• Even on U.S. Campuses, China Cracks Down on Students Who Speak Out

    Students and scholars from China who criticize the regime in Beijing can face quick retaliation from fellow students and Chinese officials who harass their families back home. U.S. universities rarely intervene.

  • China Expands Military-Political Education Programs In Developing Countries

    China has vastly expanded its military training programs for military officers from developing countries. In these programs, in which military officers from more than 100 countries have participated, Beijing combines military training with ideological education to promote authoritarian governance, especially its “Party-Army model” with the army subordinate to the ruling party. A new report says that these efforts are “an increasingly important component of China’s engagement. These efforts include training programs aimed at future military and political leaders.”

  • Why the FCC Expelled a Chinese Telecom for National Security Risks

    After months of investigating Chinese state-owned telecommunications companies for national security risks, the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) on Oct. 26 issued an order on one, China Telecom: It can no longer provide telecommunications services in the United States. But Justin Sherman writes that “the move also highlighted that there are many security risks at play with respect to certain foreign telecommunications companies, and mitigating one of those risks still leaves other risks in play.”

  • Congress Restarts Push for China Legislation by Year’s End

    Lawmakers are renewing a push to pass legislation that would boost U.S. competition with China, amid rising concerns about the global supply chain. Addressing U.S. competition with China is one of the few areas of broad bipartisan support on Capitol Hill, although lawmakers differ on the approach.

  • Belarusian Government Linked to Hacking, Disinformation Campaign

    U.S. cybersecurity researchers say they have uncovered evidence that the Belarusian government is linked to a hacking and disinformation campaign against Eastern European NATO members.

  • News Manipulation by State Actors

    Did authoritarian regimes engage in news manipulation during the pandemic? How can such manipulation be brought to light? New report shows that both Russia and China appear to have employed information manipulation during the COVID-19 pandemic in service to their respective global agendas.

  • China Has Been Conducting Campaign of Harassment, Threats against Uyghurs in 22 Countries

    China is oppressing the Uyghurs living in China, but a new report reveals the scale of China’s campaign of harassment and threats against Uyghurs living outside of China. China has used a variety of means in its campaign, including threats against family members in China; abusing the Interpol system by referring the the names of Uyghur activists abroad to Interpol for investigation of trumped-up charges; using China’s considerable cyber capabilities to hack the personal information of Uyghurs and flood their electronic devices with threats; and pressuring businesses to fire Uyghur employees.

  • Hackers-for-Hire Drive Evolution of Threat Landscape

    Cybersecurity threats are on the rise. The new edition of the ENISA Threat Landscape (ETL) highlights the surge in cybercriminality motivated by monetization using ransomware or cryptojacking. Supply-chains attacks also rank highly among prime threats because of the significant potential they have in inducing catastrophic cascading effects.

  • FCC Revokes China’s Telecom Rights to Operate in U.S.

    The FCC on Tuesday revoked China’s Telecom rights to operate and provide services in the United States, and gave the company sixty days to terminate its operations. “Promoting national security is an integral part of the Commission’s responsibility to advance the public interest, and [Tuesday’s] action carries out that mission to safeguard the nation’s telecommunications infrastructure from potential security threats,” the FCC said. 

  • U.S. Intelligence Community Pivots to Better Confront Beijing

    CIA director William Burns Thursday announced the creation of a new China Mission Center to make sure the agency’s resources and existing efforts are working together to face the growing threat.

  • Rush to Stop “Havana Syndrome”

    In 2016, dozens of diplomatic staff at the U.S. and Canadian embassies in Havana began experiencing a sudden onset of health troubles with no apparent cause. It was suspected they had been exposed to a high-intensity burst of energy or sound waves. Known as Havana syndrome, today there are at least 200 CIA, State Department, and Pentagon personnel stationed overseas who have been affected. But cause, suspects unclear as scores of U.S. spies, diplomats, security staff hit by mysterious neurological injuries overseas.

  • Havana Syndrome Fits the Pattern of Psychosomatic Illness – but That Doesn’t Mean the Symptoms Aren’t Real

    I am an emeritus professor of neurology who studies the inner ear, and my clinical focus is on dizziness and hearing loss. When news of these events broke, I was baffled. But after reading descriptions of the patients’ symptoms and test results, I began to doubt that some mysterious weapon was the cause. The available data on Havana syndrome matches closely with mass psychogenic illness – more commonly known as mass hysteria. So what is really happening with so–called Havana syndrome?

  • EU: Russia Involved in “Ghostwriter” Cyberattacks

    The European Union has warned the Kremlin that it could “consider taking further steps” over Moscow’s complicity in recent cyberattacks targeting the bloc’s members.

  • Detecting Forged Video Evidence

    Video evidence is commonly used to prove what happened during an event. However, with the emergence and rapid development of CGI (computer-generated images), deep fakes, and video manipulation, there is a pressing need for tools to detect forgeries that would otherwise undermine the value of video evidence.

  • Germany Warns Russia over Cyberattacks Related to 26 September Election

    Berlin blames Russian government hackers for a recent wave of cyberattacks related to Germany’s 26 September general election. “These attacks could serve as preparations for influence operations such as disinformation campaigns connected with the parliamentary election,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Andrea Sasse said.