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Informing your decisions with actionable intelligence
Start your day with intelligence. Get The OODA Daily Pulse.
Informing your decisions with actionable intelligence
A friend from the biz used to say that after a few days out of the office he would delete any emails or other messages older than 72 hours old; odds are that whatever was being discussed prior to that point was likely to have been overtaken-by-events, so why bother wasting time trying to catch…
A government consultant, using computer programs easily found on the Internet, managed to crack the FBI’s classified computer system and gain the passwords of 38,000 employees, including that of FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III. The break-ins, which occurred four times in 2004, gave the consultant access to records in the Witness Protection Program and…
Teri O’Brien at The American Thinker considers the impact that Apple-like compartmentalization would have on . . . well . . . the IC: So, I think [DNI Negroponte] should resign, and President Bush should give [his] gig to Apple CEO Steve Jobs. To understand why, check out the article in this morning’s Wall Street…
Charlie is on the job: Years without an intelligence strategy to secure U.S. borders resulted in uncoordinated and sometimes incomplete threat information about immigrants, a top counterterrorism official said Wednesday. Only over the past year has the Bush administration begun to develop plans to analyze border security gaps with information gleaned from all the intelligence…
Given a chance to cut back on future leaks, the Senate balks: The U.S. Senate has refused to protect whistleblowers in intelligence agencies. The Senate last week passed a markedly different version of whistleblower protection legislation than the U.S. House of Representatives had previously approved, resulting in a call by one congressman for the creation…
To say that I am on the anti-secrets-publication bandwagon would be something of an understatement, but while listening to various editors and reporters on the radio talking about the rightness or wrongness of revealing classified material during a time of war (which is a debatable point in some circles), a couple of questions occurred to…
Nearly five years after the Sept. 11 attacks, the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security continue to clash over who is in charge of coordinating and vetting information on terrorism. As a result, state and local authorities continue to get conflicting or incomplete information – sometimes none at all – on threats inside the United…
. . . so little privacy: Almost every piece of personal information that Americans try to keep secret — including bank account statements, e-mail messages and telephone records — is semi-public and available for sale. That was the lesson Congress learned over the last week during a series of hearings aimed at exposing peddlers of…
You will probably only find it in a second-hand bookstore (I found mine in Ottawa), or you can wait a month and maybe Amazon will be able to find a paperback version for you, but a great book on a fantastic intelligence success is The Double-Cross System by Sir J.C. Masterman. The short version: British…
Pesky details courtesy of Captain’s Quarters: I think that we have known of a handful of recovered chemical-weapons shells, but not 500. That number has more significance. An artillery company could have laid down a very effective attack on an enemy position, quickly killing or disabling them in a manner outlawed for decades. Of course,…
First, in light of recent events and because I am a good steward of the virtual planet, allow me to recycle this post as well as this one. Second, and at the risk of beating a dead horse, could we please stop with rating from privacy advocates about how government investigation into large pools of…
A former Defense Intelligence Agency analyst has pleaded guilty to illegally holding classified documents and admitted in a plea agreement to passing “top secret” information to Chinese intelligence officials. Ronald N. Montaperto, the former analyst who held a security clearance as a China specialist at a U.S. Pacific Command research center until 2004, pleaded guilty…
Consider: Seven radical (black) Muslims arrested in Miami Mid-2005 Population of black men between 20-39 in US prisons: ~ 500,000 (DOJ BJS) In 2004, # Muslim men in just federal facilities ~9,000 (DOJ OIG) % of Muslims in federal facilities who declare affiliation with Sunni or Nation of Islam: 85 All elephants are gray, but…
Last May Finland and neighboring Sweden announced bids to join NATO after Russia first invaded Ukraine last February. Turkey became the final and 30th member to ratify Finland’s bid to join NATO on Thursday and Finland is expected to finalize their membership in the coming days. Sweden continues to face opposition to joining the alliance. Finland…
Russia is sending a delegation to North Korea to offer food in exchange for weapons. US national security spokesperson John Kirby said any arms deal between North Korea and Russia would violate UN Security Council resolutions. The US has previously accused North Korea of supplying arms to Russian forces in Ukraine along with the Wagner…
South Sudan’s President Salva Kiir has appointed a member of his own party as defense minister. This appointment breaches a peace deal in which the role should be selected by the party of the First Vice President and opposition leader, Riek Machar. Defense Minister Angelina Teny was fired alongside the interior minister this month, causing…
Nine people have died after two US Army helicopters crashed on Wednesday night in the state of Kentucky. The incident involved the 101st Airborne Division and happened during a training mission near a military base. The crash happened at 21:35 local time near the large Fort Campbell military base. The two Blackhawk helicopters crashed during…
A malware campaign that is targeting cryptocurrency wallets was recently disclosed by security researchers at Kaspersky. Kaspersky researchers detailed the findings in a recent advisory, stating that the attacks were first observed in September 2022 and consisted of threat actors deploying malware to replace part of clipboard contents with cryptocurrency addresses. The attacks are relatively…
US President Joe Biden has moved to approve an executive order that bans government use of any commercial spyware products that have been identified to have been misused by foreign states. The misuse includes spying on citizens, dissidents, politicians, activists, and other individuals. The ruling applies to any and all tools that are used for…
A persistent threat actor from the South Asia region has been observed by security researchers targeting the nuclear energy sector in China. Security firm Intezer detailed the cyberespionage campaign purported by a threat group dubbed ‘Bitter.’ The group has been active since t least 2021 and is known for targeting of energy and government organizations…
OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT has confirmed that it suffered from a data breach that was caused by a bug in an open source library. In addition, a cybersecurity firm identified an actively exploited vulnerability affecting its recently introduced component. OpenAI stated on Friday that it had taken the chatbot offline temporarily to address the…
A fire broke out in an immigration detention facility in northern Mexico near the United States border and killed and injured dozens of people. The fire is one of the deadliest incidents at an immigration lockup in the country and occurred late Monday at a facility in Ciudad Juarez. At least 39 people died in…
Pirates attacked and boarded a Danish-owned ship in the Gulf of Guinea on Saturday. After the pirates boarded the ship, all communications channels withe the ship are down. All 16 crew members of the ship sought refuge in a safe room on board the ship. The Liberian-flagged oil and chemical tanker was sitting idle and…
Consumer and environmental groups claim that new EU anti-greenwashing rules have failed to prevent companies from spreading misinformation online about their products. Over half of the examined environmental claims in Europe were vague, misleading, or unfounded, a European Commission study found. The commission states that this creates an uneven playing field in the EU’s market…
Latitude Financial, a consumer lender firm headquartered in Melbourne, Australia, has confirmed that a cyberattack that was disclosed earlier this month had more drastic effects than previously thought. According to the company, the breach resulted in the theft of over 14 million customer records, including sensitive personal information included on driver’s licenses. Latitude Financial stated…
Taiwan’s ex-President Ma Ying-jeou has become the first sitting or former Taiwanese leader to visit China since the revolution in 1949. This visit has been called regrettable by Taipei’s ruling party. Ma was met at Shanghai’s Pudong International Airport on Monday by officials including the deputy head of China’s Taiwan Affairs Office. The visit has…
Chinese state-sponsored threat actor connected to the Operation Soft Cell campaign has been observed by security researchers at SentinelOne targeting Middle East telecom providers. SentinelOne has dubbed the campaign Operation Tainted Love and stated that it has been active since early 2023. The campaign exhibits a well-run credential theft capability and a new dropper mechanism…
The US and Canada have reached a deal to reject asylum seekers at unofficial border crossings. There have been large numbers of migrants making unsanctioned border crossings at Roxham Road on the US-Canada border. This deal closes a loophole created by a 2004 asylum agreement with the US where migrants have to make their asylum…
UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has met Benjamin Netanyahu as the Israeli leader is facing protests over judicial reforms. The two leaders met at Downing Street ahead of talks over security and the threat from Iran. Mr Netanyahu is also expected to meet Home Secretary Suella Braverman during his visit. Hundreds of protesters gathered at…
The US has carried out air strikes against groups linked to Iran in eastern Syria after a drone attack killed a US contractor. Eight fighters in the group were killed in the airstrikes. The air strikes occurred on Thursday night, after the drone attack by the group. Last August, the US bombed sites in eastern…
Security researchers have identified another threat leveraging the popularity of ChatGPT to spread malware and conduct nefarious activities. The latest attack is a fraudulent Chrome extension masquerading as ChatGPT. The threat actors behind the application forked a legitimate open source extension and added malicious code to steal Facebook session cookies from victims. The threat actors…
Australia’s leader has unveiled details of a planned referendum which could change its constitution for the first time in almost 50 years. The referendum, if approved later this year, would establish an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Voice. This would be a formal body for indigenous people to give advice on laws. Prime Minister Anthony…
A new Android banking Trojan dubbed Nexus by security researchers has been identified in several malicious campaigns across the world. The tool is promoted as part of a malware-as-a-Service subscription and allows threat actors to perform a variety of malicious activity, including account takeover. The banking Trojan was identified in January 2023 by security researchers…
Ethiopia’s Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed has created an interim government for the country’s northern region of Tigray, a first step in the implementation of a peace plan to end the ongoing war there. The interim administration appointed Tigray People’s Liberation Front delegate Getachew Reda as head of the administration. The administration was established to be…
Informing your decisions with actionable intelligence
Informing your decisions with actionable intelligence