Outer space

X-37B Military Space Plane Breaks Record on Latest Mystery Mission

The U.S. Air Force's X-37B space plane just broke its spaceflight-duration record.

At 6:43 a.m. EDT (1043 GMT) today (Aug. 26), the robotic X-37B sailed past the program mark of 717 days, 20 hours and 42 minutes, which was set by the previous mission, known as Orbital Test Vehicle 4 (OTV-4).

The current mission, OTV-5, began on Sept. 7, 2017, with a liftoff atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. It's unclear what the space plane is doing up there now, or what it has done on past flights; X-37B missions are classified, and the Air Force therefore tends to speak of the vehicle and its activities in general terms.

"The primary objectives of the X-37B are twofold; reusable spacecraft technologies for America’s future in space and operating experiments which can be returned to, and examined, on Earth," Air Force officials wrote in the X-37B fact sheet.

"Technologies being tested in the program include advanced guidance, navigation and control, thermal protection systems, avionics, high temperature structures and seals, conformal reusable insulation, lightweight electromechanical flight systems, advanced propulsion systems, advanced materials and autonomous orbital flight, reentry and landing," the officials added.

Defense

Egypt continues to produce locally M1A1 Abrams main battle tanks

The M1A1 is a third-generation of American main battle tank that has been produced in Egypt since 1992. The main components the M1A21 are manufactured locally including the hull, the turret, and ammunition. The M1A1 Abrams is the backbone of the Egyptian army.

On October 25, 2011, Egypt and the United States celebrated the resumption of co-production of M1A1 Abrams Tanks at a ceremony held at the Egyptian Tank Plant outside of Cairo. The manufacturing of M1A1s in Egypt is a key part of ongoing U.S. support for Egypt’s crucial role as a factor of security and stability in the region. Through this program, the Tank Plant provides jobs for over 2500 Egyptians and supports the capacity of the Egyptian Armed Forces to defend the country.

Since the beginning of the M1A1 Co-production Program, a joint venture between the governments of the United States and Egypt to produce parts and assemble tank kits for the M1 Abrams Main Battle Tank (MBT), the Egyptian Defense Company Tank Plant has produced around 1,200 M1A1 Abrams main battle tank in Egypt.

The first version of the M1 Abrams was armed with one 105mm cannon, while the M1A1 is armed with one 120 mm smoothbore M256 armament equipped with a muzzle reference system to measure the bend of the gun tube. The main cannon of the Egyptian M1A1 is also produced license in Egypt.

The M1A1 Abrams has a crew of four, including the driver, commander, gunner and loader. The driver is seated at the front of the vehicle in the center while the three other crew members are located in the turret. The commander and gunner are seated on the right of the turret and the loader on the left.

Criminal investigation

Mega Group, Maxwells and Mossad: The Spy Story at the Heart of the Jeffrey Epstein Scandal

While Part I and Part II of this series, “The Jeffrey Epstein Scandal: Too Big to Fail,” have focused on the widespread nature of sexual blackmail operations in recent American history and their ties to the heights of American political power and the U.S. intelligence community, one key aspect of Epstein’s own sex-trafficking and blackmail operation that warrants examination is Epstein’s ties to Israeli intelligence and his ties to the “informal” pro-Israel philanthropist faction known as “the Mega Group.”

The Mega Group’s role in the Epstein case has garnered some attention, as Epstein’s main financial patron for decades, billionaire Leslie Wexner, was a co-founder of the group that unites several well-known businessmen with a penchant for pro-Israel and ethno-philanthropy (i.e., philanthropy benefiting a single ethnic or ethno-religious group). However, as this report will show, another uniting factor among Mega Group members is deep ties to organized crime, specifically the organized crime network discussed in Part I of this series, which was largely led by notorious American mobster Meyer Lansky.

Spy story

An anti-fascist spy who defied Hitler's Nazis, was betrayed by Stalin

Dr. Richard Sorge, a German communist who penetrated the innermost political and military circles of the Japanese and German governments for a decade from the mid-1930s, only ever had one good thing to say about the Nazis. His earliest party writing (a turgid pamphlet on The Accumulation of Capital and Rosa Luxemburg) "was", he jokingly said, "so clumsy and immature I hoped the Nazis burned every last copy".

Everything else Sorge did, like stealing the secret war plans of the two biggest anti-communist World War II Axis powers, was dedicated to the defeat of fascism.

Journalist Owen Matthews begins his spy tale with a young Sorge, head full of the nationalistic and romantic notions of war typical of his petit-bourgeois upbringing, tasting disillusionment on his first day of action in World War I when his German student battalion was machine-gunned to shreds in an advance from the trenches.

A radical political transformation of Sorge was incubated in hospital as he recovered from three partially-amputated fingers (and a shattered leg that gave him a permanent limp). It came courtesy of a left-wing nurse who provided him with works by Karl Marx, Federick Engels and Georg Hegel ("the ladder to Marx").

Spy story

How Will Netflix Portray Israel’s Most Famous Spy?

Netflix’s The Spy is a six-episode series about real-life Israeli Mossad hero Eli Cohen. The Spy stars Sacha Baron Cohen, most famous for his 2006 adult-oriented comedy movie Borat, as the legendary Mossad agent, and will debut on September 6.

When Eli Cohen was publicly executed by the government of Syria on May 18, 1965, it was clear to Israelis and Syrians that he had succeeded in becoming a friend of the president of Syria, and had penetrated the innermost Syrian government circles. What was not yet known, however, was that he had gathered the intelligence that would later save the State of Israel from being destroyed.

More than any other one man, Eli Cohen, an Egyptian-born Jew, earned the Mossad its reputation as one of the best intelligence services in the world, and paved the way for Israel to win on the Golan front in the Six Day War of June 1967.

Middle East

Mysterious Israeli Businessman Behind Mega-deal to Supply Spy Planes to UAE

For the past few weeks an innocent-looking white executive jet has been taking off from the Al Dhafra Air Base in Abu Dhabi, cruising for hours in the airspace above the Persian Gulf. A much closer look is needed to notice the unique protrusions on its belly, tail and back. This is not an ordinary executive jet, but an advanced surveillance aircraft owned by the United Arab Emirates, whose purpose is to gather electronic intelligence – and one of its targets is Iran.

The sight of the surveillance plane that recently began trial flights marks the last stages of a secret mega deal that began about a decade ago, and whose connection to Israel was unknown until now. A Haaretz investigation reveals that the person behind the supply of the planes is Israeli businessman and entrepreneur Matanya “Mati” Kochavi.

Drones

Russia’s New 'Altair' Spy Drone Takes to the Skies

Russia’s Ministry of Defense shared video of the country’s new Altair/Altius unmanned aerial vehicle yesterday, uploading a video of the twin engine drone to YouTube. The drone, under development for several years, reportedly experienced cost overruns and was behind schedule for several years. The airplane is described as a spy plane but appears to have the ability to carry weapons.

Russia, despite its reputation for being a military giant has lagged behind the United States in the development of unmanned aerial vehicles. Until recently, Russia had no equivalent to American Reaper or Predator drones, medium altitude, long endurance (MALE) drones capable of loitering for a day or more over a target, conducting surveillance, then finally attacking the target with precision-guided weapons.

The new Altair/Altius-U drone appears ready to plug that hole. The drone, according to Russian state media, weighs six tons and is powered by two turboprop engines. According to open source analysis of satellite images, early prototypes were spotted with a length of 11 meters (roughly 36 feet)—about the same length as the MQ-9 Reaper.

Atom spy

Atom spy Klaus Fuchs was motivated by conscience

Graham Farmelo’s review of a new book by Frank Close about the atom spy Klaus Fuchs (Review, 17 August) fails completely to understand the motivation of Fuchs or comprehend the historical context of his action. He simplistically labels him the “most cunning of traitors”.

Fuchs came from a deeply religious family. He was the son of a Lutheran pastor who became a Quaker after the Lutheran church began collaborating with the Hitler regime. His whole family was persecuted by the Nazis.

His father, brother and sister were incarcerated for speaking out against the regime. His sister and his communist brother-in-law helped organise the escape of Jews and other opponents of the Hitler regime from Germany. Both his mother and sister would kill themselves as a result of Nazi persecution. Fuchs himself joined the Communist party because he felt that the communists were the only ones to effectively oppose the Nazis. As a brilliant physicist he worked on the Manhattan Project, fearing like many of his colleagues that if they did not do so then Hitler would get there first. Once he became aware that Britain and the US were not going to share the new knowhow with the Soviet Union, he was concerned that they might use the bomb against them once Hitler had been defeated.

Sex trafficking

Long Before Epstein: Sex Traffickers & Spy Agencies

The alleged use of sexual blackmail by spy agencies is hardly unique to the case of Jeffrey Epstein. Although the agencies involved as well as their alleged motivations and methods differ with each case, the crime of child trafficking with ties to intelligence agencies or those protected by them has been around for decades.

Some cases include the 1950s -1970s Kincora scandal and the 1981 Peter Hayman affair, both in the U.K.; and the Finders’ cult and the Franklin scandal in the U.S. in the late 1980s. Just as these cases did not end in convictions, the pedophile and accused child-trafficker Jeffrey Epstein remained at arms’ length for years.

“For almost two decades, for some nebulous reason, whether to do with ties to foreign intelligence, his billions of dollars, or his social connections, Epstein, whose alleged sexual sickness and horrific assaults on women without means or ability to protect themselves… remained untouchable,” journalist Vicky Ward wrote in The Daily Beast in July.

Spy tech

The Cold War spy technology which we all use

Moscow, 4 August, 1945. The European chapter of World War Two was over, and the US and the USSR were pondering their future relationship.

At the American embassy, a group of boys from the Young Pioneer Organization of the Soviet Union made a charming gesture of friendship between the two superpowers.

They presented a large, hand-carved ceremonial seal of the United States of America to Averell Harriman, the US ambassador. It was later to become known simply as The Thing.

Naturally, Harriman's office would have checked the heavy wooden ornament for electronic bugs, but with neither wires nor batteries in evidence, what harm could it do?

Harriman gave The Thing pride of place, hanging on the wall of his study - from where it betrayed his private conversations for the next seven years.

He could not have realised that the device had been built by one of the true originals of the 20th Century.

Confessions of spy

Russian spy who posed as a Canadian for more than 20 years

“A spy has to be an actor, but an actor that doesn’t need a public or a stage, and doesn’t require the approval of others,” says Elena Vavilova, as she sips a cappuccino in a Moscow cafe.

Vavilova acted the part of a Canadian woman named Tracy Foley, an identity stolen for her by the KGB, for two decades. Almost no one knew her real identity, not even her own children. She was an “illegal”, a deep-cover Russian operative sent to the west along with her husband Andrei Bezrukov, who used the name Donald Heathfield.

Vavilova and Bezrukov were arrested at their Boston home in 2010, part of a group of 10 Russian spies detained by the FBI, most of them illegals living in the US as ordinary Americans or Canadians. They were deported to Russia in a spy swap that included media favourite Anna Chapman and also involved four Russians accused of spying for the west travelling in the other direction, including Sergei Skripal, who was infamously poisoned in Salisbury last year...

Mass surveillance

Giving Government Permanent Authority To Spy on Everyone in America

While most of us have been thinking about the end of summer and while the political class frets over the Democratic presidential debates and the aborted visit of two members of Congress to Israel, the Trump administration has quietly moved to extend and make permanent the government’s authority to spy on all persons in America.

The president, never at a loss for words, must have been asked by the intelligence community he once reviled not to address these matters in public.

These matters include the very means and the very secret court about which he complained loud and long during the Mueller investigation. Now, he wants to be able to unleash permanently on all of us the evils he claims were visited upon him by the Obama-era FBI and by his own FBI. What’s going on?

Here is the backstory.

After the lawlessness of Watergate had been exposed – a president spying on his political adversaries without warrants in the name of national security – Congress enacted in 1978 the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act. It prescribed a means for surveillance other than that which the Constitution requires.

Intel recruitment

China’s Spies Are on the Offensive

In early 2017, Kevin Mallory was struggling financially. After years of drawing a government salary as a member of the military and as a CIA and Defense Intelligence Agency officer, he was behind on his mortgage and $230,000 in debt. Though he had, like many veteran intelligence officials, ventured into the private sector, where the pay can be considerably better, things still weren’t going well; his consulting business was floundering.

Then, prosecutors said, he received a message on LinkedIn, where he had more than 500 connections. It had come from a Chinese recruiter with whom Mallory had five mutual connections. The recruiter, according to the message, worked for a think tank in China, where Mallory, who spoke fluent Mandarin, had been based for part of his career. The think tank, the recruiter said, was interested in Mallory’s foreign-policy expertise. The LinkedIn message led to a phone call with a man who called himself Michael Yang. According to the FBI, the initial conversations that would lead Mallory down a path of betrayal were conducted in the bland language of professional courtesy. That February, according to a search warrant, Yang sent Mallory an email requesting “another short phone call with you to address several points.” Mallory replied, “So I can be prepared, will we be speaking via Skype or will you be calling my mobile device?”

Privacy security

The spy in your wallet: Credit cards have a privacy problem

I recently used my credit card to buy a banana. Then I tried to figure out how my credit card let companies buy me.

You might think my 29-cent swipe at Target would be just between me and my bank. Heavens, no. My banana generated data that’s probably worth more than the banana itself. It ended up with marketers, Target, Amazon, Google and hedge funds, to name a few.

Oh, the places a banana will go in the sprawling card-data economy. Despite a federal privacy law covering cards, I found that six types of businesses could mine and share elements of my purchase, multiplied untold times by other companies they might have passed it to. Credit cards are a spy in your wallet — and it’s time that we add privacy, alongside rewards and rates, to how we evaluate them.

Financial safety

Chinese Drug Kingpins Use Bitcoin, According to U.S. Treasury

The U.S Department of the Treasury is reporting that it is coordinating actions to place additional financial pressure on Chinese drug kingpins. These mafia-like groups are said to be responsible for a large portion of synthetic opioids in the U.S. and use Bitcoin to avoid reporting and currency restrictions.

The U.S. Department of the Treasury is targeting an international drug trafficking operation which manufactures and sells lethal narcotics. Fujing Zheng is one of the Chinese nationals currently under economic restrictions, who controls both the Zheng DTO narcotics racket and Qinsheng Pharmaceutical Co. Ltd. Xiaobing Yan is another major player in the criminal enterprise.

Outer space

Russia’s Roscosmos invents armor to protect satellites from debris flying through space

Russia’s Roscosmos space agency has invented a shield system for protecting satellites from being damaged by flying objects that could smash into them as they hurtle through space.

A patent filed with the Federal Service for Intellectual Property (Rospatent) shows that the two-layer shield, made from aluminum plates, is covered in numerous staggered conical ‘spikes,’ which are coated with a hard alloy. The spaces between the cones are filled in with carbon-fiber-reinforced carbon, a composite material used to build spacecraft and missile noses.

The armor is designed to break objects into smaller fragments which would then be pushed in different directions, hitting the cone-shaped base of the protective shield as the force of the object diminishes. The patent specificationnotes that the system should be 10 percent lighter than a flat shield. 

Satellites and spacecraft currently use a variety of anti-meteorite shields to protect against space debris such as rocks and other “space junk”.

Environmental security

18 nuclear power plants in the EU are operating without a valid license

There are 18 active nuclear power plants currently operating without a valid license in the European Union, according to a report seen by Business Insider.

Many of the power plants should have already been subject to an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA), according to a report put together by Germany's Green Party member and nuclear expertSylvia Kotting-Uhl.

An EIA aims to identify the environmental consequences of major projects, such as the construction of an airport, and has proposed some lesser damaging alternatives.

Some of the EU countries running the illegal power plants include the Netherlands, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Belgium, Finland, the UK, Sweden, and Switzerland.

The number does not take into account the 34 other illegal nuclear power plants in neighboring European countries that aren't part of the EU.

Military

China's military power may surpass the US's faster than you think, thanks to 6 shrewd strategies

China's military power is quickly becoming the greatest threat to US military primacy. From posturing in the South China Sea to damaging hacking campaigns, the Chinese government is investing more time and resources into its military strategy, and it shows.

A June report from the Center for a New American Security, co-authored by former Deputy Secretary of Defense Robert O. Work,outlines the ways China's strategy and technology threaten to best the US in a great power struggle — and what the US can do to maintain its military primacy.

By employing cyber attacks and hacking to steal US military technology, China is circumventing the long, painstaking research and development phase of weapons manufacturing.

In January and February of 2018, hackers working for the Chinese government were able to steal 614 gigabytes of information from a military contractor about a secretive US Navy project called Sea Dragon, intended to upgrade and improve current US weapons systems by introducing a "disruptive offensive capability," The Washington Post reported.

There are many other known instances of Chinese security breaches; and even at high levels of classification and security, the US government has difficulty controlling the intrusions.

Airport security

Airport security: 3D baggage scanners could end liquid restrictions

All major UK airports must introduce 3D baggage screening equipment before the end of 2022, the government says.

Ministers say the technology will boost security, speed up pre-boarding checks, and could end the restrictions on travelling with liquids and laptops.

The equipment, similar to CT scanners used in hospitals, is already being installed at London's Heathrow Airport.

It provides a clearer picture of a bag's contents, which staff can zoom in to and rotate for inspection.

Currently, passengers taking liquid in their cabin baggage are restricted to containers holding no more than 100ml, which must be shown to security staff in a single, transparent, resealable plastic bag of about 20cm (8in) x 20cm.

The limits have been in place since November 2006. Their introduction ended a ban on liquids in the cabin imposed three months earlier, when British police said they had foiled a plot to blow up as many as 10 planes using explosives hidden in drinks bottles.

Intel gathering

UK Spy Agency MI6 to Ramp Up Operations in EU as Brexit Deadline Looms Nearer - Reports

It was earlier reported that Downing Street was planning to pull British diplomats from Brussels in a bid to reinforce the message that the UK is determined to leave the EU by the 31 October deadline.

Britain’s MI6 is sending more of its agents to the EU as the Brexit deadline draws nearer, according to information obtained by The Mail on Sunday.

The Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) is reportedly ramping up its activity in Brussels, Berlin and Paris, as the government is said to be seeking an edge in last minute talks to remove the Irish backstop and facilitate trade deals post-Brexit.

The latest developments come as the intelligence services were allegedly infuriated by UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson's intention to shortly pull British diplomats from Brussels to underpin the message that London will exit the EU by 31 October “do or die”.

Financial safety

NASA investigates the first allegation of criminal activity in SPACE: Astronaut is accused of accessing her wife's bank account from the International Space Station during their messy divorce

NASA is looking into claims that an astronaut accessed her estranged wife's bank account from space during a six-month stint on the International Space Station. 

Decorated astronaut and  US Army lieutenant colonel Anne McClain has been accused of improperly gaining access to Summer Worden's online bank account using NASA computers, the New York Times reported. 

McClain allegedly accessed the bank account as part of a 'highly calculated and manipulated campaign' to obtain custody of Worden's son, who she had given birth to about a year before the couple got married.  

Worden, a former Air Force intelligence officer, brought a complaint against McClain with the Federal Trade Commission, claiming that McClain had committed identity theft, even though none of Worden's funds had been tampered with. 

Outer space

Nuclear Propulsion Could Be 'Game-Changer' for Space Exploration, NASA Chief Says

Humanity's next giant leap could be enabled by next-gen nuclear tech, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine said.

During the sixth meeting of the National Space Council (NSC) today (Aug. 20), the NASA chief lauded the potential of nuclear thermal propulsion, which would harness the heat thrown off by fission reactions to accelerate propellants such as hydrogen to tremendous speeds. 

Spacecraft powered by such engines could conceivably reach Mars in just three to four months — about half the time of the fastest possible trip in a vehicle with traditional chemical propulsion, said NSC panelist Rex Geveden, the president and CEO of BWX Technologies Inc. 

Trade wars

Trump claims he has 'absolute right' to order US companies out of China under 1977 law

President Donald Trump claimed he has the "absolute right" to "order" US companies to stop doing business with China that would involve using his broad executive authority in a new and unprecedented way under a 1977 law.

On Friday, China unveiled a new round of retaliatory tariffs on about $75 billion worth of US goods, the latest escalation in an on-going trade war that's putting a strain on the world's two largest economies. In response, Trump wrote on Twitter later Friday: "Our great American companies are hereby ordered to immediately start looking for an alternative to China including bringing ...your companies HOME and making your products in the USA."

When leaving the White House for the G7 summit in France, Trump told reporters, "I have the absolute right to do that, but we'll see how it goes." He later explained that he was referring to the 1977 International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA), and in a Friday tweet wrote: "For all of the Fake News Reporters that don't have a clue as to what the law is relative to Presidential powers, China, etc., try looking at the Emergency Economic Powers Act of 1977. Case closed!"

Middle East

Iran announces successful test of ‘new missile’ amid rising Gulf tensions

Tehran successfully test-fired a new missile, according to the leader of the elite Revolutionary Guards. The launch comes as Tehran seeks to deter military escalation with the United States in the Persian Gulf.

Major General Hossein Salami disclosed the tests to a group of clerics on Saturday.

“Our country is always the arena for testing a variety of defense and strategic systems and these are non-stop movements towards the growth of our deterrent power,” Salami said, according to the semi-official Tasnim News Agency.

Radiation safety

Lithuania Stocks Up on ‘Millions of Iodine Pills’ Fearing Radiation Leak at Belarus Nuclear Plant

Vilnius, which abandoned nuclear energy a decade ago, has repeatedly voiced opposition to the construction of a nuclear power plant close to its border, branding it a threat to national security. Belarus calls these concerns groundless, citing regular stress tests and close cooperation with foreign partners.

Lithuania has reportedly decided to buy over 4 million iodine tablets in preparation for the opening of a nuclear power plant in neighbouring Belarus.

The Lithuanian government told AP in a statement that the pills, worth roughly $1 million, are expected to be delivered in mid-September.

Citizens will get them for free in case of a radiation leak at the nuclear power plant, which Belarus plans to unveil later this year.

The thyroid cells are damaged or destroyed when they absorb radiation, and iodine is used to block the thyroid gland from radiation exposure.

Geoengineering security

Geoengineering: 'Plan B' for the planet amid climate emergency

Dismissed a decade ago as far-fetched and dangerous, schemes to tame global warming by engineering the climate have migrated from the margins of policy debates towards centre stage.

"Plan A" remains tackling the problem at its source. But the UN's top climate science body has made it clear that slashing carbon pollution won't be enough to keep Earth from overheating.

That has opened the door to a host of geoengineering schemes, and an under-the-radar set of global industry guidelines, currently in review, which could help mainstream them.

Here is a menu of "Plan B" geoengineering solutions, and their potential drawbacks:

Direct CO2 capture

Experiments have shown it is possible to suck planet-warming carbon dioxide directly from the air, converting it into fuel pellets or storing it underground.

Cybersecurity


Espionage and LinkedIn: How Not to Be Recruited As a Spy
The risk that hostile intelligence services will use LinkedIn as a recruitment tool has been widely reported. One such report, by Mika Aaltola at the Finnish Institute of International Affairs published in June 2019, focused on Chinese activity on LinkedIn. The phenomenon, however, is neither confined to Chinese intelligence operations nor limited to that particular social media platform. All intelligence agencies use similar exploits, as illustrated by the Iranian-linked hack of Deloitte in which a LinkedIn connection was used to gain an employee's trust. Even so, the number of reported cases attributed to the Chinese — including those of former intelligence officers such as Kevin Mallory and corporate espionage cases such as one involving an engineer at GE Aviation — suggest their intelligence services are among the most active and aggressive users of LinkedIn as a recruitment tool.

Statecraft

Spies fear a consulting firm helped hobble U.S. intelligence

America’s vast spying apparatus was built around a Cold War world of dead drops and double agents. Today, that world has fractured and migrated online, with hackers and rogue terrorist cells, leaving intelligence operatives scrambling to keep up.

So intelligence agencies did what countless other government offices have done — they brought in a consultant. For the last four years, the powerhouse firm McKinsey has helped restructure the country’s spying bureaucracy, aiming to improve response time and smooth out communication.

Instead, according to nearly a dozen current and former officials who either witnessed the restructuring first-hand or are familiar with the project, the multi-million dollar overhaul has left many within the country’s intelligence agencies demoralized and less effective.

These insiders say the efforts have hindered decision-making at key agencies — including the CIA, National Security Agency, and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.