• Law enforcement can store, identify millions of voice samples using new software

    Everyone this day can be identified by a fingerprint, DNA, or even a picture. Now, with the help of a Russian company, the FBI will soon be using voice recognition to identify people; the FBI says voice biometrics will be a “reliable and consistent means of identification for use in remote recognition”

  • Why common explosive sometimes fails

    The explosive PETN has been around for a century and is used by everyone from miners to the military, but it took new research by Sandia National Laboratories to begin to discover key mechanisms behind what causes it to fail at small scales

  • LAPD wants to know why you are taking these photos

    If you live in Los Angeles and decide to take some pictures of a few monuments or public places to send to friends and family or for your own private collection, the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) may see you as a potential threat to public safety

  • German police wants to develop its own computer surveillance software

    The Federal Police Office of Germany (also known as the BKA) is looking to hire software engineers who can develop computer surveillance technology for use by law enforcement and intelligence agencies in criminal investigations

  • Tasered youth fare as well as adults: study

    Adolescents who are tasered by law enforcement officers do not appear to be at higher risk for serious injury than adults, according to new a new study; the conclusions are based on a retrospective study of Taser use from law enforcement data collected by the largest, independent multicenter database established in 2005

  • Sharp drop in illegal crossers notwithstanding, “border industrial complex” keeps growing

    Since 1986, U.S. immigration enforcement has cost the U.S. government $219 billion dollars; almost 80,000 workers now depend on immigration enforcement for their employment; illegal immigration has dropped sharply over the last four years, and is now at a 1971 level — but the what some call the “border industrial complex” keeps growing and growing

  • DARPA’s legged robot beats Usain Bolt’s speed record

    Usain Bolt, Olympic gold medalist and world record-holder sprinter, set the world speed record for a human in 2009 when he reached a peak speed of 27.78 mph for a 20-meter split during the 100-meter sprint; DARPA’s Cheetah robot, already the fastest legged robot in history, bested Bolt recently by clocking at 28.3 mph for a 20-meter split

  • Radiation-enabled computer chips allow low-cost security imaging systems

    With homeland security on high alert, screening systems to search for concealed weapons are crucial pieces of equipment; these systems, however, are often prohibitively expensive, putting them out of reach for public spaces such as train and bus stations, stadiums, or malls, where they could be beneficial; until now

  • Forensic science in the dock

    Two members of O. J. Simpson’s defense team founded the Innocence Project in 1992; since then, the project has helped exonerate almost 300 innocent people by challenging improper use of DNA testing and other elements of forensic science

  • Law-enforcement agencies eager for Web-surveillance tools

    Private technology firms are pitching software capable of analyzing large swaths of the Internet to local law enforcement looking for ways to stop the next mass shooting or domestic terrorist event before it happens; police departments hope the software will help them detect online information from terrorists, traffickers, pedophiles, and rioters

  • As shoe-scanning devices fail, passengers continue to remove their shoes

    In the last five years the U.S. government has tested several scanning devices for detecting explosives and other weapons concealed in the shoes of airline passengers; after spending millions of dollars on these devices, TSA has concluded that the detection systems are ineffective; the result: removing shoes at security check points is going to be a part of air travel for the foreseeable future

  • The costs, benefits, and efficiency of aviation security measures

    The threat of terrorist attack on American aviation has made the system the focus of intense security efforts, but it is difficult to determine if the benefits outweigh their cost; efficient security policy — a focus on getting the most security for the least cost — should be the priority in an era of fiscal austerity, says a new RAND report

  • Near-instantaneous DNA analysis

    Polymerase chain reaction (PCR) is an indispensible technique allowing researchers and clinicians to produce millions of copies from a single piece of DNA or RNA for use in genome sequencing, gene analysis, inheritable disease diagnosis, paternity testing, forensic identification, and the detection of infectious diseases; PCR for point-of-care, emergency-response, or widespread monitoring applications needs to be very fast — on the order of a few minutes; this has now been achieved

  • Alcatel-Lucent offers first-responders access to multiple video feeds using 4G LTE

    New first responder video solution provides mission-critical information on handheld devices to fire, police, and ambulance services to improve responsiveness, safety, teamwork, and cost efficiency; the First Responder Video solves the network congestion problem by optimizing bandwidth use and integrating multiple video feeds and other operational data into one single stream

  • Y-12 and operator error

    Three anti-nuclear activists, led by an 82-year old nun, breached the perimeter security system of the supposedly highly secure Y-2 nuclear facility at Oak Ridge, Tennessee, where nuclear weapons components are manufactured (note that the Oak Ridge National Laboratory [ONRL] is not affiliated with the Y-12 National Security Complex); they then spent several hours in a secure area of the facility, leisurely spray-painting slogans on the facility’s walls – without the facility’s security staff, or the sophisticated $500 million security cameras and sensors, detecting them; to understand what happened at Y-2, we must accept that operator error is an essential problem in national security, and that the problem is pervasive and normal; the only way to deal with the operator error phenomenon is to build redundancies into the system