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Project allowing Mexican long-haul trucks into U.S. ends
Two years ago the Department of Transportation launched a pilot project allowing Mexican long-haul trucks to carry their cargo from the Mexican origin all the way to the U.S. destination, without transferring the cargo to an American carrier; Congress removed funding for the project from the omnibus spending bill
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Terrorist Watchlist reaches 1 million entries (representing about 400,000 individuals)
U.S. Terrorist Watchlist reaches 1 million entries; since many individuals on the list have several entries owing to the different ways in which their names may be rendered, the number of individuals on the list is about 400,000
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Innovative approach to science and technology education in Pakistan
A unique experiment: a combination of private money, government support, and intellectual leadership is helping to build the first private research school for science and engineering in Pakistan
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Critics: Commercially driven deep packet inspection (DPI) is akin to wiretapping
New technology now allows third parties to engage in deep packet inspection (DPI), a technique that makes it possible to peer inside packets of data transmitted across the Internet; data collected is then sold to other companies to allow them more targeted advertising
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Napolitano introduces make over top Real ID law
Napolitano, a harsh critic of the Real ID Act while governor of Arizona, adopts the “mend it, don’t end it” approach to the law
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U.S. slow to pinpoint source of cyber attacks
U.S. director of national intelligence tells lawmakers that “It often takes weeks and sometimes months of subsequent investigation [to identify the source of a cyber attack]… And even at the end of very long investigations you’re not quite sure who carried out the offensive”
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U.S., Israel differ sharply on Iran's nuclear threat
Dennis Blair tells Senate committee that Iran has not yet made decision to pursue nuclear weapons; Pentagon leaders also differ in their view of Iran’s intentions, capabilities
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Cost of bioterror false alarms, anthrax hoaxes rises
The U.S. government has spent more than $50 billion since the 2001 anthrax attacks to beef up U.S. defenses against biological attacks; there has not been another attack so far, but the cost of hoaxes and false alarms is rising steeply
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France, Ireland to launch e-crime police training programs
With the problem of cyber crime looming ever larger, European universities want the EC to back a plan to create an academically accredited cybercrime training program for law enforcement
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Regulate armed robots before it's too late
Unmanned machines now carry out more and more military and police missions; soon these robots will be allowed to make autonomous life-and-death decisions: when to shoot — and at whom; a philosopher argues that we should be more mindful of the ethical implications of this trend
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U.K. police equipped with additional helicopters
The U.K. government has created a capital grant to buy helicopters for local police units; Oxford-based Eurocopter benefits
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BNS wins £13 million Dounreay decommissioning contract
Dounreay was the site of a brave, new idea — a fast breeder nuclear reactor which would convert an unusable form of uranium to plutonium which could be recycled and turned into new reactor fuel; it would, that is, breed its own fuel, offering the prospect of electricity in abundance; it has not worked out that way; now it is the site of a big decommissioning effort
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New anti-crime approach: vigilant windows
Windows are coated with special polymer which contains nanoparticles that convert light into fluorescent radiation; this radiation is channeled to the edges of the window where it is detected by sensors; when a person approaches the window, the sensors wirelessly relay this currency information to a computer program, which alerts security officials of the potential intruder
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EC court: Airlines must publicize banned-items list
The EC Court of Justice ruled that airlines cannot remove items from passengers’ baggage unless these items have been included in a publicly available banned-items list; rule comes as a result of a passenger suing an Austrian airline for removing his tennis rackets from his baggage
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Of facts and wishful thinking in the Iran debate
Dennis Blair, the new DNI, said today that it will be “difficult” to convince Iran to give up its quest for nuclear weapons through diplomatic means; he also repeated the November 2007 NIE assessment that Iran had “halted” its weaponization work in 2003
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The long view
Russia's Disinformation War Is Just Getting Started
The disinformation wars are only just getting started, warns a new report on Russian social media interference released by the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence. Published last week, the report offers the most comprehensive look at the efforts of the Russian propaganda factory known as the Internet Research Agency to divide Americans, undermine public faith in the democratic process, and aggressively support Donald Trump before and after the 2016 election. Paris Martineau writes in Wired that in addition to affirming much of what had been reported about Russian online interference over the past three years—including in Robert Mueller’s sweeping indictment of the IRA in February 2018—the report offers a comprehensive look at the extent of past foreign influence operations and recommendations on how best to prepare for those yet to come. It’s the second volume to come out of the Senate Intel Committee, though this one is “much more detailed in its analysis, meticulously cited, and concerned with influence and impact,” says one expert. “The conclusions in the second volume are notably bolder and unequivocal in supporting academic research and the advisory groups’ findings. It reads like a different report altogether.”
Will Canada Weaken Encryption with Backdoors?
Imagine you wake up one morning and discover that the federal government is requiring everyone to keep their back doors unlocked. First responders need access your house in an emergency, they say, and locked doors are a significant barrier to urgent care. For the good of the nation, public health concerns outweigh the risk to your privacy and security. Sounds crazy, right? Byron Holland writes that, unfortunately, a number of governments are considering a policy just like this for the internet, and there’s growing concern that the Canadian government could soon follow suit.
Indecision in Washington Compounded the Kurds' Dilemma
The American military presence in northeast Syria was always an anomaly, unlikely to be sustained indefinitely. The manner of its termination has nevertheless proven inept and unnecessarily costly. If the military advantages of partnering with the YPG were clear, it was equally clear that none of their neighbors would indefinitely tolerate an independent Kurdish state. Turkey was most agitated by this scenario given the Syrian Kurds’ links to the Turkish Kurdistan Workers’ Party, or PKK, a designated terrorist group that has waged a low-grade insurgency against the state for decades. In the end it appears the Tump administration proved unable to choose among its competing interests in Syria, James Dobbins and Jeffrey Martini write. “Statesmanship requires the ability to choose between sometimes unpalatable alternatives. Statecraft requires a rigorous process of refining and a timely means of deliberating on those alternatives. These qualities have been notably lacking in charting the administration’s Syria end game thereby compounding the unavoidable costs of withdrawal with charges of betrayal and a retreat under fire.”
Getting the Nukes Out of Turkey: A How-To Guide
Almost as soon as Turkish troops began their invasion of Syria, old debates resurfaced about whether or not the United States should withdraw the roughly 50 B61 nuclear gravity bombs at Incirlik Air Base in Turkey also began resurfacing. Unlike in years prior, however, this time such a move may actually be in the offing. Pulling the nuclear weapons out of Turkey may seem like a bold step, but the United States has been reducing the number of tactical nuclear weapons in Europe and consolidating the remaining ones at ever fewer bases since the end of the Cold War.
Russian Theater: How to Respond to Moscow’s Return to the African Stage
Russia is preparing to launch its first Russia-Africa Summit in Sochi on Oct. 24. The Russia-Africa Summit is the latest in a series of maneuvers by the Kremlin to present an image of a resurgent Russia in Africa. Judd Devermont writes that Russia’s return, even while at times ham-fisted and amateurish, does pose a threat to U.S. interests. The United States should resist the temptation to elevate Russia’s standing in Africa: It should focus on countering Moscow’s expansion and closing down its malign activities in Africa, instead of wasting time and energy framing Russia’s return as part of ‘great power competition.’”
If Germany Can’t Stop the Rise of White Nationalism, How Can Canada?
Between 2017 and 2018, anti-Semitic and xenophobic crimes both rose nearly 20 percent in Germany. In June, following the assassination by a neo-Nazi of Walter Lübcke, a conservative politician who supported Chancellor Angela Merkel’s immigration policies, the BfV, Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, busted Nordkreuz, an extremist organization which compiled a kill list of 25,000 liberal politicians considered “pro-refugee” while also acquiring weapons, 200 body bags, and quicklime, which prevents the rotting that makes corpses smell. The BfV says that it is now tracking 24,100 known right-wing extremists in the country, of which 12,700 have been classified as violent. “That these developments are happening in Germany, a country known for an unflinching view of its own horrific past, might be considered surprising,” Sadiya Ansari writes. “And if Germany is struggling to contain this [extremists’] threat, what does that mean for countries that haven’t been as vigilant?”