LONDON (Reuters) - Britain on Thursday placed all contracts held by outsourcing firms G4S and Serco under review after an audit showed they charged for tagging criminals who were either dead, in prison or never tagged in the first place.

The news, which wiped millions of pounds off the firms' value, was the latest blow in a torrid spell for G4S which makes around 10 percent of its 7.5 billion pounds turnover from British government work.

Its reputation was severely hit last year when it failed to provide enough security guards for the London Olympics and a profit warning in May led to the departure of long-serving chief executive Nick Buckles.

G4S shares have slipped by over a quarter in three months.

The government said Serco had agreed to co-operate with an audit of all its contracts and it had asked the Serious Fraud Office to consider carrying out an investigation into G4S which declined to allow a further review into the tagging deal.

The companies are two of the government's biggest suppliers and run services from prisons and immigration centres to transport.

The current tagging contract was worth around 50 million pounds to G4S. UK public sector work, which also includes local government contracts, accounts for just under half of Serco's 4.9 billion pounds revenue.

Shares in G4S fell 5 percent to give it a market value of 3 billion pounds. Serco shares were down 8 percent, valuing it at 3.1 billion pounds.

"The House will share my astonishment that two of the government's biggest suppliers would seek to charge in this way," Justice Secretary Chris Grayling told MPs in parliament.

"The current estimate is that the sums involved are significant, and run into the low tens of millions in total, for both companies, since the contracts commenced in 2005," he said, adding that he had no information to suggest the two firms had knowingly engaged in dishonest practices.

The news is unwelcome for the Conservative-led coalition government which has ramped up the rate of work it outsources to private firms which say they can do it cheaper.

Wider scrutiny of outsourcing deals is forcing ministers to try and spread some business to smaller firms.

"Today's announcements strengthen our view that UK outsourcing is going to remain a tough place to be ahead of the 2015 election," analysts at Westhouse said.

REPUTATIONAL HIT

The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) said on Thursday an audit found some instances of tagging charges for people who had died, people who were back in prison and had their tags removed, and for people who had not been tagged at all.

The audit also revealed that some of the issues around tagging, which monitors whether offenders are adhering to curfews and are a cheaper alternative to prison, were first discovered by the MoJ in 2008 but were not addressed.

Grayling said he wanted an independent forensic audit of the contracts to rule out any foul play, to which Serco had agreed and G4S declined.

G4S, the world's biggest security firm, said it was running its own review and would reimburse any money that is owed. "G4S believes that any evidence of dishonesty should be referred to the relevant authorities, including if appropriate, the SFO," it said.

It said it would work with government on the audit of all other contracts.

Serco CEO Christopher Hyman also said it would repay any amount that was due. "We will not tolerate poor practice and behaviour and wherever it is found we will put it right."

Serco said the award of a prisons contract in Yorkshire would be delayed and added it had withdrawn from bidding for a new tagging contract due worth up to 150 million pounds a year, according to analysts.

G4S remained in the running for that contract but the MoJ was reviewing whether to exclude the firm from competition.

(Additional reporting by Sarah Young and Christine Murray; Editing by David Cowell)

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The type is a bit small, but one of the underlined parts suggests that Larson-Green will create terrible games "dedicated to baking and knitting." Though another calms that person down noting that she's "just another figurehead. Easy on the eyes, too." Over at  we get a lot more on her physical appearance. "Love to get her in front of the Kinect spycam," "milf," and "JLG > Helen Mirren" are the top three comments. Further down, though, someone counters with: "why cant they get someone hotter... she looks old and wrinkly." Thisis all particularly amusing in this situation since, Larson-Green is ultimately in charge of making the sexist gamers' games (i.e. crack), which is kind of like a drug addict disapproving of their female drug dealer because of her gender.

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Of course her looks and chromosomal makeup have nothing to do with her ability to lead Xbox, and neither does her vast experience within the company, as chronicled byRyan Tate, apparently. Beyond the whole female part of her genetic make-up, the gaming community also won't accept her, both because she has no video game-industry experience and also because she isn't a "gamer." Redditorsover Larson-Green's new role because she's not One of Them. "Somebody's extensive history and love for the video game industry has a direct relation to how a game console is ultimately developed," .

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It's not clear how much Larson-Green does or does not love the gaming industry, however. Assuming she doesn't love video games comes off as sexist, . (Would people jump to say that about a dude?—Wainwright suggests not.) Someone in Larson-Green's position probably doesn't have as much time for hardcore gaming as people commenting in video game websites. But, it's also not clear how much loving games, or even gaming-specific industry experience matters for success. There are plenty of examples of success and failure in the gaming world from all sorts of figures, as pointed out by . "A good example is Peter Moore, before working at Sega and subsequently MS, he actually worked at Rebook." 

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Plus, having a woman at the helm could have other benefits for the notoriously sexist gaming industry. Maybe some baking and knitting games would make women feel a bit more welcome in a world known for its , rape jokes, and " 

It was unclear whether the move would add to regulations on Internet use imposed by a conservative Islamist leadership wary of secular cultural influences it blames on the West.

President-elect Hassan Rouhani, a relative moderate who takes office next month, has called for less state intervention in people's private lives, including less filtering of the Internet and a loosening of media controls.

More than half of the Islamic Republic's 75 million people use the Internet, official figures show. But authorities have tried to limit access with tools including a filter that blocks many websites on the grounds they are offensive or criminal.

State authorities in March blocked software used to get around the filter. Many people said they experienced unusually slow Internet speeds ahead of the June 14 election, a phenomenon critics saw as an apparent attempt to make it harder to organize pro-reform candidate rallies via social media.

Communications Minister Mohammad Hassan Nami did not say whether the national email addresses would be mandatory or how they might affect Iranians' use of their own private addresses. But he said the official addresses must be used for electronic communication with government agencies.

"For mutual interaction and communication between the government and the people, from now on every Iranian will receive a special email address," the semi-official Mehr news agency quoted Nami as saying. "With the assignment of an email address to every Iranian, government interactions with the people will take place electronically."

The email addresses, using the "mail.post.ir" domain, will help maintain citizens' privacy, he said. Data centers are to be set up throughout Iran to support the new system.

Officials have also announced plans to switch Iranians onto a domestic Internet network which would be largely isolated from the World Wide Web. Rouhani's view of this move is not known.

(Reporting by Yeganeh Torbati; Editing by Jon Hemming and Mark Heinrich)

SAN DIEGO (AP) "Catch me if you can."

San Diego County District Attorney Bonnie Dumanis said Wanda Podgurski sent that taunting tweet after skipping trial in January while facing charges of insurance of fraud.

But then authorities did catch her.

Podgurski, 60, was captured on the Fourth of July in Rosarito Beach, Mexico, a popular retirement spot for American expatriates only 15 miles south of San Diego. She pleaded not guilty Monday to failure to appear while free on bail.

Podgurski was sentenced in absentia last month to more than 20 years in prison and ordered to pay more than $1 million in fines and restitution.

Three weeks after her initial tweet on June 5, Podgurski's feed read, "'Help find me before I con anyone else." Two other posts were links to stories about her vanishing act.

Podgurski's Twitter profile reads, "On the run possibly in Iran."

Her account follows 32 people and agencies, many of them FBI branches and other law enforcement authorities. Dumanis' office said the district attorney was the only one Podgurski followed while on the run.

The district attorney's office declined to say how authorities tracked down Podgurski, saying only that information from the Twitter account was turned over to its Computer and Technology Crime High-Tech Response Team, known by the acronym Catch.

Podgurski's attorney, Philip Kent Cohen, declined to comment.

The district attorney's office said Podgurski received $664,555 in disability payments when she was charged. While earning $44,000 a year as a clerk for Amtrak, she allegedly held six insurance policies with premiums that topped $60,000.

She made claims with all six insurance companies after reporting that she fell at her home in August 2006, prosecutors said. Private investigators working for the insurers reported seeing her walk stairs without assistance and drive to the store.

Topics covered: Increasing Demand for Midstream Assets - U.S. Energy Infrastructure Build Out - Emerging Shale Plays - Oil and Gas Transportation Infrastructure Demand - Master Limited Partnerships Distribution Growth - Outlook for Natural Gas Liquids - Low Treasury Yields and MLP Dividends

Companies include: Walt Disney Co. (DIS), American Tower Corp. (AMT), Boeing Co. (BA), Chesapeake Energy Corporation (CHK), Devon Energy Corporation (DVN), Union Pacific Corp. (UNP) and many others.

In the following excerpt from the 2013 Oil & Gas Review, Ian Mausner, a Co-Founder, Chief Executive Officer and Senior Portfolio Manager for J.S. Oliver Capital Management reveals his investment methodology and top picks:

...that, combined with extremely low interest rates, with very reasonable valuations, with increasing dividends, with increasing mergers and acquisitions, with increasing stock buybacks and the best corporate balance sheets that we've seen in our lifetimes, and significant underinvestment on the part of both institutions and individuals and a healthy dose of skepticism everywhere - it's really almost as good an environment as you can imagine, in our opinion. We see the next five or 10 years as being perhaps another "golden era" for the United States. The thing we probably like the most about that is we're in a real minority, a very, very small minority of people that have such a positive outlook at this point in time.

TWST: To what extent, then, are you incorporating energy-related investments in your funds and portfolios?

Mr. Mausner: The main focus that we have energywise is on natural gas, and the reason for that is that it's at 25-year lows. It has bounced recently about 50%, 60%, but it's come down very, very dramatically because technology has enabled vast discoveries of natural gas both here and abroad. The supply exploded over the last couple of years, and even though demand also increased, it didn't keep track at all with supply, and so the price got absolutely annihilated.

We think now is an extremely attractive time. We think the time horizon's anywhere from two years to five years, because it does take a while for people to convert, whether it be vehicles or homes or trucks or railroads, etc. But the conversion is happening, because gas is so much cheaper than oil, number one; number two, it's much, much more clean-burning; and number three, we have the largest reserves in the world in the United States. Those are three very compelling reasons for both companies and individuals to make that conversion, and it's happening.

You read about it almost every day. Union Pacific (UNP) just announced that they are going to convert most, if not all, of their engines from coal burning to natural gas...

For more of this interview and many others visit the Wall Street Transcript - a unique service for investors and industry researchers - providing fresh commentary and insight through verbatim interviews with CEOs, portfolio managers and research analysts. This special issue is available by calling (212) 952-7433 or via .

While thereveals a positive correlation between employee development and the likelihood of an employee to stay, nearly one-third of employees reported having no ongoing training in their current jobs. Looking at hiring decision makers' outlook on developing their current workforce, all agree training is important but lack of time was cited as the number one deterrent from training and developing employees.

In addition to looking at employee and hiring decision makers' sentiment regarding career development,also asked hiring decision makers about the current outlook on hiring new employees. Similar to their current workforce, half of respondents reported having less time to train new hires and one in three expect more from today's new hires than before the recession. Not surprisingly, 69 percent of hiring decision makers said that the biggest impact on cost of hiring is that it takes longer to find a qualified candidate than before the recession.

"Hiring decision makers recognize the importance of engaging and developing their current workforce but many lack the resources to develop existing employees while keeping up with hiring demands," said Tanya Axenson, vice president of Human Resources. "To break the struggle of choosing whether to invest in current or potential employees, staffing partners can shoulder time-consuming tasks in the hiring process, helping managers focus on the development of current employees."

To learn more about the survey or to download the complete Aerotek Recruit or Retain Report, please visit .

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3 out of 5 employees would leave their job for a competitive offer according to @Aerotek #RecruitorRetain Report

About the SurveyAerotek's Recruit or Retain Report was designed to learn more about the employee beliefs and drivers that impact job satisfaction and longevity, and to better understand the hiring and employee development outlook, expectations and challenges faced by hiring decision makers. , a leading satisfaction survey provider, conducted an online survey of nearly 800 individuals and more than 1,000 hiring decision makers. The survey has a margin of error of plus or minus 3.2% at a 95% confidence level.

About AerotekAerotek, headquartered in Hanover, Md., is a leading provider of technical, professional and industrial staffing services. Established in 1983, Aerotek is an operating company of Allegis Group, the largest provider of staffing services in the U.S.Aerotek operates a network of more than 200 non-franchised offices throughout the U.S., Canada and Europe.For more information, visit .

SOURCE Aerotek

LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Steve Carell has inhabited many different roles, from a 40-year-old virgin, a bumbling office manager and a Vegas magician, but it is an evil villain in animated film "Despicable Me 2" where he finds a close connection as a real-life dad.

Carell, 50, who appears again as Gru in "Despicable Me 2," and as a dysfunctional dad in independent comedy "The Way, Way Back," both out in theaters this week, is also exploring new challenges in his career with the hopes of more dramatic roles.

The actor talked to Reuters about his similarities to Gru, not getting pigeon-holed and donning suits for "Anchorman 2."

Q: Now that he's a dad, was there any fear that Gru wasn't going to be quite as despicable as the first film?

A: I feel like you still see that dark side of him and when push comes to shove, he is an evil mastermind and he always will be. He's reformed, he can't be that anymore because he has kids. His career has to change but his sense of self doesn't really.

Q: Which part of Gru's story did you relate to in this film?

A: I have two little kids so I don't really relate to him as a super spy, but I do relate to him as a dad for sure, and the fact that he has a daughter that's getting to the age that she's interested in boys and dating, I have a daughter that is just on the verge of that age, so I think I related to that most of all.

Q: Are your priorities changing in your career now that you're getting older and your kids are getting older?

A: I've been doing some more dramatic work, I'm writing something now and eventually I might direct something. I've got some other things in the fire, but that's just to keep it interesting and exciting.

It's interesting how this movie mirrors what a lot of parents go through when they have kids, because initially, when you have kids, the focus becomes the kids. I know that became the case with my wife and I, almost at the expense of everything else, it became all about our kids. Which is fine, but within that, you can't lose your sense of self, you can't lose your career and what motivates you and what nourishes you. I think that's the character of Gru, he's at odds with himself, so he needs to find something that's not being a villain but is equally satisfying.

Q: Were you ever concerned you could get pigeonholed into a certain character from your comedy roles?

A: I've done big commercial movies and little independent movies, and I've played jerks and suicidal Proust scholars, and I feel like I've been really lucky to play all the different types of characters I play, so no, I don't worry about that. If I do get pigeonholed, it's nothing I can really control.

Q: You recently returned to "The Office" for the finale in May, was it difficult saying goodbye second time round?

"I feel like I really said goodbye to it the first time. When I came back, it was primarily to honor the show and out of respect for all of my friends and the people who created it, I just wanted it to be a simple tip of the hat to the show and not to take away from the goodbye and the farewell that all of those people were having, because I felt like I already had mine and I didn't want to step on their moments."

Q: Your upcoming film "Anchorman 2" has been getting a lot of attention. How is it getting back into the suits?

A: So much fun. It felt the same. The first time around, none of us knew what we were doing or whether it would be funny. We thought it would be funny, but you never know...if it's going to work or why it works necessarily, but that one we all felt like it could be really funny, and this, we have the same feeling about. It was just fun to do, it was ridiculous, we laughed until we cried everyday.

Q: How do you pay homage to the first film and also take the storyline forward with a sequel?

A: I think if you like the first one, you'll like this one as much. I don't want to oversell it, I don't want to hype it too much, I haven't seen it, I've just shot it. But based on what we've filmed, it seems like it's going to be a truly funny movie.

(Reporting by Piya Sinha-Roy, editing by Paul Casciato)

Veteran Washington Post soccer scribe Steven Goffthat United are set to sign Wake Forest midfielder Collin Martin to a Homegrown deal after . The 18-year-old from Bethesda, Md., has been in the D.C. system for several years, and put up one goal and a team-high six assists as a freshman for the Demon Deacons in 2012.

"I had a blast playing at Wake Forest," Martin said in the release. "D.C. United made an offer that I felt I couldn't refuse. It has been a dream of mine to play professional soccer, and the offer they made was too difficult to turn down."

Martin, a pure playmaker, has been a part of the US youth set-up since the U-14 level. While he didn't make the final cut for Tab Ramos' team at last month's U-20 World Cup, he featured earlier in the spring for the US at the Toulon tournament and played well.

He becomes the sixth youngster United have signed out of their academy, joining central defenders Ethan White and Conor Shanosky, goalkeeper Bill Hamid, forward Michael Seaton and midfielder Andy Najar, who has since been sold to Anderlecht of the Belgian top flight.

D.C. United did not immediately respond to a request for comment on the report.

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That we didn't find out about the extensive NSA spying and Edward Snowden until June, is probably the reason HB 603 passed without much fanfare in the spring. At the time, the law might have seemed extraneous, or even paranoid. But knowing what we know now, the law seems prophetic () and is getting some new-found attention.  the government can't spy on Montanans through their electronic devices unless they obtain a warrant: 

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And  "electronic device" is meant to encompass laptops, cell phones and tablets: 

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That effectively makes Montana the first state in the country's history to pass an electronic privacy law that protects you from the government. The bill's sponsor, Rep. Daniel Zolnikov, and Montana's lawmakers outpaced all the states in the country when it comes to privacy, and  and a handful of other states are considering their own privacy laws when it comes to electronic surveillance and wiretapping. 

"The younger Democrats and Republicans were the ones really for the bill. The older legislators in Helena didnt say much for or against it," Zolnikov told the Daily Interlake. Zolnikov actually wanted a harsher bill that would have limited federal authority. "This is very small compared to what we want to accomplish," he added. 

SURREY, British Columbia (Reuters) - One of the suspects in a Canadian bomb plot is a former drug user with a history of violence, a self-styled "Muslim Punk" who also wrote songs about his love for Satan.

Descriptions of John Nuttall by four people who knew him, combined with court records and his own postings online, portray a sometimes troubled man on the margins of society.

Police have charged Nuttall and companion Amanda Korody with trying to set off three home-made pressure cooker bombs in a crowd celebrating the July 1 Canada Day holiday in Victoria, the capital of the Pacific province of British Columbia.

Police said the pair drew inspiration from al Qaeda and described them as self-radicalized. Officials told reporters on Tuesday the authorities had always been in control of the situation and had made sure the devices could not explode.

Police did not give more details and would not say whether they had infiltrated the cell.

Tom Morino, the couple's lawyer, told Reuters he had spoken to both clients on Monday. He said he had known Nuttall for 10 years and always found him to be "a pleasant, polite, thoughtful, generous individual", albeit one with problems.

"(He had) some emotional issues, some addiction issues ... It is on the public record he had an addiction to illicit drugs for a while and struggled with that," Morino said.

Nuttall, born in 1974, and Korody, born in 1983, will remain in jail until their next court hearing on July 9. Morino said the two were in a relationship.

In March 2003, the Victoria Times Colonist newspaper said Nuttall had been given a conditional 18-month jail sentence in 2003 for hitting a businessman on the head with a rock in May 2002 and stealing his briefcase. Morino told the court his client had been high on cocaine at the time, the paper said.

British Columbia court records posted online show only that Nuttall was convicted of robbery in relation to an offence committed in May 2002. They also show convictions for mischief and assault after an incident in 2001.

More recently, Nuttall was convicted twice for offences committed in 2009, one for assault and one for possessing a weapon for a dangerous purpose.

Morino, who the paper said had acted for Nuttall in 2003, declined to confirm details about any of the cases.

MEMBER OF PUNK BANDS

At the time of their arrest, Nuttall and Korody were living in a dirty basement apartment in the town of Surrey, some 31 km (18 miles) southeast of Vancouver.

When Reuters saw the apartment on Wednesday after a police search, there were five empty prescription bottles labeled methadone in the kitchen. All were in Korody's name.

Garbage bags stuffed with dirty clothes lay in one room. Pinned to a notice board was a leaflet about a 2011 conference to celebrate the birth and life of the Prophet Mohammad as well as an advertisement from a Vancouver store that sells surplus military clothing and equipment.

Landlord Ramesh Thaman said the couple had moved in three years previously and "looked like nice people", albeit somewhat messy ones.

"I was totally shocked," he told Reuters, speaking of the arrests.

Neighbor Charlene Thompson said she had called police earlier this year after hearing Nuttall having a loud conversation outside on his mobile phone.

"He was ... talking about jihad and all sorts of things," she told the Canadian Broadcasting Corp.

In online postings, Nuttall identified himself as Johnny Blade, "a Muslim Punk from Victoria" who belonged to a band called No World Order which had moved to Vancouver.

"We are new to Vancouver (sic) and looking to meet anyone else into Allah and hardcore punk," he wrote in August 2011.

On his website, Nuttall posted four poorly-recorded solo songs with titles like "The End Of The World" and "In League With Satan". An extract of lyrics from the latter song read:

"We are possesed (sic) by all that is evil/The death of your god we demand/We spit at the virgin you worship/And sit at Lord Satans (sic) Left Hand".

Nuttall also played for a month with the British Columbia-based hard rock band Lust Boys in 2009, lead singer Tommy Thrust told Reuters.

"I've never known him to even believe in religion. As far as I knew he was an atheist," he said, describing Nuttall as stubborn and opinionated. "He briefly spoke about politics here and there but he wasn't really that well-educated."

Thrust said Nuttall had left the band on good terms and said members would see him in Vancouver occasionally.

"He didn't really say a lot when we saw him because he was always drunk. He just wanted to party, basically," he said.

The Lust Boys issued a statement on Wednesday disassociating themselves from their former band mate.

"The actions played out by John Nuttall were one of an individuals (sic) radical thinking and poor decision making and should have no reflection on the LUST BOYS as a whole," it said.

(Writing by David Ljunggren; With additional reporting by Peter N. Henderson in Toronto; Editing by Jeffrey Hodgson, Martin Howell and Tim Dobbyn)