• Understanding Influence in the Strategic Competition with China

    What do qualitative metrics and case studies reveal about how China attempts to exert influence around the world? How should the United States respond to China’s influence-seeking activities? A new report assesses China’s ability to use various mechanisms of influence to shape the policies and behavior of twenty countries, as well as the lessons that these examples offer for the U.S. strategic competition with China.

  • The Role of Local Police in Countering Domestic Terrorism

    The Biden administration’s National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism lays out a multi-tiered approach to a growing threat. The White House strategy rests, in part, on increased federal-local cooperation, which remains difficult to achieve in practice. The administration’s strategy presumes local police departments have more insight into local permutations of violent extremism – and that federal agencies should have the capabilities to counter it. However, differing priorities and capabilities between local police departments will remain a significant challenge for federal agencies as they attempt to counter domestic terrorism.

  • Financing Violent Extremists

    Ethnically or racially motivated terrorism (EoRMT) is a complex phenomenon that encompasses a wide range of actors. These range from individuals, that operate as lone actors or so called “lone wolves” to small and medium organizations, as well as transnational movements which span borders, and sometimes even continents. A new report finds that the funding of such terrorist attacks varies from country to country, adding to the challenge of tackling such financing.

  • Beijing’s Persecution of Uyghurs Reaches Nearly 30 Countries: Report

    China persecutes the Uyghurs not only inside China, but in other countries as well. Its anti-Uyghur campaign has expanded overseas, and so far has reached 28 countries. The Chinese campaign has been successful because these countries’ governments, out of fear of Beijing’s power and influence, have been eager to accommodate China and its demands.

  • With Cyberattacks Growing More Frequent and Disruptive, a Unified Approach Is Essential

    Coordinated cyberattacks can create massive disruptions to infrastructure and supply chains. New treaties are needed to prevent cyberwarfare, but it’s challenging to predict technological advances.

  • SEC's Increasing Focus on Terrorism May Limit Financial Oversight

    When SEC asks companies about potential ties to terrorism, it catches fewer reporting errors. The SEC’s shift of attention to firms’ financial ties to states sponsoring terrorism (SSTs) began at Congress’s behest in 2003, leading to a shift in the composition of SEC review staff — the number of lawyers the review staff has grown while the number of accountants has decreased.

  • Matt Hancock and the Problem with China’s Surveillance Tech

    Matt Hancock, Britain’s Health Secretary, resigned last week – and informed his wife that he was divorcing her – after CCTV footage emerged of him snogging his assistant outside his office. Ian Williams writes that the Hancock affair raises serious questions involving surveillance and national security: The cameras involved were made by the Chinese company Hikvision, one of the 1.3 million Hikvision cameras installed across the U.K. Hikvision has close links to the Chinese Communist Party and China’s intelligence services. Even if the Chinese intelligence services were not involved in leaking the compromising Hancock video to the press, the episode is one more indication, if one were needed, of the security risks involved in allowing an unregulated access by Chinese technology companies access unfettered and unregulated access to Western markets.

  • Intel Agencies in an Age of “Nuclear” Cyberattacks, Political Assassinations

    Even without the kind of network of global partners that many larger nations have, Israel manages to punch far above its weight in intelligence with the CIA as a partner. At a recent talk at Harvard, former CIA director John Brennan and Tamir Pardo, former head of Mossad, spoke about the close ties between the CIA and Mossad, and discussed the intelligence challenges the two countries face.

  • What Do Former Extremists and Their Families Say about Radicalization and Deradicalization in America?

    Violent extremism has become a serious and complex threat in the United States. This development raises several questions: Who is at risk of joining violent extremist organizations? How do they find groups of like-minded people to join with? Can families and friends recognize whether someone is becoming radicalized? How do individuals change their minds and walk away from extremism? What can communities do to stop the growth of extremism in their areas?

  • Islamists in Germany: Quiet, but Dangerous

    A stabbing spree in the German city of Würzburg has renewed focus on the threat of Islamism, even if the attacker’s motive remains unclear.

  • Black Nationalist Arrested Following Shooting of Florida Officer

    On 26 June, following a 56-hour manhunt, multiple law enforcement agencies were involved in the arrest of Othal Toreyanne Resheen Wallace just outside of Atlanta, Georgia. Wallace has been affiliated with the Not F*cking Around Coalition (NFAC), a paramilitary group that advocates for Black liberation and separatism.

  • Al Qaeda Renews Its Focus on Anti-Semitism and Attacking Israel

    For decades, Al Qaeda has used the issue of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict to rally support for themselves and unify disparate Islamist movements under its banner. The terrorist organization, however, has failed to carry out attacks against Israel or against Jews in other countries, leading to criticism of Al Qaeda by other jihadist groups. In recent weeks, Al Qaeda has directed an unusual portion of its propaganda toward encouraging attacks on Israel, Jewish institutions, and Jewish people.

  • Who is Germany's 'New Right'?

    For the first time ever, the Bundesverfassungsschutz (BfV), Germany’s domestic intelligence agency, included a section on the “New Right” in its annual catalog of political extremists in Germany. The BfV said that the tag refers to an “informal network” of individuals and organizations which don’t openly organize or call for violent attacks, but rather focus on nurturing a far-right “cultural revolution” which threatens the German constitution and democratic institutions. The BfV says that the New Right movement promotes racist, xenophobic, and anti-democratic ideologies by subtle and slick professional means.

  • Holding the Line: Chinese Cyber Influence Campaigns After the Pandemic

    While the American public became more aware of Chinese cyber influence campaigns during the 2020 COVID-19 outbreak, they did not start there – and they will not end there, either. Maggie Baughman writes that as the world’s attention returns to the origins of the global pandemic and recommits to its containment, the United States must prepare for inevitable shifts in Chinese methods and goals in its cyber influence activities – “likely beyond what Western countries have previously experienced in dealing with China”

  • For Flood-Prone Cities, Seawalls Raise as Many Questions as They Answer

    The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, whose mission includes maintaining waterways and reducing disaster risks, has recently proposed building large and expensive seawalls to protect a number of U.S. cities, neighborhoods and shorelines from coastal storms and rising seas. As a scientist who studies the evolution and development of coastlines and the impacts of sea level rise, I believe that large-scale seawalls, which cost billions of dollars to build, are almost certainly a short-term strategy that will protect only a few cities, and will protect only selected portions of those cities effectively.