• Drop the Charges Against Minor Capitol Hill Defendants

    Rioter who assaulted police or vandalized the Capitol should be prosecuted. But the majority of those who came to the Capitol on 6 January were “gawkers” who just wanted to see the spectacle, or to non-violently express their political opinion, and merely walked through a public office building, The charges against them should be dropped.

  • Cyber Regulation Could Be Coming Following Spate of Hacks, Ransomware Attacks

    The United States may soon look to regulate private companies, mandating higher standards for cybersecurity following a series of damaging hacks and ransomware attacks against key firms and critical infrastructure. Cybersecurity experts say that malign actors are currently operating with impunity and that too many private sector organizations have, so far, failed to take the necessary precautions. “Enlightened self-interest, that’s apparently not working,” Chris Inglis, tapped to be the country’s first national cyber director, told members of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee. “Market forces, that’s apparently not working.”

  • What Are “Ghost Guns,” a Target of Biden’s Anti-Crime Effort?

    It’s not expensive or difficult to produce large numbers of untraceable firearms in the United States. Whether for private use, sale on the criminal market or arming violent extremists, it’s actually startlingly cheap and easy to mass-produce firearms that police can’t track – what are often called “ghost guns.”

  • In Oregon, New Gun Violence Restraining Orders Appear to Be Used as Intended

    Extreme risk protection orders (ERPOs), also known as gun violence restraining orders, are civil court orders that grant temporary restrictions on purchasing and possessing firearms for individuals determined by a civil court judge to be at extreme risk of committing violence against themselves or others. A new study found that while ERPOs are commonly considered as a tool to remove guns from dangerous individuals, they should also be considered as a tool to prevent gun purchases by dangerous individuals.

  • Supreme Court: Migrants Temporarily in US Ineligible for Permanent Residency

    The U.S. Supreme Court unanimously ruled Monday that 400,000 immigrants from 12 countries living in the United States for humanitarian reasons are not eligible to become permanent residents. Justice Elena Kagan, writing for the court, said that U.S. immigration law blocks migrants who entered the country illegally from obtaining permanent residency, or “green cards,” although they have Temporary Protected Status.

  • U.S. Judge Overturns California's Decades-Long Ban on Assault Weapons

    A judge in San Diego has slammed a 1989 ban on assault weapons as unconstitutional and said Americans should have the right to own semi-automatic rifles. “Like the Swiss Army knife, the popular AR-15 rifle is a perfect combination of home defense weapon and homeland defense equipment. Good for both home and battle,” San Diego District Judge Roger Benitez said. “Guns and ammunition in the hands of criminals, tyrants and terrorists are dangerous; guns in the hands of law-abiding responsible citizens are better.”

  • Americans Bought 1.6 Million Guns Last Month. Who Were the Buyers?

    Americans bought 1.6 million guns last month – an impressive number, but only the 14th highest on record, and still down 18 percent from May 2020. What has remained far more opaque is who exactly was doing the buying last year. This week, we started to have a more definitive answer.

  • Defining Domestic Terrorism: Does the U.S. Need New Criminal Penalties for Domestic Terrorism Events?

    Debates over what legally constitutes domestic terrorism—and the barriers to prosecuting these incidents—stretch back decades. “Significant political opposition to anti-domestic terrorism statutes are already being observed among lawmakers,” Lucy Tu writes, adding that “Individual lawmakers, however, are not the only opponents to the new bill.”

  • Cyber Attacks Can Shut Down Critical Infrastructure. It’s Time to Make Cyber Security Compulsory

    The 7 May attack on the Colonial Pipeline highlights how vulnerable critical infrastructure such as fuel pipelines are in an era of growing cyber security threats. In Australia, we believe the time has come to make it compulsory for critical infrastructure companies to implement serious cyber security measures.

  • Airlines Shun Belarusian Airspace as Calls for Sanctions over Plane Diversion Grow

    The global aviation industry has moved to isolate Belarus as the leader of the country’s opposition called for the international community to act in concert to stop authoritarian leader Alyaksandr Lukashenka from continuing to act with “impunity” following the diversion of a commercial airline to Minsk, where one of the passengers, an opposition journalist, was arrested.

  • Belarus Kidnapping: What International Law Says about Capture of Dissident journalist Roman Protasevich

    The full details of what happened with the plane which flew from Athens in Greece to Vilnius in Lithuania on May 23, and which was forced, by the Belarus air force, to land in Minsk, remain a matter of dispute. But even if Belarus can show that its diversion of the plane was lawful, the detention by the Belarus police of opposition blogger Roman Protasevich and his girlfriend is another question entirely. Under the ICAO treaties, Flight FR4978 was under the jurisdiction of Poland as the country of registration of the aircraft. The aircraft was still “in flight,” even when diverted to Minsk. No country has the right to detain suspects on a civil aircraft for crimes that were not committed on board that aircraft.

  • The Case for a “Disinformation CERN”

    Democracies around the world are struggling with various forms of disinformation afflictions. But the current suite of policy prescriptions will fail because governments simply don’t know enough about the emerging digital information environment.

  • On Christchurch Call Anniversary, a Step Closer to Eradicating Terrorism Online?

    Is it possible to eradicate terrorism and violent extremism from the internet? To prevent videos and livestreams of terrorist attacks from going viral, and maybe even prevent them from being shared or uploaded in the first place? Courtney C. Radsch writes that the governments and tech companies involved in the Christchurch Call are dealing with a difficult issue: “The big question is whether the twin imperatives of eradicating TVEC while protecting the internet’s openness and freedom of expression are compatible,” Radsch writes.

  • It’s Time to Surge Resources into Prosecuting Ransomware Gangs

    In the popular imagination, hacking is committed by lone wolves with exceptional computer skills. But in reality, the vast majority of hackers do not have the technical sophistication to create the malicious tools that are essential to their trade. Kellen Dwyer writes that hacking has exploded in recent years because criminals have specialized and subspecialized so that each one can concentrate on facilitating just a single phase of a successful data breach. This is known as cybercrime-as-a-service and it is a massive business. This intricate cybercrime ecosystem offers the key to fighting it: “While organization and specialization are strengths of cybercriminals, they are also weaknesses. That means there are organizations that can be infiltrated and exploited.”

  • U.S. Anti-Hate Crime Law Provides New Enforcement Tools, but Will It Work?

    A bill that President Joe Biden signed into law Thursday gives local and federal officials new tools and resources to combat hate crimes, while putting the spotlight on a surge in anti-Asian hate during the COVID-19 pandemic. The impetus for the new law was a dramatic increase in attacks on Asian Americans since the start of the pandemic in Wuhan, China, more than a year ago.