Hard Numbers: Piling on Beijing, 7th time’s the charm for Boris, massacre in Myanmar, US unemployment claims drop

Staff members sit near a board with signs of the 2022 Olympic Winter Games, at the National Aquatics Center, known colloquially as the "Ice Cube", in Beijing, China April 1, 2021

5: Five countries — Australia, Canada, the UK, New Zealand and Lithuania — have so far joined the US in refusing to send government officials to the Beijing Winter Olympics in February over China’s human rights abuses. China’s Foreign Ministry on Thursday said these states would “pay the price” for the diplomatic boycott.

52: US unemployment claims plunged last week to a 52-year low. Several factors likely influenced the drop, including the ongoing pandemic recovery as well as job market changes related to the holiday season.

11: Myanmar's military reportedly rounded up 11 civilians — including five children — on Tuesday, tied them up, and then burned them alive. The massacre in the country’s northwest reportedly came after a military vehicle hit a roadside bomb.

7: UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson became a dad for the seventh time Thursday, when his wife Carrie gave birth to a baby girl. It’s a welcome reprieve for Johnson, who has been having a very rough time politically, including over a recent scandal in which his staff allegedly breached lockdown restrictions to party.

More from GZERO Media

There’s a new strain of cybercrime in online retail. It targets consumers going about their everyday business, whether it’s booking flights on a major airline or purchasing concert tickets from their go-to platform. It’s called digital skimming, also known as e-skimming, online card skimming, or web skimming, and it’s the evolution of an older scam known as card skimming. That’s when criminals install equipment on point-of-sale systems or tiny cameras at ATMs or gas pumps to capture card data. With digital skimming, hackers plant malware at online stores to harvest that information. It can be harder than physical skimming to detect, and it can strike more victims at once. Read our explainer to learn more and understand how to stay safe.

Tesla CEO and X owner Elon Musk reacts next to Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. president Donald Trump during a campaign rally, at the site of the July assassination attempt against Trump, in Butler, Pennsylvania, U.S., October 5, 2024.
REUTERS/Brian Snyder

Elon Musk, the world’s wealthiest person, has thrown his full weight behind former President Donald Trump’s presidential campaign.

FILE PHOTO: Yahya Sinwar, Gaza Strip chief of the Palestinian Islamist Hamas movement, waves to Palestinians during a rally to mark the annual al-Quds Day (Jerusalem Day), in Gaza, April 14, 2023.
REUTERS/Ibraheem Abu Mustafa/File Photo

Ever since 1,200 Israelis were brutally murdered by Hamas on Oct. 7, 2023, in southern Israel, the Jewish state has been on the hunt for the mastermind, the terrorist group’s leader, Yahya Sinwar.

Acting Director of the U.S. Secret Service Ronald Rowe Jr. speaks during a press conference as the FBI investigates what they said was an apparent assassination attempt in Florida on Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump, in West Palm Beach, Florida, U.S. September 16, 2024.
REUTERS/Marco Bello/File Photo