America is being watched from above. Government surveillance planes routinely circle over most major cities — but usually take the weekends off. Each weekday, dozens of U.S. government aircraft take to the skies and slowly circle over American cities. Piloted by agents of the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS), the planes are…
Category: Counter-Surveillance
Espionage Files: The Brave New World of Drone Hacking
The Israel Police and Shin Bet security service arrested a Gaza resident suspected of hacking into the feeds from Air Force drones and collecting information on troop movements and civilian flights for the Palestinian Islamic Jihad terror group, police said Wednesday. A police statement named the suspect as Majd Ouida, 22, describing him as an…
Espionage Files: The Return of Wetwork
Putin’s Kremlin Employs assassination abroad as State Policy in a manner not seen in Moscow since Stalin By John R. Schindler This week’s announcement by a British court that Russian spies murdered Alexander Litvinenko in London in November 2006, made global headlines. Particularly because the massive report, based on a multi-year investigation, concluded that the…
Modern Crime: The Next Great Hacker Threat Could be Drones
Ryan Satterfield was testing out his new Parrot drone in his backyard in Camarillo, California, when suddenly he wondered: Could it get hacked? Since Satterfield, founder of information security company Planet Zuda, uncovers hacking vulnerabilities for a living, it didn’t take long for him to discover a way to take over the aircraft remotely. He…
Cyber-Warfare: Policing The Dark Web and How it Can Effect National Sovereignty
Cops hack into foreign computers to find cyber criminals As crime continues to proliferate on the so-called dark web, law enforcement agencies are sometimes having to work outside of their jurisdiction. When a suspected criminal acts on the dark web, authorities are unlikely to know where in the world he or she is physically located….
Crusader Corner: Tracking Down Salah Abdeslam
Man Hunting, The Sport of Security Forces Bottom Line Up Front Intelligence agencies must cooperate more rapidly and proactively to counter ISIS’ rapid and haphazard operational tempo. Clandestine operatives must rely on support networks that include overt members of the public. These networks are easily mapped out based on metadata available to nation state…
Espionage Files: Syrian Rebel Spy Chief Claims CIA Ignored Intelligence On Rise of ISIS
Free Syrian Army agent says his agents have been providing the US agency with GPS positions of its leaders and headquarters but the US has failed to act The “spymaster” of a key moderate Syrian rebel group has accused the CIA of failing to act on reams of detailed intelligence his network has been supplying…
Cold War Files: The Americans are Coming
…or is it the Russians? The popular FX series premieres episode one of season four on Wednesday. (March 16th). In case you’re not already read in on the cold-war drama, prepare to be taken back to 1980s Virginia and into the household of Elizabeth and Philip Jennings, a seemingly normal American couple who are actually…