u/mrkoot

“[…] OpenAI said in a blog post on Thursday that it banned Russian and Iranian accounts that were using the company's artificial intelligence tools to help with influence operations in multiple countries. The operatives said they managed to get their false narratives picked up by news outlets, and in once case, prompted a response from a member of the European Parliament, according to internal reports the operations produced using OpenAI's chatbot, ChatGPT. […]”

“[…] The Committee to Protect Journalists joined partner organizations on Wednesday in condemning the arrest in recent days of six journalists working for independent Egyptian investigative journalism platform Matsda2sh, and calling for their immediate release. […]”

“[…] Di Jin, 41, a resident of Tianjin Municipality in northern China, was charged with acting as an agent of a foreign government without notifying the U.S. attorney general. If convicted, she faces up to 10 years in federal prison. […] The FBI counterintelligence case involves alleged lies, an airport confrontation and claims that Jin was working for the Chinese government while trying to meet with current and former U.S. government officials. […]”

“[…] Identified only as H.L., the suspect is a 52-year-old dual Belgian-Chinese national who reportedly held a senior research position at BelGaN, a microchip maker based in Oudenaarde, East Flanders. The company was the last industrial microchip producer in Belgium, specializing in gallium nitride semiconductors. […] He faces four charges: espionage, participation in a criminal organization, misuse of company assets, and unlawful disclosure of trade secrets. A second suspect, reportedly former BelGaN CEO Alan Zhou Zhen, remains at large. […]”

“[…] A Chinese national who managed to get a job working as a U.S. Customs and Border Protection supervisor in Calais has been arrested and charged in what FBI agents claim was a plot to install modified hardware in Department of Homeland Security computers. […] Terry “Jiajia” Liu […] was arrested after a counter intelligence investigation captured hidden-camera footage of him breaking into government computers and modifying the hard drives. […] Months later, CBP personnel discovered that approximately 23 computers had been modified without authorization. Original processors, memory and hard drives had been replaced with components that did not meet agency requirements. […]”

Open access. Abstract: “The debate on the intelligence cycle is mostly academic and theoretical. Although some exceptions exist, empirical data is largely lacking from the debate. This article aims to contribute an evidence-based approach through in-depth field research at NATO’s Multinational Corps Northeast (MNC NE) in Poland and the Baltic States. It finds that the results largely reflect the academic critique on the intelligence cycle. At MNC NE, steps were skipped, its order was reversed, it was multidirectional and feedback was an issue. The results also show practitioners mostly commented on the cycle from a proceduralist perspective regarding malfunctioning procedures or input as the problem. Especially the lack of clear direction and a limited operational mandate were dominant topics. Others include challenges with open source intelligence (OSINT) and the Intelligence Requirement and Collection Management (IRM&CM) process. Contrary to debate, no substantial critical reflection on the cycle itself was observed.”

Open access. Abstract: “Disinformation by authoritarian regimes is a growing security challenge for democracies. The effectiveness of such disinformation depends on citizens in democratic countries as recipients and potential disseminators. Resilience-building policy therefore requires a better understanding of why audiences might endorse Russian disinformation. Despite relevance in other fields, the role of psychological needs has been overlooked. This article takes an initial theoretical step through a survey study with Greek, Serbian, Swedish, and British respondents. Contrary to expectations, our confirmatory analysis shows that needs are not significantly directly related to disinformation endorsement. However, their role might be more indirect, with associations observed with several other intermediary factors, above all conspiratorial orientation and media choice. The article therefore sketches a more complex picture of the role of psychological needs when it comes to endorsement of Russian disinformation. The findings highlight the value of this needs-based research avenue for future construction of counter-disinformation strategies.”

re: Operation Overload aka Matryoshka, a coordinated Russian propaganda network that creates and spreads fake news and videos, deepfakes and memes using logos of well-known Western media outlets: “[…] Despite a ban on Russian media outlets in Greece in line with EU sanctions, pro-Kremlin content often finds its way into the country’s news as fringe claims are ‘laundered’ into mainstream outlets. […]”

“[…] Ukraine’s Foreign Intelligence Service (FISU) has reported that eight Indonesian citizens were allegedly recruited to serve in the Russian armed forces, prompting the Indonesian government to launch a verification process. […] Indonesia’s Foreign Ministry is investigating the information through its diplomatic representatives in Russia and coordinating with relevant government agencies, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Yvonne Mewengkang said. […] The government will also investigate whether the alleged recruitment involved fraud, exploitation or job offers that concealed the true nature of the work. […]”

“[…] The goal is to mask “digital exhaust,” the metadata automatically emitted by mobile phones, such as location and specific device IDs. […] The device must “mimic realistic patterns of life to defeat automated network analysis,” DoD said. […]”

Gift link to bypass paywall: https://www.ftm.eu/articles/travel-app-polarsteps-military-sensitive-data-leaked?share=Tl9Ev5mh3UkwjECJXU8Ep8JSOmh21AVGzBAcPvtnb%2FrH5DLPK5IYX7zxRvanHw%3D%3D

Quoting the "This article in 1 minute" section from the article:

What’s the news?

• Travel app Polarsteps has some 23 million users worldwide. Users can log their journeys with the help of the app – but because of weak privacy protections inside the app, FTM managed to download and trace the exact locations of many of them.  
• This means that FTM could view where people spent their holidays, where they went on work trips, and sometimes where they dropped their children off at kindergarten. In many cases, this was also possible when the users had not put their profiles on public and only shared photographs and locations with followers.
• This included over 30 military personnel from different countries including the United States, the United Kingdom, France, and Belgium. In many cases their likely home addresses were also found.
• In total, FTM accessed some 230 million photographs and videos.

Why does it matter?

• This privacy issue has existed for a long time. At the latest in December 2025, the company was warned about the issues, but had not fixed them.
• According to security experts, the information poses severe risks, including stalking and potential blackmail. 
• Polarsteps is a company based in the Netherlands. The Dutch privacy authority told FTM that social media companies have a responsibility to protect their users against their data being collected.

How was this investigated?

• A French cybersecurity specialist tipped off FTM after he found the backend of the app revealed much more information than a normal user can see in the app.
• FTM scraped the data of over 23 million users, including house addresses, profile pictures, connections and in many cases GPS-locations and photos and videos.

 

“[…] U.S. military officials say they have disabled advertising trackers on a ​range of phones and computers, according to letters, opens new tab released on Friday by U.S. Senator Ron Wyden and statements given ‌to Reuters, a development that follows reports that commercially available location data had been used to target American forces in the Middle East. […]”

“[…] Biwei Zhang, 33, will remain in custody after a Belgian judge on Monday denied the former NATO intern’s appeal for release. […] Because of the seriousness of the allegations and the risk that the suspect may abscond, it is "rather unlikely" that Zhang will be released before the trial, one Belgian legal expert told CBC News. […] The trial likely won’t begin until sometime next year "at the earliest," he said. […] Verbruggen says the spying charges against Zhang will likely be a "test case" for Belgian courts, as definitions of espionage were updated in 2024 to account for modern techniques of intelligence gathering. […] Depending on whether there are any alleged aggravating factors, Verbruggen expects Zhang could face up to a decade in prison if convicted of espionage or three years' imprisonment for working with a criminal organization. […]”

“[…] EDRi member SHARE Foundation has confirmed that at least 14 people in Serbia were targeted with advanced spyware since the beginning of 2026 – the largest documented wave of such surveillance in the country to date. Those targeted include members of the student movement, activists, a member of parliament, and a local councilor, all from opposition parties. The timing the of spyware attacks coincides with the local elections held on March 29, 2026. […]”

“[…] The Russian president is waging war against the West, and organized crime networks are becoming an ever more important tool in this conflict. Indeed, it is increasingly difficult to tell the security services from the criminal gangs. […]”