• USS Cole attack mastermind killed in drone strike in Yemen

    A U.S. drone attack in Yemen kills Fahd al-Quso, 37, one of the masterminds of the 2000 USS Cold attack; al-Quso was a senior operative in Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula (AQAP), and among other plots, was behind the underwear bomber’s attempt on a Delta flight to Detroit; he escaped an earlier drone attack, in 2009; the Obama administration has dramatically intensified drone attacks on terrorist targets; since Obama took office on 20 January 2009, there have been 260 attacks by Predators or Reapers in Pakistan — averaging one every four days; in addition, there have also been some three dozen drone attacks on terrorist targets in Yemen, and a few in Somalia

  • Detecting a North Korea nuclear test

    The monitoring tools that scientists have available to them to detect a nuclear test have improved in quality and quantity since North Korea last tested a nuclear weapon in 2009; the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty Organization (CTBTO) has a total of 287 detection facilities available, consisting of 157 seismic monitoring stations, forty-five infrasound stations, sixty-five radionuclide stations, and ten hydroacoustic stations

  • Protecting U.S. bridges from terrorism, accident

    More than 600,000 bridges in the United States are 20-feet long or longer, some over a century old, many of them national iconic monuments; DHS, the Federal Highway Administration, and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers are conducting a series of tests aiming to make the bridges better able to withstand a terrorist attack; this research is discovering how materials, connection details, and designs in aging bridges react to IEDs, other explosives, kinetic impact, intense fires, and other accidents

  • New tool offer better flooding protection

    There are more than 84,000 dams across the United States, and millions of Americans live behind them; if these dams and levees were to fail and unleash catastrophic flooding, as some did in New Orleans in 2005, a high price will be paid in life lost and property destroyed; DHS S&T and partners develop new software systems for fast simulation of catastrophic flooding

  • Detecting suicide bombers from a safe distance

    Suicide bombings have now spread to Syria; a Florida company produces equipment designed to aid in the detection of a suicide bomber at standoff distances, before a terrorist can reach his intended target

  • Five arrested in foiled Cleveland bridge bomb plot

    Five men who considered themselves anarchists and angry at the government and corporate America were arrested after a foiled attempt to blow up a Cleveland area bridge; the five were planning on commemorating May Day, the international workers’ holiday, by destroying the bridge connecting two wealthy Cleveland suburbs

  • Al-Awlaki, posthumously, urges biological, chemical attacks on U.S.

    In a 5-page article published in al Qaeda in Yemen’s English-language magazine, Anwar al-Awlaki, the U.S.-born jihadist who was killed last September by a missile launched from a CIA-operated drone, writes that the use of poisons of chemical and biological weapons against U.S. population centers is allowed and strongly recommended “due to the effect on the enemy”

  • Counterterrorism expert: democracy in Central Asia lost in translation

    Democracy in post-Soviet Central Asia states failed not only because of the region’s Soviet legacy and hardships of transition, but also due to a lack of cultural competence among international, U.S., and EU agencies promoting democracy

  • Concerns raised about body-cavities explosives attack on aviation

    Security services raised the possibility that al Qaeda affiliates may decide to mark the anniversary of the killing of Osama Bin Laden by sending suicide bombers with explosives inside their bodies to bring down airplanes; these experts point to an August 2009 attempt by a suicide body-bomber on a Saudi prince, and to the fact that U.S. drones earlier this year killed a Yemeni doctor who had devised medical procedures which could be used surgically to plant explosive devices in humans

  • Budget, safety concerns cast doubt on Kansas BioLab

    Uncertainty continues to surround the National Bio and Agro-Defense Facility, or NBAF, which is scheduled to be built on the campus of Kansas State University in Manhattan, Kansas, to replace the aging Plum Island facility; the price tag for the lab has increased from $415 million to an estimated $1.14 billion, and concerns about the safety of building a Level-4 BioLab in the middle of tornado alley are yet to be fully addressed

  • Study challenges Russian investigation of Smolensk plane crash

    A new study by a team of experts of the 10 April 2010 plane crash near Smolensk, Russia, in which the Polish president, his wife, nine NATO generals and others were killed, raises pointed questions about the conclusions of the official Russian investigation into the incident, and points to contradictions and discrepancies in the report

  • Kansas City to deploy ShotSpotter technology

    Kansas City police and the Kansas City Area Transportation Authority have agreed jointly to deploy the Shot Spotter, an acoustic technology that provides detailed information on gunshots fired

  • Maryland police defy court decision, continue to collect arrestees DNA

    Police departments around Maryland will continue to collect arrestees DNA despite the state top court’s ruling by a five-to-two decision that such collection is a violation of Fourth Amendment rights to privacy

  • Report: Some terrorist plots hatched by FBI

    In recent years a number of terrorist attacks against the United States have been foiled by federal, state, and local authorities; a number of these plots may have been initiated by the FBI, and though they fall short of entrapment, they may well never have been developed without the FBI’s direct encouragement

  • German official: Lone-wolf terrorists are the greatest threat

    Germany’s interior minister said that the greatest terrorist threat Germany faces is no longer the large-scale organization of the al Qaeda stripe, but the independent “lone-wolf” attacker