DHS Reauthorization
The U.S. House of Representatives has passed the Reauthorization of the Department of Homeland Security Act, bill HR 2825. The vote was 386 for and 41 against, with 32 democrats and 9 republicans in opposition. It’s next up to the U.S. Senate to deliberate and vote. “The threats we face have evolved in the past…
Read MorePassports
A passport is a critical travel document without which you are literally grounded. We might nowadays associate passports mainly with train and aviation travel. But there are biblical references to travel documents that survive til today. In the Old Testament (Nehemiah 2:7-9), around…
Read MoreTextalyzer
Perhaps you can relate: driving to work this morning on the highway a car in the lane next to me started to gradually slow down and then it was swerving a bit. As I sped past, I saw the driver looking down at his phone, no doubt texting. Once I reached my exit, the off…
Read MoreInvisible Code
Earlier this month, NSA employee Ms. Reality Winner was found distributing a printed copy of sensitive information to the publication Intercept. Although the NSA did not verify the exact means by which they were able to determine that it was Ms. Winner who printed the document, one possible way is via micro dots. The…
Read MoreIran’s Push for Power
Since 1979, the Islamic Republic of Iran has tried to establish itself as a dominant power in the Middle East. The goal to dominate during the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s cost both sides of the conflict millions of lives and billions of dollars. While the Iran-Iraq war was essentially over the Shaat al-Arab (the…
Read MoreReality is Stranger than Fiction
Reality Winner who worked for Pluribus International at their offices in Georgia was arrested this week under the Espionage Act for sending a classified document to Intercept, a publication first created in 2014 as a platform to report on documents released by Edward Snowden. Ms. Winner faces one count of “gathering, transmitting or losing defense…
Read MorePerception and Travel Risk
I recently went to Paris and before my departure, more than one friend warned me to be careful while in Europe. When I arrived in Paris, my French friends expressed concern over the shootings at schools in the U.S. It seems that danger is to a degree a matter of perspective. Our perspective is most…
Read MoreManchester Attack – Known Vulnerabilities
With the Manchester U.K. suicide bombing incident still under investigation, it is hard to draw final conclusions regarding security failures in this incident. What we know now is that the Manchester Suicide Bomber exploded himself at the foyer of the arena immediately after the concert ended at around 10:30PM and just as thousands of young…
Read MoreBin Laden Marketing to Lone Wolves
Bin Laden is an über brand name in terrorism. Osama Bin Laden’s son, Hamza, has recently narrated a video encouraging Lone Wolf terrorists to act, one of several videos he has made over the last few years. Hamza was often featured in his father’s videos, holding a weapon or reciting. Clearly it is hoped that…
Read MoreSecurity at Cannes
Next week is the opening of the famous Cannes Film Festival, celebrating its 70th anniversary with maximum glitz and glamour. Hundreds of thousands attend. After the horrific terrorist attack in nearby Nice last July, and the particularly tense political atmosphere roiling in the south of France, festival organizers are ramping up security. Again. Last year…
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