News of the Cyber World

[kyonides]

Intel Officials, Generals Sound Alarm on Tech Threat Posed by CCP

Former Director of the National Counterintelligence and Security Center (NCSC) William Evanina called China “an existential threat” at a hearing Thursday of the House Homeland Security Subcommittee on Counterterrorism, Law Enforcement, and Intelligence.
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Evanina pointed to intellectual property theft, high-tech espionage, and efforts to co-opt the U.S. government by electing CCP officials—something he called “elite capture”—as some of the biggest threats from the Asian superpower.
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The former NCSC director also warned that “80 percent of American adults have had all of their private data stolen by the Communist Party of China.”
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[U.S. Air Force, Lt. Gen. Joseph T.] Guastella suggested that China’s rapid military advancement can be attributed to its studying American technology and methods.

“Their military now enjoys leading-edge capabilities that include long-range precision strike hypersonic weapons, advanced integrated air defense weapons, stealthy aircraft surface-to-air missiles, and electronic warfare.”

On the recent Chinese high-altitude surveillance balloon...a Brown University professor said the incident illustrates the CCP’s willingness to assume risks in the pursuit of intelligence.

FTC Orchestrated Aggressive Campaign to Harass Twitter After Elon Musk Takeover

The Committee on the Judiciary and the Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government released an interim report highlighting the FTC’s apparent overreach in making more than 350 specific demands for information within a period of less than three months after Musk took the helm.

According to the report, the federal agency inundated Twitter with demands to reveal information about hiring and firing decisions and “every internal communication relating to Elon Musk.”

Particularly concerning for the panel, the FTC wanted the names of journalists who were granted access to internal Twitter files during their work “to expose abuses by Big Tech and the federal government.”

Among others, the FTC sent over 60 letters demanding information about Twitter’s subscription product alone. The agency also demanded to know if Twitter was “selling its office equipment” and “all of the reasons” why former FBI official Jim Baker was fired.

“These demands have no basis in the FTC’s statutory mission and appear to be the result of partisan pressure to target Twitter and silence Musk,” the report states

 The FTC truly behaved more like some private company's administration board instead of a simple federal regulator.

Visa, Mastercard Pause Implementation of New Code to Track Gun Purchases

Visa and Mastercard confirmed on March 9 that they’re pausing implementation of a new code that will help track gun purchases.

They are among the credit card companies working on a implementing a new merchant category code (MCC) for gun and ammunition stores.

Visa, explaining the pause, stated that it stemmed from how legislators in multiple states are considering legislation to prohibit or restrict the use of the code.
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Mastercard said that the bills would cause “inconsistency” in how the code could be used.
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Discover, which planned to start the tracking in April, said in an emailed statement that it was removing the new MCC from its next network update planned for April in order “to continue alignment and interoperability with the industry.”

Congress Data Breach Will Have ‘Adverse Impact’ on Thousands, Say House Leaders

House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-N.Y.) said Congressional leaders believe the recent data breach at DC Health Link could have an adverse impact on thousands of people and is “highly problematic.”

Jeffries said in a March 9 press conference that he and House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) would “continue to work on this issue in a bipartisan way, get to the bottom of what happened, [and] figure out the implications of what has occurred.
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The lawmaker went on to say that the House leaders are going to “need some real reassurance as to guardrails that are put in place to prevent this type of data breach from ever happening again.”

A spokesperson for Capitol Police told The Epoch Times that their agents are “assisting the FBI with the ongoing investigation.”
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The House of Representatives CAO Catherine Szoindor stated in a letter circulated on March 8 that the U.S. Capitol Police and DC Health Link had informed her office of a “significant data breach,” as The Epoch Times previously reported.
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“Speaker McCarthy and Democratic Leader Jeffries have formally requested additional information from DC Health Link on what data was taken, who was impacted, and what steps they are taking—including providing credit monitoring protections—to protect House victims of this breach.