India has announced a ban on electronic cigarettes, as a backlash gathers pace worldwide about a technology promoted as less harmful than smoking tobacco. From a report: The announcement by India on Wednesday came a day after New York became the second US state to ban flavored e-cigarettes following a string of vaping-linked deaths. "The decision was made keeping in mind the impact that e-cigarettes have on the youth of today," India's finance minister, Nirmala Sitharaman, told reporters in the capital, New Delhi. E-cigarettes heat up a liquid -- tasting of anything from bourbon to bubble gum or just tobacco, and which usually contains nicotine -- into vapor, which is inhaled. The vapor does not contain the estimated 7,000 chemicals present in tobacco smoke but does contain a number of substances that could potentially be harmful. They have been pushed by producers, and also by some governments, including in Europe, as a safer alternative to cigarette smoking -- and as a way to kick the habit.

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India has announced a ban on electronic cigarettes, as a backlash gathers pace worldwide about a technology promoted as less harmful than smoking tobacco. From a report: The announcement by India on Wednesday came a day after New York became the second US state to ban flavored e-cigarettes following a string of vaping-linked deaths. "The decision was made keeping in mind the impact that e-cigarettes have on the youth of today," India's finance minister, Nirmala Sitharaman, told reporters in the capital, New Delhi. E-cigarettes heat up a liquid -- tasting of anything from bourbon to bubble gum or just tobacco, and which usually contains nicotine -- into vapor, which is inhaled. The vapor does not contain the estimated 7,000 chemicals present in tobacco smoke but does contain a number of substances that could potentially be harmful. They have been pushed by producers, and also by some governments, including in Europe, as a safer alternative to cigarette smoking -- and as a way to kick the habit.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

German city rescinds Nelly Sachs Prize from British Pakistani author, citing her support of the pro-Palestine movement.

German city rescinds Nelly Sachs Prize from British Pakistani author, citing her support of the pro-Palestine movement.

German city rescinds Nelly Sachs Prize from British Pakistani author, citing her support of the pro-Palestine movement.

The FBI tried to force the owner of an encrypted phone company to put a backdoor in his devices, Motherboard has learned. From the report: The company involved is Phantom Secure, a firm that sold privacy-focused BlackBerry phones and which ended up catering heavily to the criminal market, including members of the Sinaloa drug cartel, formerly run by JoaquÃn "El Chapo" Guzman. The news signals some of the tactics law enforcement may use as criminals continue to leverage encrypted communications for their own ends. It also comes as Canadian media reported that a former top official in the Royal Canadian Mounted Police (RCMP), who has been charged with leaking state secrets, offered to sell information to Vincent Ramos, Phantom's CEO. "He was given the opportunity to do significantly less time if he identified users or built in/gave backdoor access," one source who knows Ramos personally and has spoken with him about the issue after his arrest told Motherboard. A backdoor is a general term for some form of technical measure that grants another party, in this case the FBI, surreptitious access to a computer system. What exactly the FBI was technically after is unclear, but the desire for a backdoor was likely to monitor Phantom's clients.

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Karoui's lawyer said court rejected appeal to release runoff candidate for the third time.

Hundreds of workers face hardships and an uncertain future after a number of tea gardens are forced to shut down.

Following a 2015 constitutional amendment, the next president will have fewer powers than his predecessors.

California Governor Gavin Newsom signed a sweeping new law that could force gig companies like Uber and Lyft to reclassify their workers as employees. From a report: The hotly contested legislation, Assembly Bill 5, dictates that workers can generally only be considered contractors if they are doing work that is outside the usual course of a company's business. The law codifies a 2018 state supreme court ruling, and applies it to a wide range of state laws. It could upend the business models of companies that depend on armies of independent contractors, who aren't guaranteed employment protections like minimum wage and overtime. The bill is slated to go into effect on Jan. 1. While the legislature has adjourned until next year, fierce lobbying and deal-making efforts are expected to continue in the meantime, and could potentially yield separate legislation in 2020. In a statement, Newsom called the bill "landmark legislation," and said that, "A next step is creating pathways for more workers to form a union, collectively bargain to earn more, and have a stronger voice at work -- all while preserving flexibility and innovation." Lorena Gonzalez, the state assemblywoman who authored the bill, said in a statement that, "California is now setting the global standard for worker protections for other states and countries to follow." Further reading: Drivers? Never Heard of Them, Says Uber.

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Heart-breaking video brings home what it would be like to be a kid with an active shooter inside your school.

Today's Daily podcast is about Harvey Weinstein. The reporters covering him for the NYT got access to the notes, letters and emails of Lisa Bloom, one of Weinstein's attorneys, detailing the PR and legal campaign to get the story killed. Presumably these techniques worked in the past, but this time the story came out.

Members of the military will seize cars entering the capital for protests, Lieutenant-General Ahmed Gaid Salah says.

Both leaders are short of the parliamentary majority they need to form a government.

Why is human childbirth so long and difficult? Scientists may have the answer from studying fossils.