• Deadline for ASIS Accolades Competition approaches

    ASIS International 58th Annual Seminar and Exhibits will be held in Philadelphia on 10-13 September; one of the highlights of the show is the ASIS Accolades Competition, which is open to exhibitors in the event; Deadline for Submissions is 23 July

  • Many criminals who used guns in a crime were not legally barred from possessing firearms

    Sixty percent of persons incarcerated for gun crimes in the thirteen U.S. states with the most lax standards for legal firearm ownership were not legally prohibited from possessing firearms when they committed the crime that led to their incarceration

  • New book confirms Israel behind killing of Iran nuclear scientists

    A book to be published today offers details about, Israel’s campaign to take out Iranian nuclear scientists, a campaign which is part of the Israel’s broader effort to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons; the book also says that the cyber campaign against Iran’s nuclear program was an Israeli innovation, not an American one as recently reported; it was the brainchild of Israel’s military intelligence agency (AMAN) and Unit 8-200 — Israel’s equivalent of the eavesdropping, code-breaking National Security Agency (NSA) — and endorsed by the White House at Israel’s suggestion

  • Experts: If Arafat was poisoned, it was not by polonium-210

    In a report last week, Al Jazeera claimed that the cause of Yasser Arafat death in 2004 was poisoning by the radioactive substance polonium-210, and that Swiss scientists found high concentrations of polonium in the cloths Arafat wore in his last days; experts say that the laws of physics make this theory impossible: Polonium-210 has a half-life of 138 days, meaning that half of the substance decays roughly every four-and-a-half months; since only miniscule amounts of the substance would suffice to kill someone, it is not possible that eight years after Arafat’s death, such high levels of the material would still be found in his belongings; put another way: for polonium-210 to be discovered today in Arafat’s clothing at such high levels would mean that such large quantities of the material had to be used – unnecessarily — eight years ago, that not only Arafat, but his entourage and many of the doctors, nurses, and patients at the Hôpital d’instruction des armées Percy where he was treated would be dead as well of radiation poisoning

  • ACLU-sponsored app keeps police accountable

    A new app from the ACLU of New Jersey allows people securely and discreetly to record and store interactions with police, as well as provide legal information about citizens’ rights when interacting with the police

  • Fort Hood incident report calls for sweeping changes in FBI’s approach

    A report of the 2009 Fort Hood shooting will recommend eighteen specific changes which will make the FBI more likely to detect such insider threats earlier; the report, written by William Webster, the former director of the FBI, will be on the desk of Robert Mueller, the current FBI director, next week; the report’s authors focused on the FBI and the agency’s more than a hundred Joint Terrorism Task Forces (JTTFs) and how they handled and acted on counterterrorism intelligence before and after the shootings … and the FBI’s remedial measures in the aftermath of Fort Hood

  • Did Arafat die of radioactive poisoning?

    When Yasser Arafat was taken seriously ill in October 2004, and then died in a Paris hospital the next month, many Palestinians charged that he was poisoned by the Israeli Mossad; his widow refused to permit an autopsy, so the poisoning theory could never be proved; now, Swiss scientists who examined items of clothing Arafat wore in his last days say these items contain a significant – and highly unusual – levels of polonium-210, a toxic radioactive material; the Russian secret service used polonium in 2006 to kill Alexander V. Litvinenko, a former KGB agent who became a critic of Putin’s Russian government; Arafat’s widow and the Palestinian Authority call for Arafat body to be exhumed to determine whether or not he was poisoned

  • A third Bell 412 helicopter delivered to NYPD for counterterrorism missions

    The NYPD dedicated many hours to designing the specifications of the department’s third Bell 412 to meet the diverse needs of the police department; one of the counterterrorism additions to the Bell 412 is a radiation detection system that can identify radiation signatures from an altitude of 200 feet in an effort to protect the city from nuclear bomb threats

  • NYPD AW119 fleet achieves 20,000 hour milestone

    The NYPD has four AW119 helicopters in service; the department’s first AW119 entered service in 2004; the NYPD has become the worldwide law enforcement fleet leader, having achieved more than 20,000 flying hours on the fleet

  • Even a limited India-Pakistan nuclear war would substantially reduce global crop yields

    Worries about nuclear winter have faded since the end of the cold war, but existing stockpiles of nuclear weapons still hold the potential for devastating global impacts; researchers have found that the climate effects of a hypothetical nuclear war between India and Pakistan would greatly reduce yields of staple crops, even in distant countries

  • A third Bell 412 helicopter delivered to NYPD for counterterrorism missions

    The NYPD dedicated many hours to designing the specifications of the department’s third Bell 412 to meet the diverse needs of the police department; one of the counterterrorism additions to the Bell 412 is a radiation detection system that can identify radiation signatures from an altitude of 200 feet in an effort to protect the city from nuclear bomb threats

  • NYPD AW119 fleet achieves 20,000 hour milestone

    The NYPD has four AW119 helicopters in service; the department’s first AW119 entered service in 2004; the NYPD has become the worldwide law enforcement fleet leader, having achieved more than 20,000 flying hours on the fleet

  • Viewing terrorist attacks on TV increases pain intensity

    A new study finds that exposure to media coverage of terrorist missile attacks increases pain levels in people already suffering from chronic pain

  • Feds give Colorado access to critical infrastructure info

    The Homeland Security Infrastructure Program (HSIP) compiles about 500 layers of geographic features, including power plants and water pumps; it is managed by DHS, the Pentagon’s National Geospatial Intelligence Agency, and the U.S. Geological Survey; the data set is available to state first responders only when federal disasters are declared; DHS has now given Colorado access to the HSIP

  • DHS FY2013 $5.75 billion IT budget request focuses on mobility, data center consolidation

    DHS FY2013 IT spending requests are roughly even with FY2012 levels, with emphasis on commodity IT, mobility, and data center consolidation; the overall 2013 DHS budget request is just under $40 billion; the department’s IT budget request is just over $5.75 billion; down from $5.79 billion in FY2012