Author: Ethan Johnson

(Kulfi) — Rep. Clay Higgins (R-LA) recently announced that the U.S. Department of Agriculture will provide assistance to crawfish farmers in the state to help them with their fish farming in the wake of the recent drought that has impacted the crawfish season. Deep sea crawfish have also been adversely affected by their season and are left without any help. “Whenever any disaster happens, they always leave us out of the loop. We're not allowed to do anything. I don't know why, because we're the crawfish industry,” said Ben Bienvenu, vice president of the Louisiana Crawfish Growers Association. The drought…

Every day, people write that artificial intelligence has the potential to revolutionize government services, making them more efficient, more responsive, and more people-centric. And on March 28, the Office of Management and Budget released final guidelines for the use of AI by government agencies (M-24-10). After spending extensive time at the highest levels of the legislative and executive branches of government and working with governments around the world on how to effectively use technology, a new memo from the Office of Management and Budget teaches how to improve government outcomes. It is clear that there is a significant lack of…

Companies working on classified U.S. government projects may soon be required to use encryption algorithms that protect their data and technology from quantum computer attacks. Bloomberg reports that in July, the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), an agency of the U.S. Department of Commerce, plans to designate three encryption algorithms that it believes are sufficient to protect against the threat of quantum computers. The report says these algorithms will be a significant step toward “quantum cryptography” for U.S. government contractors, establishing international standards for protecting everything from state secrets to online transactions. added. “Breaking codes not only threatens…

Sanctions are a fact of life, but the question is: should they be sanctioned? In a global economy, it is important to consider what methods actually work As children, we are taught that every negative action has negative consequences. A logical extension of that concept is that actions deemed inappropriate or contrary to a government's interests would be subject to sanctions programs that ultimately aim to have an undesirable impact on a country in a way that forces a change in behavior. It means you can deal with it. However, as sanctions are applied more frequently and over longer periods…

The Federal Bureau of Prisons faced a surprise visit, this time to FCI Sheridan in Oregon. … [+] The results were dire.Copyright 2020 Associated Press. All rights reserved The Department of Justice's Office of Inspector General (OIG) released a report on FCI Sheridan, one of several federal prison facilities across the country. While the report specifically highlighted problem areas in Sheridan, most are simple challenges that exist across the BOP. This report reflects the results of separate unannounced inspections of BOP facilities (see reports for Tallahassee and Waseca here). The OIG stated that Sheridan “…significant shortages of correctional officers and…

Ron Prosser, Israel's ambassador to Berlin, was arrested Wednesday by the government of German Chancellor Olaf Scholz after the envoy made a dramatic appeal on X (formerly Twitter) for the federal government to completely reject the legitimacy of the ICC. Rejected.Scholz's spokesman Steffen Hebestreit was asked on Wednesday whether the German government would enforce the ICC arrest order against Netanyahu on suspicion of war crimes with the Iron Sword.Mr Hebestright replied: “Of course. Yes, we will abide by the law.” German government spokesperson Steffen Hebestreit was recently asked whether an ICC arrest warrant would be executed in Berlin. His…

In March, WhatsApp’s security team issued an internal warning to their colleagues: Despite the software’s powerful encryption, users remained vulnerable to a dangerous form of government surveillance. According to the previously unreported threat assessment obtained by The Intercept, the contents of conversations among the app’s 2 billion users remain secure. But government agencies, the engineers wrote, were “bypassing our encryption” to figure out which users communicate with each other, the membership of private groups, and perhaps even their locations. The vulnerability is based on “traffic analysis,” a decades-old network-monitoring technique, and relies on surveying internet traffic at a massive national…

President Trump's threats against Biden range from ominous warnings to concrete plans for retaliation. Many of these threats revolve around reenacting his own legal predicament against Biden, which he calls the “weaponization” of the Justice Department. In one post about Special Counsel Jack Smith's investigation, he warned:the impact is much greater More than Biden and his thugs can comprehend,” and the ongoing investigation would open a “Pandora's box” of retaliation. In another post, Trump said the federal indictment was “set a bad precedent For yourself, Joe. The same thing can happen to you. ” In July, Trump reposted coverage of…

The U.S. government and rival technology companies, including Google and CrowdStrike, recently criticized Microsoft for failing to prevent China from hacking their systems. One of the changes Microsoft is currently making is tying executive compensation to the success of its cybersecurity strategy. While new pay approaches for top business leaders are not common, compensation experts say Microsoft's move has sparked discussions at other companies. Microsoft has recently come under fire from both the U.S. government and rival companies for failing to prevent China from hacking its systems last summer. One change tech giants are making in response is to tie…

U.S. water utilities have become easy targets for state-backed groups to test their ability to infiltrate infrastructure and remain unnoticed.This year alone, groups from China, Iran, and Russia have been found hiding in OT infrastructure systems used to control water utilities, with some groups flooding them with water.As a result, the Environmental Protection Agency has decided to step up testing of U.S. drinking water to reduce the impact of a successful attack on water facilities.Light of hope?Recent inspection results for U.S. water utilities have not been encouraging, with EPA's own testing showing that 70% of water systems will meet cyber…