• Scientists: Oil spill's "grim reshuffle" of Gulf food web may destroy region's fishing industry

    The initial impact of the BP disaster on the maritime food chain in the Gulf are already apparent; scientists warn that if such impacts continue, they will result in a grim reshuffling of sea life that could over time cascade through the ecosystem and imperil the region’s multibillion-dollar fishing industry

  • Coalition of Tucson businesses launches campaign against Arizona harsh immigration law

    A coalition of 90 Tucson, Arizona businesses launches a “We Mean Business” campaign to show their resistance to SB 1070 — the harsh immigration law set to take effect 29 July; many of the owners agree there is a need for immigration reform; however they do not think the new law is the most effective approach

  • To qualify for lucrative defense research work, Florida research park undergoes anti-terrorism makeover

    Florida’s largest research park, located in east Orange County, has quietly and subtly transformed some of its most prominent facilities into anti-terrorism fortresses for the high-tech military agencies located there; the research center has now become a defense-industry “nerve center” that looks and operates more like a military base than ever before

  • Software to cut millions from nuclear clean-up bill

    New software lets planners work out the best way of breaking up and packing contaminated equipment while minimizing workers’ radiation exposure. It also shows in minute detail how radioactive waste can be stored in the smallest possible space, reducing the number of long-term storage containers needed

  • U.S. replaces noisy immigration raids at place of employment with "silent audits"

    The Obama administration has replaced noisy, media-covered immigration raids at factories and farms with a quieter enforcement strategy: sending federal agents to scour companies’ records for illegal immigrant workers; one expert says: “Instead of hundreds of agents going after one company, now one agent can go after hundreds of companies”; employers say the Obama administration is leaving them short of labor for some low-wage work, conducting silent raids but offering no new legal immigrant laborers in occupations, like farm work; federal labor officials estimate that more than 60 percent of farm workers in the United States are illegal immigrants

  • U.S. economy influences immigration more than security measures

    A Forbes’ columnist says that immigrants — legal and illegal — are an economic bellwether, and that recent rends in immigration show that both the low-skilled and high-skilled immigrants have doubts about the U.S. economy right now; a DHS study shows that overall population of unauthorized aliens in the United States dropped from 11.8 million in 2007 to 10.8 million in 2009, in parallel with the economic slow-down; the risk to U.S. national security and economic welfare are these: low-skilled immigrants will likely return when the U.S. economy picks up again, but to bring back high-skilled immigrants, America’s economy will have to do more than make a comeback — it will have to make a strong comeback

  • Leaking well may be sealed ahead of schedule

    The Deepwater Horizon may be sealed a month or so ahead of schedule — during the second half of July rather than the second half of August — owing to three positive developments: one of two relief wells being drilled will be in a position to engage in “bottom kill” in several days; the containment ship Helix Producer, capable of capturing an additional 53,000 barrels of oil a day, is on station; BP is pressing ahead with plans to swap the current leaky containment cap with a new, no-leak, bolt-down cap

  • New counter-IED approach: flying car

    California based company offers a solution to the vexing IED problem: a car flying car; if soldiers find themselves in a tactical situation requiring a quick escape, they can flip a switch and the car just shoots up in the air; in April DARPA invited engineers to dream up a flying car — for the initial design of which it allocated $54 million — to give the military an “unprecedented capability to avoid traditional and asymmetrical threats while avoiding road obstructions” through vertical takeoff and landing

  • U.K. approves well-capping and containment study; new prevention, mitigation solutions sought

    In response to BP’s Gulf disaster, the U.K. offshore oil and gas advisory group charged its technical review group to proceed with developing new solutions for preventing or mitigating similar catastrophes in the future; over the past twenty years nearly 7,000 wells have been successfully drilled in the U.K. continental shelf

  • U.S. quietly launches protection program against cyber attacks on critical infrastructure

    The administration has quietly launched Perfect Citizen, a digital surveillance project to be run by the NSA; the project’s goal is to detect and detect cyber attacks on private companies and government agencies running critical infrastructure such as the electricity grid, nuclear-power plants, dams, and more; the program would rely on a set of sensors deployed in computer networks for critical infrastructure that would be triggered by unusual activity suggesting an impending cyber attack — although it would not persistently monitor the whole system

  • China's nuclear reactors to use technology rejected by U.S., U.K. as unsafe

    Ten of China’s proposed nuclear power reactors will use Westinghouse’s AP1000 advanced technology; the United States rejected the AP100 design, saying key components of the reactormight not withstand events like earthquakes and tornadoes; the United Kingdom indicated it, too, would reject Westinghouse’s new reactor because it could be vulnerable to terrorist attacks

  • Lawmakers say Chinese investment in a U.S. steel mill poses national security risks

    A Chinese steel company — China’s fourth largest — plans to invest in a Mississippi-based steel maker; this is the first investment by a Chinese company in a U.S. mill; fifty U.S. lawmakers write the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury urging him to block the deal; they argue that the investment poses a national security risk as Anshan Steel is controlled by the Chinese government

  • Hand-held scanner checks 100 databases -- in one second

    Army guards at Fort Sam Houston are using a hand-held identity detector that taps information from more than 100 databases — in one second; the manufacturer says that the use of the device has resulted in 60,000 arrests since the start of 2004; Senator Schumer wants TSA to use the device at airports

  • Europe's first finger-vein biometric ATMs installed in Poland

    Poland claims to be the first European country to install finger-vein biometric ATMs; the authentication system developed by Japanese tech giant Hitachi; unlike fingerprints, which leave a trace and can be potentially reproduced, finger veins are impossible to replicate because they are beneath the surface of the skin

  • Docusign commemorates ESIGN anniversary by launching new e-signature tools

    Exactly ten years ago — on 30 June 2000 — President Bill Clinton signed the Electronic Signatures in Global National Commerce (ESIGN) Act, which aimed to encourage the use of e-signatures on business documents; to commemorate the anniversary, Docusign, a provider of an e-signature platform, is releasing of Docusign Spring 10, a major upgrade to its service