Our picksSynthetic Pandemic Risks | Cyber Command Combating Ransomware | Hydropower Withers in Drought, and more
· Court Rejects ‘Shockingly Low’ 4-Year Sentence for NY Woman Who Aided Islamic State
· US Hospitals Divert Care After Cyber-attack
· What Is Cyber Command’s Role in Combating Ransomware?
· Social Media Users Misinterpret DHS Terrorism Bulletin
· A Natural Pandemic Has Been Terrible. A Synthetic One Would Be Even Worse
· U.S. Officials in Germany Hit by Havana Syndrome
· The True Haiti Earthquake Death Toll Is Much Worse than Early Official Counts
· First-Ever Water Cuts Declared for Colorado River in Historic Drought
· Hydropower Withers in Drought, Boosting Fossil-Fuel Generation
Court Rejects ‘Shockingly Low’ 4-Year Sentence for NY Woman Who Aided Islamic State (Jonathan Stempel, Reuters)
A U.S. federal appeals court on Wednesday threw out what it called a “shockingly low” four-year prison term for a Brooklyn woman who admitted to supporting Islamic State, and ordered that she be resentenced. The 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Manhattan said late U.S. District Judge Jack Weinstein abused his discretion in finding Sinmyah Amera Ceasar’s need for educational and mental health support after a lifetime of emotional, physical and sexual abuse justified the sentence. While “not without sympathy” for Ceasar, Circuit Judge Robert Sack said the four-year term “shocks the conscience,” failing to balance her need for rehabilitation against the needs to ensure just punishment and promote respect for the law. “We further conclude that in comparison with sentences for similar terrorism crimes, Ceasar’s sentence of 48 months’ imprisonment was shockingly low and unsupportable as a matter of law,” Sack wrote for a three-judge panel. Prosecutors had sought a 30- to 50-year prison term, calling the 26-year-old Ceasar a “committed recruiter” for Islamic State who, using the name “Umm Nutella,” tried to connect supporters in the United States with operatives in other countries.
US Hospitals Divert Care After Cyber-Attack (Sarah Coble, InfoSecurity)
A cyber-attack forced hospitals in West Virginia and Ohio to divert patients to other care providers and work from paper records.
What Is Cyber Command’s Role in Combating Ransomware? (Erica D. Borghard and Lauren Zabierek, Lawfare)
The recentspate of ransomware attacks in the United States, including against critical infrastructure in the case of the Colonial Pipelineattack, raises questions about U.S. Cyber Command’s role in responding to this type of malicious behavior. The crux of the issue is how to define an appropriate mission—if any at all—for employing military authorities, capabilities and resources against ransomware gangs, which are typically criminal organizations rather than nation-state adversaries. It’s an issue that will only take on increased relevance, and one for which many key questions remain unanswered.
