Author: MNK News

A jury in New Mexico has found Meta liable for violating the state’s consumer protection laws in a high-profile civil trial over child exploitation and other safety issues. One day after closing arguments in the weeks-long trial concluded, the jury ruled against Meta on every count and ordered the company to pay $375 million.The case was brought by New Mexico’s attorney general in 2023 and centered around allegations that Meta knew its platform put children at risk of exploitation and mental health harms and failed to put safety measures in place. In the end, the jury ruled that Meta was…

Author Wynton Hall warns in his new book Code Red: The Left, the Right, China, and the Race to Control AI that AI companions and chatbots are repeating the same mental health disaster social media inflicted on a generation of teens. Only this time, the body count has already started. Hall opens chapter five of CODE RED with the story of Sewell Setzer III, a fourteen-year-old from Orlando, Florida, who spent months exchanging thousands of messages with an AI girlfriend named Dany on Character.AI. Sewell had been diagnosed with mild Asperger’s syndrome, anxiety, and disruptive mood dysregulation disorder. On February…

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — North Carolina government’s most influential politician, Republican state Senate leader Phil Berger, conceded the primary race for his seat to Sam Page on Tuesday, shaking the power structure in the ninth-largest state and likely soon ending Berger’s preeminence as the state’s top conservative architect.Berger had trailed Page, the Rockingham County sheriff, in their March 3 primary by only 23 votes. He has been Senate leader since 2011 when Republicans took full control over the General Assembly for the first time in 140 years. President Donald Trump had endorsed Berger for reelection, praising him for his policy…

Nine in ten Americans think ultra-processed foods are designed to keep them hooked. Now, nearly half support stricter government oversight Fast food, soda, pizza, candy, chips, ice cream, processed meats — Americans admit they can’t quit ultra-processed foods (UPFs), but they’re no longer blaming themselves. Nine in ten believe such food products are engineered to keep them hooked, and nearly half want them regulated like tobacco and alcohol.That’s according to a new survey from health app Lifesum, which polled what it described as a representative sample of 2,000 U.S. adults on their ultra-processed food habits and attitudes toward regulation.It’s happening in a country…

Crypto continues to show resilience with bitcoin (BTC) steadily trading around $70-$71k after briefly dropping below the $70k mark over the weekend, outperforming prior Middle East‑driven sell‑offs where thin liquidity exaggerated downside. Related Reading New QCP’s Market Colour argues that Trump’s failed push for Iran to reopen the Strait over the weekend set the scene for bitcoin’s start of the week. At first, risk assets slipped as traders braced for a spike in geopolitical danger, factoring in possible attacks on Iranian power facilities if the choke-point stayed shut. Once the deadline expired and Trump revealed that any strikes were being…

Ethereum is attempting to reclaim the $2,200 level as market participants react to recent moves by US President Donald Trump in the Middle East, developments that have introduced renewed volatility across global risk assets. The reaction reflects a broader sensitivity to geopolitical uncertainty, with crypto markets showing mixed signals as traders reassess risk exposure. Related Reading Despite the attempted recovery, the underlying data suggest that demand remains uneven. According to CryptoQuant analyst Arab Chain, the Coinbase Premium Index for Ethereum has registered a reading of approximately -0.0149, a clearly negative value. This indicates that ETH is trading at a higher…

Grok has already taken extensive heat after the AI chatbot’s image generation tool was used to create an estimated 3 million sexualized images over 11 days, including 23,000 of minors, according to the Center for Countering Digital Hate. Regulators around the world have limited access or launched investigations into the platform’s potentially illegal and nonconsensual image generation. The US government hasn’t made any moves against xAI or its platform at the federal level, but today, the city of Baltimore began a municipal lawsuit against the company.The lawsuit takes a different tactic, arguing that Elon Musk’s businesses violated the city’s Consumer…

Six platforms consistently stand out for beginners in 2026. Each one has a different strength. The comparison table below gives you the key numbers at a glance — the sections that follow explain what those numbers actually mean for you.  Exchange Best For Trading Fee Coins Beginner Rating Coinbase Absolute beginners (US) 0.05–0.60% 300+ ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ Kraken Security & trust 0.16–0.26% 500+ ⭐⭐⭐⭐⭐ …

The jury deliberating a landmark social media addiction case involving tech giants Meta and Google informed a Los Angeles judge on Monday that they are experiencing difficulty reaching a consensus regarding one of the defendants — but which one has not been made public. The New York Post reports that a jury in Los Angeles has notified Judge Carolyn B. Kuhl that it is struggling to come to an agreement in a landmark trial addressing social media addiction claims against technology companies Meta and Google. The jury did not specify which of the two defendants is causing the impasse in their…

Summit Art Creations / Shutterstock.com (Summit Art Creations / Shutterstock.com)Quick ReadChatGPT ranked Solana first with a $140–$180 price target, Bitcoin second at $95,000–$120,000, and XRP last at $1.80–$2.40, giving SOL the highest upside at 52–96% from current levels.Solana ETFs have 48.8% institutional ownership from 13F filers compared to just 15.9% for XRP, despite both products holding roughly $1.45 billion in cumulative inflows.XRP’s weekly ETF flows collapsed from $200 million at launch to $640,000, and its daily DEX volume of under $7 million is a fraction of Solana’s billions, making it rank last on fundamentals alone.The crypto market is back in…