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NEWS STREAM
Russians Expel American Ryan Fogel For "Espionage"; Cyclone Mahasen Bears Down On 8 Million In Bangladesh, Myanmar; Microsoft Teaches At-Risk Filipino Youth Computer Skills; Preview of Google I/O 2013; Police Investigate Destruction of Ancient Mayan Pyramid; Outrage Over Disnification of Brave's Princess Merida
Aired May 15, 2013 - 08:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
KRISTIE LU STOUT, HOST: I'm Kristie Lu Stout in Hong Kong. And welcome to News Stream where news and technology meet.
Now the strange case of the alleged spy, his blonde wig and the growing rift between the U.S. and Russia.
As fears of cyber warfare grow, we meet China's original patriotic hacker.
And last year, they demonstrated their latest product by jumping out of a plane, so what does Google have planned for its annual showcase this year?
Now this man is at the center of the latest strain on U.S.-Russia relations. Moscow has declared that U.S. diplomat Ryan Fogel persona non grata and ordered his expulsion. Now the Russian security service, the FSB, says Fogel was caught red-handed trying to recruit a Russian intelligence officer. He has since been handed over to the U.S. embassy that has not commented on the situation and neither has the CIA.
Now Russia's foreign ministry says such provocative actions in the spirit of the Cold War does not contribute to building mutual trust.
But some in the U.S. intelligence community are casting doubt on the incident. Now one former FBI officer says Fogel's alleged spy arsenal looks like a setup. As you can see, it includes wigs, sunglasses, recording devices, a paper map of Moscow and on the far end there a compass. Now that envelop, it appears to contain a stack of euros.
And Russian media report that a letter found in Fogel's possession offered his would-be recruit a $100,000 payment for a meeting and $1 million a year to work as a spy. Some analysts say that amount is abnormally high.
Now questions are also being raised about the timing of all this.
Now Phil Black joins us now live from Moscow. And Phil, the wigs, the dark glasses, a compass. I mean, the so-called spy arsenal it's a bit bizarre. Is there growing skepticism about this case?
PHIL BLACK, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Kristie, a lot of the expert comment has certainly been skeptical. And with the Americans maintaining a very strict silence, no comment on these allegations, there is something of an information vacuum. And swimming around within it are lots of interesting questions like if the Russian allegations are true then what did this man really hope to achieve with that very low tech, basic, really old school or retro spy kit that you've described there -- the wigs, the compass, the pocket knives, the flashlight and so forth.
And again, if it is true, then why did the Russians decide to stop this man rather than monitor and potentially manipulate him? And in deciding to stop him, why did they decide to blow his cover so spectacularly in such a public way with the video and the photos and so forth.
It would seem pretty clear that the Russians are trying to send a message in this, but who that message is intended for and precisely what it is still isn't entirely clear, Kristie.
LU STOUT: So many questions about this, but it has turned into an incident. So what does the incident say about the relationship and the trust issue between Russia and the U.S.?
BLACK: Well, it confirms what wasn't really a secret and that since the -- with the end of the Cold war, the cloak and dagger sneaky stuff, that didn't stop, nor did the distrust, really, that still hangs over from that historic period as well.
Over the last 18 months, have been a very frosty time for U.S.-Russian relations, because the Russians have regularly accused the Americans of trying to meddle and interfere in Russian affairs, specifically through using non-governmental organizations, funding them, they say, to allegedly interfere in Russian politics.
A lot of the analysis believes that that message has largely been for a domestic Russian audience. And it's possible that this incident, and particularly the very public way with which it's been handled, is intended for the same.
But in recent weeks, we've seen these two countries try to work together more closely. In the aftermath of the Boston attack, they've been talking about really being more open with counter-terrorism issues and sharing intelligence and so forth, and in the last week or so they've been talking about trying to work together to solve Syria.
At the moment, it's unclear if this one incident is going to affect that sort of recent progress, but for the moment, America appears to be holding return fire. They're maintaining this strict no comment and there's still no sign just yet as to whether there will be a tit-for-tat expulsion of a Russian diplomat from the United States, Kristie.
LU STOUT: Now we have learned that the U.S. ambassador to Russia has met with Russian officials to discuss the case. What can we read into that meeting?
BLACK: Well, we know that the U.S. ambassador to Russia Michael McFaul, he was summoned yesterday and he went along to the foreign ministry this morning, met with the deputy foreign minister and left silently a short time later. The Russian say that they issued a formal protest about this diplomatic officer that they say was really an undercover spy.
And over in Sweden, that's where you'll find the Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov and the U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry. Sergei Lavrov says the two men have not mentioned this spy scandal despite the fact they're attending a summit, an Arctic summit meeting there.
Sergei Lavrov says there was no reason to. It's all out in the open, it's all very clear.
As I said, the Americans are not saying anything. All they have acknowledged so far is that one of their diplomatic officials here in Moscow was detained for a short period of time -- Krisite.
LU STOUT: A very intriguing story. Phil Black joining us live from Moscow, thank you.
Now buried in the rubble of a collapsed clothing factory of Bangladesh, this young seamstress, she spent 17 days in pitch darkness fearing that she would never be found. But Reshma survived the industrial disaster and without serious physical injury. And now in a CNN exclusive, she speaks to Leone Lakhani about her harrowing experience.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
LEONE LAKHANI, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Pulled out of the rubble after 17 harrowing days, Reshma's rescue was hailed a miracle. We meet her at a military hospital where she's recovering. No broken bones or serious injuries, but she's till weak. We're asked not to rattle or move her.
From her hospital bed, she describes her unimaginable ordeal.
RESHMA, SURVIVOR OF SAVAR DISASTER (through translator): I keep sleeping off and on. I couldn't see anything. It was so dark.
LAKHANI: Cracks in the building had already been detected, but I ask her if she had been warned not to go to work.
RESHMA (through translator): No, no one told me. Everyone was looking to see which parts were cracked. So I went in and I see that there is a wall where a little bit is cracked. The manager said this is just water damage and you guys can work.
LAKHANI: Day after day as the rescue efforts carried on above her, she lay in pitch dark scavenging for food and water.
RESHMA (through translator): There was a hole. I didn't know if it was dirty water or what type of water. I was thirsty, so I drank.
LAKHANI: She had no idea how long she'd been inside.
I asked if she heard the people outside during the rescue efforts. She heard nothing and saw nothing until the 17th day when it all changed.
RESHMA (through translator): Suddenly I heard the call to prayer, then I heard sounds. I heard the sounds of voices and I wondered where is the sound coming from? Where is the sound coming from? I was really, really happy. And I said, god, save me god.
LAKHANI: Images of Reshma's rescue were seen the world over. Rescuers had thrown in a flashlight, allowing her to find a fresh set of clothes to change into.
RESHMA (through translator): The day I got out, all of my clothes had torn off me and I didn't have many clothes on. I was thinking how is I going to come out in front of all those people?
LAKHANI: She tells me she's unsure about her future, but she knows she's not going back to the garment business.
RESHMA (through translator): Everybody, please pray for me.
LAKHANI: With the world's eyes upon her, many already are.
Leone Lakhani, Savar, Bangladesh.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LU STOUT: An incredible story.
And after that disaster, Bangladesh is also bracing for a tropical cyclone heading towards its southern coast. Now tropical cyclone Mahasen is on track to make landfall near the country's second largest city Chittagong late on Thursday. And it brings with it the threat of a humanitarian crisis.
The United Nations says Mahasen could cause, quote, "life threatening conditions for more than 8 million people in northeast India, Bangladesh, and Myanmar.
Now thousands of refugees from the violence in Myanmar now living in temporary shelters are particularly at risk.
Let's get more on the tropical cyclone and its potentially deadly path now. Mari Ramos is tracking it from the world weather center -- Mari.
MARI RAMOS, CNN WEATHER CORRESPONDENT: Kristie, yeah, you know, whenever we talk about tropical cyclones in this part of the world, there's just so much anxiety about it. There's a lot of different factors that come into play here. One of them is the population density, because so many people, like you said, could be affected. In this case, the UN is saying about 8 million people.
Now what we're expecting with this storm, landfall probably within the next 24 hours. Rainfall is going to be the main concern and so that's the second thing. We're talking about the topography here that is very vulnerable to flooding, because it's so flat. The way -- the way the terrain is with so many rivers coming out to the ocean in this one particular area of the northern Bay of Bengal, it becomes very difficult and very easily flooded not just by rain, but also by the winds pushed the water back.
Then you have the wind. In this case, we're not talking about a major storm, a category 4, a category 5 like we had in other times. But still with winds close to a 100 kilometers per hour, we could still see some significant damage, particularly in those most vulnerable areas that you were talking about.
And I mentioned the coastal flooding or the storm surge that is still a huge concern along the rivers and of course along the water.
This is what the storm looks like now. You can see it continuing to track to the north. (inaudible) significant rainfall here along the coast of India and very rough seas. You're seeing improvement to the south, but of course conditions worsen to the north. And already along the mouth of the Ganges here you're starting to see some of that rain is starting to approach. So people that haven't moved out of the way already from this area, it's going to make it even more difficult to do so.
I showed this Google Earth image earlier today. And I want to go ahead and show it to you once again. So we're going to step away over here toward my desk and zoom in a little bit. You see all of these areas here? That's what they call the mouth of the Ganges. It's very flat and kind of a river floodplain area. And I'm going to go ahead and zoom in to the areas where this storm is expected to make landfall.
Look over here, this is what it looks like. And I wanted to show you this, because I don't think people really have an idea. You see all these rivers that come out very flat. There are small canals that come out to this area and you think, well, there's not that many people here, right?
You might think that at first glance, but you know just look a little bit farther upstream with this these pictures from Google and then you can see how people actually live. They rely on these waterways. They rely on the dry lands that's around here to try, you know, to survive and to have their livelihoods. So it is a populated area. It's not just some random place where nobody lives.
So it's very important for people to understand and that is why it becomes so difficult for evacuations to happen.
The track itself takes it northward. Winds, like I said, close to 100 kilometers per hour. We're not expecting this to intensify much more than what it already has so far.
You mentioned -- I showed you Bangladesh. Myanmar is another very vulnerable area and we have pictures to show you of some of the evacuations that were happening there. This is completely new, Kristie. I've never seen this happen before in the years that I've been covering storms in this part of the world.
Normally, they don't get a lot of warning in these areas and that has been one of the big criticisms for this part of the world. This time around in Myanmar, we are seeing or we're hearing at least from the UN that there are people that are being evacuated, particularly those displaced people, the people that live in those tent cities and that's extremely important. There's also announcements being made on the radio they say in their local languages so that people are aware that a tropical cyclone is coming. In other times, in other cases we haven't heard this before so this is a big change, I think, of preparedness in this part of the world that will hopefully help to save lives.
Back to you.
LU STOUT: And Mari, thank you for showing us so clearly why that area is so vulnerable. Again, according to the UN, up to 8 million people could be at risk due to this storm. Mari Ramos tracking it for us. Thank you.
Now you're watching News Stream. And still to come, we have an exclusive look at life inside the Guantanamo Bay detention facility in Cuba. See for yourself the conditions inmates are kept in. And hear from the guards who watch over them.
U.S. President Barack Obama promised to camp would be closed by now. And ahead, why critics are now questioning some other promises he made.
And we meet a man who once hacked the White House website, now reformed.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LU STOUT: Welcome back. You're watching News Stream. And you're looking at a visual rundown of all the stories we have in the show. Our top story is Russia's claim that an American diplomat tried to recruit a Russian intelligence officer to spy for the U.S.
And later, we'll show you how Microsoft is helping the fight against human trafficking.
But now, we're taking you to the U.S. detention center in Guantanamo Bay. And nearly four-and-a-half years after U.S. President Barack Obama said he would close the facility, it is still open with more than 160 prisoners inside. And there are growing calls for the president to fulfill his promise and that includes the ex-chief prosecutor at GITMO. And he spoke to Christiane Amanpour.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
COL. MORRIS DAVID, FRM. CHIEF PROSECUTOR, GUANTANAMO BAY: What we're asking the president to do is to keep his word. I mean, I think -- you know, I'm disappointed that he didn't follow through on hope and change, but there are 166 men that are even more disappointed than I am. He promised before he became president he was going to close Guantanamo. You know, it was a nonpartisan issue for awhile. John McCain said he wanted to close it yet it's still open because it became a political football and people are paying for it with their lives.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LU STOUT: A lawyer for some of the GITMO detainees says that they're growing increasingly resentful and frustrated. And as Chris Lawrence shows us, they're taking it out on the U.S. guards.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
CHRIS LAWRENCE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: CNN got exclusive access to camps five and six where most of the detainees are being held. We saw individual cells, media rooms with leg shackles bolted to the ground, and communal areas that used to be filled with detainees.
(on camera): Right now, the camp six detainees are all being held in individual cells like these.
(voice-over): Patrolling those cells, young guards the age of college students. And for the first time we're seeing the faces of those who guard the detainees.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: They use extremely vulgar language towards females. And I've had a lot of experience with that, unfortunately. So especially Caucasian females, they do not like us at all.
LAWRENCE: She's 21-years-old. And down in the cell block she's been called every name in the book.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The most common one is (EXPLETIVE DELETED), whore, slut. They'll say things like I'll piss all over your face. They'll say, oh you've had (EXPLECTIVE DELETED) thrown on you, you've been disrepected, nobody wants you. You're trash now.
LAWRENCE: The situation inside Guantanamo is dire. A hunger strike has gone from a half dozen detainees to more than 100. Of those, about 30 refuse to take the liquid nutritional drinks and have to be fed through a tube.
But officials admit the clock is ticking on this option.
CAPTAIN ROBERT DURAND, TASK FORCE GITMO SPOKESMAN: If anybody has had a can of Ensure or Muscle Milk or whatever it says right on it it's not designed to be a long-term sole source of nutrition. So there are long- term consequences of getting all your meals through a liquid supplement.
LAWRENCE: All of this tension is leading to more conflict, including so-called splashing where detainees squirt guards with a mix of water, urine and feces.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: That is their biggest way to act out is throw feces at guards. And it's been happening consistently, actually, for the past month-and-a-half. Every single day there's a splashing.
LAWRENCE (on camera): In fact, you can see the results of some of the splashing here on the ceiling, pieces of feces that are still stuck to the top of the ceiling.
(voice-over): One guard says she's been splashed several times.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: And then you go to the hospital. They draw your blood. They'll let you know if that detainee has any diseases and then you go right back to work.
LAWRENCE: What kind of training...
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LU STOUT: Chris Lawrence reporting there from the Guantanamo Bay Detention Center. And even though that facility is on a U.S. Naval Base, let's not forget that it's located on the eastern tip of Cuba. You might find that strange, since U.S. maintains and economic embargo on Communist Cuba, but it is actually controlled the 115 square kilometers of land for more than a century and for a surprisingly reasonable rate. The U.S. pays Cuba just over $4,000 a year for the land. And it will probably remain that way. The lease can only be broken by mutual consent.
Now the U.S. Justice Department is defending its decision to secretly obtain phone records of the Associated Press. The U.S. attorney general says it was necessary to get the court order to investigate the leak of classified information about a planned bombing. He calls the leak one of the most serious he has ever seen. The AP says it is shocked by the government intrusion.
Now the White House says it did not know about the subpoena, that is just one of several scandals currently rocking Barack Obama's administration raising questions about his commitment to transparency.
Erin McPike has more.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BARACK OBAMA, PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES: It's a great question.
ERIN MCPIKE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Remember this?
OBAMA: A central ingredient of making Washington work is increasing transparency and accountability.
MCPIKE: That was on the campaign trail five years ago. And this from President Obama's first day on the job.
OBAMA: Let me say it as simply as I can, transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency.
MCPIKE: And still three months ago in the Roosevelt Room.
OBAMA: This is the most transparent administration in history.
MCPIKE: He explained how in a Google chat.
OBAMA: Every visitor that comes into the White House is now part of the public record, that's something that we changed. Just about every law that we pass, every rule that we implement we put online for everybody there to see.
MCPIKE: But those are incremental changes inside the walls of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Other parts of the administration are facing withering criticism about a lack of transparency.
OBAMA: There's no there there.
MCPIKE: Republican critics still charge there's been a coverup campaign after four Americans were killed in an attack on the mission in Benghazi.
OBAMA: The whole issue of this -- of talking points, frankly, throughout this process has been a sideshow. Nobody understood exactly what was taking place during the course of those first few days.
MCPIKE: An investigation is escalating into the IRS targeting conservative groups with additional scrutiny just as they were gaining traction.
OBAMA: If you've got the IRS operating in anything less than a neutral and non-partisan way, then that is outrageous, it is contrary to our traditions, and people have to be held accountable and it's got to be fixed.
MCPIKE: And in an apparent effort to pinpoint a leak, the Justice Department secretly combed through months of phone records from the Associated Press.
JAY CARNEY, WHITE HOUSE PRESS SECRETARY: He believes strongly in the need for the press to be unfettered in its pursuit of investigative journalism. He also believes strongly as a citizen and as president in the need to ensure that classified information is not leaked.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
LU STOUT: And that was Erin McPIke reporting.
Now the New York Knicks trying to stay alive in the NBA playoffs, but not if the Indiana Pacers have their way. Alex Thomas has the details on that and all the sports next on News Stream.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LU STOUT: Broadcasting live from Hong Kong, you're back watching News Stream.
All eight of the remaining teams in the NBA playoffs have played at least four games, but no one is through to the next round yet.
Let's join World Sport's Alex Thomas for more -- Alex.
ALEX THOMAS, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Yeah, hi Kristie. They finished the regular season as the second best team in the East, only the NBA champions had a better record, but now the New York Knicks are fighting for their lives in the playoffs. Carmela Anthony and his teammates will have to win three in a row to get past the Indiana Pacers and reach the conference finals.
In game four on Tuesday night, the Knicks with a slow start. Melo shot there coming back off the rim. He made only nine of 23 all night, still finished as New York's top scorer with 24 points. That was only two less than Indiana's George Hill with a game high 26. He helped give the Pacers an early 18 point lead. Then their defense stopped any Knicks recovery. a 93-82 win. Indiana go 3-1 up in the series.
Like Melo and the Knicks, Steph Curry and the Warriors are also one game away from a playoff exit after losing game five of their series against the Spurs. Curry with an off night, only nine points from him. Lost the ball there in the third as Kawhi Leonard scores with the fast break slam.
Tony Parker led the Spurs with 25 points and 10 assists. This is Manu Ginobili, though, with a three from the wing as San Antonio win 109-91. They go 3-2 up in their series.
On to Football, the Spanish media reporting that Malaga have agreed to let coach Manuel Pellegrini leave. And it's thought he's agreed in principle to become Manchester City's next football manager.
Here in the UK, there were protests on Tuesday evening ahead of City's penultimate game of the English Premier League season away to Reading. Mancini's sacking a split opinion, but some fans simply aren't happy he's going.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: City finished second, last year he won the Premiership. (inaudible) won the FA Cup. I don't know why he's getting sacked for, it's just stupid.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The fans (inaudible) because we have to pay for the owners to (inaudible) so we have to -- it's not in Mancini we trust, it's in the owners we trust.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: We have (inaudible). And at the end of the day some people will blame the players, but at the end of the day if the manager gets the credit holding the Premier League and the FA Cup, then he's got to accept the criticism.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: He had passion, he had commitment, and he delivered trophies. And if coming in second isn't good enough, I feel sorry for the new manager.
UNIDENTIIFED MALE: You know who I think we should go for, Ferguson.
(LAUGHTER)
(END VIDEO CLIP)
THOMAS: That really would be some story.
Now while City lick their wounds after a trophy-less season, Manchester United are still recovering from their title celebrations. And less than 48 hours after that Premier League trophy parade through the city streets, Rio Ferdinand has announced his international retirement. The 34- year-old says he's quitting England to focus on his United career.
Below those two Manchester clubs, there's still a fight on for the other Champion's League qualifying places. Aresenal's fate remains in their own hands after a 4-1 win over Wigan who now become the first FA Cup holders to also get relegated. Aresenal leap back above Spurs into fourth place in the table. There's even a chance the Gunners could overhaul Chelsea into third depending on results on the final day of the season this weekend.
We have got a Europa League final between Chelsea and Benfica to look forward to. We'll do that in World Sport in just over three-and-a-half hours time. For now, Kristie, back to you.
LU STOUT: All right, Alex Thomas there, thank you.
Now the man known as China's original patriotic hacker is now working to prevent the very thing he became famous for. We'll have that story next on News Stream.
Plus, the instant message app exclusively for BlackBerry won't be exclusive for much longer. We've got the details ahead.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LU STOUT: I'm Kristie Lu Stout in Hong Kong. You're watching News Stream. And these are your world headlines
Now Cyclone Mahasen is bearing down on southeast Asia and is heading north in the Bay of Bengal and is set to make landfall on Thursday afternoon. Northeast India, Bangladesh and Myanmar are all in its path. And the UN says more than 8 million people in coastal areas face life threatening conditions.
Israel says rockets have landed in the Israeli held Golan Heights on its border with Syria. Israeli military officials say that the rockets were the result of what they call the domestic situation in Syria. Israel has closed off the area to visitors.
Nigeria's president has declared a state of emergency across three states. Goodluck Jonathan says the country is facing a rebellion driven by Islamist extremists. He has sent more troops to northeast Nigeria promising to hunt down the insurgents.
15 years of hard labor have started for Korean American Kenneth Bay. North Korea says the man it accuses of trying to bring down the state is now in a special prison. The U.S. says he entered the country as a tour operator and should be released. So far Pyongyang has ignored the U.S. appeal.
Now cyber hacking has become a major issue between the U.S. and China, but the man who once proclaimed himself to be China's patriotic hacker now wants to help end cyber crime. David McKenzie has more on this from our bureau in Beijing -- David.
DAVID MCKENZIE, CNN INTERNATIONAL CORRESPONDENT: Well, that's right, Kristie. Those accusations have been flying for weeks, in fact months, between the U.S. and China. The Pentagon is the latest one to weigh in saying that China, in fact, is hacking in to U.S. defense systems. We met with the original patriotic hacker.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MCKENZIE: Cheesy graphics, and cheesy music. It was state of the art stuff back then. The homepages of the legendary Chinese hacking syndicate China Eagle Union founded by Eagle One, China's original patriotic hacker.
EAGLE ONE, FRM. HACKER: In that time I was a young man, angry young man, OK.
MCKENZIE: He tells me he was angry at China's weakness and America's strength and went on the attack hacking and defacing a series of U.S. government and corporate sites, bringing down the White House official site. Hackers was here, they wrote. Juvenile to be sure, but it kicked off a cyber battle between U.S. and Chinese hackers.
Those days seem almost innocent. This building in Shanghai is now the command center of a new cyber war, says U.S. security firm Mandiant, claiming it houses a military sponsored hacking group stealing terabytes of data from mainly U.S. companies.
As we found out, it's a highly sensitive installation.
Keep driving. Drive away. Drive away. Drive away.
Duncan Clark helps foreigners invest in Chinese internet ventures. He says today's hacking could be all about gaining the competitive edge for Chinese state corporations.
DUNCAN CLARK, CHAIRMAN, BDA: Well, I think the biggest question is with industrial cyber espionage, what is the most valuable stuff in the world today? And, you know, there is really a gap between China's innovation capacity, its industrial strength, and that of, say, the U.S.
MCKENZIE: The Chinese government flatly denies all the hacking accusations. And think about this, cyber China is so vast that even Twitter-like sites like Sino Weibo have more than haf a billion users. And that scale means that China is both a potential culprit of hacking, but also an ideal victim.
So I'm looking here from Ho Chi Minh, from Teipei.
Eagle One says hacking is a constant threat from all over the world. He now helps track and prevent hacking attacks in China, including, he says, from the United States.
Hacking can come from anywhere.
EAGLE ONE: Yes.
MCKENZIE: And it's very hard to trace.
EAGLE ONE: Yes.
MCKENZIE: He says hacking ground rules need to be quickly established, or they'll permanently damage the U.S.-China relationship and inspire a new generation of patriotic hackers in the cyber war.
(END VDIETAOPE)
MCKENZIE: Well, Kristie, you see those old hacks it seems almost ancient history now just how crude they were. But really how things have shifted away from defacing sites, making it very obvious in terms of Chinese involvement, or alleged involvement in hacking, and more going beneath the systems, into the data and potentially stealing that data to help state companies, or the government. That's certainly something that China denies, but those are the accusations flying right now.
It seems like we in the thick of another cyber war between the U.S. and China -- Kristie.
LU STOUT: And the accusations come from both sides. And it was very interesting in your report to hear that reformed security expert Eagle One talk about hack attacks originating from the United States. So, David, what more do we know about America's cyber threat to China?
MCKENZIE: Well, we do know that all countries have hackers both private and potentially publicly funded. Now recently declassified documents in the U.S. suggest that the NSA, the National Security Agency, had a directive from as early as 1997 that the next cyber warfare, or the next warfare will be cyber warfare. And certainly those documents released by George Washington University show that the U.S. has always been heavily involved in cyber espionage in some way.
The difference here, really, is that the allegation is that China or either Chinese government officials or private individuals are hacking to steal corporate data innovation to help Chinese state companies, in particular, get ahead.
So, the ground rules they talk about, it's either -- whether it's in a sense they mustn't cross those red lines and steal data, but certainly cyber espionage is something of the modern-era -- Kristie.
LU STOUT: All right. David McKenzie joining us live from Beijing, thank you very much indeed for that report.
Now, we want to tell you about a computer class that may keep children in the Philippines from falling victim to human traffickers. Michael Holmes shows us how Microsoft is helping students in some of the country's poorest communities.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
MICHAEL HOLMES, CNN CORRESPONDENT: It may look like a typical after school program, but these kids are getting farm more than just a little help with their homework.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I'm scared for I don't know how to use computer. Because if I use -- I think if I use this, I broke a computer.
HOLMES: The students, most of whom come from some of Manila's poorest slums, are taking part in the step-up program.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: It's beneficially to us, most of the youth, because even though out of school until they can go here to not become human trafficked or drug addicts. Then if they study here, they avoid that.
HOLMES: Part of Microsoft's community outreach program and its ongoing effort to help combat human trafficking, students with the step up program learn how to use computers, becoming familiar in basic IT, Microsoft Office, and other types of business software.
John Bessey, managing director of Microsoft Philippines, says the company has invested around $2 million to create 50 of these centers across the Philippines.
JOHN BESSY, MANAGING DIRECTOR, MICROSOFT PHILIPPINES: I think the important thing that we've learned is that if you've been something like human trafficking, obviously you need safety and security, but you also need to get your confidence back. And what we've seen is with technology and these girls, young girls often using this technology, its a way for them to build skills not only that can be used in the workforce, but just building the skills and having confidence to do something new and brave like go out to the internet again helps them build their confidence, I think, and rebuild their lives.
HOLMES: In the past seven years, the program has helped train more than 30,000 young people -- 30,000 -- with new skills and a renewed hope for what the future might hold.
Michael Holmes, CNN, Atlanta.
(END VIDEOATPE)
LU STOUT: And we have more on the problem of human trafficking in the Philippines in a new CNN documentary. It's called The Fighters. It debuts this week. It looks at how migrant workers and their families become victims of slave labor and highlights the brave individuals who have stepped up to try and stop it.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
UNIDENTIIFED FEMALE: We are on the way to conduct a raid. We are following two vans here. The first van (inaudible) which are the assault group.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Where are you?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The back.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: The girls are stunned and compliant.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Passport (inaudible) passport.
UNIDENTIIFED MALE: But the suspected trafficker isn't ready to cooperate.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: (SPEAKING IN FOREIGN LANGUAGE)
UNIDENTIIFED MALE: One agent tries to take her cellphone, which she reluctantly hands over. Others sift through stacks of passports and recruitment albums littered across a mattress. At the same time, Obana (ph) is learning more from the victims who are learning a few things themselves.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Most of them were actually promised a job in the Middle East, but when I asked them do you have any contract and where are you going? They don't even know where they are going to do. They say that they're just instructed here to come to Manila and try to fix their document and they don't have any idea. Some of them said that they're going to Kuwait, some of them said that they're going to Syria. They don't even know what's going on in Syria now.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Obana (ph) explains what they're lack of knowledge could have led to.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: I think a lot of them now is really scared and some of them are even confused what's going on next.
UNIDENTIIFED MALE: Many of these women who come from the Muslim region of Mindanao cry not out of relief, but disappointment, still believing they've lost an opportunity to help their struggling families.
How are you feeling right now?
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE; The feeling right now is really I'm angry, you know, because that whoever, you know, committed this crime really (inaudible) on the hope of these poor mothers. And look at their situation, that this is really, you know, terrible and I'm angry.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LU STOUT: And the CNN Freedom Project document, it'll be presented in two parts over two consecutive nights. Viewers can see part one Friday at 9:00 pm London time, that's 4:00 am Saturday in Hong Kong. And part two airs the next day at the same time.
If you'd like to learn more, just head to CNN.com/thefighters.
You're watching News Stream. And just ahead, as Google gears up for its annual developer conference, we explore what might be in store for its Android operating system. Stick around.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LU STOUT: Welcome back.
Now it is a signature feature for the BlackBerry, but now the company says it will bring BlackBerry messanger to both Apple's iOS and Google's Android. Now BBM has long been a popular way for BlackBerry users to swap messages with each other. It's one of the first to send messages as data instead of as regular SMS text messages, meaning users avoided paying text message fees to phone companies. But BBM could face stiff competition. There are now plenty of apps that do what BBM does.
Let's take a look at their competition on the iPhone alone. There's Apple's own iMessage, Facebook Messenger, Skype, WeChat from China's Tencent and WhatsApp which is the third most popular paid app on the iPhone's App store.
Now a new messaging app is also rumored to be one of Google's big announcements at its developers conference. Now Google I/O is where the company shows off what it has in store for the coming year. It's where Google Glass was memorably introduced during a live skydiving demonstration in 2012.
But most will be closely watching to see what Google has planned for Android under its new boss. Just two months ago, Android's co-founder Andy Rubin, he left Google and he was replaced by Sundar Pichai who could take the stage in just a few hours to unveil the future of Android.
Let's get more on what we can expect from Google. I'm joined by Nick Thompson. He's the editor of TheNewYorker.com. And Nick, first, let's talk about Sundar Pichai, he's been running Android, Chrome and Google Apps for just a couple of months now. What do you think of his leadership so far?
NICK THOMPSON, NEWYORKER.COM EDITOR: Well, we don't really know. It's a little bit early. We'll know a little bit more at the end of the day. People seem generally satisfied . There hasn't been anything that's been broken rather badly at least in the first two months.
I mean, he has two really big problems he has to solve. The first is that he used to run Chrome and now he runs Chrome and Android. Google has two operating systems. Really, they shouldn't have two operating systems with engineers working in two different direction that they should try to unify them. However, it's a really hard challenge, which becomes which how do you mold them together, how do you make the complicated pieces fit together? Very hard problem. We have no idea where he's going to come out.
And the second big one, which is what we're going to learn a lot about today is how do you make money from Android? They made this operating system that the world loves, it's you know taken over the phone world and they're not really making much money from it at all. So, how do they make money from it?
LU STOUT: That's right. What are your thoughts about that? What's the future of Android?
THOMPSON: Well, the way they make money right now is they drive people to basic Google services, right. People -- if they have Android on their phone, this is what Google says. If people have Android on their phones, they use the web more often. If they use the web, they search, they use YouTube, we make some money off advertising off that.
OK, maybe.
They also make a little bit of money off Google Play. It's a very small number, but it is increasing fairly rapidly. So they can make some money there.
But in truth, the companies that make money off Android are, you know, what's mainly Samsung is making tons of money from Android.
So what Google is going to have to decide is whether they want Android to become more of a closed system where they have more control, where they drive people in certain ways, whether they try to make it more like iOS. Android was very much in the very beginning totally open. It was open source. It was free. People could modify it. Google's competitors have used it. Amazon uses it in their Kindles. Facebook uses it.
So Google is going to have to decide whether at some point they want to kind of go away from the founding mission, away from the openness, away from the ideolism, and toward something where they make some more money.
LU STOUT: So we'll be looking out for an Android announcement from Google. Also an announcement about unified messaging. It is rumored that Google will unify all its messaging services -- Drive, Gmail, Google+. Google users need this, but will Google deliver it?
THOMPSON: Well, it's a hard challenge. I mean, Google has this funny problem. They invent and they launch 75 new products a year, which creates all this confusion. So then they have to try to unify them, kill some, and bring them back together. People have Google products and you have Google Voice isn't really that integrated with Gmail, isn't that integrated with Google+. So they need to do it, but again they've had development teams working in different directions on these different products. So it's a little hard, it's -- you know, it's Lego blocks that don't really entirely fit. And there are bugs and glitches.
So they're absolutely going to try. There are all sorts of hints and code that people have seen that there's something called Babble that is going to try to bring these things together. We'll probably know about that again, you know, at least by tomorrow.
LU STOUT: Yeah, looking out for talk on Babble.
Also Google Glass. I mean, it was last year's best of show. But what does Google need to deliver next for Google Glass?
THOMPSON: Well, it needs to work. I mean, you know, people -- there's a relatively small number of people who use them. Some people love them, some people find it confusing and distracting. But it is a very exciting product. I think we're going to -- I think they've had a very smart rollout strategy. They announced it a year ago. Everybody got very excited. We spent about six months, you know, building up the hype, trying to think about more about how futuristic it is, whether it takes us into the Minority Report world. Now they've given out to, I don't know, a couple of thousand people. They're starting to show demonstrations with journalists. I get my first test with it on Friday.
So it's sort of a slow rollout. And, you know, maybe by the end of the year they'll have some sort of massive option.
LU STOUT: Yeah, look forward to hear what your reaction is after you test it out on Friday.
Nick Thompson, thank you so much for the preview of Google I/O. Nick Thompson of NewYorker.com joining us live from New York. Thank you and take care.
THOMPSON: Thank you, Kristie.
LU STOUT: Now, Google CEO Larry Page has broken his silence on his loss of voice. He says it's due to vocal chord paralysis. And writing on his Google+ page he says his doctors think the condition stems from nerve damage related to a bad cold he suffered 14 years ago. That illness paralyzed his left vocal chord. And another cold last summer made things worse. It explains why Page did not speak in public for several months last year. And when he did, why he sounded hoarse.
Now Larry Page says paralysis of both vocal chords is rare. And that he is funding research through the Voice Health Institute.
Now an ancient structure reduced to rubble. Still to come here on News Stream, why officials in Belize made the decision to destroy a pyramid more than 2,000 years old.
(COMMERCIAL BREAK)
LU STOUT: Welcome back.
We have another check of the global forecast with news of a hail storm in China. Let's get the very latest now with Mari Ramos. She joins us from the World Weather Center -- Mari.
RAMOS: Hey, Kristie, sometimes you know these summer thunderstorms can be extremely violent and severe and that's what we saw right now in parts of China.
Let's go ahead and roll the pictures, because you know the temperature gets -- rises and then all of a sudden you get these downpours. This happening on Tuesday. And I wanted to show it to you, because you can still see a lot of the damage left over by the hail storm.
When you talk about hail, it's not only, of course, dangerous if it falls on you if you happen to be outside, but look at that, it looks like snow. All of that ice on the ground surprising people on a summer day.
But it's also quite damaging to crops. And that's one of the big concerns, because as you can see there all of that -- not only covered in the ice, which is not necessarily the bad part, the hail destroys the leaves of the plants and they have a hard time recuperating from that. So that is still a big concern.
So we'll continue to monitor that story for you.
I want to bring you back over here very quickly and tell you again about this tropical cyclone that we're watching in the Bay of Bengal. It's still there. And it has been bringing rain along the coast of India here, in particular right now. 30 millimeters of rain on and off, that doesn't seem too bad, right. But this time of year it is unusual to get rain of course ahead of the monsoon and that is precisely when these tropical cyclones form, ahead -- you know, in this in between times before the monsoon actually starts.
India just came out with their latest forecast and they're expecting the monsoon to set in in Kerala around June 4. We'll see how that pans out later on in the year.
The cyclone itself expected to move along the coast of India into Bangladesh and then eventually into parts of Myanmar, not expected to intensify too much more than what we are right now with winds gusting just over 100 kilometers per hour. The main concern continues to be the rain moving into this area. We talked earlier about how the UN is saying about 8 million people are in the cyclone's path, that is always a huge concern when you have a tropical cyclone making landfall in a highly populated area and a particular concern, Kristie.
And this brings us back, of course, to what we said at the very beginning is this area right over here where there are so many internally displaced persons, these camps of people that have moved into this area where there's over 200,000 people living in flimsy tents. And of course you have all of this rain moving in. And it's a huge concern for the region.
Back to you.
LU STOUT: Yeah, Mahasen is a storm to watch.
Mari Ramos, thank you very much indeed for that.
Now Disney is under fire for making over the beloved heroine of the 2012 Pixar hit Brave. In case you haven't seen it, the film features a feisty Scottish princess, her name is Merida, who prefers a bow and arrow to fancy dresses and handsome princes.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
KELLY MACDONALD, ACTRESS: I am Merida. And I'll be shooting for my own hand.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: What are you doing?
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LU STOUT: But, as you can see from the before and after, the new version of Merida doesn't look much like the old one. And outrage over the makeover is spreading on Twitter and Facebook. More than 148,000 people have signed an online petition urging Disney to keep their hero brave, including director Brenda Chapman. And she spoke with CNN's Christine Romans and John Berman.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
CHRISTINE ROMANS, CNN CORREPSONDENT: What do you feel when you see this new version of this princess who to all of us was supposed to be the anti-princess?
BRENDA CHAPMAN, BRAVE CO-CREATOR & DIRECTOR: Appalled, actually. I just couldn't believe it when I saw it. It is so not Merida that it was kind of shocking to see what they did to her.
JOHN BERMAN, CNN CORRESPONDENT: So what's going on here, do you think? Is Disney just trying to cash in by kind of sexing up this princess?
CHAPMAN: Well, I think they've taken -- they've gone through the whole Disney princess line and I think they're just doing standard procedure, which in this case was I think a bad choice, because Merida is not standard procedure, she's not one of the regular princesses. And she was created to be not one of those princesses.
ROMANS: And we're showing the line-up right there. And you can see her in the middle kind of with a saucy pose, I would say, and a lower neckline and a slimmer waist. And she looks older. And you know one of her characteristics, Brenda, was sort of a resistance to conventional beauty. She appears in the same kind of dress that her character kind of detested, right?
CHAPMAN: Exactly, exactly. I mean, Merida wouldn't be caught dead looking like that. And I think that's what's angering everyone is that they've totally lost site of the character in this new design.
BERMAN: Let me read you the statement that Disney released. They said, "Merida exemplifies what it means to be a Disney princess through being brave, passionate and confident. And she remains the same strong and determined Merida from the movie whose inner qualities have inspired moms and daughters around the world."
I'm not sure you agree with that statement, do you?
CHAPMAN: Not at all. I mean, if they had left her looking the way she looked I would be great, but you know I understand what the toys that they have to, you know -- they don't want to put in a lot more money creating a new body for the doll, so yes she has a Barbie like quality with the doll, but this is a drawing that they've put out there that's going to be on tons of merchandise. And it doesn't cost that much money to put a little effort into a drawing that portrays the character as who the character is as opposed to this sort of grotesque, you know, sexist sort of depiction of her.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
LU STOUT: And all the backlash, it seems to be having an impact. Disney appears to have removed the new Merida from their website and replaced it with the old one.
Now in Belize, bulldozers have been used to destroy a 2,000 year old pyramid. The Noh Mul temple, it sat in northern Belize, it was built by Mayans around 250 BC. But now those hand cut limestone bricks are being ground up. They are to be used to fill roads in the village of Douglas, possibly this very highway connecting to San Pablo. Archeologists say that they will look through the rubble for any artifacts.
Now police are looking to criminal charges against the land owner and the contractor.
It is on private land, but it is against the law to destroy ancient Mayan monuments.
And that is News Stream, but the news continues at CNN. World Business Today is next.
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