Spy story

The worst traitor of all: How an East End jailbird lied and cheated his way across France, joined the Nazis and condemned 150 resistance fighters to death - and was committed to no cause other than pursuing a life of champagne and women

The showdown was fittingly violent. It was 1946 and the war in Europe had been over for almost a year when armed police surrounded an apartment building in central Paris.

They were acting on a tip-off that a wanted traitor-on-the-run, a renegade British soldier who had sided with the Germans and betrayed hundreds of men and women to the Gestapo, was holed up in a flat there.

The police crept up the stairs, but their heavy tread gave them away and the tall, flame-haired fugitive was waiting at the open door, pistol in hand. He fired, they shot back and their hail of bullets slammed him back across the shabby room and onto the bed, where he bled to death.

It was over at long last — a blood-stained finale for the conman from Hackney, whose double-dealing and murderous collaboration with the Nazis since 1940 led to MI6 declaring him 'the worst British traitor of the war'.

MI5 marked his death with the terse note: 'He has now been liquidated.'

Electronic surveillance

Mexican spy scandal escalates as study shows software targeted opposition

The text messages seemed innocuous enough when they buzzed on to the smartphone of Roberto Gil, a senior member of Mexico’s opposition National Action Party.

“I wanted to share this report from [the Mexican newsweekly] Proceso where your name is mentioned,” said one.

“My husband just died. I’m sending you information about the wake,” read another.

“Do you see what the PRD [another opposition party] is saying about us? Take a look,” said the third message.

Each message carried a link, however, and, once clicked, they would have immediately allowed sophisticated spy software to infect Gil’s phone, tracking keystrokes, accessing contact lists and taking control of the phone’s cameras and microphone.

Public security

Trump says he is sending federal help to fight Chicago crime

President Donald Trump said on Friday he was sending federal help to fight crime in Chicago that has reached "epidemic" proportions.

The government is sending federal agents to Chicago and plans to prosecute firearms cases aggressively, Attorney General Jeff Sessions told Fox News when asked about Trump's statement about the plan in an early-morning Twitter post.

"Crime and killings in Chicago have reached such epidemic proportions that I am sending in Federal help. 1714 shootings in Chicago this year!" Trump wrote on Twitter.

The president has regularly singled out Chicago's violent crime problem and in January decried the high crime rate in the third-most populous U.S. city as "carnage."

In 2016, the number of murders in Chicago exceeded 760, a jump of nearly 60 percent, and was more than New York and Los Angeles combined. There were more than 4,300 shooting victims in the city last year, according to police.

Cybersecurity

U.S. warns businesses of hacking campaign against nuclear, energy firms

The U.S government warned industrial firms this week about a hacking campaign targeting the nuclear and energy sectors, the latest event to highlight the power industry's vulnerability to cyber attacks.

Since at least May, hackers used tainted "phishing" emails to "harvest credentials" so they could gain access to networks of their targets, according to a joint report from the U.S. Department of Homeland Security and Federal Bureau of Investigation.

The report provided to the industrial firms was reviewed by Reuters on Friday. While disclosing attacks, and warning that in some cases hackers succeeded in compromising the networks of their targets, it did not identify any specific victims.

"Historically, cyber actors have strategically targeted the energy sector with various goals ranging from cyber espionage to the ability to disrupt energy systems in the event of a hostile conflict," the report said.

Radiation safety

High risk of another nuclear waste tunnel collapse in Washington – govt

The US Department of Energy says there is a high risk that a tunnel filled with radioactive waste might collapse at the Hanford Nuclear Reservation in the state of Washington. This after another tunnel partially caved in at the same facility last month.

The agency says it has until August 1 to develop plans to prevent the collapse of yet another tunnel at Hanford. 
The facility was built in the 1950s and for decades produced plutonium for the US nuclear weapons arsenal. In 1988, production stopped and the site became a burying ground for radioactive waste. 
The tunnels were used to get rid of nuclear material and equipment, such as rail cars that transported the fuel rods from nuclear reactors to the processing facility.

One such tunnel partially collapsed on May 9, prompting the Department of Energy to declare an emergency at Hanford. Some 3,000 workers sought shelter and were advised to temporarily refrain from eating and drinking. 

Innovations & technologies

The end of hunting for wifi: Facebook's app to show nearby networks

Facebook has launched a new feature to show users where their nearest wifi hotspot is.

Called 'Find wi-fi' it shows users a map with the nearest access points mapped.

'Today we're beginning to roll out Find Wi-Fi everywhere in the world on iPhone and Android,' Facebook's Alex Himel said.

'We launched Find Wi-Fi in a handful of countries last year and found it's not only helpful for people who are traveling or on-the-go, but especially useful in areas where cellular data is scarce.'

Find Wi-Fi helps you locate available Wi-Fi hot spots nearby that businesses have shared with Facebook from their Page. 

So wherever you are, you can easily map the closest connections when your data connection is weak.

Once activated, the feature automatically detects places with free Wi-Fi near the user's location and marks them on their map.

Nuclear security

Has South Korea renounced “nuclear hedging”?

South Korea’s freshly inaugurated President Moon Jae-in seems committed to phasing out nuclear power. During his campaign, he promised to close operating nuclear plants, suspend construction of two nuclear reactors (Shin Kori No. 5 and Shin Kori No. 6, which are about 30 percent complete), and scrap plans to construct eight additional nuclear power plants—with a goal of cutting the country’s 25 nuclear reactors to zero over the next 40 years. He also pledged to reconsider the research program on pyroprocessing technology to recycle nuclear spent fuel, which was launched in 1997 to mitigate the country’s nuclear waste problem. A little over a month into his presidency, on June 18, Moon permanently shut down the country’s oldest nuclear reactor, Kori No. 1.

The nonproliferation community may hail the Moon administration’s nuclear-free energy policy, as some view South Korea as a potential nuclear weapons aspirant given the nuclear weapons tests and threats coming from its northern neighbor. The nonproliferation community has been concerned about pressure in South Korea to acquire nuclear weapons for many decades, because a nuclear weapons development program was initiated in the 1970s, because South Korean public opinion has recently run in favor of nuclear weapons, and because the government has stated its intentions to acquire enrichment and reprocessing capabilities. 

Climate security

The trouble with geoengineers “hacking the planet”

Geoengineering seems to be the new darling idea making the rounds of the science and technology media. But what is geoengineering? Loosely speaking, the term refers to deliberate manipulation of the Earth’s ecosystem so as to achieve some desired climate effect—usually a cooling to offset the effects of human-caused global warming. Many researchers who have studied the subject are uncomfortable with the word “engineering” applied to meddling with a system we still understand rather poorly, so other terms—such as “Hacking the planet”—have come into play. In National Research Council reports on the subject, of which I was a co-author, we settled on the term “Climate Intervention,” which carries less freight in assuming that the undertaking will necessarily achieve the desired end.

Climate intervention comes in two main flavors. One is albedo (i.e., reflectivity) modification, which involves putting something in the atmosphere to reflect more sunlight back out into space. The other is carbon dioxide removal and sequestration, which involves removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere and stowing it somewhere where it will hopefully stay put for a few thousand years. The latter technique is relatively benign, though highly technologically challenging. It is albedo modification, which has some truly terrifying implications, which I will be concerned with here.

International cooperation

Despite hacking charges, U.S. tech industry fought to keep ties to Russia spy service

U.S. authorities had accused the FSB, along with the GRU, Russia's military intelligence agency, of orchestrating cyber attacks on the campaign of Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, a charge Moscow denies.

But the sanctions also threatened to imperil the Russian sales operations of Western tech companies. Under a little-understood arrangement, the FSB doubles as a regulator charged with approving the import to Russia of almost all technology that contains encryption, which is used in both sophisticated hardware as well as products like cellphones and laptops.

Worried about the sales impact, business industry groups, including the U.S.-Russia Business Council and the American Chamber of Commerce in Russia, contacted U.S. officials at the American embassy in Moscow and the Treasury, State and Commerce departments, according to five people with direct knowledge of the lobbying effort.

The campaign, which began in January and proved successful in a matter of weeks, has not been previously reported.

In recent years, Western technology companies have acceded to increasing demands by Moscow for access to closely guarded product security secrets, including source code, Reuters reported last week.

Electronic warfare

Cyber, electronic warfare blur tactical, strategic lines

One of today's frequently emerging adages is that the character of war is changing. The rapid pace of technologies and nascent domains of war such as cyberspace are turning what used to be tactical issues into issues of strategic importance. 

“If we don’t win the cyber/[electronic warfare] fight, then the maneuver fight may not matter because we may not get to it,” Maj. Gen. Wilson Shoffner, director of operations at the Army's Rapid Capabilities Office, said in early June, noting that the decisive fight may well be the electromagnetic spectrum as opposed to maneuver. 

Moreover, if communications are disrupted via  jammed radios — which are increasingly more susceptible to cyber and electronic attacks as demonstrated in Ukraine — then campaign plans could be significantly affected. 

Defense spending

Defense spending by European NATO countries to rise in 2017

Total defense expenditures by NATO members in Europe and Canada are projected to rise in 2017, according to a report released by NATO on Thursday.

The report indicates a boost of 4.3 percent in overall spending by non-U.S. NATO members, marking the sharpest rise in years.

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg told reporters Thursday that the new money represents "a significant increase," and that "European Allies and Canada spent almost $46 billion more on defense" since 2014.

"We are moving in the right direction when it comes to burden-sharing and defense spending," he added.

NATO defense spending is expected to total $915 billion in 2017 in constant 2010 prices and exchange rates, with the U.S. accounting for $616 billion of that total. The U.S. spends nearly twice as much on defense as the rest of NATO combined.

Aerospace

Grounding the Ayatollah’s Tomcats

On April 9, 1972, Iraq and the Soviet Union signed an historic agreement. The USSR committed to arming the Arab republic with the latest weaponry. In return for sending Baghdad guns, tanks and jet fighters, Moscow got just one thing — influence … in a region that held most of the world’s accessible oil.

In neighboring Iran, news of Iraq’s alliance with the Soviets exploded like a bomb. Ethnically Persian and predominately Shia, Iran was — and still is — a bitter rival of Iraq’s Sunni Arab establishment, which during the 1970s dominated the country’s politics.

In Tehran, King Mohammad Reza Shah Pahlavi — the “shah” — moved quickly to counter Baghdad’s move. First he set loose an army of secret police in a desperate and bloody bid to quell internal dissent. And then he reached out to the United States.

Forensics

"Identity Intel Ops" Turn US Special Operators Into Combat Detectives

When you hear a report about an American counter-terrorism operation, especially one that results in the death or capture of some apparently notable militant in a hot spot around the world, you’ll often hear about how important intelligence was in tracking them down. What you won’t hear much about is exactly what this “intelligence driven” process necessarily entails in any detail. The War Zone has now obtained a document through the Freedom of Information Act that gives a more in depth look at how U.S. special operators are becoming combat detectives, gathering vacuuming up forensic details during missions that could lead them to their next target.

Though it’s just one piece of the intelligence puzzle, so-called “identity intelligence,” or I2, has become an essential part of the action cycle, which broadly involves gathering information, tracking individual terrorists, neutralizing them, and then repeating the process with any new data obtained during those raids. U.S. Special Operations Command (SOCOM) has codified these concepts what it officially calls Directive 525-40, Identity Intelligence. Thanks to the FOIA, we received what appears to be the most recent edition of this document, which is dated April 7, 2017. This replaced a previous version the Pentagon’s top special operations command had published four years earlier.

Korea

Trump: US patience with the North Korean regime 'is over'

President Donald Trump, speaking alongside South Korean President Moon Jae-in, declared Friday US patience with the North Korean regime "is over."

"The era of strategic patience with the North Korean regime has failed," Trump said in a statement from the Rose Garden. "And, frankly, that patience is over."

The remarks were the latest sign that Trump is growing increasingly frustrated with the lack of progress in curbing North Korea's nuclear and ballistic missile programs, which top US officials have eyed with increasing concern in recent months.

The South Korean President's visit to the White House came after Trump approved a series of measures designed to ratchet up pressure on North Korea -- while also sending signals to China about the US' shrinking patience.

Health security

Opioid addiction rates continue to skyrocket

A new study finds that the number of Americans being diagnosed with opioid addiction continues to skyrocket, but still very few receive any treatment. This is in line with the rising trend documented in previous reports.

An analysis from Blue Cross Blue Shield of its members found that from 2010 to 2016, the number of people diagnosed with an addiction to opioids -- including both legal prescription drugs like oxycodone and hydrocodone, as well as illicit drugs -- climbed 493%. In 2010, there were just 1.4 incidences of opioid use disorder among every 1000 members. By 2016, that rate had climbed to 8.3 incidences for every 1000 members. Yet, at the same time, there was only a 65% increase in the number of people getting medication-assisted treatment to manage their addiction.

Public security

Timeline: Key moments in Venezuela's crisis

Over the past 90 days, Venezuela has seen near-daily demonstrations - with anti- and pro-government protesters taking to the streets. 

The political roots of the protests go back to 2016, when the Supreme Tribunal of Justice suspended the election of four legislators for alleged voting irregularities.

The opposition swore in three of the legislators. The entire opposition-led National Assembly was in contempt and the supreme court ruled that any decisions it made would not stand.

Gun control

America’s Complex Relationship With Guns

As a nation, the U.S. has a deep and enduring connection to guns. Integrated into the fabric of American society since the country’s earliest days, guns remain a point of pride for many Americans. Whether for hunting, sport shooting or personal protection, most gun owners count the right to bear arms as central to their freedom. At the same time, the results of gun-related violence have shaken the nation, and debates over gun policy remain sharply polarized.

A new Pew Research Center survey attempts to better understand the complex relationship Americans have with guns and how that relationship intersects with their policy views.

The survey finds that Americans have broad exposure to guns, whether they personally own one or not. At least two-thirds have lived in a household with a gun at some point in their lives. And roughly seven-in-ten – including 55% of those who have never personally owned a gun – say they have fired a gun at some point.

False flag operations

For Those Who Don’t ‘Believe’ In ‘Conspiracies’ Here Are 58 Admitted False Flag Attacks

“False flag terrorism” occurs when elements within a government stage a secret operation whereby government forces pretend to be a targeted enemy while attacking their own forces or people. The attack is then falsely blamed on the enemy in order to justify going to war against that enemy.

Yes, it’s true: There really are conspiracies. As the popular TV show “The X-Files” notes, all you have to do is look because “the truth is out there.”

But unfortunately many in our society have been conditioned by the old media and politicos not to take any mention of conspiracies seriously, and this despite the fact that conspiracies have been real and have occurred much more frequently than many people realize.

In fact, one website – Washington’s Blog – has documented 58 of them in recent days, and many are quite shocking:

In the following instances, officials in the government which carried out the attack (or seriously proposed an attack) admit to it, either orally, in writing, or through photographs or videos:

(1) Japanese troops set off a small explosion on a train track in 1931, and falsely blamed it on China in order to justify an invasion of Manchuria. This is known as the “Mukden Incident” or the “Manchurian Incident”. The Tokyo International Military Tribunal found: “Several of the participators in the plan, including Hashimoto [a high-ranking Japanese army officer], have on various occasions admitted their part in the plot and have stated that the object of the ‘Incident’ was to afford an excuse for the occupation of Manchuria by the Kwantung Army ….” And see this...

Nuclear security

Hacking nuclear submarines – how likely is the nightmare scenario?

Trident has one big security advantage: when a submarine is at sea, it’s very difficult to talk to. Communications are all one way, from the mainland, via low-frequency radio or satellite. There are no internet connections, in what’s commonly known as an air gap (shouldn’t that be a water gap?)

The UK government has always maintained that this isolated design makes the missiles secure and protects them from hackers. BASIC is far from convinced, calling this view “patently false and complacent”.

Its report explores the system’s vulnerabilities methodically, and says that there are ways in to Trident that could lead to a variety of outcomes: stopping missiles firing, exploding them early, or even destroying the vessel by hitting its reactor.

Let’s start with the outlandish stuff first. In the future, surveillance nano-drones could infiltrate the vessel, the report says. People could use subdermal skin implants and “advanced nano and bionic technologies” to compromise its systems. It worries about nano-surveillance drones that could somehow hack a sub from the outside. That’s all conjecture, though...

International security

President Donald Trump Set To Meet With Russia’s Putin Next Week

U.S. President Donald Trump will meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin at a summit of world economic powers in Germany next week in their first ever encounter, a top U.S. official said on Thursday.

White House National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster told reporters that no agenda has yet been set for the meeting at the summit of G20 nations in Hamburg.

Allegations that Russia interfered in the U.S. presidential election last year and colluded with Trump’s campaign have overshadowed the businessman’s unexpected victory and have dogged his first five months in office.

The two nations are also at odds over the civil war in Syria where Moscow supports President Bashar al-Assad. The United States backs rebel groups trying to overthrow Assad, and Washington angered Russia by launching missile strikes against a Syrian government air base in April.

Cybersecurity

News in brief: PCs’ PCs still running XP; bug-hunters cashing in; airport security stepped up

More than half of the computers in London’s Metropolitan Police force are still running on Windows XP, according to London’s mayor Sadiq Khan. That admission comes a year after the force had pledged to upgrade them to supported versions of Windows.

The mayor told Steve O’Connell of the London Assembly in a written response that a total of 18,293 of the force’s 32,751 desktops are on XP.

O’Connell said on Tuesday: “The Met is working towards upgrading its software, but in its current state it’s like a fish swimming in a pool of sharks.”

There’s increased concern about the number of PCs running out of date versions of Windows in the light of the WannaCry ransomware attack, which focused attention on the number of devices running the unsupported version of Microsoft’s operating system in the NHS and elsewhere.

Drug trafficking

BBC: Albanian gangs control drug trafficking in UK

Violent Albanian criminal groups have “considerable control” over drug trafficking in Great Britain.

At the same time, Serbians and Turks “dominate high volume maritime cocaine logistics.”

This is according to a BBC report, published under the headline, “Albanian gangs ‘controlling’ UK drug trafficking market,” that cited the National Crime Agency (NCA) annual assessment document.

The NCA said it was “increasingly concerned by what it called the Albanians’ ‘high-profile influence within UK organized crime’,” reported the BBC.

According to this, Albanian gangs have particular influence on the cocaine market and are “characterized by their readiness to resort to serious violence.”

Election security

NYT JUST QUIETLY ADMITTED TRUMP/RUSSIA HYSTERIA IS BASED ON A COMPLETE FALSEHOOD

The New York Times has been forced to (finally) retract a popular Democratic talking point that 17 U.S. intelligence agencies agree that Russia conducted cyber attacks on the U.S. during the 2016 election.

As Consortium News reports, The New York Times’ correction came after the outlet, in a report on Monday, mocked President Donald Trump for “still refus[ing] to acknowledge a basic fact agreed upon by 17 American intelligence agencies that he now oversees: Russia orchestrated the attacks, and did it to help him get elected.”

...“The Times’ grudging correction was vindication for some Russia-gate skeptics who had questioned the claim of a full-scale intelligence assessment, which would usually take the form of a National Intelligence Estimate (or NIE), a product that seeks out the views of the entire Intelligence Community and includes dissents,” reports Consortium News.

Health security

This foam could save your life

Countless military lives could be saved in the future thanks to a new remarkable foam.

Made by Arsenal Medical and fittingly dubbed ResQ Foam, this remarkable innovation rapidly expands inside the body and seals off the wound.

Bleeding to death is the leading cause of fatalities on the battlefield, according to the U.S. Army Institute of Surgical Research. So the US military has long been searching for a solution that would let combat medics stabilize patients for transport to field hospitals.

The foam has enormous potential for civilians as well. EMTs responding to a gunshot wound to the abdomen, for example, could immediately apply the foam to help buy time to get the victim to surgical care.

International security

How much of a threat does Russia pose, and to whom?

Nato defence ministers are reviewing progress in what's known as the alliance's "enhanced forward presence" - its deployment of troops eastwards to reassure worried allies, and deter any Russian move west.

Nato has dispatched four battalion-sized battle groups, one deployed in Poland and one in each of the three Baltic republics: Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia.

The US has also begun to bring back heavy armoured units to western Europe.

The whole effort is prompted by the shock emanating from Russia's seizure and subsequent annexation of the Crimea, and its continuing support for rebel groups in eastern Ukraine.

If Moscow could tear up the rule-book of security in post-Cold War Europe by carving off a slice of Ukraine (as it previously did in Georgia), many feared the Baltic republics - also territory of the former Soviet Union - could be next.

Military

Just How Dangerous Is Russia's Military?

The Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency has released a new assessment of Russian military power—reviving a Cold War-era practice. The agency concludes that the modern Russian military builds upon its Soviet heritage but has modernized its capabilities and doctrine for the present day.

“The Russian military has built on the military doctrine, structure, and capabilities of the former Soviet Union, and although still dependent on many of the older Soviet platforms, the Russians have modernized their military strategy, doctrine, and tactics to include use of asymmetric weapons like cyber and indirect action such as was observed in Ukraine,” the DIA report states.

In the years since the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the Russian military atrophied into a pale shadow of its once mighty Soviet forbearer. While the Soviet Union renounced the first use of nuclear weapons, the new Russia relied upon those weapons to offset its conventional weakness. However, Russia is trying to reduce its reliance on nuclear weapons as it rebuilds its conventional forces and adopts modern precision-guided munitions.

Foreign trade security

China concerned by U.S. probe of aluminum imports on national security grounds

China is "concerned" by Washington's probe into aluminum imports from the world's top producer of the metal on national security grounds, China's Commerce Ministry said on Thursday, as the two economies' 100-day trade talks continue.

Washington is investigating aluminum imports from China under the rarely used section 232 of the Trade Expansion Act of 1962 that allows restrictions on imports for reasons of national security. The administration is also conducting a separate investigation into steel.

"The scale of 'national security' is very wide and lacking clear definition, which is easily misused and therefore posing restrictions on normal flow of international trade," Sun Jiwen, spokesman at China's Commerce Ministry, said at a weekly briefing.

His comments come after senior officials told Reuters that U.S. President Donald Trump is growing increasingly frustrated with China over its inaction on North Korea and bilateral trade issues and is now considering possible trade actions against Beijing.

Human rights security

British spies could be forced to disclose deepest secrets in legal challenge

A legal challenge brought against British intelligence services aims to shed light on the nature of their most secretive operations.

Civil rights groups Reprieve and Privacy International want to make public the allegedly highly intrusive activities of the UK’s security agencies by bringing a case before the Investigatory Powers Tribunal.

The tribunal is responsible for overseeing the activities of the UK’s intelligence agencies, including MI5, MI6 and GCHQ.

The legal action is concerned with the set of “directions” issued by then-Prime Minister David Cameron, enabling the Intelligence Services Commissioner to supervise highly invasive and covert intelligence activities.

Two of these directions were subsequently released to the public with certain redactions.

One document governed interrogation of detainees abroad by UK intelligence personnel, while the other regulated the extensive collection of personal data by British spooks.

The third direction was only once referred to in public in a separate legal challenge brought by Privacy International, but was redacted in its entirety.

Information security

Ex-CIA: Media leaks put lives of US foreign agents -- and Americans -- at risk. Is that worth a scoop?

For the past year, Americans have read a barrage of stories related to Russia’s role in the 2016 election. The latest comes from the Washington Post, which recently gossiped about how President Obama did – and did not – respond to Moscow’s propaganda operations aimed at thwarting America’s democracy.

Like many articles before it, this essay highlighted classified information leaked by anonymous government sources to prove its claims.

What the Post didn’t tell readers, however, is that classified intelligence doesn’t come from its secret leakers in Washington D.C. Rather, America’s intelligence flows from a global network of clandestine informants recruited by my former colleagues in the CIA and FBI.

Korea

Military option for North Korea being prepared for Trump, McMaster says

The Trump administration is considering a wider range of strategies on how to deal with North Korea, including the military option, Trump's national security adviser said Wednesday.

“The threat is much more immediate now and so it’s clear that we can’t repeat the same approach – failed approach of the past,” H.R. McMaster, the adviser, said during a security conference with Homeland Security Chief John Kelly.

He said it would be insanity to continue to do the same thing the U.S. has done for years and expect a different result.

McMaster’s comments come a day before Trump is scheduled to meet with South Korean President Moon Jae-in. South Korea’s new leader vowed to stand firmly with Trump against North Korea, downplaying his past advocacy for a softer approach toward the isolated regime.