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Privacy-Enhancing Browser Extensions Fail to Meet User Needs, New Study Finds
Popular web browser extensions designed to protect user privacy and block online ads are falling short, according to researchers, who are proposing new measurement methodologies to better uncover and quantify these shortcomings.
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Another Report Says CBP, ICE Not Detaining, Removing Inadmissibles Flying into Country
A DHS OIG audit found that a regional CBP and ICE detention and removal processes were ineffective at one major international airport, the OIG audit found. Between fiscal years 2021 and 2023, the report found CBP agents at this airport released at least 383 inadmissible travelers from custody into the U.S. who, under the law, are prohibited from entering the country.
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‘Risks of Nuclear Terrorism Are High and Growing.’ New Tools, Alliances, Renewed Focus Needed, experts recommend
For roughly 80 years, the United States has managed the threat of nuclear terrorism through nonproliferation treaties, agency programs, intelligence activities, international monitoring support and more, withstanding the Cold War, the fall of the Soviet Union, and 9/11. A National Academies committee wants to ensure the U.S. remains prepared.
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Iran Can Now Produce Enough Fissile Material for 5 Nuclear Bombs within 30 Days of Decision to Do So
Iran notified the IAEA recently that over the next 3-4 weeks it would install eight cascades each containing 174 IR-6 centrifuges, about 1,400 in total, at the underground Fordow Enrichment Plant. The installation of eight more IR-6 cascades represents a dramatic increase in Fordow’s total enrichment capacity, meaning that by the end of the first month from a decision to “go nuclear,” Iran could produce a total of 145 kg of WGU, enough for five nuclear weapons.
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Russian Wargame Practicing Tactical Nukes Use Is Warning to West
Last month, the Russian defense ministry launched a multi-phase exercise near Ukraine meant to prepare its forces for using non-strategic nuclear weapons (NSNWs). In addition to the obvious purpose of preparing Russian troops to use tactical nuclear weapons in battle, the multi-stage exercise was also meant to signal to the West that it should refrain from escalating assistance to Ukraine, as well as to warn the U.S. and its allies that Russia may liberalize its conditions for using nuclear weapons.
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States Struggle with Unreliable Federal Funding for Making Sure Elections Are Secure
The federal government has sought to bolster election security for years through a popular grant program, but the wildly fluctuating funding levels have made it difficult for state officials to plan their budgets and their projects.
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Record Number of NATO Allies to Hit 2% Defense Spending Goal
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg has announced that more NATO member states than originally expected were set to fulfill the 2% target of GDP defense spending this year. The NATO defense investment target was agreed upon in 2014. Across the alliance, all member states aside from Slovenia and Italy have upped their defense budget.
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Joining NATO Binds Countries to Defend Each Other – but This Commitment Is Not Set in Stone
At the root of debates over policy toward alliances such as NATO is the assumption that NATO requires its members to step in and help with defense if another member of the alliance is attacked, but it is important to understand that, in reality, alliance agreements are more flexible than people think. In practice, it is possible for the U.S. and other Western countries to stay out of a conflict that involves a NATO country without having to break their alliance commitments.
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New Study Reveals the Costs of Sanctions
What effect do economic sanctions have on the countries affected, such as Russia or Iran? Economic sanctions can be a double-edged sword. On the one hand, they usually reduce gross domestic product and thus prosperity in the affected countries, as intended. On the other hand, however, they can also have a severe impact on the economies of the sanctioning countries.
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Evaluating U.S. Readiness to Prevent, Counter, and Respond to WMD
Two new reports review the adequacy of U.S. strategies to prevent, counter, and respond to the threat of nuclear and chemical terrorism and highlight the strengths and limitations of U.S. efforts to prevent and counter threats from weapons of mass destruction (WMD), particularly in a changing terrorism threat landscape.
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Role of Nuclear Weapons Grows as Geopolitical Relations Deteriorate: SIPRI
The nine nuclear-armed states—the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, China, India, Pakistan, the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (North Korea) and Israel—continued to modernize their nuclear arsenals and several deployed new nuclear-armed or nuclear-capable weapon systems in 2023.
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Global Annual Nuclear Weapons Spending in 2023: $91.4 Billion
In 2023, the nine nuclear-armed states spent a combined total of $91,393,404,739 on their arsenals – equivalent to $2,898 a second. A new report shows that $10.7 billion more was spent on nuclear weapons in 2023 than in 2022.
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How Much of a Threat Does Hamas Still Pose to Israel?
In 1969, at the height of the United States’ war in Vietnam, Secretary of State Henry Kissinger famously wrote, “The guerrilla wins if he does not lose. The conventional army loses if it does not win.” Israel is arguably in the same situation now.
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Modern-Day Outlaws, “Sovereign Citizens” Threaten the Rule of Law
The FBI considers sovereign citizens a domestic terrorism threat. My research into sovereign citizens has found they have long been active in the U.S. and other countries. At the core of their beliefs is the denial of the government’s legitimacy. They commonly do not register their vehicles, acquire driver’s licenses or car insurance, or pay taxes. And they pose a significant threat to the public.
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Election Administration Performance Linked to Counties’ Economic, Racial Makeup
“The federal government and states may set general directives about how elections are to be administered, but a lot of those actions are carried forth by county-level governments.,” says Professor Michael Ritter, lead author of a new study on election administration.
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More headlines
The long view
Kinetic Operations Bring Authoritarian Violence to Democratic Streets
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
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
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
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.”