched in the summer had revealed concerns about slow broadband speeds, the availability of high-speed fibre broadband and the quality of service from major providers.

Ofcom said it had considered calls for a full break-up of BT and Openreach as well as concerns raised by BT about the "substantial costs" this would trigger and the impact on its pension scheme.

It said its current view that Openreach should remain a subsidiary of BT was "likely to achieve the greatest improvements for everyone in the shortest amount of time".

But the regulator warned: "If Ofcom's monitoring suggests that legal separation is not delivering sufficient benefits for the wider telecoms industry and its customers, we will return to the question of structural separation - fully breaking up the companies."

Jill Stein tries to force recount in Pennsylvania, as Trump team keeps up talk of voter fraud with no evidence

President-elect Donald Trump and Green Party candidate Jill Stein continued raising competing doubts about the election on Monday, with Trump's transition team voicing concerns about voter fraud without providing evidence and Stein taking legal action to trigger a recount in Pennsylvania, one of three states she has targeted for additional scrutiny.

Trump on Monday was also officially declared the winner in Michigan by a slim margin. Stein announced plans to force a recount there on Wednesday. In Wisconsin, where Stein asked for a recount last week, elections officials on Monday announced a timeline and procedure for it.

In a conference call with reporters, Jason Miller, communications director for the Trump transition team, read a statement from the president-elect stating his disapproval of Stein's recount efforts.

“The people have spoken and the election is over,” Miller said. He later added: “It is important to point out that with the help of millions of voters across the country, the president-elect won 306 electoral votes on Election Day, the most of any Republican since 1988.”

Miller also echoed Trump's Sunday accusations of widespread voter fraud, which have not been backed up by any evidence.

[Donald Trump’s bogus claim that millions of people voted illegally for Hillary Clinton] 

“I do think that's an issue of concern, the fact that there's a concern that so many voted who were not legally supposed to,” Miller said. Asked for evidence, he cited studies about voter registrations conducted before the election but presented no specific proof of his claims that has emerged since the vote was conducted.

Stein, who finished well behind Trump and Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton, announced that she filed a legal petition in Pennsylvania on behalf of 100 voters “to protect their right to substantively contest the election in Pennsylvania beyond the recounts being filed by voters at the precinct level.”

“Americans deserve a voting system we can trust,” Stein said in a statement. “After a presidential election tarnished by the use of outdated and unreliable machines and accusations of irregularities and hacks, people of all political persuasions are asking if our election results are reliable. We must recount the votes so we can build trust in our election system.”

But Stein acknowledged in a Sunday video that it would be difficult to force a recount in Pennsylvania and would require her to “jump through some hoops.”

Republicans raised doubts Monday that Stein's argument would prevail.

“Our General Counsel has reviewed the Election Contest and said it is totally and completely without any merit. It does not even allege any facts to support its wild claim that the ‘discontinuity’ of pre-election polls reported by the media showing that Hillary Clinton would win and the actual results could only have occurred through computer hacking originated by a foreign government,” said Pennsylvania Republican Party Chairman Rob Gleason in a statement.

Stein said she has raised $ 6.5 million from more than 137,000 donors for the recount efforts. Because of the margins, the states are not absorbing the costs of recounting the votes.

In Michigan, the Board of State Canvassers certified Trump's win over Clinton by 10,704 votes out of about 4.8 million cast. Stein's team said it plans to demand a statewide hand-recount on Wednesday, in accordance with the 48-hour deadline to do so.

In Wisconsin, where Trump defeated Clinton by a percentage point, the bipartisan state Elections Commission announced plans to begin a recount on Thursday, provided that proper payment for the recount has been received by the state. It rejected the Stein campaign’s request for a statewide hand recount, instead leaving it to each county to decide whether to use a machine or not. The Stein campaign said it was filing a legal challenge to trigger an all-hand recount.

Iranian vessel points weapon at US helicopter

An Iranian vessel pointed its weapon at a US Navy helicopter in the Strait of Hormuz at the weekend, it has been revealed.

The move was described as an "unsafe and unprofessional" action by two US defence officials who spoke to Reuters.

The officials, who were not identified, said the SH-60 helicopter had flown within half a mile of two Iranian vessels in international waters when one of the vessels pointed its weapon.

Those on the helicopter did not feel threatened, the officials said - but they added that the move could have prompted a retaliation.

It follows a similar incident in July, when an Iranian frigate pointed a weapon at a US Navy helicopter and coalition auxiliary ship during a US training exercise in the Gulf of Aden.

Iran has a history of such behaviour in Middle Eastern waters, including firing shots at a Singapore-flagged tanker in May.

The strait, which is just 21 miles wide at its narrowest point, connects the Persian Gulf to the rest of the world.

It is the path for about 40% of the world's oil tanker traffic and is claimed not only by Iran but also by Oman and the United Arab Emirates.