• Report: U.S. companies should consider counter-hacking Chinese hackers

    A group studying how the United States should respond to the sustained campaign of cyberattacks conducted by Chinese government hackers against U.S. companies, said the United States should seriously consider a campaign of retaliatory cyberattacks against the hackers.

  • U.S. to help protect private companies from malicious cyberattacks

    The U.S. government said it will help protect private companies from cyber attacks. DHS secretary Janet Napolitano said a system is being developed which will monitor Internet traffic directed to critical infrastructure businesses and block attacks on software programs.

  • Senate passes water resources bill, funding flood control projects

    Several projects for the Army Corps of Engineers will now be expedited under a bi-partisan Senate legislation passed last Wednesday. The authors of the bill hope the legislation will move the Morganza-to-the-Gulf hurricane protection project forward. The project goal is to install a series of levees, locks, and other systems through the Terrebonne and Lafourche parishes, which will protect about 200,000 people from storm surges like the ones Hurricane Katrina caused.

  • Panel's draft bill shields DHS funds

    A house panel introduced a bill last week that will protect DHS from budget cuts facing other domestic agencies under the house’s budget plan. This will allow the department to hire 1,600 new agents at Customs and Border Patrol agency, replace cuts to local and state governments, boost spending on cybersecurity, and abandon cuts to the Coast Guard.

  • Cybersecurity framework for critical infrastructure: analysis of initial comments

    On 12 February 2013 President Obama issued the “Improving Critical Infrastructure Cybersecurity” executive order, which called for the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) to work with industry to develop a voluntary framework to reduce cybersecurity risks to the nation’s critical infrastructure, which includes power, water, communication, and other critical systems.

  • GPS technology offers 3-minute tsunami alerts

    Researchers show that by using global positioning systems (GPS) to measure ground deformation caused by a large underwater earthquake, they can provide accurate warning of the resulting tsunami in just a few minutes after the earthquake onset.

  • The contribution of geophysics to disaster planning

    Earthquakes, tsunamis, and other natural disasters often showcase the worst in human suffering — especially when those disasters strike populations which live in rapidly growing communities in the developing world with poorly enforced or non-existent building codes. Geophysicists can help by identifying natural hazards, and by developing effective disaster risk reduction strategies which integrate many different experts.

  • DHS advises Michigan State U on football stadium safety

    By all accounts, Michigan State University’s basketball team has been doing better over the years than the school’s football team (just think Magic Johnson). The university wants to raise the profile of its football team, and is building a new, $24 million stadium — but DHS advised the university that the stadium’s north side stands are too close to the gas tanks and pumps which serve the school’s motor pool. The university is now moving the gas tanks to a new location.

  • Asteroid 1998 QE2, nine times larger than cruise ship, to glide past earth

    Two weeks from now, on 31May 2013, asteroid 1998 QE2 will sail serenely past Earth, getting no closer than about 3.6 million miles, or about fifteen times the distance between Earth and the moon. While QE2 is not of much interest to those astronomers and scientists on the lookout for hazardous asteroids, other asteroids are. NASA recently announced developing a first-ever mission to identify, capture, and relocate an asteroid for human exploration.

  • Obama administration shifting cybersecurity legislative strategy

    The Obama administration’s has shifted its cybersecurity legislative strategy. Rather than emphasize DHS-monitored regulations – an approach which stalled in Congress last summer because of Republican opposition — the administration is focusing on getting Congress to help promote the voluntary adoption by industry of standards being developed by the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) following a February 2013 executive order signed by President Obama.

  • California community sinking into the ground, and engineers are baffled

    Several homeowners in the community of Lake County, California are faced with a problem: their houses are sinking into the ground and they do not know why. The situation has been deteriorating steadily, and now mail delivery has been cancelled in the area, and city and county crews have been forced to change the subdivision’s sewage line to an overland pipe as a result of manhole collapses.

  • State agency imposes heavy fine on PG&E for San Bruno blast

    The California Public Utilities Commission (CPUC) two weeks ago  wrapped up its investigation of a 2010 gas pipeline explosion in San Bruno, California, and recommended  that Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) pay $2.25 billion for its negligence, which led to the blast.

  • New software protects networked control systems from cyber attacks

    Researchers have developed a software algorithm that detects and isolates cyber-attacks on networked control systems — which are used to coordinate transportation, power, and other infrastructure across the United States.

  • Hazard of Western Indian Ocean earthquake, tsunami greater than thought

    Earthquakes similar in magnitude to the 2004 Sumatra earthquake could occur in an area beneath the Arabian Sea at the Makran subduction zone, according to recent research. The study suggests that the risk from undersea earthquakes and associated tsunami in this area of the Western Indian Ocean — which could threaten the coastlines of Pakistan, Iran, Oman, India, and potentially further afield — has been previously underestimated.

  • Wave of cyberattacks targets American energy companies

    A new wave of cyberattacks has been hitting American corporations, and federal officials, say the attackers, who reside somewhere in the Middle East, are trying to sabotage these corporations. The majority of the targets have been energy companies, and the attacks are trying to take control of company’s processing systems.