• TerrorismFuller picture of the human cost from terrorist attacks

    An average of 8,338 people died and 10,785 people were injured every year in domestic and international terrorist attacks between 1970 and 2016. Terrorist attacks injure far more people than they kill, leaving victims with lost limbs, hearing loss, respiratory disease, depression and other issues — but little research has measured the impact of that damage beyond the number of people who are hurt.

  • Perception of immigrationWhite Americans see many immigrants as “illegal” until proven otherwise: Study

    Fueled by political rhetoric evoking dangerous criminal immigrants, many white Americans assume low-status immigrants from Mexico, El Salvador, Syria, Somalia and other countries have no legal right to be in the United States, new research suggests. In the eyes of many white Americans, just knowing an immigrant’s national origin is enough to believe they are probably undocumented, the study’s co-author says.

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  • Perception of immigrationThe power of negative thinking: why perceptions of immigration are resistant to facts

    By Heather Rolfe

    Research shows consistently high levels of concern among people in the UK over the scale of immigration and its impact on jobs and services. New research on how people use and understand information about the economic impacts of immigration shows that there is a tendency to rely on personal accounts rather than on economic statistics.

  • ResilienceMore than 1,000 stakeholders join N.Y.-N.J. Metropolitan Resilience Network

    An innovative program, the Metropolitan Resilience Network (MRN), now has over 1,000 credentialed stakeholders from hundreds of public and private organizations in the New York metro area. MRN members are connected and collaborating on shared threats to the region through a unique technology platform as well as a wider spectrum of activities.

  • Food securityThe 1800s Global Famine could happen again

    Researchers have completed the most thorough analysis yet of The Great Drought — the most devastating known drought of the past 800 years — and how it led to the Global Famine, an unprecedented disaster that took 50 million lives. She warns that the Earth’s current warming climate could make a similar drought even worse.

  • EbolaDRC Ebola cases mount, with in-school infection a new worry

    As the Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) reaches 194 cases and deaths hit 122, a humanitarian group yesterday added a new concern—the virus has now spread within a school. The group also said response efforts were again interrupted by regional violence. A World Health Organization (WHO) official says the epidemic will likely carry well into 2019.

  • ResilienceWhy doesn’t the U.S. bury its power lines?

    By Theodore J. Kury

    It is nearing the end of a highly destructive hurricane season in the United States. The devastation of Hurricane Florence in North and South Carolina caused more than 1.4 million customers to lose power and Hurricane Michael has cut service to an estimated 900,000 customers in Florida, Alabama, Georgia, and the Carolinas. Soon, winter storms will bring wind and snow to much of the country. When it comes to electricity, people turn their attention to the power lines overhead and wonder if their electricity service might be more secure if those lines were buried underground. But having studied this question for utilities and regulators, I can say the answer is not that straightforward. Burying power lines, also called undergrounding, is expensive, requires the involvement of many stakeholders and might not solve the problem at all.

  • ViolenceDoes more education reduce political violence?

    Recent evidence of above-average levels of education among genocide perpetrators and terrorists, such as those who carried out the 9/11 attacks, has challenged the consensus among scholars that education has a generally pacifying effect. Is it true that more schooling can promote peaceful behavior and reduce civil conflict and other forms of politically-motivated group violence?

  • Truth decayViral game which helps users spot fake news gets a makeover

    After helping more than 750,000 players spot fake news, a game that became an unexpected viral hit is getting a reboot right in time for the midterm election.

  • Truth decayMeasuring “iffy” news on social media in time for 2018 election

    As the crucial mid-term election approaches, the University of Michigan Center for Social Media Responsibility offers media and the public a tool to help monitor the prevalence of fake news on social media through a Platform Health Metric called the Iffy Quotient.

  • Vehicular cyberthreatsMitigating cyberthreats in vehicles

    In acts of terrorism, vehicles have been deployed as killing machines. These incidents involved human operators, but another sinister possibility looms: a vehicle cyber hack intended to cause human harm. While this kind of terrorist attack has not yet occurred, in the realm of security research, it’s been demonstrated how hackers could gain control over car systems like the brakes, steering and engine.

  • CybersecurityStrict password policies help prevent fraud

    The all-too-common practice of using the same email address/password combination to log into multiple websites can be damaging, especially for employers with many users and valuable assets protected by passwords, like universities. Researchers show that longer minimum passwords are the most effective way to prevent password reuse and reduce potential exposure in a third-party data breach.

  • School safetyAlabama safe school technology tests may keep children safer

    Safety and security technology tests underway at a Jackson County, Alabama school could help keep Alabama’s schoolchildren safer if implemented statewide. Rather than developing an emergency response to an active shooter incident, the project focuses on expanding the perimeter of protection to help ensure interception of a potential shooter. Components of the system also provide law enforcement with enhanced situational information.

  • Hurricane MichaelFlorida Panhandle counties less prepared for emergency than rest of state

    found that the vast majority of counties in the Florida Panhandle were less prepared for emergency evacuation compared to the rest of the state. Of the 67 counties in Florida, 10 were rated as having weak levels of evacuation preparedness, and all of these counties were located in the Panhandle/North Florida. Eleven of 16 counties with moderately rated plans also were in this region. Only seven of the counties in the Panhandle had strong plans.

  • RecoveryHelp from friends key to natural disaster recovery

    Natural disasters are life-changers for all involved, and understanding why some communities recover faster than others can be better achieved by looking at both the social and physical networks within these communities and their interplay, according to a four-year study.

  • Our picksInsect army for crop protection; facial recognition future; Google Plus bug, and more

    ·  The Pentagon is studying an insect army to defend crops. Critics fear a bioweapon

    ·  A controversial virus study reveals a critical flaw in how science is done

    ·  Why scientists should be tracking a catastrophic pig disease

    ·  When anthrax-laced letters terrorized the nation

    ·  Winning Like War: A conversation about social media and conflict with Peter Singer

    ·  What the future of facial recognition means for law enforcement

    ·  The newest password technology is making your phone easier for police to search

    ·  Why Google could be in trouble over the Google Plus bug

  • The Russia watchRussia’s broad political assault on the U.S.; collusion & the First Amendment; Clausewitz & social media, and more

    ·  Collusion is not a crime, Trump campaign argues

    ·  What facts would deny the Trump campaign First Amendment protections in colluding with Russia

    ·  Data mining has revealed previously unknown Russian Twitter troll campaigns

    ·  Ukraine’s spiritual split from Russia could trigger a global schism

    ·  What Clausewitz can teach us about war on social media: Military tactics in the age of Facebook

    ·  The problem isn’t fake news from Russia. It’s us: Propaganda has long affected elections around the world because publics have an appetite for it

    ·  Russian hackers pose an international persistent threat

    ·  How Russia and China undermine democracy: Can the West counter the threat?

    ·  The origins of Russia’s broad political assault on the United States

    ·  Russia’s low-cost influence strategy finds success in Serbia

  • EMPDHS unveils new strategy to deal with EMP threats

    DHS earlier this week announced the release of department’s new strategy to prepare for and recover from EMP and GMD incidents – whether naturally occurring or intentional. Electromagnetic incidents, caused by either an intentional EMP attack or naturally occurring GMD events, are unlikely, but they could cause serious damage to the U.S critical infrastructure.

  • The Russia connectionPeter Smith met Flynn in 2015

    Peter W. Smith, the GOP operative who raised $100,000 in his search to obtain Hillary Clinton’s missing emails from Russian hackers before allegedly killing himself in May 2017, had a well-established business relationship Trump former National Security Advisor Michael Flynn. Previous reports indicated Smith knew both Flynn and his son well, but on Wednesday, the Wall Street Journal explains the backstory behind their connection.

  • The Russia connectionKey takeaways from the Kremlin’s recent interference offensive

    By David Salvo and Bradley Hanlon

    Recent counterintelligence operations by U.K. and Dutch intelligence services, and similar operations by the U.S. and Swiss authorities, have exposed a broad, sustained, and determined Russian effort to undermine Western democracies. The main takeaways from the revelations about these Russian operations: First, the Kremlin uses cyber hacks and other asymmetric tools not only to interfere in elections, but also to execute a number of other objectives. Second, the Kremlin uses various asymmetric tools in conjunction with one another to achieve its objectives. Finally, the Kremlin has authorized its security services to pursue Moscow’s interests with brazen and aggressive vigor.

  • Conspiracy theoryWho believes in conspiracies? Research offers a theory

    The Apollo moon landing was staged. The CIA killed JFK. 9/11 was a plot by the U.S. government to justify a war in the Middle East. President Barack Obama was not a natural born citizen. The massacre at Sandy Hook elementary school was staged as a pretense for increased gun control. The “deep state” is trying to destroy Donald Trump’s presidency. Conspiracy theories have been cooked up throughout history, but they are increasingly visible lately, likely due in part to the president of the United States routinely embracing or creating them. What draws people to conspiracy theories? New research suggests that people with certain personality traits and cognitive styles are more likely to believe in conspiracy theories.

  • Intelligence & societyAn assault on American intelligence

    By Una Hajdari

    “The veneer of civilization is something that is quite thin,” retired four-star general Michael Hayden said at an MIT presentation. “It has to be protected and nurtured.” The United States was formed on the basis of the ideas of the Enlightenment, he said, with adaptations and improvements being made as societies and “civilization” developed. Since then, those who rejected these ideas represented the negative phenomena in society and were often overpowered by the progressive or forward-thinking mainstream. Now, those who represent the negative segments of society are threatening to become mainstream.