STUDENT NEWS

Hostage Taking in Sydney; Search for Flight 370 Continues; Sony Getting Hacked; Space Travel Going
Commercial

Aired December 16, 2014 - 04:00:00 ET

CARL AZUZ, CNN ANCHOR: Welcome to CNN STUDENT NEWS. My name is
Carl Azuz.

We are starting today with a recap of a hostage situation that unfolded this week in
Australia. In its largest city, Sydney, a gunman entered a cafe Monday and took about
17 people hostage. Australian officials believe he acted alone. They don`t know yet
what he wanted or why he targeted the cafe. Officials say the suspect was born in Iran.
He considered himself a Muslim religious leader. He had a criminal record in
Australia, and experts believe he was inspired by Middle Eastern terrorists groups.
Hours after the standoff began, several of the hostages escaped, and 16 hours into the
siege, Australian Special Forces and police storm cafe from two entrances. They killed
the gunman and ended the standoff. Two of the hostages died in the siege, four others,
including a police officer were injured. Australian Prime Minister Tony Abbott called
it a difficult day, but said Australians had risen to the challenge.
Staying near Australia for our second story, hundreds of miles off the country`s coast,
searchers are scouring the ocean floor for the wreckage of Malaysia Airlines Flight
370. It was traveling from Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia to Beijing, China, on March 8.
Authorities believe it took a turn, and then just vanished somewhere over the Indian
Ocean. The disappearance of its 239 passengers and crew is one of the biggest stories
and mysteries of 2014.

NAJIB RAZAK, PRIME MINISTER OF MALAYSIA: Like MH 370 ended in the

southern Indian Ocean.
MARTIN DOLAN, AUSTRALIAN TRANSPORT SAFETY BUREAU: How fast it
goes depends essentially on the sort of terrain we cover. And that varies from quite flat
plains or sloping areas, to ravines and fissures and crevasses which will require a
much closer look.

AZUZ: From Monday`s transcript page at cnnstudentnews.com, it`s time for "The
Roll Call." We`ll start in the capital of Virginia. That`s Richmond and that`s the home
of Northstar Academy. Good to see you.
Delaware may be one of the smallest U.S. states. We`ve got a big welcome waiting for
the students of MOT Charter High School, the Mustangs are hopping it in historic
middle town. And on the West Coast, in Moreno Valley, California, hello to the
Mavericks of March Middle School rounding at our roll.
There`s never been a hack like this before. It involves the computer systems of Sony
Pictures. Hackers broke in last month. They`ve been releasing confidential
information online, and they say there`s more to come. It`s stuff any corporation
wants to keep secret: Social Security numbers, movie scripts, movies that haven`t
been released, salaries of executives and actors. What executives have said about
actors? The attack shut down Sony`s computer systems. At one point, employees had
to work with only paper, pens and fax-machines. Who did this?

UNIDENTIFIED MALE: While the Sony hackers promised a Christmas gift, yet
another juicy and possibly worst data dump. Sony is asking news organizations to
ignore the leaked emails. The studio now hiring David Boies, a high-profile litigator
to demand that news organizations not reveal any further hacked material. In the letter
that CNN received, Boies writes, "If you do not comply with these requests, and the
stolen information is used or disseminated by you in any manner, Sony will have no
choice but to hold you responsible." In the letter, Sony strongly suggests that they are
being blackmailed, not to release the upcoming movie "The Interview" calling the
attack an ongoing campaign, explicitly seeking to prevent Sony from distributing the
motion picture." It`s the first time that company has said publicly that this comedy,
there pokes fun at a plot to assassinate leader Kim Jong-un appears to be the target of
this attack. Sony hasn`t accused any particular group of being behind the attack, but
security experts now point their finger at North Korea.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: Essentially, we`ve done their bidding, we`ve maximized the
exposure to this content, and I don`t do that lightly, but on the other hand, it was going
to get out there anyway. We have to be part of the conversation.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: This just weeks after hackers broke into the studio`s

computer systems and published millions of confidential and embarrassing emails.

AZUZ: You know the Wright brothers got us in the power of flight. But the pioneers
of balloon flight were real animals. Back in 1783, when balloons were taking off,
there were concerns about the effects of altitude on people. So, the guinea pigs, so to
speak, were duck, a sheep and a rooster. They made that flight about a months before
the first people did. Now, that`s random! All right. Flash forward a couple of hundred
years. Going into space was a reality, but you needed to be an astronaut. An advanced
degree in engineering or science, or math, at least 1,000 hours piloting a jet, those
were NASA`s preferences. That`s not the case at the $209 million Spaceport America.
It`s in New Mexico. It`s where commercial space travel could get off the ground.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: The future of travel can take place here. Some day. This
is Spaceport America in New Mexico, a place where you buy a ticket for a future ride
to space.
UNIDENTIFIED MALE: And lift off ....
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: For decades, NASA has dominated the space industry.
But over the last ten years or so, entrepreneurs like Sir Richard Branson, Elon Musk
and Amazon`s Jeff Bezos have injected billions into the field. They are looking to
make space travel commercial.
ELON MUSK: We want to make space accessible to everyone.
RICHARD BRANSON: That - that would be the ....
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: Virgin Galactic plans to shuttle customers into suborbital
space for a quarter million dollars each, and they plan to do it from a facility like this.
They are not alone. Xcor Airspace, World View, also have plans to send people to
space. But the tourism industry is just one part of commercializing space. Economist
who studied the field say the real moneymaker will be something called point to point
travel. Imagine, traveling by space plane from London to Singapore in an hour. Or
from Los Angeles to London in a couple of hours.
These ships once they are tested and approved, could be the concord of the 21
Century. Zipping people and packages around the globe ultrafast.

Innovating for the future travel is a huge task and will take time. Point to point is still
in its infancy, and commercial space tourism has yet to find its legs. And there are
setbacks along the way. Virgin Galactic, a company considered by many to be leading
the pack in commercial space tourism, suffered a major setback during a test flight in
October.
One of their space planes flying over the Mojave came apart killing one pilot and
injuring another.
As it grows, the commercial space industry is having to overcome some of the same
issues its predecessors like NASA faced: fire, explosions and losses of life. But those
leading the way like Virgin`s Branson say despite the challenges and setbacks, they
too are enduring. They will push ahead.
RICHARD BRANSON, VIRGIN GALACTIC: In the early days of aviation, there
were incidents and then aviation became very safe. We are going to learn from what
went wrong. Discover how we can improve safety and performance, and then move
forwards together.
UNIDENTIFIED FEMALE: There are nine spaceports in the country, and more are
planned in the coming years. When commercial spaceflights take off, they launch
from places like this one. Will buildings like Spaceport America and others one day
shuttle paying customers back and forth to space? We can`t say for sure, but at one
point, the idea of a race to the Moon must have seemed pretty daunting as well.

AZUZ: In a one stoplight town, this wouldn`t work, but in a heavily populated city,
were you have to wait a while to cross the street, why not turn the wait into a
competition? This is the brain child of two European graduate students. The idea?
While you`re waiting for a walk signal, play around the pong or a game style like it,
with the stranger also waiting across the street. It will help you pass the time while
you pass the ball, plus gamers who can`t stop gaming will think there`s some paying
(ph) really cool about it. And if it`s cost-effective and keeps people say for, what
could go pong? It`s a handy way to keep our feet from crossing cross across walk till
the crossing, signals signals fit can safely walk across.
CNN STUDENT NEWS steps back in tomorrow.

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