-
Facebook Takes a Step Forward on Deepfakes—and Stumbles
The good news is that Facebook is finally taking action against deepfakes. The bad news is that the platform’s new policy does not go far enough. On 7 January Facebook announced a new policy banning deepfakes from its platform. Yet, instead of cheers, the company faced widespread dismay—even anger. What went wrong?
-
-
Jewish Student Accuses College of Ignoring Wild Anti-Semitism
A former Pennsylvania college student says in a lawsuit that she dropped out before the start of her junior year because of a string of hateful and threatening anti-Semitic incidents that the school failed to appropriately address.
-
-
How Qassem Soleimani Expanded, Managed Iran's Proxies in the Middle East
The Iranian general who was killed last week in a U.S. airstrike in Baghdad, along with several Iranian-backed Iraqi militia leaders, was instrumental in expanding Iran’s influence and reach beyond its borders through various proxy groups in the region.
-
-
The Risks Posed by Deepfakes
This use of a deepfake video is becoming more prevalent. While pornography currently accounts for the vast majority of deepfake videos, the technique can also be used to defraud, to defame, to spread fake news or to steal someone’s identity.
-
-
Soleimani Strike Marks a Novel Shift in Targeted Killing, Dangerous to the Global Order
The 3 January drone strike against Qasem Soleimani marks a significant escalation in the U.S. use of force against external security threats as it has evolved in the years since September 11, 2001. Anthony Dworkin writes that there is nothing new or remarkable in a state carrying out the targeted killing of a military commander of another state in wartime, as the United States did in 1943 when it brought down the plane carrying Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto. But the attack against Yamamoto took place in the context of an all-out war between the United States and Japan, while the killing of Soleimani which ended with the complete surrender of Japan. looks less like a wartime military operation, and more like the targeted killings that the United States, Israel, and other countries have carried out to remove individual members of non-state groups.
-
-
Iran Abandons 2015 Nuclear Deal
Iran says it is no longer limiting the number of centrifuges used to enrich uranium— a virtual abandonment of the 2015 nuclear deal. But the Sunday statement did not make any explicit threats that Iran is seeking a nuclear weapon — something Iran has always denied it wants to do. Its statement said Iran will still cooperate with the International Atomic Agency. President Donald Trump pulled the U.S. out in 2018.
-
-
Ordinary Jihad
In 2012, Mohamed Merah, a French self-proclaimed jihadist, and friends killed seven people, including three Jewish children outside their school, in several shootings in southwestern France. Since then, more than 260 people have died in France at the hands of Islamist terrorists. Many of the killers came from what what Bernard Rougier, in his book The Conquered Territories of Islamism, called “Islamist ecosystems.”
-
-
California's Stricter Vaccine Exemption Policy Improves Vaccination Rates
California’s elimination, in 2016, of non-medical vaccine exemptions from school entry requirements was associated with an estimated increase in vaccination coverage at state and county levels, according to a new study.
-
-
Artificial Intelligence: China “Uses Taiwan for Target Practice” as It Perfects Cyber-Warfare Techniques
China has already deployed its expertise in artificial intelligence to make China into a surveillance state, power its economy, and develop its military. Phil Sherwell writes that now Taiwan’s cybersecurity chiefs have identified signs that Beijing is using AI to interfere in an overseas election for the first time. It is “a laboratory for China for adaptation and improvement on political warfare instruments which can then be unleashed against other targeted democratic societies,” Michael Cole, editor of the Taiwan Sentinel, said
-
-
Review: Oscar Jonsson’s The Russian Understanding of War: Blurring the Lines between War and Peace
A new book analyzes the evolution of Russian military thought and how Russia’s current thinking about war is reflected in recent crises. Simon Cocking writes that while other books describe current Russian practice, Oscar Jonsson provides the long view to show how Russian military strategic thinking has developed from the Bolshevik Revolution to the present – especially, how Russian elites see information warfare and political subversion as the most important ways to conduct contemporary war.
-
-
U.S. Strike Kills Commander of Iran’s Elite Quds Force
The Pentagon confirmed the killing of Quds Force Commander General Qassem Soleimani in an elaborate missile strike in Baghdad. Soleimani, a cunning and ruthless military commander, was the mastermind behind Iran’s relentless drive to achieve a regional hegemony in the Middle East. His major achievements include securing Bashar al-Assad’s victory in the Syrian civil war; turning Iraq into an Iranian satellite; making Hezbollah into a potent and well-equipped military force; igniting the Houthi rebellion in Yemen; overseeing the development of sophisticated drones and cruise missiles which, in a massive September 2019 attack on Saudi oil facilities, showed they can evade U.S. dense air-defenses; and accelerating Iran’s march to the bomb since the U.S. withdrew from the 2015 nuclear deal.
-
-
Don't Ignore Far-Left Extremists Even as Far-Right Violence Is Rising: German Police
New Year’s violence between left-wing extremists and police in the eastern Germany city of Leipzig has created a heated political debate. “It is right and important to fight far-right extremism with all means, but that doesn’t mean we should disregard the left,” said Rainer Wendt, head of one of the two largest German police unions.
-
-
DHS Begins MPP Returns at Nogales Port of Entry in Arizona
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) said that on Thursday it started processing migrants for return to Mexico under the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP) at the Nogales Port of Entry south of Tucson, Arizona. This brings the total number of ports of entry where MPP returns will be made to seven.
-
-
Enhanced Deepfakes Capabilities for Less-Skilled Threat Actors Mean More Misinformation
The ability to create manipulated content is not new. But what has changed with the advances in artificial intelligence is you can now build a very convincing deepfake without being an expert in technology. This “democratization” of deepfakes will increase the quantity of misinformation and disinformation aiming to weaken and undermine evidence-based discourse.
-
-
A Bigger Foreign-Policy Mess Than Anyone Predicted
Every four years the U.S. National Intelligence Council publishes a report looking ahead to the next two decades in global affairs. Thomas Wright writes that the NIC’s 2012 report, “Alternative Worlds,” described two scenarios—the best plausible case and the worst plausible case. In the worst-case scenario, “the risks of interstate conflict increase. The U.S. draws inward and globalization stalls.” The 2010s were far more disruptive than the National Intelligence Council’s worst-case scenario envisioned.
-
More headlines
The long view
Kinetic Operations Bring Authoritarian Violence to Democratic Streets
By Etienne Soula and Lea George
Foreign interference in democracies has a multifaceted toolkit. In addition to information manipulation, the tactical tools authoritarian actors use to undermine democracy include cyber operations, economic coercion, malign finance, and civil society subversion.
Patriots’ Day: How Far-Right Groups Hijack History and Patriotic Symbols to Advance Their Cause, According to an Expert on Extremism
By Art Jipson
Extremist groups have attempted to change the meaning of freedom and liberty embedded in Patriots’ Day — a commemoration of the battles of Lexington and Concord – to serve their far-right rhetoric, recruitment, and radicalization. Understanding how patriotic symbols can be exploited offers important insights into how historical narratives may be manipulated, potentially leading to harmful consequences in American society.
Trump Aims to Shut Down State Climate Policies
By Alex Brown
President Donald Trump has launched an all-out legal attack on states’ authority to set climate change policy. Climate-focused state leaders say his administration has no legal basis to unravel their efforts.
Vaccine Integrity Project Says New FDA Rules on COVID-19 Vaccines Show Lack of Consensus, Clarity
By Stephanie Soucheray
Sidestepping both the FDA’s own Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee and the CDC’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices (ACIP), two Trump-appointed FDA leaders penned an opinion piece in the New England Journal of Medicine to announce new, more restrictive, COVID-19 vaccine recommendations. Critics say that not seeking broad input into the new policy, which would help FDA to understand its implications, feasibility, and the potential for unintended consequences, amounts to policy by proclamation.
Twenty-One Things That Are True in Los Angeles
To understand the dangers inherent in deploying the California National Guard – over the strenuous objections of the California governor – and active-duty Marines to deal with anti-ICE protesters, we should remind ourselves of a few elementary truths, writes Benjamin Wittes. Among these truths: “Not all lawful exercises of authority are wise, prudent, or smart”; “Not all crimes require a federal response”; “Avoiding tragic and unnecessary confrontations is generally desirable”; and “It is thus unwise, imprudent, and stupid to take actions for performative reasons that one might reasonably anticipate would increase the risks of such confrontations.”
Luigi Mangione and the Making of a ‘Terrorist’
Discretion is crucial to the American tradition of criminal law, Jacob Ware and Ania Zolyniak write, noting that “lawmakers enact broader statutes to empower prosecutors to pursue justice while entrusting that they will stay within the confines of their authority and screen out the inevitable “absurd” cases that may arise.” Discretion is also vital to maintaining the legitimacy of the legal system. In the prosecution’s case against Luigi Mangione, they charge, “That discretion was abused.”