Jeffrey Epstein committed at least US$113,000 to American scholar Ben Goertzel – known for popularising the term “artificial general intelligence” – to help him secure at least HK$8.9 million in Hong Kong government grants at a top city university, a South China Morning Post investigation has found. The almost two-decade relationship between Epstein and computer…
Hong Kong’s anti-corruption agency has arrested 33 people on suspicion of defrauding two government technology funding schemes of more than HK$150 million (US$19.2 million). The Independent Commission Against Corruption (ICAC) said on Friday that it had dismantled two syndicates this month and arrested 24 men and nine women aged between 27 and 66, including a…
Hong Kong police have arrested eight people for allegedly attempting to defraud HK$8.24 million (US$1.06 million) from a subsidy scheme meant to help companies boost employees’ technology skills, with a family suspected of running the swindle. Chen Chi-cheong, assistant district commander (crime) of Sham Shui Po police district, said on Friday that officers had busted…
Hong Kong’s once sprawling and diffuse network of state-backed research labs has undergone a surgical transformation – streamlined, repurposed and laser-focused on Beijing’s strategic technology ambitions. In a move emblematic of China’s broader overhaul of its national scientific apparatus, the city has dismantled underperforming labs, rebranded legacy institutions and launched three cutting-edge facilities dedicated to…
Hong Kong authorities have referred 15 suspicious cases under a government subsidy scheme to law enforcement over the past three years, while also conducting random checks on 1,860 projects funded by the programme. Secretary for Innovation, Technology and Industry Sun Dong, in a written reply on Wednesday to a lawmaker’s questions about the suspected abuse…
Nine people, mostly university students, have been arrested in Hong Kong over an employment scam that allegedly defrauded the government of HK$140,000 (US$17,887) of subsidies through an internship programme. Police said they received a report from a local university in November that a man had allegedly used two companies to falsely recruit eight students for…