Corruption

 

Role of Senior Managers, Intermediaries & Gatekeepers in Foreign Bribery-2020 OECD Report

Many years of foreign bribery enforcement have proved that in a vast majority of cases, bribes are paid, offered, or promised through a senior manager or an intermediary. Those are just some of the latest findings issued by the September 2020 OECD report "Foreign bribery and the role of intermediaries, managers and gender", which analyzes data from anti-bribery enforcement actions around the world ( OECD Report).

To better understand how companies bribe foreign officials and in turn better predict and mitigate risks, it helps to know what kind of individuals perpetrated the malfeasance. This information is crucial in helping companies design adequate compliance programs, focusing their efforts where it matters most.

Senior Management

One of the most alarming results reinforces the need for training and audits at every hierarchical level of a company. The OECD report demonstrates that senior management is the hierarchical level of individuals most frequently involved in bribery committed by a company. In fact, in 75% of the cases (87 out of 115), a senior manager was involved in the scheme. In a majority of cases, the offense involved more than one individual within the same company. These findings confirm that senior leadership is often aware of, if not directly involved in, corrupt activity.

Health security

 

SCIENTISTS DISCOVER ORGANISMS THAT EAT VIRUSES

It’s been a banner year for viruses. One of the nasty little things has shut down large parts of human civilization, knocked the economy senseless, killed more than a million, and sickened countless more.

After all that, it’s nice to see something take a bite out of viruses instead of vice versa. To wit, scientists just announced the discovery of two organisms that eats viruses — the first credible finding of that type of creature.

“Our data show that many protist cells contain DNA of a wide variety of non-infectious viruses but not bacteria, strong evidence that they are feeding on viruses rather than on bacteria,” said corresponding author Ramunas Stepanauskas, director of the Single Cell Genomics Center at Bigelow Laboratory for Ocean Sciences, in a statement. “That came as a big surprise, as these findings go against the currently predominant views of the role of viruses and protists in the marine food webs.”

The research, published in the journal Frontiers in Microbiology, identifies two single-cell organisms, both found off the coast of Maine, that the researchers say can gobble down viruses.

Health security

 

Scientists kill cancer cells by “shutting the door” to the nucleus

Scientists at Sanford Burnham Prebys Medical Discovery Institute have shown that blocking the construction of nuclear pores complexes—large channels that control the flow of materials in and out of the cell nucleus—shrank aggressive tumors in mice while leaving healthy cells unharmed. The study, published in Cancer Discovery, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research, reveals a new Achilles heel for cancer that may lead to better treatments for deadly tumors such as melanoma, leukemia and colorectal cancer.

“Nuclear pore complexes are the ‘doors’ that all materials pass through to gain entry to the cell’s nucleus. Because cancer cells are rapidly growing and dividing they need and create more nuclear pore complexes than normal cells,” says Maximiliano D’Angelo, Ph.D., associate professor in the Development, Aging and Regeneration Program at Sanford Burnham Prebys. “Our study is the first to demonstrate that by blocking the formation of these nuclear ‘doors’ we can selectively kill cancer cells.”

Personal security

 

'Hero rat' wins gold medal from UK charity for hunting landmines

Magawa, an African giant pouched rat, was given a gold medal by the British veterinary charity People's Dispensary for Sick Animals (PDSA) for his work detecting undetonated landmines in Cambodia.

Decades of conflict have left the Southeast Asian country littered with millions of landmines, unexploded ordnance (UXO), and other explosive remnants of war that still kill or injure dozens of people each year.

Cambodia, with assistance from other countries, has spent years slowly clearing the land of explosives, but it's difficult and dangerous work.

This is where Magawa comes in.

Magawa was trained by non-governmental organization APOPO (which in Dutch stands for "Anti-Persoonsmijnen Ontmijnende Product Ontwikkeling," or in English, Anti-Personnel Landmines Detection Product Development).

The organization, which was founded in Belgium and is headquartered in Tanzania, trains rats like Magawa to detect the scent of the explosive chemicals used in landmines and point them out to their handlers.

Immigration security

 

Switzerland referendum: Voters reject end to free movement with EU

Swiss voters have rejected a proposal to end an accord with the EU allowing the free movement of people.

With all referendum votes counted, nearly 62% said they wanted to keep free movement, while 38% were against.

Switzerland is not a member of the EU but has a series of interdependent treaties with Brussels which allow it to access to Europe's free trade area.

The move to rein in immigration was proposed by the Swiss People's Party (SVP), but opposed by the government.

A similar initiative to introduce quotas on immigrants from the EU to Switzerland narrowly passed in a 2014 referendum, damaging Swiss-EU relations.

Radiation safety

 

Nuclear power: Are we too anxious about the risks of radiation?

This week, Boris Johnson restated the UK government's commitment to nuclear power. But of six sites identified for replacements for the country's ageing nuclear reactors, three have now been abandoned, two are waiting approval and just one is under construction. So is it time to reassess our attitude to nuclear power?

Consider this conundrum: when you talk to climate scientists you quickly discover they are far more worried about the dangers of global warming than most of us. Some tell you privately that they have had counselling to cope with the psychological effects of knowing the world is facing an impending disaster and not enough is being done.

Meanwhile, speak to experts on the effects of ionising radiation and you find they are surprisingly relaxed about the risks low-level exposure poses to human health - certainly far less so than most people.

Despite the popular anxiety about this form of energy, it's hard to see how the UK government can meet its carbon reduction targets without new nuclear. Not least because decarbonising transport and home heating will involve a massive increase in electricity demand.

Health security

 

Experimental Cancer Treatment Destroys Cancer Cells Without Using Any Drugs

One of the latest methods pioneered by scientists to treat cancer uses a Trojan horse sneak attack to prompt cancer cells to self-destruct – all without using any drugs.

Key to the technique is the use of a nanoparticle coated in a specific amino acid called L-phenylalanine, one of several such acids that cancer cells rely on to grow. L-phenylalanine isn't made by the body, but absorbed from meat and dairy products.

In tests on mice, the nanoparticle – called Nano-pPAAM or Nanoscopic phenylalanine Porous Amino Acid Mimic – killed cancer cells specifically and effectively, posing as a friendly amino acid before causing the cells to destroy themselves.

The self-destruction mode is triggered as the nanoparticle puts production of certain chemicals known as reactive oxygen species (ROS) into overdrive. It's enough to bring down the cancer cells while leaving neighbouring, healthy cells intact.

Weapons

Blasting The Air In Front Of Hypersonic Vehicles With Lasers Could Unlock Unprecedented Speeds

Over the last decade, two of the most significant topics in defense research and development have been directed energy systems and hypersonic weapons. The Department of Defense and its major contractors have been pushing the boundaries of what is possible with these technologies and those efforts could someday soon literally change the face of warfareforever.

As it turns out, these two cutting edge areas of defense research are beginning to converge in laboratories with the goal of enabling unprecedented levels of speed for aerial weapons. By combining advanced directed energy technology with the latest in hypersonic vehicle design, researchers in private and Department of Defense (DoD) funded laboratories have laid the groundwork for systems designed to literally sheathe an entire vehicle in laser and/or microwave-induced plasma in order to drastically reduce drag. If successfully developed, this concept may someday lead to new frontiers in speed and radical new forms of aerodynamic control and aircraft design.

International security

Kremlin’s World War III Propaganda Meltdown Shows Putin Is Cornered

...Last weekend, on Russia’s Day of the Gunsmith—an obscure holiday which is usually ignored—Putin went on television to discuss Russia’s latest nuclear weapons. They can reach anywhere in the world, he said. The Avangard hypersonic glide vehicles can wipe out a territory the size of Texas or France, viewers were told. Putin blamed the U.S. for the withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic-Missile treaty back in 2002. “We had to create these weapons in response to the U.S. deploying a strategic missile defense system, which in the future would be able to actually neutralize, nullify our entire nuclear potential,” Putin said.

On Friday, Putin asked the White House for a truce on the “information war,” which is laughable since Western intelligence agencies say the Kremlin has already been targeting the 2020 presidential election. Nonetheless, Markov explains that Moscow is expecting incoming rhetorical fire during the height of the American election season: “Russian intelligence has informed Vladimir Putin earlier this year of rough attacks on him personally coming up,” he said. “That might happen during the U.S. elections, the conflict might enter a hot phase, so it is time to buy canned food.”

Chemical security

 

Alexei Navalny thanks ‘unknown friends’ for saving his life after poisoning

On Friday, Navalny said he owed his life to the pilots who made an emergency landing and the paramedics who he said had diagnosed poisoning and injected him with atropine, a drug used to treat nerve agents.

The Kremlin denies poisoning him and says it has seen no evidence.

“As far as I understand … the killers’ plan was simple: I will feel bad 20 minutes after takeoff, after another 15 minutes I will pass out,” Navalny wrote.

“Medical assistance will be guaranteed to be unavailable, and in another hour I will continue my journey in a black plastic bag on the last row of seats, terrifying passengers going to the toilet,” he added with his characteristic dark humor.

Military

 

Russian Army to be Equipped With New Weapons by End of Year

Despite the fact that there isn’t really all the much of 2020 left on the calendar, there are now claims in Moscow that the 70 percent of the Russian Armed Forces will be equipped with brand-new and even “cutting edge” weapons and military hardware by the end of the year.


“I think that upon the results of this year we will achieve a coveted amount, as we will approach to 70 percent in our army’s rearmament with advanced and promising types of weapons and military hardware,” Deputy Prime Minister Yury Borisov said in a televised interview with Rossiya’23 news channel on Saturday.


Borisov said that state defense orders had not been, and will not be, disrupted due to the still ongoing novel coronavirus pandemic. Those claims were made despite the fact that the annual Victory Day parade, which is used to show off Moscow’s latest weapons, was delayed from May until June due to coronavirus concerns. In addition, last month’s Army-2020 International Military-Technical Forum was significantly scaled back.

Secret rules

 

New rules for MI5 and police to authorise crimes

Undercover informants working for the police and MI5 are going to be explicitly permitted for the first time under British law to commit crimes.

The unprecedented legislation to authorise and oversee crimes comes after years of unclear rules over when these agents can break the law.

The law will not specify exactly which crimes can be committed.

And critics are urging MPs to amend the proposed law to rule out murder and serious violence.

The highly unusual decision to create a law that sanctions crime comes after a legal battle to force MI5 and the government to reveal secret rules governing when an informant can break the law.

Informants - also known as agents - are recruited to gather intelligence on targets, including terrorist organisations, major drugs gangs and child abuse networks.

These agents are often already involved in the networks being targeted and need to maintain a cover in order to gather critical evidence for investigators.

Innovations & technologies

 CIA’s new tech recruiting pitch: More patents, more profits

The CIA has long been a place cutting-edge technology is researched, developed, and realized—and it wants to lead in fields like artificial intelligence and biotechnology. However, recruiting and retaining the talent capable of building these tools is a challenge on many levels, especially since a spy agency can’t match Silicon Valley salaries, reputations, and patents.

The agency’s solution is CIA Labs, a new skunkworks that will attempt to recruit and retain technical talent by offering incentives to those who work there. Under the new initiative, announced today, CIA officers will be able for the first time to publicly file patents on the intellectual property they work on—and collect a portion of the the profits. The agency will take the rest of the balance. Dawn Meyerriecks, who heads the agency’s science and technology directorate, says the best-case scenario is that the agency’s research and development could end up paying for itself.

“This is helping maintain US dominance, particularly from a technological perspective,” says Meyerriecks. “That’s really critical for national and economic security. It also democratizes the technology by making it available to the planet in a way that allows the level of the water to rise for all.”

Cybersecurity

 

A computer can guess more than 100 billion passwords per second — still think yours is secure?

Last year, a record was set for a computer trying to generate every conceivable password. It achieved a rate faster than 100,000,000,000 guesses per second.

By leveraging this computing power, cybercriminals can hack into systems by bombarding them with as many password combinations as possible, in a process called brute force attacks.

And with cloud-based technology, guessing an eight-character password can be achieved in as little as 12 minutes and cost as little as US$25.

Also, because passwords are almost always used to give access to sensitive data or important systems, this motivates cybercriminals to actively seek them out. It also drives a lucrative online market selling passwords, some of which come with email addresses and/or usernames.

Environmental security

 

Scientists blame climate change for bacteria that caused the mysterious deaths of 300 African elephants

Veterinary scientists have confirmed that a bacterial toxin other scientists say is thriving more because of warming temperatures in water bodies as a result of climate change is the cause of massive elephant deaths in Botswana this year.

The death toll of elephants in the southern Africa country has subsequently risen to 330, with Monday’s announcement by its Department of National Parks and Wildlife confirming the elephants drank water contaminated by cyanobacteria. The research findings, building on tests conducted in laboratories in Zimbabwe, South Africa, the US, and Canada, represents a ground-breaking and until now elusive scientific explanation that could also provide answers to the yet to be explained deaths of more elephants in neighboring Zimbabwe.

Criminal investigation

 

Cult leader who claims to be reincarnation of Jesus arrested in Russia

Russian authorities mounted a special operation to arrest a former traffic police officer who claims to be the reincarnation of Jesus and has run a cultbased in the depths of Siberia for the past three decades.

Helicopters and armed officers stormed communities run by Sergei Torop, known to his followers as Vissarion, and arrested him and two of his aides. Russia’s investigative committee said it would charge him with organising an illegal religious organisation, alleging that the cult extorted money from followers and subjected them to emotional abuse.

Torop, 59, with long grey hair and a beard, was led by masked troops to a helicopter. The operation involved agents from Russia’s FSB security service as well as police and other agencies. Vadim Redkin, a former drummer in a Soviet-era boyband who is known as Vissarion’s right-hand man, was also arrested, along with another aide, Vladimir Vedernikov.

Biosecurity

 

Second defector's knowledge of Chinese bioweapons reaches U.S.

U.S. intelligence agencies recently increased their knowledge of China’s covert biological weapons program with the help of a defector from the People’s Liberation Army, according to people familiar with the incident.

The defector escaped from China and traveled to Europe, where he is under the protection of a European government security service, according to the sources. The PLA defector believes that Chinese intelligence has penetrated the U.S. government and is therefore wary of cooperating with the CIA and other Western spy agencies.

Still, the defector has provided some information about China’s biological arms program that has reached the U.S. government. No other details of the defection could be learned.

Outer space

 

Pentagon report: China amassing arsenal of anti-satellite weapons

China is progressing with the development of missiles and electronic weapons that could target satellites in low and high orbits, the Pentagon says in a new report released Sept. 1.

China already has operational ground-based missiles that can hit satellites in low-Earth orbit and “probably intends to pursue additional ASAT weapons capable of destroying satellites up to geosynchronous Earth orbit,” says the Defense Department’s annual report to Congress on China’s military capabilities.

DoD has been required by law to submit this report since 2000.

The Pentagon says Chinese military strategists regard the ability to use space-based systems and to deny them to adversaries as central to modern warfare. China for years has continued to “strengthen its military space capabilities despite its public stance against the militarization of space,” the report says.

China has not publicly acknowledged the existence of any new anti-satellite weapons programs since it confirmed it used an ASAT missile to destroy a weather satellite in 2007, but the nation has been steadily advancing in this area, the report says. So-called counterspace capabilities developed by China include kinetic-kill missiles, ground-based lasers, orbiting space robots and space surveillance to monitor objects across the globe and in space.

Information security

 

Former MI6 man suspected of selling information to undercover Chinese spies

A British businessman, formerly of MI6, is under investigation for allegedly selling information to undercover spies from China, a Whitehall official says.

Fraser Cameron, who runs the EU-Asia Centre think tank, is suspected of passing sensitive information about the EU to two spies allegedly posing as Brussels-based journalists.

He is alleged to have exchanged the information for thousands of Euros.

But Mr Cameron told The Times the allegations were "ridiculous".

The businessman, who worked for Britain's Secret Intelligence Service from 1976 to 1991, says he has no access to any "secret or confidential information".

Mr Cameron, who has also worked for the Foreign Office and European Commission, told Politico that the allegations "are without foundation", saying he has "a wide range of Chinese contacts as part of my duties with the EU-Asia Centre and some of them may have a double function".

A senior Whitehall official, who asked not to be named, told the BBC the investigation had been a long-running joint inquiry between British and Belgian intelligence and claimed that a breakthrough had come in recent months.

Radiation safety

 

'Midnight Rockets': Whistleblower lawsuit reveals toxic releases by Ohio nuclear plant

A whistleblower lawsuit filed by former workers at an Ohio nuclear plant has revealed new details about disturbing practices during the plaintiffs' tenures at the Portsmouth Gaseous Diffusion Plant (PORTS), including the alarming process — dubbed "midnight rockets" — of releasing toxic chemicals into the atmosphere.

According to the suit, "PORTS would regularly and purposefully vent raw UF6 [uranium hexafluoride], transuranics, heavy metals, and other toxic chemicals into the atmosphere from the roof of the process buildings."

Filed against U.S. Department of Energy nuclear fuel contractors on Sept. 3 in the Southern District of Ohio, Eastern Division, Walburn, et al, v. Centrus Energy Corp., et al   alleges criminal conduct, gross negligence, poisoning of nuclear workers, and contamination of Ohio communities in Pike, Scioto and neighboring counties with radioactive isotopes, causing cancer clusters, injuries, sickness and death, as well as loss of property values. 

Middle East

 

The end of the Saudi era

As we approach the second anniversary of the state-sponsored assassination of Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi, Saudi Arabia continues its retreat, losing direction and influence in the Gulf and Middle East regions.

More than 50 years after the Saudi kingdom began its rise to regional and international prominence as the leading member of OPEC and the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation (OIC), it now finds itself on a path of steady decline.

Home to Islam's holiest sites and to the world's second-largest oil reserves, Saudi Arabia's misguided policies are wasting the religious and financial clout it has accumulated over the years.

The past five years have been especially painful and destructive. What began as a promising and ambitious drive by the rather Machiavellian Prince Mohammed Bin Salman (MBS), soon turned into a reckless venture.

Guided primarily by his mentor, the other Machiavellian prince, Mohammed Bin Zayed (MBZ) of the United Arab Emirates (UAE), MBS is running the kingdom to the ground.

Cybersecurity security

 

NSA Issues Cybersecurity Guidance for Remote Workers, System Admins

he National Security Agency (NSA) has published two cybersecurity information sheets (CSIs) with recommendations for National Security System (NSS) and Department of Defense (DoD) workers and system administrators on securing networks and responding to incidents during the work-from-home period.

Titled Compromised Personal Network Indicators and Mitigations, the first of the CSIs is meant to deliver details on how teleworkers can identify and mitigate the compromise of their personal networks and to secure data and the equipment provided by the government when working remotely.

Furthermore, the CSI provides a series of indicators of compromise (IoC), along with the mitigation techniques that teleworkers can apply to prevent future compromises. The CSI is meant for government employees, but anyone can use the provided information to identify and prevent network breaches, the NSA points out.

“While there is no way to ensure that personal networks will be completely secured from attacks—attackers are persistent and continue to find ways to circumvent security controls—users can still take steps to help prevent future attacks,” the CSI reads.

Should the indicators of compromise outlined in the document be observed, users are advised to apply the provided mitigations to any computer, mobile device, or IoT device connected to their personal network.

Biosecurity

 Mosquito-borne viruses linked to stroke

A deadly combination of two mosquito-borne viruses may be a trigger for stroke, new research published in the The Lancet Neurology has found.

University of Liverpool researchers and Brazilian collaborators have been investigating the link between neurological disease and infection with the viruses Zika and chikungunya. These viruses, which mostly circulate in the tropics, cause large outbreaks of rash and fever in places like Brazil and India. Zika is widely known to cause brain damage in babies following infection in pregnancy, but the new research shows it can also cause nervous system disease in adults.

The study of 201 adults with new onset neurological disease, treated in Brazil during the 2015 Zika and 2016 chikungunya epidemics, is the largest of its kind to describe the neurological features of infection for several arboviruses circulating at the same time.

The new research shows that each virus can cause a range of neurological problems. Zika was especially likely to cause Guillain-Barre syndrome, in which the nerves in the arms and legs are damaged. Chikungunya was more likely to cause inflammation and swelling in the brain (encephalitis) and spinal cord (myelitis). However, stroke, which could be caused by either virus alone, was more likely to occur in patients infected with the two viruses together.

Scam

 

Warning: FBI says sextortion scammers are using this scary new tactic

Of all the scams floating around on the web, sextortion scams are some of the scariest to deal with. When a hacker claims to have intimate photos of you and threatens to post them online, it feels like a total violation of your rights. Thankfully, for the most part, these scams are nothing but bluster.

Until recently, scammers would only claim that they had recordings of their victims without offering proof to back it up. But as times change, so do hackers and their tactics. Tap or click here to see a malware that actually does what sextortion scammers claim to do.

And now, two new types of sextortion scams are starting to spread — and the FBI is putting everyone on alert. Sextortion scammers are now targeting teens for intimate photos and making threats to spread them if their demands aren’t met. Others are sending photos to victims before switching to pretending to be family members of the person in the photo. Here’s what we know.

Sextortion scams are back with a vengeance

It’s already difficult for teens online, but a predatory new form of sextortion targeting teens is bad enough to make the FBI concerned. The Bureau has put out a notice warning about a sextortion incident in Arizona that appears to be spreading throughout the state and beyond — and if teens aren’t careful, their privacy may be in grave danger.

Weapons

US quitting ABM pact forced Moscow to turn to advanced hypersonic systems & now it has weapons no one else does - Putin

The US pullout from the 1972 Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty was a threat to Russia’s security and risked “zeroing” its nuclear arsenals, prompting Moscow to design unparalleled hypersonic projectiles, President Vladimir Putin said.

Moscow, which claims primacy in the worldwide race to develop the ultra-fast weapons systems, faced an urgency to maintain strategic parity with its near-peer opponent Washington, the Russian president recalled on Saturday.

“The US withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty [ABM Treaty] in 2002 forced Russia to start developing hypersonic weapons,” Putin said while speaking over a video link to Gerbert Yefremov, a renowned engineer who played a lead role in designing an array of sensitive missile systems for the Russian military.

Signed back in 1972, the ABM Treaty was instrumental in helping keep the equilibrium between Russian and American nuclear deterrents, until the 2002 pullout threatened to dramatically tilt the balance. No longer bound by the pact, the US rushed to deploy its ballistic missile shields, including close to Russian borders.
Moscow could not stand back and watch the new threat emerge, Putin continued.

Climate security

 

Geoengineering Is the Only Solution to Our Climate Calamities

...If the Industrial Revolution and borderless capitalism are the forces that have brought us to this environmental apotheosis, then it will have to be geoengineering moon shots and scientific collaboration that buy us time to reverse the damage. Geoengineering proposals generally fall into two categories: removing carbon from the atmosphere, or shielding Earth from solar radiation. The most ambitious proposal for carbon removal involves fertilizing the ocean with iron sulfate and other nutrients to stimulate algae growth that could potentially revitalize the marine food chain while also absorbing atmospheric carbon. In terms of slowing global warming, injecting sulphur dioxide aerosol particles in the atmosphere would reflect sunlight and cool temperatures across the globe.

One might recoil at such audacious plans to intentionally alter the geophysical environment, yet that is precisely what we have unintentionally been doing for the past century. At least this time we can direct our efforts in the right direction. As Stewart Brand memorably wrote in the first edition of the Whole Earth Catalog in 1968, “We are as gods and might as well get good at it.”

Biosecurity

 

Updated CDC guidance acknowledges coronavirus can spread through the air

...Covid-19 most commonly spreads between people who are in close contact with one another, and now says the virus is known to spread "through respiratory droplets or small particles, such as those in aerosols, produced when an infected person coughs, sneezes, sings, talks or breathes."

These particles can cause infection when "inhaled into the nose, mouth, airways, and lungs," it says. "This is thought to be the main way the virus spreads."

"There is growing evidence that droplets and airborne particles can remain suspended in the air and be breathed in by others, and travel distances beyond 6 feet (for example, during choir practice, in restaurants, or in fitness classes)," the page now says. "In general, indoor environments without good ventilation increase this risk."

Chemical security

Suspect arrested for allegedly sending ricin-tainted letter to White House

A woman suspected of sending a letter containing the deadly poison ricin to the White House was arrested trying to enter the United States from Canada, two federal law enforcement officials said Sunday.

An FBI spokesperson confirmed the arrest and said the agency is continuing to investigate the suspicious letter.

A federal law enforcement official said the woman was taken into custody while traveling across Peace Bridge, which connects Fort Erie, Ontario, and Buffalo, New York.

Another federal law enforcement official said the suspect was detained by Customs and Border Protection agents. Additional information about the arrest and the suspect was not immediately available.

The FBI said Saturday that it was investigating a suspicious letter addressed to President Donald Trump that had been intercepted.

Financial safety

Leaked U.S. government files suggest Deutsche Bank tops list of suspicious transactions

Germany’s largest lender Deutsche Bank appears to have facilitated more than half of the leaked $2 trillion of suspicious transactions that were flagged to the U.S. government over nearly two decades, reported German broadcaster Deutsche Welle (DW).

Those documents showed that between 1999 and 2017, $1.3 trillion of $2 trillion in leaked transactions that were flagged as suspicious passed through Deutsche Bank, according to the DW report.

The leaked documents contained suspicious activity reports that banks and other financial institutions filed with the U.S. Department of Treasury’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, or FinCEN. Financial firms are required by law to alert regulators when they detect activities that may be suspicious, such as money laundering or sanctions violations. Such reports are not necessarily evidence of any criminal conduct.

In a statement posted on its website, the German bank said the incidents in the leaked documents “have already been investigated and led to regulatory resolutions in which the bank’s cooperation and remediation was publicly recognized. Where necessary and appropriate, consequence management was applied.”

Financial safety

 Leak reveals $2tn of possibly corrupt US financial activity

Thousands of documents detailing $2 trillion (£1.55tn) of potentially corrupt transactions that were washed through the US financial system have been leaked to an international group of investigative journalists.

The leak focuses on more than 2,000 suspicious activity reports (SARs) filed with the US government’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN).

Banks and other financial institutions file SARs when they believe a client is using their services for potential criminal activity.

However, the filing of an SAR does not require the bank to cease doing business with the client in question.

The documents were provided to BuzzFeed News, which shared them with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists.

The documents are said to suggest major banks provided financial services to high-risk individuals from around the world, in some cases even after they had been placed under sanctions by the US government.

According to the ICIJ the documents relate to more than $2tn of transactions dating from between 1999 and 2017.

Spy work

 

The CIA sent a team of 4 operators on a spy mission targeting China. None came back.

As Tropical Storm Higos blew in from the Pacific, Stephen Stanek, a covert CIA operative, faced a decision. It was time to either cancel the operation he was running or go forward with it. The storm was barreling through the Philippines but was then projected to veer north and miss their area of operation.

Stanek’s partner for the operation, a younger man named Michael Perich, had recently graduated from the Merchant Marine Academy. A football player at the academy, Perich was now at the beginning of his career in paramilitary operations and had just recently been trained as a scuba diver.

Two other men were aboard their 40-foot vessel, Jamie McCormick and Daniel Meeks, both in supporting roles. Stanek, a retired Navy ordnance disposal diver, was highly experienced but had only recently attained his license to be a ship captain, according to those who knew him.

The crew had spent the last several days sailing up the coast of the Philippines after departing Malaysia in what was to be the maiden voyage of their ship, which was secretly owned by the CIA’s Maritime Branch.

Arms trade

 Russia’s state arms seller to offer almost 50 new weapon systems to world market

Russia’s state arms seller Rosoboronexport plans to offer almost 50 new weapon systems to the world arms market in the next five or six years, Rosoboronexport CEO Alexander Mikheyev told TASS in the run-up to the Army-2020 international military and technical forum on Sunday.

"In the next five or six years, Rosoboronexport plans to deliver almost 50 new weapon systems to the international arms market. These are final products involving air defense systems, combat and military transport aircraft, and also the armor, naval hardware and artillery," the chief executive said.

The active work of Russian defense enterprises makes it possible to constantly deliver new armaments to the world market and formalize authorizing documentation for their exports, he said.

"Among bright examples, I can name such products of Rostec [state hi-tech corporation] as the T-14 ‘Armata’ tank, the Su-57 fifth-generation fighter and the entire family of Kalashnikov new-generation assault rifles: the 200th series. Among the products of other manufacturers, I would like to mention the Bumerang standardized combat platform, the 59N6-TE radar capable of detecting hypersonic targets and many other weapons," the chief executive said.