Countermeasures
The Supporting and Treating Officers in Crisis (STOIC) Act, which would improve mental health treatment and support for our nation’s law enforcement officers, now heads to the president’s desk for signature.
The bill highlights the need for suicide prevention. Law enforcement officers are... Read More »
U.S. Rep. Jim Langevin (D-RI) criticized the Trump Administration for its refusal to provide Congress with copies of National Security Presidential Memoranda (NSPM) regarding Department of Defense cyberspace operations.
Langevin, the co-chair of the Congressional Cybersecurity Caucus and... Read More »
The Coast Guard released this week a best practices Safety Alert in the wake of what is categorized as a growing cybersecurity threat landscape amid expanded reliance on technology to support vessels.
The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) is encouraging vessel and facility... Read More »
Edwards Air Force Base personnel provided emergency crews to Naval Air Weapons Station China Lake near Ridgecrest, California, in the wake of a pair of high desert area earthquakes.
“Crews maintained their posture locally after the July 4th earthquake; responders went through the base looking... Read More »
Under a new partnering agreement between Wageningen Bioveterinary Research and the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), up to $12.5 million will be put to manufacturing, research and a phase 1 study of a single-dose vaccine for the Rift Valley fever virus.
The vaccine is made... Read More »
The Department of Homeland Security recently released its annual report on Mass Attacks in Public Spaces (MAPS).
Last year there were 27 targeted attacks in the United States in public spaces in which three or more persons were harmed. A total of 91 people were killed and 107 were... Read More »
U.S. Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton (D-DC) proposed legislation to give the District of Columbia home-rule authority over the D.C. National Guard.
This bill -- filed as an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act for fiscal year 2020 -- would give the D.C. mayor the same authority that... Read More »
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has awarded a contract of up to $4.7 million to BAE Systems to integrate machine learning (ML) into platforms deciphering radio frequency signals.
Officials said the Controllable Hardware Integration for Machine-learning Enabled Real-time... Read More »
With a focus on biological threats to the United States and a new, public-private effort to counter them, the Blue Ribbon Study Panel on Biodefense will host its first public meeting in New York City this week.
Their main topic of discussion will be ‘A Manhattan Project for Biodefense’ -- a... Read More »
U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) seized 20 tons of cocaine last month at the Port of Philadelphia and seized the vessel July 4.
The U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania issued a seizure warrant for the vessel, MSC Gayane, after an application was filed by the U.S.... Read More »
A Houston man pleaded guilty to attempting to join and provide information to the terrorist organization the Islamic State of Iraq and al-Sham (ISIS).
Kaan Sercan Damlarkaya, 20, attempted to join and support ISIS, the U.S. Justice Department claims. He provided information to other ISIS... Read More »
Customs and Border Protection (CBP) officials said a pair of recent Laredo enforcement operations yielded narcotics seizures worth a combined estimated street value exceeding $4.1 million.
“I congratulate our officers for their dedication which has prevented these dangerous narcotics from... Read More »
The International Atomic Energy Agency’s (IAEA) Safeguards Statement for 2018 recently determined that the amount of nuclear material subject to IAEA safeguards is continuing to rise.
“Since 2010, the amount of nuclear material under safeguards has increased by 24 percent,” Massimo Aparo,... Read More »
The National Institutes of Health (NIH) awarded a $3.15 million grant to scientists at Portland State University (PSU) to fuel research into a pill-based cure for malaria.
The funding will go to advance the research toward clinical trials. The study is built on the back of a compound created... Read More »
South Africa’s National Institute for Communicable Diseases, in collaboration with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention and other global agencies, held a workshop last month addressing biosecurity and biosafety gaps.
More than 50 experts from the Southern African region met in... Read More »
The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) is holding a competition where teams use robots to navigate and search dark, dangerous, and unpredictable underground tunnels.
The Virtual Tunnel Circuit competition features nine teams vying for prizes totaling $500,000. The competition... Read More »
Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) personnel recently joined a series of partners in addressing the increasing risks of a catastrophic biological event.
Citing such factors as rapid technological advances, an increasingly interconnected world with health security challenges, ongoing global... Read More »
House officials said language from Rep. Elise Stefanik’s (R-NY) Counterintelligence Accountability Act bill has been incorporated in the 2019 Intelligence Authorization Act (IAA).
The IAA ensures the Intelligence Community has the necessary resources, funding, and authorities to protect and... Read More »
A shipment of malangas -- a starchy root vegetable common in South America -- from Mexico to Florida’s Port Manatee was found to contain a rare, aggressive and highly destructive type of New World army ant known as Eciton.
The discovery, made in June, was conducted by U.S. Customs and Border... Read More »
Following the release of a report from the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO), Representatives Lee Zeldin (R-NY-1), Eliot Engel (D-NY-16), Peter King (R-NY-2), and Al Green (D-TX-09) recently urged the advancement of a bill that would preserve the T-Band spectrum for use by emergency... Read More »
U.S. Sen. Bob Casey (D-PA) announced last week that several key provisions that he worked to advance were included in the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA).
The Taking Back Congressional Authority Over War Authorization amendment prohibits the United States from spending funds that could... Read More »
The Department of Justice said an electrical engineer has been found guilty of violating the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) and faces a maximum prison sentence of 219 years.
After a six-week trial, Yi-Chi Shih, 64, a part-time Los Angeles resident, was found guilty of... Read More »
Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) officials said the 2019 Indianapolis 500 aided the department’s nuclear, biological and chemical threat detection process.
During the event, an advanced network of sensors kept continued vigilance, providing security real-time awareness of any... Read More »
In testimony before the House Oversight and Reform Subcommittee on National Security, Dr. Helen Boucher -- treasurer for the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) -- called for action to circumvent the growth of antimicrobial resistance.
“While bacteria develop resistance in nature,... Read More »
The Government Accountability Office (GAO) recently reviewed reports issued from December 2009 through March 2019 on various biological threats and biodefense efforts.
The agency concluded many challenges remain.
GAO concluded in 2011 that there was no broad, integrated national strategy and... Read More »
The International Atomic Energy Agency recently confirmed Iran violated the restrictions on stockpiling enriched uranium specified in the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA).
In response, three Republican senators sent a letter to President Donald Trump urging the administration to put... Read More »
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) published guidance for first responders and emergency managers on how to respond in the first minutes of a radiological dispersal device (RDD), or “dirty bomb.”
The guidance was developed by the DHS’s Science and Technology Directorate (S&T)... Read More »
Department of Homeland Security (DHS) officials said an agency waiver would expedite construction of three miles of a new border wall system in the Border Patrol’s Rio Grande Valley (RGV) Sector.
The work would be located west of Roma near Fronton, in Starr County, Texas, with the waiver... Read More »
Immigration and Custom and Enforcement (ICE) Executive Associate Director Nathalie R. Asher recently offered an assessment of the agency’s January-March 2019 enforcement statistics, citing a commitment to arresting unlawfully present aliens.
“During this time period, more than 85 percent of... Read More »
Dr. Baozhang Wang -- an associate professor in Georgia State University’s Institute for Biomedical Sciences -- received $3.26 million in federal funding this week to help develop a universal flu vaccine over the next five years.
"A novel approach to fighting the flu is needed because there are... Read More »
Researchers at Sandia National Laboratories recently discovered a vulnerability in a standard open-source software for genomic analysis DNA-based medical diagnostics.
Such a vulnerability leaves the software open to cyberattacks.
Researchers found a weak spot while studying the software’s... Read More »
Since the U.S. Army discovered in 1904 that mosquitoes were transmitting yellow fever, malaria, and other diseases, they have been working on ways to protect themselves.
Even in modern times, US troops, deployed to mosquito-infested areas, have been using basic or crude protections.... Read More »
Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) is encouraging Florida League of Cities and Florida Association of Counties officials to take advantage of Department of Homeland Security (DHS) resources to bolster cybersecurity efforts.
Rubio recently forwarded correspondence to both organizations in response to... Read More »
A group of lawmakers recently introduced legislation designed to direct the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to conduct an annual study of deepfakes and other types of similar content.
Deepfakes are hyper-realistic, digital manipulations of real content depicting events that did not... Read More »
House Republican recently introduced fours bills as part of the Republican’s American Security Agenda.
The agenda is aimed at combating new and evolving threats by providing the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) with resources, reforming structure and management, and granting the agency... Read More »
