• Seeing through concrete, clearly

    Insurgents and terrorists fight from within civilian structures, making it difficult for soldiers and first responders to respond without injuring many civilians; DARPA wants a solution which would allow soldiers to look through concrete walls and give them a detailed picture of a building’s interior — right down to the fixtures

  • Manipulating Google searches as counter-terrorism tool

    The U.K. government will train pro-West Islamic groups to game Google searches in order to fight the influence of radicals; search engine optimization techniques will make moderate Islamic groups come up first in Google searches

  • U.K. Home Office terrorism advisory site offered link to a porno site

    On Monday, a new EU regulation went into effect mandating that ISPs store details of user e-mails and Internet calls; a Home Office site contained a link for citizens who felt the measure was too intrusive, and who would want to send the Home Office a complaint about it; trouble is, those who clicked on the link were sent to a Japanese porno site

  • DARPA wants stealthy 3D building-interior mapping kit

    SWAT teams, special forces units, and first responders often are called upon to storm buildings in which terrorists hide; would it not be better if these units had up-to-date, accurate pictures of the insides of the structures they are about to storm? DARPA thinks it is a good idea

  • Sudan attack: update

    Israel used “dozens of aircraft” to destroy an Iranian arms convoy in Sudan in late January; UAVs were used for BDA (bomb damage assessment); sources: there was another Israeli attack in Sudan, in early February, and an attack on a ship in the Gulf of Aden

  • Sudan attack demonstrates new U.S.-Israel counter-Iran policy

    Israeli aircraft, with U.S. logistical and intelligence support, attack and destroy an Iranian arms convoy in Sudan; arms were part of an effort by Iran to resupply Hamas’s forces in Gaza

  • Indian security firms: IPL could have been held in India

    Cricket is near religion in India, but fear of terrorist attacks forced the organizers of the high profile Indian Premier League (IPL) to shift the competition from India to South Africa (this is like moving NFL games to, say, Bulgaria); a coalition of Indian private security firms says the move was unnecessary

  • Hi-G-Tek, Trojan Defense work on global nuclear threat early detection

    Hi-G-Tek and Trojan Defense collaborate on developing a global nuclear threat early detection and warning system; the wireless sensor is designed for rapid reporting of WMD in global shipments

  • Taliban continue campaign against cellular service in Waziristan

    Taliban and al-Qaeda militants believe that the CIA and U.S. military rely on cellular communication intercepts to track and kill members of the two organizations; Taliban leaders warned Pakistan not to expand the cellular network in the areas under Taliban control; those networks already in place must be shut down overnight

  • U.S., Germany to collaborate in homeland security research

    U.S., Germany sign a research and development collaboration agreement which will see secret U.S. laboratories open to German scientists

  • U.K. to train workers in counter-terrorism

    Home Office says 60,000 U.K. workers will be trained in counterterrorism so they can assist in responding to terror incidents; the trained workers will augment the existing force of 3,000 dedicated counterterrorism police officers

  • Northern Ireland terror attacks make for uneasy St. Patrick's Day

    The dissident republican splinter terror groups which killed two British soldiers and a Northern Ireland police officer this weekend hope to re-ignite sectarian violence in the province; far from igniting a new civil war, the attacks brought together Protestant and Catholics; for the sake of Northern Ireland’s stability and future, however, the unresolved policing issue should be addressed soon

  • Terrorist Watchlist reaches 1 million entries (representing about 400,000 individuals)

    U.S. Terrorist Watchlist reaches 1 million entries; since many individuals on the list have several entries owing to the different ways in which their names may be rendered, the number of individuals on the list is about 400,000

  • Innovative approach to science and technology education in Pakistan

    A unique experiment: a combination of private money, government support, and intellectual leadership is helping to build the first private research school for science and engineering in Pakistan

  • U.S. slow to pinpoint source of cyber attacks

    U.S. director of national intelligence tells lawmakers that “It often takes weeks and sometimes months of subsequent investigation [to identify the source of a cyber attack]… And even at the end of very long investigations you’re not quite sure who carried out the offensive”