Good morning. China’s government is tightening its rules on the protection of confidential information, including intensified scrutiny on international travel by people privy to state secrets, as concerns over espionage rise amid an increase in global tensions.

The changes also put a heavier burden on the country’s internet companies to stop leaks of sensitive information.

• Reasons for the new rules. Published this week, the new regulations offer direction to authorities in implementing China’s state-secrets law, which was updated in February as part of Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s efforts to shore up safeguards against espionage and other threats to national security.
   
• What's required: The changes require state agencies to draft lists of state secrets related to their areas of responsibility. The agencies are also required to ensure that personnel who handle classified information receive permission and undergo confidentiality training before traveling abroad.
   
• Technology under scrutiny: All entities defined as “network operators”—a category that includes internet companies and network-infrastructure vendors—must establish mechanisms for detecting and dealing with leaks of confidential information and other secrecy breaches, according to the new regulations. They must also cooperate with authorities in investigations and regulatory actions related to state secrets.
   
• Context: The updated rules underscore a sweeping counterespionage campaign Xi has launched to tighten the country’s defenses amid intensifying geopolitical competition with the U.S. and other Western powers. In recent years, China has traded blows with Western governments over alleged espionage, issuing public warnings about cyberattacks, spying and other forms of intelligence-gathering, as well as conducting high-profile arrests of alleged spies.

ServiceNow Operating Chief Desai resigns after probe into government contract.

ServiceNow Chief Operating Officer CJ Desai resigned following an internal investigation related to the hiring of the former chief information officer of the U.S. Army and procuring government contracts.

The investigation by the board found that the hiring of the individual, whom the company didn’t name, violated company policy. That person, who led the company’s public sector through leadership and business development efforts since 2023, has left ServiceNow.

What prompted the investigation? The probe stemmed from a complaint that raised compliance issues during the procurement process related to a government contract. ServiceNow, which provides cloud software, disclosed the investigation in May in its quarterly filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission.

Star brokers’ sexual-assault allegations caught attention of police, school, boss.

Sexual-assault allegations against Tal and Oren Alexander, two of the country’s top real-estate agents, sent shock waves through the world of luxury real estate last month. Two women filed lawsuits in March accusing Oren and his twin brother, Alon, 37, of rape. A subsequent lawsuit—and accounts by women shared with The Wall Street Journal—contained similar allegations against Tal, 38.

The latest reporting gives a detailed picture of the nature and extent of the allegations, which include incidents dating back to high school where students at the time said the brothers sometimes filmed encounters with women. Two complaints were brought to police, and three women sought medical attention. It also shows that more than a decade ago, a top executive at Douglas Elliman was warned by one of the brothers that an allegation against him would surface.

• PepsiCo Chief Sustainability Officer Jim Andrew has clear goals and expectations for his company’s suppliers and believes that through partnerships and systemic change, reducing emissions is possible.
   
• For years, high rollers from China have flouted their country’s ban on gambling by getting their fix online. Livestreamed games of baccarat, roulette, poker and more feature young women sitting behind tables, dealing cards and spinning wheels.
   
• More Americans are driving without car insurance, and it’s making coverage more expensive for everyone else.

China casts itself as peacemaker in first high-level talks with Ukraine since Russia’s invasion.

Ukraine’s top diplomat met with his Chinese counterpart Wednesday for hours of talks in his first such high-level visit to the country since Russia’s full-scale invasion, as Kyiv seeks Beijing’s support to end the war on “just” terms.

Context. Efforts to kick-start dialogue between Russia and Ukraine have faltered during a war that has upended European security and triggered commodity price shocks worldwide. Several countries have attempted to broker peace talks, beginning with Turkey in the weeks after Russia’s February 2022 invasion.

• There is an often-repeated rule that many crypto fans live by: HODL, or hold on for dear life. It is a crypto slang for buying and holding indefinitely, even when markets go haywire. Yet dozens of everyday investors quickly answered the call when former President Donald Trump became the first major-party presidential candidate to accept crypto donations in May.
   
• Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu dove into a volatile moment in U.S. presidential politics with a fiery address to Congress, defending his handling of the war in Gaza and appealing to both President Biden and Donald Trump to back Israel against its Middle East enemies.
   
• Every time an athlete steps onto the podium at the Paris Olympics this month, officials will be watching even more closely than usual. What they’ll be looking for is any sign of political messaging at what could become the most fraught Summer Games in a generation.
   
• An estimated 582 million people worldwide will be chronically undernourished by 2030, according to an assessment by U.N. agencies.
   
• Private-sector activity is growing strongly in the U.S. thanks to a buoyant services sector, while a prolonged slump in German manufacturing continues to dog economic activity in the eurozone, according to surveys published Wednesday.
   
• China’s central bank surprised markets again by cutting another key policy rate, continuing a wave of monetary easing as it looks to support the country’s ailing economy.

Time to turn off cookies? Making sense of Google’s Chrome changes.

Google was going to dump its cookie jar into the garbage. For now, it’s back on the shelf.

The company reversed course on Monday and said it isn’t getting rid of the software cookies that track you across the web. Instead, it says it will make it easier for you to turn them off.

So now what? Do you block them yourself? Here’s where things stand now.

• What Marketers Should Know About Google’s ‘Surprising, but Not Shocking’ Cookies About-Face

• CrowdStrike, the cybersecurity company that upended computer systems across the world last week, said it had identified a quality-control flaw that led to outages for millions of Microsoft Windows users and how it got onto its systems.

• Kamala Harris is well known for her forceful defense of abortion rights, her role within the Biden administration on immigration and border security, and her legacy as a prosecutor and attorney general of California. But the economy is a central election issue, and there, her positions and policy goals haven’t yet been as clearly defined.
   
• The vice president’s tenure was rocky at first, but over time Harris became more influential as the president’s comfort level with her increased.
   
• The gunman who tried to kill former President Donald Trump searched Google a week before the shooting for “How far away was Oswald from Kennedy,” referring to the 1963 presidential assassination, the clearest indication yet that the 20-year-old had been plotting a similar attack.
   
• The National Basketball Association said it has signed landmark media-rights deals worth $77 billion with Disney’s ESPN, Amazon.com and Comcast’s  NBCUniversal, turning away a last-minute bid from current rights holder Warner Bros. Discovery.
   
• The Winter Olympics will return to Salt Lake City in 2034, bringing the Games to the U.S. for a fifth time and back to a host city mired in a bribery scandal over two decades ago.

Follow us on X at @WSJRisk. Follow Risk & Compliance editor David Smagalla @DSmagalla_DJ and reporters Mengqi Sun @_MengqiSun, Dylan Tokar @dgtokar and Richard Vanderford @VanderfordRich.

You can reach us by replying to any newsletter, or email David at david.smagalla@wsj.com.