Our picksChinese Snooping Tech | Counterintelligence & Disinformation | Anthrax Bombs, and more

Russia Moves to Fill Void Left by U.S. in Northern Syria (AP)
Russia moved to fill the void left by the United States in northern Syria on Tuesday, deploying troops to keep apart advancing Syrian government forces and Turkish troops. At the same time, tensions grew within NATO as Turkey defied growing condemnation of its invasion from its Western allies.
Now in its seventh day, Turkey’s offensive against Kurdish fighters has caused tens of thousands to flee their homes, has upended alliances and is re-drawing the map of northern Syria for yet another time in the 8-year-old war.
Russia moved quickly to further entrench its role as a power broker after President Donald Trump ordered the pullout of American forces in northeastern Syria. The American move effectively abandoned the Kurdish fighters who were allied with the U.S. and cleared the way for Turkey’s invasion aimed at crushing them.

Chinese Snooping Tech Spreads to Nations Vulnerable to Abuse (AP)
When hundreds of video cameras with the ability to identify and track individuals started appearing in the streets of Belgrade, some protesters began having second thoughts about joining anti-government demonstrations in the Serbian capital.
City authorities claim the system, built by Chinese telecommunications company Huawei, helps reduce crime. Critics contend it erodes personal freedoms and exposes citizens to snooping by the Chinese government.
The cameras, equipped with facial recognition technology, are being rolled out across cities around the world, particularly in poorer countries with weak track records on human rights where Beijing has increased its influence through big business deals. The United States intelligence community has warned that the Chinese state can get backdoor access to Huawei data, and the rollout is raising concerns about the privacy of millions of people.

Indiana Plant Was Asked to Make Anthrax Bombs (James Webb, Evansville Courier & Press)
Winston Churchill was scared.
By late 1944, Allied forces had grabbed control of World War II, but a terrifying thought still haunted the British prime minster.
What if, in a final desperate move, Adolf Hitler bombed the United Kingdom with biological weapons?
If that was going to happen, Churchill wanted something to retaliate with. So, he reached out to the American military with a very specific request. I want half-a-million bombs, he said. And I want them stuffed with anthrax.
President Franklin Roosevelt agreed to the request, and the military soon found a perfect place to possibly build those nightmarish weapons: six miles outside Terre Haute, Indiana, about two hours north of Evansville.
All this is relayed in “Poisoner in Chief,” a new book by Stephen Kinzer. The main subject of the book is Sidney Gottlieb, the mastermind behind the CIA’s infamous MK-Ultra experiments. But Kinzer dives into other secretive government operations as well, including a brief foray into work at the Vigo County Ordnance Plant.
The Indiana anthrax order became public in January 1987. Military officials denied the plant tucked along the Wabash River ever churned out anthrax bombs, and the Chicago Tribune talked with a former Vigo worker in ‘87 who said the plant never got beyond the “dry run” stage.
Kinzer also reports that the war ended before the plant produced any anthrax-tinged explosives.
Others, though, disputed that.

For All the Advances in Earthquake Science, Shaking Still Takes Us by Surprise (Peter Fimrite, San Francisco Chronicle)
None of the detection equipment or computer-generated models helped geologists predict the 4.5 magnitude earthquake that rolled through Pleasant Hill, Calif., Monday night. The fault shook 70,000 people in the region.

Anonymity of Cyber Threats Creates Legal Headaches for Insurance (Amelia Brust, Federal News Network)
Cyber technology is now an integral part of all sorts of businesses, and therefore exposes them to an unpredictable range of risks. Foreign actors are increasingly using those vulnerabilities to advance state policies, causing governments to treat cyber attacks as an extension of armed conflict.
That’s according to Scott Anderson, the David M. Rubenstein fellow in Governance Studies at the Brookings Institution. But, he said, even though the legal vocabulary around cyber warfare can be at times misguided, it nonetheless results in complicated issues around insurance policies. He recently wrote an article for legal blog Lawfare about the subject.

U.S. Conducted Cyberattack on Iran Following Strike on Saudi Oil – Report (Times of Israel)
Offensive said to have taken aim at Tehran’s propaganda capabilities, seen as a more limited response than military strike that could escalate into war

To Fight Disinformation, Rethink Counterintelligence (Christopher P. Costa, Defense One)
For too long, the focus of U.S. counterintelligence has been safeguarding government secrets and corporate intellectual property.

PG&E Shutdowns: Will They Happen Again? What’s Next? (Patrick May, Mercury News)
What you need to know about last week’s shutdowns — and what’s in store for the utility going forward