Our picksRussia Inflames U.S. Racial Tensions | Sinking Jakarta | North Korean Malware, and more

Sinking City: Indonesia’s Capital on Brink of Disaster (AFP)
Time is running out for Jakarta.
One of the fastest-sinking cities on earth, environmental experts warn that one third of it could be submerged by 2050 if current rates continue.
Decades of uncontrolled and excessive depletion of groundwater reserves, rising sea-levels, and increasingly volatile weather patterns mean swathes of it have already started to disappear.
Existing environmental measures have had little impact, so authorities are taking drastic action: the nation will have a new capital.
Its location could be announced imminently, according to local reports.
“The capital of our country will move to the island of Borneo,” Indonesian leader Joko Widodo said on Twitter.

Water Crisis Grips U.S. City after Lead Contamination (AFP)
A growing water crisis gripped a US city Thursday after environmental officials discovered high lead levels in tap water, sparking worry and highlighting creaking infrastructure in a major urban center.
Thousands of people in Newark, a city in New Jersey with a predominantly black and Hispanic population, have been told to drink only bottled water after the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) found filters were not extracting lead properly.
The situation has drawn comparisons with a water crisis in the former industrial city of Flint, Michigan, which became a symbol of social injustice in America.

Russian Link Revealed Behind Attempts to Escalate Racial Tension in the U.S. (Diane Sorensen, Industry News Works)
Researchers from Clemson University have found out that malicious videos about racial discrimination promoted on social media were done through fake accounts. These inauthentic accounts which have since been removed by Twitter were found be linked to Russian efforts to escalate racial issues in United States. These videos were promoted with nicknames like Basketball Becky and Taco Truck Tammy and these suspicious accounts retweeted these inflammatory videos before they were picked up by others and shared.

Senators Concerned Epstein Conspiracy Theories Play into Russia’s Hands (Cat Zakrzewski, Washington Post)
The rush to spread baseless theories in the wake of Epstein’s apparent suicide is what makes American society “so vulnerable to disinformation and foreign influence threats,” Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) tweeted this weekend. Rubio asserted that Russia, as part of its long-running campaign to sow political division in the U.S., might be capitalizing on the death of the disgraced financier and accused sex abuser.
The most shocking share of a conspiracy theory came from Trump himself, who retweeted a conservative actor who suggested Epstein’s death might somehow be tied to former president Bill Clinton and used the hashtag #ClintonBodyCount. Posts citing #TrumpBodyCount, implicating the president instead, were also trending on Twitter. 

U.S. Cyber Command Warns of North Korea-Linked Lazarus Group Malware (Shannon Vavra, Cyberscoop)
Malicious software samples uploaded by U.S. Cyber Command to VirusTotal on Wednesday are associated with campaigns from Lazarus Group, an advanced persistent threat group linked with North Korea, two cybersecurity researchers told CyberScoop.
Lazarus is an umbrella name that typically describes hacking activity which advances Pyongyang’s interests. The group is especially known for its financial motivations, such as abusing the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (SWIFT) monetary transfer system and for hacking banks, according to Adam Meyers, vice president of intelligence at CrowdStrike. The instance Wednesday marks the second time in as many months Cyber Command added malware details to the VirusTotal security repository as part of an information sharing effort with the private sector.

Pentagon’s AI Center is Developing Tech that Could Revolutionize Disaster Response (Brandi Vincent, Defense One)
It’s another example of federal automation at work.

Gov. Greg Abbott Launches Domestic Terrorism Task Force in Wake of El Paso Massacre (Troy Closson, Texas Tribune)
The task force will analyze current and emerging state threats and form stronger prevention strategies. Abbott took similar action — which led to sweeping legislation — after last year’s school shooting in Santa Fe

Watchdog: Hiring Freeze Increased Cyber Risk at State (Adam Mazmanian, FCW)
An extended hiring freeze at the Department of State delayed key cybersecurity initiatives and placed highly classified information at risk according to a watchdog report