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Flames change the sound of a firefighters' personal safety alarm
The PASS, short for Personal Alert Safety System, has been used by firefighters for thirty years to help track members of their team who might be injured and need assistance to escape a fire. Though the alarm has saved many lives, there are cases in which the device is working correctly but is not heard or not recognized.
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Bloomberg group presses lawmakers to close FBI’s gun “terror gap”
New York City mayor Michael Bloomberg’s group, Mayors Against Illegal Guns, has turned its attention to Senators Kelly Ayotte (R-New Hampshire), Jeff Flake (R-Arizona), and Max Baucus (D-Montana) to gain their support for a gun bill which would prevent people on the U.S. terrorist watch list from passing background checks for guns.
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Former CIA chief: NYPD surveillance would have prevented Boston-like attacks
Former CIA director Michael Hayden said a terror attack like the Boston Marathon bombings would never have taken place in New York City. Hayden, who also headed the National Security Agency (NSA), said the New York Police Department’s (NYPD) broad campaign of spying on the Muslim communities in the city would have helped officials identify the radical tendencies of the alleged bombers, thus preventing the attack.
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Letters containing ricin sent to Mayor Michael Bloomberg, gun-control advocacy group
Two letters sent to Mayor Michael Bloomberg – one to his office in New York, the second to the Washington, D.C. offices of Mayors Against Illegal Guns, a non-profit gun-control group he has founded — contained traces of the deadly poison ricin.
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Israel warns: if S-300 missiles arrive in Syria, Israel will “prevent” them from becoming operational
Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said that if Russia went ahead with its planned sale of advanced S-300 air defense missiles to Syria, and these systems became operational, then Israel’s “entire airspace will become a no-fly zone.” Netanyahu warned that the threat was such that Israel “cannot stand idly by.”
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Laser weapons on ships require reliable shipboard power
For the first time, a laser weapon system (LaWS) will be placed onboard a deployed ship, USS Ponce, for testing in the Persian Gulf in 2014. The U.S. Navy’s plan to put laser weapons on ships, makes the need for reliable, high-voltage shipboard power a matter of national security.
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Smartphone technology to accelerate development of unattended sensors
DARPA wants to develop low-cost, rapidly updatable intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) sensors – to be used by the military on the ground, in the air, at sea, and undersea – in less than a year, a marked improvement to the current three-to-eight year development process. It hopes to do so by using an original design manufacturer (ODM) process similar to that of the commercial smartphone industry.
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Chinese government hackers steal designs of advanced U.S. weapons systems
The Chinese government has been conducting a broad, sustained, and disciplined campaign of cyberattacks against U.S. government agencies, critical infrastructure, private companies, and news organizations. The public version of a study prepared for the Pentagon by the Defense Science Board now says that Chinese government hackers have also been able to penetrate the computer networks of all the major U.S. defense contractors, stealing the designs and specifications of the most advanced weapon system in the U.S. arsenal, and gaining insights into broad technologies on which U.S. military advances are based.
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San Diego to receive $16.9 million in DHS funding
Some cities see DHS cutting its funding for their terrorism-related programs, but other cities see such funding increasing. A case in point is San Diego, which will receive $16.9 million in DHS funding to strengthen the city’s security against terrorist attacks.
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Game changer: Russia to supply Syria with advanced S-300 air-defense systems
In what should be regarded as a major victory for Iran and its two regional allies, Syria and Hezbollah, Russia has announced it would provide Syria with advanced S-300 air defense missiles. The United States, Israel, and EU and NATO countries have been vigorously, and anxiously, pressing Russia not to go ahead with the sale of the missiles, because the deployment of the S-300 would make the imposition of a no-fly zone over Syria, let alone air attacks on targets inside Syria — like the ones Israel conducted in late January and early May — much costlier.
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McCain meets with Syrian rebel leaders in Syria
Senator John McCain (R-Arizona) on Monday, Memorial Day, met with Syrian rebel leaders. McCain’s visit makes him the highest ranking U.S. official to enter Syria since the civil war began in 2011.Rebel commanders asked that the U.S. consider providing heavy arms to the Free Syrian Army, set up a no-fly zone in Syria, and conduct airstrikes on Hezbollah. McCain, for his part, asked the rebels how they planned to reduce the presence of Islamic extremists in rebel ranks.
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Biometric technology identifies one of the Boston Marathon bombers
In a study which evaluated some of the latest in automatic facial recognition technology, researchers were able quickly to identify one of the Boston Marathon bombing suspects from law enforcement video, an experiment that demonstrated the value of such technology.
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Firefighters, FAA weighing the use of drones for wildfires
With the wildfire season already claiming land and homes in the Western United States, federal government firefighters are considering the use of drones outfitted with cameras to map out the size and speed of a wildfire.
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New Obama policy sets higher standards for drone use
In a major policy speech Thursday, President Obama announced plans to set higher standards for the use of drones in the fight against terrorists. He defended the use of the unmanned vehicles in that war, however, including when, in extreme situations, they are used to kill American citizens.
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DHS: it is impossible to stop 3D plastic guns from getting past security checkpoints
A DHS intelligence bulletin starkly warns it may not be possible to stop 3D-printed guns from being made – or from getting past security checkpoints undetected. DHS notes that 3D-printed firearms can be made without serial numbers or unique identifiers, making ballistics testing difficult, and that advancements in technology and decreasing 3D printer costs will mean even more sophisticated printed guns will become easier to acquire.
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More headlines
The long view
Are We Ready for a ‘DeepSeek for Bioweapons’?
Anthropic’s Claude 4 is a warning sign: AI that can help build bioweapons is coming, and could be widely available soon. Steven Adler writes that we need to be prepared for the consequences: “like a freely downloadable ‘DeepSeek for bioweapons,’ available across the internet, loadable to the computer of any amateur scientist who wishes to cause mass harm. With Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4 having finally triggered this level of safety risk, the clock is now ticking.”
“The Federal Government Is Gone”: Under Trump, the Fight Against Extremist Violence Is Left Up to the States
As President Donald Trump guts the main federal office dedicated to preventing terrorism, states say they’re left to take the lead in spotlighting threats. Some state efforts are robust, others are fledgling, and yet other states are still formalizing strategies for addressing extremism. With the federal government largely retreating from focusing on extremist dangers, prevention advocates say the threat of violent extremism is likely to increase.
Luigi Mangione and the Making of a ‘Terrorist’
Discretion is crucial to the American tradition of criminal law, Jacob Ware and Ania Zolyniak write, noting that “lawmakers enact broader statutes to empower prosecutors to pursue justice while entrusting that they will stay within the confines of their authority and screen out the inevitable “absurd” cases that may arise.” Discretion is also vital to maintaining the legitimacy of the legal system. In the prosecution’s case against Luigi Mangione, they charge, “That discretion was abused.”
Autonomous Weapon Systems: No Human-in-the-Loop Required, and Other Myths Dispelled
“The United States has a strong policy on autonomy in weapon systems that simultaneously enables their development and deployment and ensures they could be used in an effective manner, meaning the systems work as intended, with the same minimal risk of accidents or errors that all weapon systems have,” Michael Horowitz writes.
Ukraine Drone Strikes on Russian Airbase Reveal Any Country Is Vulnerable to the Same Kind of Attack
Air defense systems are built on the assumption that threats come from above and from beyond national borders. But Ukraine’s coordinated drone strike on 1 June on five airbases deep inside Russian territory exposed what happens when states are attacked from below and from within. In low-level airspace, visibility drops, responsibility fragments, and detection tools lose their edge. Drones arrive unannounced, response times lag, coordination breaks.
Shots to the Dome—Why We Can’t Model US Missile Defense on Israel’s “Iron Dome”
Starting an arms race where the costs are stacked against you at a time when debt-to-GDP is approaching an all-time high seems reckless. All in all, the idea behind Golden Dome is still quite undercooked.