FROM THE DESK OF CLEARANCEJOBS.COM
College questions. Contributor Ron Kness writes, “When searching for a school, one can never be too careful. Once GI Bill benefits are gone, they are gone for good, so it is important to use them wisely by doing due diligence when choosing a school. Nobody is going to watch out for you except you!”
Cyber-job market. Contributor Charles Simmins writes, “The Federal Government is very open about its need for more cyber specialists in all its departments and agencies. Competition with the private sector for qualified applicants is intense and the government has a disadvantage. . . . The various agencies, however, are using new authority and new appropriations to try to fill these empty chairs.”
THE FORCE AND THE FIGHT
Metro warfare. Defense News’ Jen Judson reports, “US land forces will eventually find themselves locked in fights within huge, dense urban environments where skyscrapers tower over enormous shanty towns, and these troops need more realistic training to operate within these future megacities . . . . ‘I’ve trained in every environment, jungle, the desert, the mountains, cold weather, but I’ve never really trained well in an urban environment,’ said Brig. Gen. Julian Alford, the Marine Corps Warfighting Laboratory commander . . . .”
Spec ops women. The Christian Science Monitor’s Anna Mulrine reports, “With the lifting of the ban on women in special operations forces earlier this month, female service members are no longer automatically disqualified from being Navy SEALs, Delta Force operators, and Army Rangers because of their gender. The Pentagon’s next big step is figuring out how to make it work. To this end, Defense officials launched a couple of big studies earlier this year to give them a sense of the major concerns and points of resistance among the troops who do these jobs.” See also, “Women in government: A slow but steady progression up.”
Recruiting terrorists. Homeland Security News Wire reports, “Understanding the reasons why young people are susceptible to recruitment by violent extremist organizations like the ISIS is a formidable undertaking requiring a multidisciplinary approach. An ambitious U Chicago research — the Social and Neurological Construction of Martyrdom Project – will use functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate the neural pathways through which martyrdom appeals evoke sympathy in the viewer. They aim to uncover exactly what is happening in the brain when an individual is persuaded to change their beliefs.” See also, “Uzbek group in Syria trains children for jihad.”
World according to Russia. The Atlantic’s Jeffrey Tayler reports, “The two-hour-plus film, Miroporyadok (World Order), explores, in the words of its narrator Vladimir Solovyov, ‘what is happening with us [Russians], what sort of world we have inherited from our parents, and what sort of world we will leave to our children.’ Partly through interviews with the Russian president himself, it also offers a window on Putin’s own realpolitik perspective, one that I’ve found to be widely shared throughout Russia over many years of living in the country—a worldview according to which international relations consist of competing blocs of nations pursuing their interests, and the violation of sovereignty is a recipe for instability.”
CONTRACT WATCH
Reverse auction contracts reviewed. Government Executive contributor Jimmy Christianson writes, “Dozens of organizations representing hundreds of thousands of America’s small construction firms— whether minority-owned, women-owned, veteran-owned, HUBZone or just plain old small business—agree: using reverse auctions to procure construction services for the federal government does not save money, does not encourage quality and does not help small businesses.”
Congressional cybersecurity contracts. Federal Times’ Aaron Boyd reports, “The U.S. Senate has been beefing up its cybersecurity and now the Office of the Sergeant at Arms (SAA) is looking for contractors that can help conduct threat and intelligence analysis on the network. The SAA issued a sources sought announcement on FedBizOpps seeking possible vendors. While there is no official solicitation yet, respondents can get pre-qualified to bid on a potential future RFP.”
TECH, PRIVACY, & SECRECY
Quantum cryptography quirks. We Live Security’s Narinder Purba reports, “Quantum cryptography, considered to be one of the most complex and unbreakable methods of encryption, has been found to be vulnerable to attack, according to a major new study. Published in Science Advances, the paper concluded that energy-time entanglement, which underpins many forms of quantum cryptography, is exploitable. Researchers from Stockholm University and Linköping University observed in theoretical models and later in actual experiments that the critical security flaw could allow for attackers to ‘eavesdrop on traffic without being detected’.” See also, “Swedish researchers hack ‘unbreakable’ quantum encryption.”
TERN, TERN, TERN. Space Daily reports, “Small-deck ships such as destroyers and frigates could greatly increase their effectiveness if they had their own unmanned air systems (UASs) to provide intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) and other capabilities at long range around the clock. Current state-of-the-art UASs, however, lack the ability to take off and land from confined spaces in rough seas and achieve efficient long-duration flight. Tern, a joint program between DARPA and the U.S. Navy’s Office of Naval Research (ONR), seeks to provide these and other previously unattainable capabilities.”
Hacks of the year. Wired’s Kim Zetter writes, “Every year hack attacks seem to get worse—whether in their sophistication, breadth, or sheer brazenness. This year was no different. Big hacks hit a range of high-profile targets, from the web’s leading adultery website to the federal Office of Personal Management. We’re also ending 2015 with a doozy of a hack mystery: Juniper Networks discovered two unauthorized backdoors in its NetScreen firewalls, one of which would allow the unknown hackers to decrypt protected traffic passing through the firm’s VPN/firewall.”
POTOMAC TWO-STEP
Foul! “The Obama administration confirmed Wednesday that it is looking at ways to sanction Iran over over its recent test of a ballistic missile, a move that comes as the two countries are implementing a historic nuclear deal. . . . The sanctions would be the first major U.S. sanctions leveled against Iran since the nuclear agreement was reached in July, and they risk the possibility of angering Iran, which has suggested it would view such actions as a violation of the nuclear deal.”
Tops for the year. “By any measure, 2015 was a remarkable year in the world of politics. Here’s a look back at some of the most compelling stories of the past twelve months . . . .”
OPINIONS EVERYONE HAS
“Events of Geopolitical Consequence to Anticipate in Asia in Early 2016.” The Diplomat contributor Ankit Panda offers, “2016 is just around the corner and there’s a lot to keep an eye on in Asia in the first month of the year. . . . Here’s your guide to starting off the new year with an eye to some early developments of geopolitical significance in the Asia-Pacific . . . .”
“Corruption in Ukraine is so bad, a Nigerian prince would be embarrassed.” Reuters contributor Josh Cohen argues, “Ukraine needs radical reforms to root out graft. After 18 months in power, Poroshenko still refuses to decisively confront corruption. It’s time for Poroshenko to either step up his fight against corruption — or step down if he won’t.”
THE FUNNIES
2016.
