Microsoft Report Signals ‘Great Concern’ for Dam Cybersecurity | Integrated Approach Needed at the Southern Border | You Probably Shouldn’t Panic About Measles — Yet, and more

FERC is poring over the report’s findings and will be using it to inform changes to forthcoming dam cybersecurity guidance, which can be reasonably completed within nine months, said Terry Turpin, who heads FERC’s office of energy projects, in testimony before a Senate subcommittee.
FERC licenses some 2,500 dams across the U.S. and the dams used for over half of the country’s non-federal power generation have not been given a cybersecurity audit, according to Ron Wyden, D-Ore. and chairman of the Energy and Natural Resources subcommittee, in opening remarks, who added the agency has just four staff overseeing dam cyber posture.
Microsoft products are widely used in the dam sector, Turpin confirmed to Wyden, though they did not discuss specific applications. The company has come under fire following last year’s incident in which Chinese hackers accessed the Microsoft email accounts of high-ranking U.S. officials, with critics accusing the software giant of selling insecure products managed under poor cybersecurity culture. The company, which has secured billions of dollars in federal contracts, has previously showcased management tools that can help estimate water usage volumes.

The Integrated Approach Needed at the Southern Border to Degrade the Flow of Narcotics into the Homeland  (Michael Brown, HSToday)
Building a wall along the southern border of the United States is often promulgated as a partial solution to the ongoing narcotics and migrant crisis impacting the southern states, which has expanded as far as New York City. A wall is a feasible plan. However, it will only make a difference if integrated into a holistic border security program that mitigates all the vulnerabilities currently entrenched in Mexico-US border policies and processes.
The influx of immigrants, as well as the cross-border narcotics, weapons, and human/sex trafficking run by Mexican cartels, is ongoing and seemingly unstoppable with current regulations. The US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) reports an increase in drug seizures across the US in 2023, as well as increased smuggling back into Mexico of bulk currency or weapons – the profits of the cartels’ criminal activities.
Recently, Texas Governor Greg Abbott launched Operation Lone Star, deploying the Texas National Guard and Texas Department of Public Safety to the southern border while hastening the construction of a wall in the state. Governor Abbot set the state’s personnel to work around the clock to deal with illegal crossings and cartel operations. He said, “While the federal government ignores this crisis, Texas is holding the line.”
The question is, how can we degrade the volume of migrants and narcotics streaming into our country? 

You Probably Shouldn’t Panic About Measles — Yet  (Keren Landman, Vox)
On April 11, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) published a report containing new information about this year’s spate of measles cases. As of April 11, 121 measles cases have been identified so far in the US this year across 18 jurisdictions.
That number should shock you: In a typical year, the US has only around 5 cases in the first quarter. The total for 2024 so far is more than twice the number of cases the country saw in the entirety of 2023, when 58 cases were reported over the full calendar year.
The authors of the latest report credited the United States’ effective measles monitoring system as a critical factor in enabling public health officials to catch and contain measles cases when they’ve popped up — at least, so far.
According to the report, the increase has been so explosive that it threatens to flip the US from being a country where measles is considered eliminated (no longer spread locally) to being one where measles is considered endemic (something that infects people on a regular basis).
It’s been nearly 25 years since measles was officially eliminated in the US. But the declaration didn’t mean measles could never come back: Under certain conditions — lots of cases imported from abroad, not enough people vaccinated against the infection, and not enough tools to fight back — measles could re-entrench itself stateside.
That’s why public health authorities monitor measles cases and vaccination rates against the infection so closely. And why, when cases rise while vaccination rates drop, they fret.

Colorado Is Latest State to Try Turning Off the Electrical Grid to Prevent Wildfires − a Complex, Technical Operation Pioneered in California  (Kyri Baker, The Conversation)
The U.S. power grid is the largest and most complex machine ever built. It’s also aging and under increasing stress from climate-driven disasters such as wildfires, hurricanes and heat waves.
Over the past decade, power grids have played roles in wildfires in multiple states, including California, Hawaii, Oregon and Minnesota. When wind speeds are high and humidity is low, electrical infrastructure such as aboveground power lines can blow into vegetation or spark against other components, starting a fire that high winds then spread.
Under extreme conditions, utilities may opt to shut off power to parts of the grid in their service areas to reduce wildfire risk. These outages, known as public safety power shutoffs, have occurred mainly in California, where wildfires have become larger and more destructive in recent decades.
On April 5-6, 2024, Colorado utility Xcel Energy carried out that state’s first public safety power shutoff, cutting power to thousands of customers ahead of an intense windstorm. Public officials and Xcel customers complained that they had not received enough warning or explanation. Gov. Jared Polis has directed state regulators to investigate the incident and propose better procedures for the future.