Daily Intel Brief
Russia sends more troops to northern Syria, an explosive envelope delivered to the U.S. Embassy in Madrid is detonated, and Interpol issues red notice for an Angolan tycoon...
Counterterrorism
An explosive envelope that was delivered at the gate of the U.S. Embassy in Madrid was detonated in a controlled environment without injury, two U.S. officials told NBC News on Thursday. Over the past couple of days, similar explosive letters were sent to other locations…
The armed forces of the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) have accused the M23 rebel group and its allies of killing 50 civilians in the eastern town of Kishishe. The army said in a statement on Thursday that the massacre took place on Tuesday, as it also accused the rebels…
Military & Defense
Russia deployed troop reinforcements Wednesday to an area of northern Syria controlled by Kurdish fighters and government troops, residents and a war monitor said, amid fears of a Turkish ground incursion. The move by Damascus ally Moscow comes after Ankara…
North Korea issued an order to munition factories in late October to produce additional conventional artillery shells, Daily NK has learned. Facing a new production order with the big end-of-year reviews approaching, munition factories are reportedly responding with…
Cybersecurity
In mid-November, a threat actor posting on a dark web forum claimed to have stolen the personal information of almost 500 million WhatsApp users. Now, Check Point Research (CPR) has published a new advisory analyzing the exposed files and confirming the leak…
The FBI and CISA revealed in a new joint security advisory that the Cuba ransomware gang raked in over $60 million in ransoms as of August 2022 after breaching more than 100 victims worldwide. This is a follow-up to another advisory issued one year ago, which warned that…
Counterintelligence & Espionage
Serbia’s government on Thursday named a staunchly pro-Russian politician as the Balkan state's new spy chief. Aleksandar Vulin, who served as Serbia’s interior minister in the previous government and held the defense ministry portfolio prior to that…
As Iran tries to stifle anti-regime protests, human rights advocates and lawmakers are concerned Iranian authorities can draw on sophisticated video surveillance technology provided by a Chinese company that uses U.S. manufactured chips. Tiandy Technologies…
Transnational Organized Crime
Global police agency Interpol is asking law enforcement authorities around the world to locate and provisionally arrest Angolan billionaire Isabel dos Santos, the Reuters news agency has reported. Interpol confirmed to the agency on Wednesday that it has issued a red notice for…
Ethnically divided Cyprus ranks first among European Union member nations in the number of migrants it repatriates relative to its population of just over a million people, the country's interior minister said Thursday. Nearly 7,000 migrants were sent back to their home…