PrisonsPrivate prisons have a political role in corrections issues in the U.S.

Private prisons hold more than 120,000 inmates, about 8 percent of all prisoners, for 29 states and the federal government. The two largest private prison companies also operate more than 13,000 beds for immigrant detention. Private prisons play a political role in immigration and incarceration issues in the United States and the industry may face obstacles as well as opportunities in the current political landscape, new research finds.

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First respondersAI helps protect emergency personnel in hazardous environments

Whether it’s at rescue and firefighting operations or deep-sea inspections, mobile robots finding their way around unknown situations with the help of artificial intelligence (AI) can effectively support people in carrying out activities in hazardous environments.

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PerspectiveGeoengineer the planet? More scientists now say it must be an option

Once seen as spooky sci-fi, geoengineering to halt runaway climate change is now being looked at with growing urgency. A spate of dire scientific warnings that the world community can no longer delay major cuts in carbon emissions, coupled with a recent surge in atmospheric concentrations of CO2, has left a growing number of scientists saying that it’s time to give the controversial technologies a serious look. Fred Pearce writes in Yale Environment 360 that among the technologies being considered are a range of efforts to restrict solar radiation from reaching the lower atmosphere, including spraying aerosols of sulphate particles into the stratosphere, and refreezing rapidly warming parts of the polar regions by deploying tall ships to pump salt particles from the ocean into polar clouds to make them brighter.

TerrorismTehran has set up network of terror cells in Africa to attack U.S., Western targets

As part of its broad response to the increasing severity of the Western economic sanctions, Iran has been setting up a sprawling network of terror cells throughout Africa. The cells, operated by the Quds Force, the branch of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps which is responsible for overseas operations, aim to attack U.S. and other Western targets, at the time and place of Tehran’s choosing, in retaliation for the sanctions – let alone a military strike by the United States or Israel.

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The Russia connectionTop takes: Suspected Russian intelligence operation

A Russian-based information operation used fake accounts, forged documents, and dozens of online platforms to spread stories that attacked Western interests and unity. Its size and complexity indicated that it was conducted by a persistent, sophisticated, and well-resourced actor, possibly an intelligence operation. Operators worked across platforms to spread lies and impersonate political figures, and the operation shows online platforms’ ongoing vulnerability to disinformation campaigns.

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DeepfakesIdentifying a fake picture online is harder than you might think

By Mona Kasra

Research has shown that manipulated images can distort viewers’ memory and even influence their decision-making. So the harm that can be done by fake images is real and significant. Our findings suggest that to reduce the potential harm of fake images, the most effective strategy is to offer more people experiences with online media and digital image editing – including by investing in education. Then they’ll know more about how to evaluate online images and be less likely to fall for a fake.

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National emergency alertsNational emergency alerts potentially vulnerable to spoofing

On 3 October 2018, cell phones across the United States received a text message labeled “Presidential Alert.” It was the first trial run for a new national alert system, developed by several U.S. government agencies as a way to warn as many people across the United States as possible if a disaster was imminent. Now, a new study raises a red flag around these alerts—namely, that such emergency alerts authorized by the President of the United States can, theoretically, be spoofed.

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PerspectiveThe Budapest Convention offers an opportunity for modernizing crimes in cyberspace

Governments worldwide are in the process of updating the Budapest Convention, also known as the Convention on Cybercrime, which serves as the only major international treaty focused on cybercrime. This negotiation of an additional protocol to the convention provides lawmakers an opportunity the information security community has long been waiting for: modernizing how crimes are defined in cyberspace. Specifically, the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), codified at 18 U.S.C.§ 1030, dictates what constitutes illegal acts in cyberspace in the United States. Andrew Burt and Dan Geer write in Lawfare that without changing the CFAA—and other cybercrime laws like it—we’re collectively headed for trouble.

PerspectiveHow the "White Replacement" conspiracy theory spread around the globe

From pockets in small town Minnesota to Christchurch, New Zealand, a racist conspiracy theory has taken hold—sometimes to deadly consequences. The “great replacement,” also known as “white genocide,” is summed up by its name: a secretive cabal of elites, often Jewish, is trying to deliberately destroy the white race through demographic change in importing immigrants and refugees. Luke Darby writes in GQ that obsession with racial purity obviously goes far back, but the modern iteration of “white genocide” comes almost directly from The Turner Diaries, a racist novel self-published in 1978 by neo-Nazi William Luther Pierce, writing under the pen name Andrew Macdonald. The book is set in a dystopian America where white people have been disarmed and oppressed by non-whites. The book culminates in a white nationalist revolution led by a group called The Order, who go on to plan a global genocide against non-white people. There’s another layer to the panic over demographics: the fear that birth rates for white people are falling all across western nations. The idea was partially popularized in a 2012 book by French philosopher Renaud Camus, and it’s articulated in another white nationalist trope, the “14 Words”: “We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children.”

China syndromeGermany warns Huawei to meet Germany’s security requirements

Germany warned Huawei that the company must meet Germany’s security requirements before the company will be allowed to bid on building the 5G infrastructure in Germany. Germany has so far resisted U.S. pressure to exclude Huawei from the project. The United States has long suspected Huawei of serving the interests of Chinese intelligence, and Washington has argued that Huawei technology could be used for spying purposes by China.

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