Daily Intel Brief
Russian mercenaries in Africa, Chinese spy drones in the UK, and IS attacks in Nigeria...
Counterterrorism
Aman linked to environmental extremist acts in the mid 1990s and early 2000s has pleaded guilty to conspiracy to commit arson in California and Oregon, and arson in Oregon, according to a news release Friday from the US Department of Justice. According to the DOJ…
Gunmen on Saturday attacked a police station in central Nigeria's Kogi state and killed three policemen, an official said, as the Islamic State claimed responsibility and gave a higher toll. The attackers stormed the police station in Adavi town and a fierce gunbattle ensued…
Military & Defense
When abuses were reported in recent weeks in Mali — fake graves designed to discredit French forces; a massacre of some 300 people, mostly civilians — all evidence pointed to the shadowy mercenaries of Russia’s Wagner Group. Even before these feared professional…
North Korea's state media boasted Sunday that its armed forces had "gained invincible power" under leader Kim Jong Un as it prepares for a major army holiday that analysts say could be marked with a military parade or major weapons test…
Cybersecurity
Conti ransomware attack was aimed at destabilizing government transition, Costa Rican president says
Several systems operated by the government of Costa Rica were hit with a ransomware attack this week, according to the country’s president Carlos Alvarado Quesada. The Conti ransomware group added systems connected to several government agencies to its list of…
Threat analysts report that zero-day vulnerability exploitation is on the rise, with Chinese hackers using most of them in attacks last year. Zero-day vulnerabilities are security weaknesses in software products that are either unknown or have not been fixed at the time…
Counterintelligence & Espionage
Chinese agents are using drones to spy on the nuclear sub base in Faslane, say top brass. They believe Beijing spooks are behind 18 drone sightings above UK military sites and power stations in just two years. Faslane in Helensburgh, Dunbartonshire, is home to Trident…
WhatsApp messages between a Turkish prosecutor and a former police officer who was his alleged cohort in a network involving Turks and Iranian intelligence operatives show how they are paid for helping Iranians abduct dissidents. D.Y. was arrested in February on charges of…
Transnational Organized Crime
The Lebanese military Sunday recovered the bodies of five migrants whose boat carrying nearly 60 people sank the night before, raising the death toll to six, state media reported. The National News Agency said the five bodies were found near a small island off the coast of…
The deteriorating security, economic, and living conditions in Syria have pushed many young people to seek asylum outside their homeland — in Turkey or Europe — in a bid to overcome life’s difficulties and problems and lead a decent life away from the conflict in their country…