Counterterrorism
Pakistan’s military said Sunday five of its troops were killed when militants from across the Afghan border opened fire on them. The attack, believed to be one of the deadliest such incidents in recent years, took place in the Pakistani district of Kurram on the border…
Iran on Sunday put on trial the alleged leader of a US-based "terrorist group" accused of being behind a deadly mosque bombing in 2008, the judiciary said. Iran-born Jamshid Sharmahd, 66, who is also a German national and a US resident, is charged with spreading…
The Office of Justice Programs’ National Institute of Justice (NIJ) today published an article discussing the NIJ-supported and publicly available Violence Project Database that identifies common traits of persons who engaged in mass shootings between 1966 and 2019…
Military & Defense
White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said Sunday that Russia could invade Ukraine “any day,” launching a conflict that would come at an “enormous human cost.” The senior adviser to President Joe Biden offered another stark warning the day after…
Growing challenges in Mali are forcing Germany's military to consider the future of operations in the West African state. There are around 1,200 German personnel deployed. Germany's defense minister on Sunday expressed doubt as to whether Germany's military…
Russia has almost completed preparations for a large-scale invasion of Ukraine which could lead to 50,000 civilian casualties, the Washington Post report. The paper warns that not only could this lead to thousands of deaths and injuries, but it could topple the Ukrainian…
Cybersecurity
North Korean cyber-attacks have stolen millions of dollars worth of cryptocurrency to fund the country's missile programmes, a UN report briefed to media says. Between 2020 and mid-2021 cyber-attackers stole more than $50m (£37m) of digital assets, investigators found…
News Corp, one of the largest media conglomerates in the world, said today that it was hacked by Chinese government-backed hackers, the company revealed today in documents filed with the US Securities Exchange Commission and in a report in the Wall Street Journal, one of its…
The usual tax-season barrage of cybercriminal activity is already underway with a phishing campaign impersonating the popular accounting and tax-filing software. Just in time for tax season, Intuit is warning customers of a phishing campaign that threatens to close user…
Counterintelligence & Espionage
A Danish court has found three members of an Iranian opposition group guilty of spying for Saudi Arabia. The three men were detained by police in February 2020 and are members of the Saudi-backed Arab Struggle Movement for the Liberation of Ahvaz (ASMLA)…
Despite damning revelations of unauthorized police used of NSO spyware to derive information on state witness Shlomo Filber, the trial of former Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is expected to resume on Monday, according to a report on Channel 13 News…
A court in Crimea has rejected an appeal by an alleged Ukrainian spy and confirmed his 12-year prison sentence, the TASS news agency reported on Friday, citing Russia's FSB security service. Ukraine's foreign ministry demanded that Konstantin Shiring, the alleged spy…
Transnational Organized Crime
The U.S. Navy announced Sunday it seized a boat in the Gulf of Oman carrying fertilizer used to make explosives that was caught last year smuggling weapons to Yemen. The British royal navy said it confiscated 1,041 kilograms (2,295 pounds) of illegal drugs in the same waters…
In the war raging between drug cartels in western Mexico, gangs have begun using improvised explosive devices (IEDs) on roads to disable army vehicles. The self-defense movement in the town of Tepalcatepec, in western Michoacan state, said improvised land mines severely…
Sixteen people died in Mexico's central state of Zacatecas following an apparent violent dispute between criminal gangs, authorities said on Saturday, as the state grapples with a spike in violence. State prosecutor Francisco Murillo said 10 bodies were found wrapped…