The United States Defense Department is contemplating a bold approach to safeguard Taiwan against potential Chinese aggression by employing a vast array of drones to create an “unmanned hellscape” across the island. Concurrently, the US National Institute of Standards and Technology has partnered with the AI ethics group Humane Intelligence to launch a red-team challenge aimed at identifying vulnerabilities and biases in generative AI technologies.
WIRED investigates the Telegram channel and site known as Deep State, which combines public information and covert intelligence to update a live-map detailing the dynamic military lines in Ukraine. Additionally, demonstrators gathered at Citi Field in New York this Wednesday to highlight the severe privacy implications connected with using facial recognition technology at sports facilities, a practice that is becoming more common in venues nationwide without significant regulatory supervision. Furthermore, Amazon Web Services has revised the guidelines on how users should set up authentication for its Application Load Balancer following the discovery by researchers of a configurational flaw that could potentially expose misconfigured web applications.
In other news, US Navy officials disclosed to Military.com this week about the supply challenges with the standard Navy Working Uniform (NWU) pants, now unavailable at Navy Exchanges and extremely limited across other distribution channels. According to spokesperson Courtney Williams, the Navy’s Exchange Service Command is currently facing “severe shortages of NWU trousers” both in physical stores and online, with world stock levels at mere 13 percent. The primary focus at this time is to ensure the availability of trousers for new enlistees at Recruit Training Command in Illinois, the Naval Academy Preparatory School in Rhode Island, and the officer training schools.
The current uniform shortage in the Navy is attributed to problems with the Defense Logistics Agency’s supply chain for pants. According to Military.com, Navy Exchanges display notices stating the shortage is “due to Defense Logistics Agency vendor issues.” It has been reported that communication with DLA regarding a timeline for production and re-supply is ongoing.
Mikia Muhammad, representing the Defense Logistics Agency, has informed Military.com that pant restocks will begin in October, focusing initially on recruits and training programs. Navy exchanges are expected to receive full support starting January.
Recently, a collaborative declaration by the FBI, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency accused Iran of executing a hack-and-leak campaign aimed at Donald Trump’s presidential effort. This follows Trump’s accusation via a social media post on August 10, which was one day after Microsoft’s report on Iranian hackers targeting American political campaigns. The Iranian authorities have refuted these claims.
The US intelligence trio stated that there is firm confidence in Iran’s attempt to tap into the US election by targeting individuals closely connected to both major political party campaigns through social engineering and other tactics aimed at influencing the electoral process.
Politico reported on August 10 that Iran had breached the Trump campaign, and an entity known as “Robert” had reached out to the outlet offering alleged stolen documents. This same entity also made contact with The New York Times and The Washington Post, proposing similar documents.
The well-known flight-tracking service FlightAware reported that a “configuration error” in its systems resulted in the exposure of personal customer data, including names, email addresses, and some Social Security numbers. The exposure was discovered on July 25, although the company mentioned in a breach notification to the attorney general of California that the mishap could date as far back as January 2021. Consequently, all affected users are required to reset their account passwords.
The company’s public announcement stated that the exposed data comprised “user ID, password, and email address. Depending on the information you provided, the exposed data might also have included your full name, billing address, shipping address, IP address, social media accounts, telephone numbers, year of birth, the last four digits of your credit card number, details about aircraft owned, industry, title, pilot status (yes/no), and your account activity (such as flights viewed and comments posted).” In its disclosure to California, the company also noted, “Additionally, your Social Security Number may have been exposed.”
Since the hacking of the encrypted phone company Sky by European law enforcement agencies in 2021, the communications they uncovered have been utilized as evidence in numerous EU investigations and criminal cases. According to a review of court documents by 404 Media and Court Watch, US agencies have relied heavily on this pool of approximately half a billion chat messages for multiple drug-trafficking prosecutions, especially those targeting alleged cocaine smugglers using commercial ships and speedboats.
