In The News

The FBI Used the Web’s Favorite Hacking Tool to Unmask Tor Users

Kevin Poulson December 29, 2014
Anonymity on the Tor network may be compromised: “FBI agents relied on Flash code from an abandoned Metasploit side project called the ‘Decloaking Engine’ to stage its first known effort to successfully identify a multitude of suspects hiding behind the Tor anonymity network,” reports Kevin Poulson for Wired. “Tor, a free, open-source project originally funded by the US Navy, is sophisticated...

The Lost Children: France Takes Stock of Growing Jihadist Problem

Julia Amalia Heyer November 19, 2014
In regulating immigration, policy planners anticipate newcomers to assimilate, especially over generations. Most do, but children of immigrant families long settled in France are often intrigued by jihad. Julia Amalia Heyer profiles a French family – the mother atheist and the father Muslim – whose 17-year-old daughter traveled to Antakya on the Turkish-Syrian border and then called home to...

How Social Media Is Helping Islamic State to Spread Its Poison

Con Coughlin November 11, 2014
Exposure of top-secret, massive US surveillance operations by Edward Snowden – and subsequent efforts by companies like Twitter, Facebook, Google and Apple to counter the surveillance – is aiding the Islamic State, contends Con Coughlin for the Telegraph. “Aided by the increased use of encryption software by the leading internet service providers, terrorist groups such as the Islamic State … have...

Putin, ISIS, Ebola: How Globalization Harms Us More Than Helps

Melik Kaylan October 16, 2014
Upheaval over geopolitical rivalries, religious strife and disease raises questions as to whether greater interconnectedness is destabilizing the world. Melik Kaylan, writing for Forbes, suggests that Russia’s President Putin is at the helm of a worldwide reaction against globalization: “The multicultural poly-sexual utopia without borders that American-style globalism sells as a matter of...

Facebook and Gmail Face Blacklist Under Russian Web Laws

Roland Oliphant October 7, 2014
Russia has demanded that Western internet companies like Gmail, Facebook and Twitter register with Russia’s communication watchdog group and create servers that Russian officials can access. Officials have warned that companies that do not comply will face sanctions and, as some westerners expect, possible expulsion. The big companies fall into the net of Russia’s “blogger laws,” imposed in...

Saving Languages Through Korean Soap Operas

Rose Eveleth October 6, 2014
About half of the world’s languages are at risk of falling into disuse in the near future. This rapid disappearance of languages is attributed to globalization, which has granted languages like English a special status of utility that rare languages do not share. Translators from entities like the Living Tongues Institute seeking to preserve endangered languages are working with “Viki,” a website...

iOS Trojan Spies on Hong Kong Protesters

Stephanie Mlot October 2, 2014
A massive group of protesters using smart phones, all eager for specific news about their event, clicking on links, is a ripe target for cyber-surveillance. Pro-democracy demonstrators in Hong Kong suspect that China has infiltrated their phones with a fake application that is really a Trojan for the Apple mobile operating system, or iOS. Similar reports have emerged about Android phones, too....