• Police use of technology drives property crime to 20-year low

    Law enforcement authorities say that the growing use of technology once accessible only to a few large agencies allows officers to conduct real-time analyses of burglaries, petty thefts, and car thefts; the result: U.S. property crime has fallen to a 20-year low despite the sour economy

  • Iran admits its nuclear facilities are under massive cyberattack

    Iran has confirmed that 30,000 computers in the country’s power stations, including the nuclear reactor in Bushehr, have been attacked by the Stuxnet worm; the Stuxnet worm is described by experts as the most complex piece of malware ever designed; once Stuxnet gains access to a plant’s computers, it hunts out specific software that controls operations such as the opening and closing of valves or temperature regulation; by halting those processes it can cause extensive damage to nuclear power stations, power grids or other industrial facilities; the high number of infections in Iran have led experts to conclude that the worm may have been designed in the United States or Israel to disable Iran’s controversial nuclear facilities

  • Fast DNA analysis for law enforcement unveiled

    The cost and complexity of current forensic DNA analysis methods have contributed to significant processing backlogs throughout the criminal justice system; Lockheed Martin and ZyGEM Corp. unveil a new platform that uses recent developments in microfluidic research and development to accelerate the DNA identification process

  • Experts: Israel used cyber weapon to disrupt Iran's nuclear reactor

    The Stuxnet malware has infiltrated industrial computer systems worldwide in July and August; now, cyber security experts say that the worm was, in fact, is a search-and-destroy cyber weapon meant to hit a single target — Iran’s Bushehr reactor; Stuxnet amazed — and stunned — computer security experts: too large, too encrypted, too complex to be immediately understood, it employed amazing new tricks, like taking control of a computer system without the user taking any action or clicking any button other than inserting an infected memory stick; in Stuxnet, the world faces a new breed of malware that could become a template for attackers wishing to launch digital strikes at physical targets worldwide — Internet link not required

  • Russia cancels S-300 delivery to Iran

    The Russia-made S-300 is the most sophisticated air defense system in the world, and Iran signed a contract to buy them in order to protect its nuclear weapons facilities; Russia has now decided to abrogate the contract — meaning that Iran’s nuclear facilities remain exceedingly vulnerable to destruction from the air, and that the option of attacking these facilities is less daunting than would have been the case otherwise

  • Feds arrest Arizona buyers of guns for drug cartels

    Mexico’s violent drug war — which, in the last four years, has claimed nearly 30,000 dead — is fought with American guns; in a sweeping operation aimed at uncovering “straw buyers” blamed for funneling high-powered guns to Mexican drug cartels, federal agents have arrested dozens of Arizonans and seized a large amount of weapons

  • Freed Pope plot suspects may sue police for false arrest

    U.K. police and counterterrorism authorities are worried that the six men who were arrested Friday on suspicion that they were plotting to assassinate the Pope during his U.K. visit may take legal action for unlawful arrest and detention; the men, all of North African origin, were released Saturday and Sunday after police admitted there was no evidence of a plot

  • Police warm to predictive analysis crime fighting tools

    Memphis made an 863 percent return on its investment in Blue CRUSH — a predictive analysis crime fighting effort; the ROI was calculated using the percentage decline in crime and the number and cost of additional cops that would be needed to match the declining rate; Memphis has paid on average $395,249 a year on the Blue CRUSH initiative, including personnel costs, for a $7.2 million return; MPD operates on a $255.9 million annual budget

  • Vehicle escape windows increase soldiers' safety

    BAE receives a $70 million contract to install Vehicle Emergency Escape (VEE) Windows to more than 39,000 U.S. Army vehicle, with more than 16,000 kits already shipped; the patent pending system features a simple, intuitive design that enables soldiers quickly to exit the vehicle in case of an emergency

  • DHS looking for systems to detect drug smugglers' ultralights

    Mexican drug cartels have been using ultralights — slow-moving, low-flying aircraft, not much more than a hang glider equipped with an engine — to smuggle drugs into the United States; DHS wants to buy off-the-shelf systems to track these hard-to-detect craft

  • Multi-touch control search-and-rescue robot swarms

    The new Dream controller for Microsoft Surface could help speed up search-and-rescue operations; . when disaster strikes, search-and-rescue teams must quickly gather and assimilate the data needed to find survivors; a team of robots can help scout out for persons stuck in rubble or create new maps of the landscape; first responders, though, need ways to control those robots, and process incoming information quickly

  • Ford faces competition for next-generation cruiser

    Ford has long dominated the police car market with about 70 percent of the 75,000 police cars sold annually; the Dearborn automaker, however, will stop producing the Crown Victoria next August and is replacing it with the far more modern Police Interceptor; Ford is facing competition from a redesigned Dodge Charger Pursuit police car and the return of the General Motors’ Chevrolet Caprice police car

  • NYPD buys new portable fingerprint scanners

    The NYPD is armed with a portable fingerprint reader that allows cops immediately to confirm identities at crime scenes with the roll of a thumb; they can also be used to identify the dead at homicide and accident scenes; the NYPD has become increasingly dependent on technology, a move that has helped it offset a decrease in the size of the force; there are about 6,000 fewer officers than there were in 2001

  • Resurgent Irish terrorism on agenda North and South

    Irish politicians on both sides of the border say resurgent Republican terrorism is a growing problem; tensions grown as community leaders charge that the Northern Irish police have turned a blind eye to the killing of a Belfast man by the Protestant Ulster Volunteer Force (UVF); intelligence sources say the UVF leadership authorized the killing because the man “had flouted their authority”