The U.S.intelligence community (IC) has assessed the origins of COVID-19 and reached these tentative conclusions: • “Four IC elements and the National Intelligence Council assess with low confidence that the initial SARS-CoV-2 infection was most likely caused by natural exposure to an animal infected with it or a close progenitor virus—a virus that probably would […]
The HackerNews reports that Google and Microsoft “are pledging to invest a total of $30 billion in cybersecurity advancements over the next five years, as the U.S. government partners with private sector companies to address threats facing the country in the wake of a string of sophisticated malicious cyber activity targeting critical infrastructure, laying bare […]
We need to be continually reminded of the chaotic state of the U.S. Capitol grounds on January 6, 2021 to keep realizing that such thuggery can, indeed, happen. Claire Meyer on Today in Security contributes to that unceasing effort. “According to the Associated Press,” Meyer writes, “the inspector general’s report found that most of the […]
Ilan Fuchs, Ph.D., on the American Military University EDGE blog, discusses the fall of Saigon, South Vietnam and, 46 years later, Kabul, Afghanistan. “One point that has been on my mind”, he writes, “has to do with how events such as the fall of Kabul have affected how the U.S. is now perceived around all […]
Sarah Coble on the Infosecurity magazine blog reports that hospitals in West Virginia and Ohio, part of the Memorial Health System group, were hit by a cyber-attack earlier this month (August, 2021). The disruption forced the medical centers “to divert patients to other care providers and work from paper records.” “Threat actors targeted Memorial Health […]
More from Silvertrac, a guide for promoting site security: “Pros & Cons of Using GPS (Global Positioning System) for Security Guard Tracking” “Security guard tracking is an important piece of effective guard management,” a Silvertrac post advises, “but without other processes in place, it will only tell part of the story.” “If an angry client […]
Steve Lasky at SecurityInfowatch reports on the return of football fans to college stadiums “As the NCAA college football season prepares for its new season,” Lasky advises, “there is an air of optimism that the COVID menace has been vanquished enough to allow for full stadiums and normality in the locker room for all collegiate […]
With the situation in Afghanistan looking pretty dire, the U.S, Department of Homeland Security “has issued a new National Terrorism Advisory System (NTAS) Bulletin regarding the current threat environment across the United States. “The Homeland continues to face a diverse and challenging threat environment leading up to and following the 20th Anniversary of the September […]
Brandon Lee on the IT Security Guru site discusses “What characteristics make up an effective password policy?” Lee comes down for using passphrases instead of passwords. “Passphrases,” he explains, “offer many benefits over traditional passwords. These benefits include easier to remember than passwords with special characters. They are much longer and stronger passwords that can […]
Words that don’t go well together include “good enough” and “security”. Daniel Miessler deals with them in a post on his blog, “The Strange World of ‘Good Enough’ Fencing”. “So I was walking around earlier today near a construction site,” he writes, “and saw all the different fences that were keeping people out of the […]