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Private Data/Public Regulation
Police, increasingly relying on the collection of digital data, seek fewer search warrants and more requests to harvest metadata. They buy data from brokers, they track location and other aspects of our lives. Sometimes police collect the data themselves. More often they gather it from third parties. Barry Friedman writes that “The benefits of this approach are uncertain, but placing this much personal data in the hands of the government has its costs.”
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Safe Airspace in the Age of Drones
Drones are becoming more and more ubiquitous, and are being used for everything from backyard fun to military operations. As the technologies for UAS continues to improve, so has the potential for them to be used in illegal and dangerous ways.
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Bolstering Speed, Flexibility of Response to Nuclear Events
Researchers are combining basic research and development of emergent technologies, predictive capabilities, and systems assessment to revolutionize the speed and flexibility of technical nuclear forensic (TNF) response to nuclear events.
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Minor Volcanic Eruptions Could “Cascade” into Global Catastrophe
Researchers call for a shift in focus away from risks of “super-volcanic” eruptions and toward likelier scenarios of smaller eruptions in key global ‘pinch points’ creating devastating domino effects.
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Havana Syndrome Fits the Pattern of Psychosomatic Illness – but That Doesn’t Mean the Symptoms Aren’t Real
I am an emeritus professor of neurology who studies the inner ear, and my clinical focus is on dizziness and hearing loss. When news of these events broke, I was baffled. But after reading descriptions of the patients’ symptoms and test results, I began to doubt that some mysterious weapon was the cause. The available data on Havana syndrome matches closely with mass psychogenic illness – more commonly known as mass hysteria. So what is really happening with so–called Havana syndrome?
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Leader of Atomwaffen Extremist Group Convicted of Federal Felonies, Conspiracy
The leader of the extremist Atomwaffen group was convicted in U.S. District Court in Seattle of five federal felonies for his conspiracy to send threatening posters to journalists and employees of the Anti-Defamation League.
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The Effect of Imports of Neodymium Magnets on U.S. National Security
The Commerce Department’s Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) has initiated an investigation to determine the effects on U.S. national security from imports of Neodymium-iron-boron (NdFeB) permanent magnets.
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Why It Matters That North Korea Tested a Hypersonic Missile
Like most ballistic missiles, hypersonic glide vehicle (HGVs) fly at hypersonic speeds, or faster than five times the speed of sound. But HGVs are in theory more difficult to detect and intercept, since they can fly at relatively low altitudes and be maneuvered in flight.
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Bringing the Power of AI to help Firefighters
With $5 million in support from the National Science Foundation’s Convergence Accelerator program, researchers will bring the power of AI to help firefighters strategize how best to plan these controlled burns, as well as manage unexpected blazes.
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2020 Homicides Up 30% over 2019 – Largest Increase on Record: FBI
The estimated number of violent crimes in the U.S. in 2020 has increased by 5.6 percent when compared with the 2019’s statistics, but the number of homicides – a total of 21,570 — has increased by 30 percent relative to 2019.
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IAEA: Iran Denying Monitoring Access at “Indispensable” Site
The IAEA, the UN nuclear watchdog, says Iran has not allowed international inspectors access to a centrifuge-component-manufacturing workshop as agreed under a monitoring deal reached two weeks ago.
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Can Better Gun Safety Practices Lower Teen Suicide Rates?
Forty percent of the teenagers committing suicide used guns. A new study showed that teens who die by suicide using guns may show fewer warning signs like mental health issues than teens who die by suicide using other methods. Gun availability could contribute to this, as gun-owning parents loosen safety practices as children grow up.
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Big Fires Demand a Big Response: How 1910’s Big Burn Can Help Us Think Smarter about Fighting Wildfires and Living with Fire
The aftermath of 1910 Big Burn in Northwestern U.S., the Rockies, and parts of British Columbia, led to bold decision-making in forest and fire management techniques and directives. Now, more than a century later, the 21st century’s big burns are a signal that things have gone terribly wrong.
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Earthquake Expert Who Advised the Haiti Government in 2010: “Why Were Clear Early Warning Signs Missed?”
There have been very few improvements in Haiti’s seismic early warning systems between the 2010 and the 14 August 2021 earthquakes. For example, a seismic network was installed in some private residences in different locations in Haiti. These data can be easily and freely accessed online. But this network has not been efficiently used for early warning alerts. A quick examination of the data revealed that at least two strong motions (with magnitude 4.0 or above) were recorded before August 14 along the Enriquillo Plantain Garden Fault. So the warning signs were there, but nobody – it seems – was looking out for them.
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U.S. Domestic Terrorism Caseload “Exploding”
U.S. national security and law enforcement agencies are battling what they describe as a “significant jump” in threats from domestic terrorists, many of whom are acting on their own and motivated by racial animosity or anti-government ideology.
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The long view
AI-Controlled Fighter Jets May Be Closer Than We Think — and Would Change the Face of Warfare
Could we be on the verge of an era where fighter jets take flight without pilots – and are controlled by artificial intelligence (AI)? US R Adm Michael Donnelly recently said that an upcoming combat jet could be the navy’s last one with a pilot in the cockpit.
What We’ve Learned from Survivors of the Atomic Bombs
Q&A with Dr. Preetha Rajaraman, New Vice Chair for the Radiation Effects Research Foundation in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan.
Need for National Information Clearinghouse for Cybercrime Data, Categorization of Cybercrimes: Report
There is an acute need for the U.S. to address its lack of overall governance and coordination of cybercrime statistics. A new report recommends that relevant federal agencies create or designate a national information clearinghouse to draw information from multiple sources of cybercrime data and establish connections to assist in criminal investigations.