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EXTREMISMHow Local Police Could Help Prevent Another January 6th-Style Insurrection
As scholars who study street gangs and far-right groups, we see that the larger law enforcement community continues to focus – we believe mistakenly – on the belief that, like terrorist groups, white supremacists are coordinated in ideology and intent. Evidence shows that perception actually diverts local police agencies’ attention from identifying and managing these groups. We believe that if police had treated Proud Boys as members of a street gang from the group’s inception in 2016, the events of Jan. 6, 2021, might have been avoided, or at least reduced in severity.
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EXTREMISMHigh Rate of Mental Health Problems and Political Extremism Found in Those Who Bought Firearms During COVID Pandemic
People who bought firearms during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic have much higher rates of suicidal thoughts, self-harm behaviors and intimate partner violence, a study suggests, compared with other firearm owners and people who don’t own firearms. Pandemic firearm buyers were also much more likely than the other groups to hold extreme beliefs, ranging from anti-vaccination views to support for QAnon conspiracy theories.
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AIWalking the Artificial Intelligence and National Security Tightrope
Artificial intelligence (AI) presents nations’ security as many challenges as it does opportunities. While it could create mass-produced malware, lethal autonomous weapons systems, or engineered pathogens, AI solutions could also prove the counter to these threats. Regulating AI to maximize national security capabilities and minimize the risks presented to them will require focus, caution and intent.
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FLOODSNew Flood Prediction Model Has Potentially Life-Saving Benefits
A new simulation model that can predict flooding during an ongoing disaster more quickly and accurately than currently possible. The new model has major potential benefits for emergency responses, reducing flood forecasting time from hours and days to just seconds, and enabling flood behavior to be accurately predicted quickly as an emergency unfolds.
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GRAND STRATEGYAmerican Grand Strategy, Realism, and the Russo-Ukraine War
Choices in foreign policy are never simple and are always sub-optimal. The choice faced now is whether to continue to support Ukraine fighting a messy, tragic war, which it may take time to win, or to let it carry on alone, with the prospect of an even more tragic conclusion from which the Western Alliance, let alone Ukraine, might never recover. As Western countries are not actually doing the fighting and have the resources to sustain Ukraine in its struggle, in the end this is not that difficult a choice to make. No, Ukraine is not another Vietnam.
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DISASTER RESPONSECoordinating Australia’s Response to Natural Disasters and National Crises
Australia’s comprehensive national crisis coordination process — the National Coordination Mechanism, or NCM — works well, and its continued use—and evolution—points the way to even more comprehensively coordinated resilience building, crisis planning, response and recovery. Extrapolation of the NCM will prove critical if national mobilization is required to deal with crises other than natural disasters and pandemics.
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ARGUMENT: NORTH KOREAN THREAT North Korea’s Coming Breakout
Bad news for the world is often welcome relief to North Korea, a country that thrives in the shadowy cracks of the international system, Jonathan Corrado writes. Recent international developments have played into North Korea’s hands. “History shows that North Korea cannot be ignored. The more preparation is done today, the easier the answer will be tomorrow,” Corrado concludes.
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CYBERSTRATEGYIn Pentagon's Overhauled Cyber Strategy, Offense is the New Defense
The Defense Department Tuesday unveiled an unclassified version of its updated cybersecurity strategy, calling for the nation’s cyber forces to persistently seek out and engage adversaries including China and Russia, as well as terrorist organizations and transnational criminal groups, to minimize threats to the U.S.
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SURVEILLANCEApple and Google Are Introducing New Ways to Defeat Cell Site Simulators, But Is it Enough?
Cell-site simulators (CSS)—also known as IMSI Catchers and Stingrays—are a tool that law enforcement and governments use to track the location of phones, intercept or disrupt communications, spy on foreign governments, or even install malware.
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CRITICAL MINERALSLarge Lithium Deposits Discovered in a Caldera on the Nevada-Oregon Border
Geologists estimate that about 20 to 40 million tons of lithium metal – among the world’s largest deposits – are available in the McDermitt Caldera on the Nevada-Oregon border. “If you believe their back-of-the-envelope estimation, this is a very, very significant deposit of lithium,” says one expert. “It could change the dynamics of lithium globally, in terms of price, security of supply and geopolitics.”
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WEAPON SYSTEMSU.S. Military Plans to Unleash Thousands of Autonomous War Robots Over Next Two Years
The United States military plans to start using thousands of autonomous weapons systems in the next two years in a bid to counter China’s growing power. The so-called Replicator initiative aims to work with defense and other tech companies to produce high volumes of affordable systems for all branches of the military. The scale and scope of the US plan makes clear the future of conflict has changed: the age of warfighting robots is upon us.
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WEAPON SYSTEMSThe Inside Story of How the Navy Spent Billions on the “Little Crappy Ship”
Littoral combat ships were supposed to launch the Navy into the future. Instead they broke down across the globe and many of their weapons never worked. Now the Navy is getting rid of them. One is less than five years old.
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EARTHQUAKES100th Anniversary of the Great Kanto Earthquake: Is Japan Ready for the Next Big One?
Japan is marking 100 years since a devastating earthquake triggered a widespread inferno in Kanto, a region that includes the capital, Tokyo. Most of the tens of thousands of victims perished in the fire. seismologists put the likelihood of another major quake beneath the Kanto region of Tokyo and the surrounding prefectures at 70% in the next 30 years.
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WILDFIRESWIFIRE Lab Forms New Partnership with DHS
For the past 10 years, the WIFIRE team at the San Diego Supercomputer Center (SDSC) at UC San Diego has been focused on meeting the growing needs of hazard monitoring, mitigation and response. Most recently, the team has partnered with DHS to integrate edge computing – a strategy emphasizing data collection and analysis at the site of or geographically near data sources. Joint effort aims to demonstrate workflows utilizing edge computing for wildfire monitoring, response and mitigation.
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CHINA WATCHU.S. Chip Sales to China to Continue, but Not Most Powerful Ones
The United States will continue to sell semi-conductor computer chips to China but not its most powerful ones “that China wants for its military,” Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said. While the United States and China maintain more than $700 billion in annual trade, escalating tensions in recent years have made it more challenging for U.S. firms to operate in China.
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More headlines
The long view
ARGUMENT: REGULATING COMMERCIAL SPYWAREThe Scourge of Commercial Spyware—and How to Stop It
Years of public revelations have spotlighted a shadowy set of spyware companies selling and servicing deeply intrusive surveillance technologies that are used against journalists, activists, lawyers, politicians, diplomats, and others. Democratic nations (thus far) lag behind the United States in executing spyware-related policy commitments.
GUNSStudy Confirms Link Between Concealed Carry Weapons and Gun Homicide Rates
Concealed guns significantly impact homicide rates and public safety, according to a Rutgers study that found an increase in homicides based on the number of concealed carry weapons licenses issued.
EXTREMISTSProsecuting Extremists in the U.K.: Charging, Prosecution, and Sentencing Outcomes
There is a lack of data regarding prosecution and sentencing for terrorism and terrorism-related offences across the three legal jurisdictions of the UK (England and Wales, Scotland, and Northern Ireland). Does the prosecution landscape (charging, prosecution, and sentencing) vary in the UK for extremist actors depending upon the legal jurisdiction?
AIAI-Controlled Weapons Should Be Banned from the Battlefield: Experts
AI expert says autonomous systems being used in the current Ukraine conflict need to be prohibited in the same way as chemical and biological weapons. “I’m quite hopeful that we will, at some point, decide that autonomous weapons also be added to the lists of terrible ways to fight war like chemical weapons, like biological weapons. What worries me is that in most cases, we’ve only regulated various technologies for fighting after we’ve seen the horrors of them being misused in battle,” he says.
DISASTER RELIEFUsing Hydrogen to Power Disaster Relief
A new vehicle will not only get emergency responders safely to the site of an emergency, but also directly provide power at the scene for up to 72 hours as they assess next steps. And it does all this running on hydrogen—a much more sustainable solution for our environment.
ARGUMENT: NORTH KOREAN THREAT North Korea’s Coming Breakout
Bad news for the world is often welcome relief to North Korea, a country that thrives in the shadowy cracks of the international system, Jonathan Corrado writes. Recent international developments have played into North Korea’s hands. “History shows that North Korea cannot be ignored. The more preparation is done today, the easier the answer will be tomorrow,” Corrado concludes.