China is Detaining Many Americans, Release?

Posted on June 19, 2018June 19, 2018 by Denise Simon

One has to wonder why Obama, Hillary or John Kerry did not work for their release.

In 2015, the Obama administration issued a warning to China to call off security agents working in the United States as part of Operation Fox Hunt. The agents were pressuring expatriate Chinese, including some wanted on corruption charges.

According to the state-run Xinhua news agency, Operation Fox Hunt has nabbed 2,566 fugitives who fled overseas in 90 countries to avoid Chinese authorities.

A total of 1,283 were convinced to return or turned themselves in, including 410 Communist Party members or official staff.

A hunt for China’s 100 most-wanted fugitives has resulted in the return of 39 people under a program called Sky Net.

China asked Obama more than once to return key Chinese located in the United States to China. In most cases, Obama said no. Meanwhile, China is holding Americans and it seems their release continues to be the subject of discussions.

China's Top Financial Fugitives Flee Abroad: New Report ... photo

The Daily Beast reports:

In its ongoing campaign to extend its reach beyond its borders, the Chinese government has found a new form of leverage: American citizens in China.

Last year, Beijing prevented several U.S. citizens from leaving China, including a pregnant woman, according to email correspondence obtained by The Daily Beast. The total number of so-called exit bans placed on U.S. citizens in China is unknown, but at least two dozen cases have occurred within the past two years, according to one analyst’s estimate.

Chinese authorities typically target U.S. citizens of Chinese heritage for exit bans, usually in connection with an investigation. Sometimes, Beijing uses American citizens to try to coerce family members residing in the United States to return to China or to cooperate with Chinese authorities in investigations.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has championed a sweeping anti-corruption campaign with an international element, known as “Operation Fox Hunt,” aimed at pursuing Chinese citizens who have fled abroad after allegedly committing economic crimes. The United States does not have an extradition treaty with China and in the past has rarely cooperated with Chinese demands to repatriate Chinese citizens whom Beijing considers to be fugitives. Beijing has previously deployed undercover agents to the United States to coerce targets into returning to China, violating U.S. visa laws and prompting U.S. government indignation.

Now the People’s Republic seems to have found another lever of pressure. If one of Beijing’s targets living in the United States has relatives in China, Chinese authorities aren’t shy about applying pressure to those relatives, even if they are U.S. citizens. Exit bans are a “pretty new tool in the Chinese toolbox” for exerting such pressure, said John Kamm, founder of the U.S. nonprofit Dui Hua Foundation, which works on sensitive human rights cases in China.

“That individual might be treated as a material witness,” said Kamm. “Or that individual might be in effect being held as a hostage in an effort to get the people back.”

The Trump administration has pushed back quietly but firmly against exit bans. For example, in the lead-up to the first U.S.-China Law Enforcement and Cybersecurity Dialogue, held in Washington, D.C., in October 2017, Attorney General Jeff Sessions pushed for China to allow the free travel of three U.S. citizens who had been prevented from leaving China, including a pregnant woman, according to emails reviewed by The Daily Beast.

“Both sides will continue to cooperate to prevent each country from becoming a safe haven for fugitives and will identify viable fugitive cases for cooperation,” reads the U.S.-China joint statement released on Oct. 6, after the dialogue concluded. “Both sides commit to take actions involving fugitives only on the basis of respect for each other’s sovereignty and laws.”

It’s a delicate balancing act for an administration that also wishes to deport Chinese citizens who are in the United States illegally. In the past, China has often refused to accept deportations, leaving the United States with a large number of Chinese asylum seekers with final deportation orders. In 2015, Beijing’s refusal to accept deportees began to coincide with its push to repatriate fugitives it claimed were guilty of corruption. The Obama administration signed a memorandum of understanding with China to help expedite the deportation process, but remained reluctant to agree to Chinese demands to extradite fugitives.

Human rights groups have warned that fugitives may face torture or death back in China, also expressing concerns that Beijing might use trumped-up corruption charges to get their hands on troublesome political dissidents abroad.

The Department of Justice did not respond to emailed questions. The National Security Council did not respond to a request for comment.

The State Department declined to comment regarding the fate of those three U.S. citizens, citing privacy concerns, but a State Department spokesperson said that the U.S. government had not agreed to repatriate any Chinese citizen due to pressure from exit bans. More here.

Next Mission is Citizenship Cheaters, Finally

Posted on June 11, 2018June 11, 2018 by Denise Simon

The USCIS is authorized to cancel any Certificate of Citizenship or Naturalization in cases where evidence provided to government documents is proven false.

Just 5 days ago: U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS) assisted in an investigation that led to U.S. District Judge Virginia M. Hernandez Covington sentencing Enite Alindor, also known as Odette Dureland, to five months in federal prison. The 55-year-old woman was sentenced for making false statements in a matter relating to naturalization and citizenship and for procuring naturalization as a U.S. citizen. As part of her sentence, the court also entered an order de-naturalizing her, thus revoking her July 2012 naturalization as a U.S. citizen. A federal jury had found her guilty on March 1, 2018.

According to court documents, Alindor, a citizen of Haiti, applied for asylum with the Immigration and Naturalization Service (INS) in Miami in 1997. After the INS denied that application, the United States Immigration Court ordered her to be removed from the United States. Shortly thereafter, Alindor presented herself to the INS as Odettte Dureland and filed for asylum protection under that new identity. She concealed the fact that she had previously applied for status in the United States as Enite Alindor, and she concealed the fact that she was under a final order for removal from the United States. USCIS personnel, unaware of the Alindor identity and order of removal, approved Dureland for citizenship in July 2012, and she was naturalized as a U.S. citizen under that name in July 2012.

When Prosecutors Cheat Justice to Protect Aliens ... photo

How about this one from January?

Iyman Faris is set to be released from prison in 2020 after serving 17 years behind bars for terrorism-related charges stemming from a plot to destroy the Brooklyn Bridge. By the time he gets out, American authorities hope, he will no longer be able to call the U.S. his home.

The Justice Department has filed a lawsuit to try to strip the Pakistan-born Faris of his citizenship, which he obtained in 1999, saying it’s an affront to allow him to continue to be an American citizen.

It’s just the type of case authorities say they expect to pursue more frequently under President Trump and Attorney General Jeff Sessions.

“The attorney general and the administration are focused on enforcing all immigration laws, especially when it comes to this pinnacle level of citizenship,” said one Justice Department official, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

AG Sessions is holding true to his mission on immigration.

(AP) — The U.S. government agency that oversees immigration applications is launching an office that will focus on identifying Americans who are suspected of cheating to get their citizenship and seek to strip them of it.

U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services Director L. Francis Cissna told The Associated Press in an interview that his agency is hiring several dozen lawyers and immigration officers to review cases of immigrants who were ordered deported and are suspected of using fake identities to later get green cards and citizenship through naturalization.

Cissna said the cases would be referred to the Department of Justice, whose attorneys could then seek to remove the immigrants’ citizenship in civil court proceedings. In some cases, government attorneys could bring criminal charges related to fraud.

Until now, the agency has pursued cases as they arose but not through a coordinated effort, Cissna said. He said he hopes the agency’s new office in Los Angeles will be running by next year but added that investigating and referring cases for prosecution will likely take longer.

“We finally have a process in place to get to the bottom of all these bad cases and start denaturalizing people who should not have been naturalized in the first place,” Cissna said. “What we’re looking at, when you boil it all down, is potentially a few thousand cases.”

He declined to say how much the effort would cost but said it would be covered by the agency’s existing budget, which is funded by immigration application fees.

The push comes as the Trump administration has been cracking down on illegal immigration and taking steps to reduce legal immigration to the U.S.

Immigrants who become U.S. citizens can vote, serve on juries and obtain security clearance. Denaturalization — the process of removing that citizenship — is very rare.

The U.S. government began looking at potentially fraudulent naturalization cases a decade ago when a border officer detected about 200 people had used different identities to get green cards and citizenship after they were previously issued deportation orders.

In September 2016, an internal watchdog reported that 315,000 old fingerprint records for immigrants who had been deported or had criminal convictions had not been uploaded to a Department of Homeland Security database that is used to check immigrants’ identities. The same report found more than 800 immigrants had been ordered deported under one identity but became U.S. citizens under another.

Since then, the government has been uploading these older fingerprint records dating back to the 1990s and investigators have been evaluating cases for denaturalization.

Earlier this year, a judge revoked the citizenship of an Indian-born New Jersey man named Baljinder Singh after federal authorities accused him of using an alias to avoid deportation.

Authorities said Singh used a different name when he arrived in the United States in 1991. He was ordered deported the next year and a month later applied for asylum using the name Baljinder Singh before marrying an American, getting a green card and naturalizing.

Authorities said Singh did not mention his earlier deportation order when he applied for citizenship.

For many years, most U.S. efforts to strip immigrants of their citizenship focused largely on suspected war criminals who lied on their immigration paperwork, most notably former Nazis.

Toward the end of the Obama administration, officials began reviewing cases stemming from the fingerprints probe but prioritized those of naturalized citizens who had obtained security clearances, for example, to work at the Transportation Security Administration, said Muzaffar Chishti, director of the Migration Policy Institute’s office at New York University law school.

The Trump administration has made these investigations a bigger priority, he said. He said he expects cases will focus on deliberate fraud but some naturalized Americans may feel uneasy with the change.

“It is clearly true that we have entered a new chapter when a much larger number of people could feel vulnerable that their naturalization could be reopened,” Chishti said.

Since 1990, the Department of Justice has filed 305 civil denaturalization cases, according to statistics obtained by an immigration attorney in Kansas who has defended immigrants in these cases.

The attorney, Matthew Hoppock, agrees that deportees who lied to get citizenship should face consequences but worries other immigrants who might have made mistakes on their paperwork could get targeted and might not have the money to fight back in court.

Cissna said there are valid reasons why immigrants might be listed under multiple names, noting many Latin American immigrants have more than one surname. He said the U.S. government is not interested in that kind of minor discrepancy but wants to target people who deliberately changed their identities to dupe officials into granting immigration benefits.

“The people who are going to be targeted by this — they know full well who they are because they were ordered removed under a different identity and they intentionally lied about it when they applied for citizenship later on,” Cissna said. “It may be some time before we get to their case, but we’ll get to them.”

Hat Tip to the FBI for Operation Wire Wire

Posted on June 11, 2018June 11, 2018 by Denise Simon

Beyond phishing, there is vishing and smishing.

Vishing is using the phone, either a land line or cell.

Smishing is scamming your text messages.

Tactics are constantly being developed. Are you paying attention?

Outline of how the business e-mail compromise is executed by some organized crime groups, from identifying a target to grooming to exchanging information to receiving a wire transfer from the victim.

more here

Department of Justice

Office of Public Affairs

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Monday, June 11, 2018

74 Arrested in Coordinated International Enforcement Operation Targeting Hundreds of Individuals in Business Email Compromise Schemes

42 Alleged Fraudsters Arrested in the United States

Federal authorities announced today a significant coordinated effort to disrupt Business Email Compromise (BEC) schemes that are designed to intercept and hijack wire transfers from businesses and individuals, including many senior citizens. Operation Wire Wire, a coordinated law enforcement effort by the U.S. Department of Justice, U.S. Department of Homeland Security, U.S. Department of the Treasury and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, was conducted over a six month period, culminating in over two weeks of intensified law enforcement activity resulting in 74 arrests in the United States and overseas, including 29 in Nigeria, and three in Canada, Mauritius and Poland. The operation also resulted in the seizure of nearly $2.4 million, and the disruption and recovery of approximately $14 million in fraudulent wire transfers.

BEC, also known as “cyber-enabled financial fraud,” is a sophisticated scam often targeting employees with access to company finances and businesses working with foreign suppliers and/or businesses that regularly perform wire transfer payments. The same criminal organizations that perpetrate BEC also exploit individual victims, often real estate purchasers, the elderly, and others, by convincing them to make wire transfers to bank accounts controlled by the criminals. This is often accomplished by impersonating a key employee or business partner after obtaining access to that person’s email account or sometimes done through romance and lottery scams. BEC scams may involve fraudulent requests for checks rather than wire transfers; they may target sensitive information such as personally identifiable information (PII) or employee tax records instead of, or in addition to, money; and they may not involve an actual “compromise” of an email account or computer network. Foreign citizens perpetrate many BEC scams. Those individuals are often members of transnational criminal organizations, which originated in Nigeria but have spread throughout the world.

“Fraudsters can rob people of their life’s savings in a matter of minutes,” said Attorney General Sessions. “These are malicious and morally repugnant crimes. The Department of Justice has taken aggressive action against fraudsters in recent months, conducting the largest sweep of fraud against American seniors in history back in February. Now, in this operation alone, we have arrested 42 people in the United States and 29 others have been arrested in Nigeria for alleged financial fraud. And so I want to thank the FBI, nearly a dozen U.S. Attorneys’ Offices, the Secret Service, Postal Inspection Services, Homeland Security Investigations, the Treasury Department, our partners in Nigeria, Poland, Canada, Mauritius, Indonesia, and Malaysia, and our state and local law enforcement partners for all of their hard work. We will continue to go on offense against fraudsters so that the American people can have safety and peace of mind.”

“This operation demonstrates the FBI’s commitment to disrupt and dismantle criminal enterprises that target American citizens and their businesses,” said FBI Director Christopher A. Wray. “We will continue to work together with our law enforcement partners around the world to end these fraud schemes and protect the hard-earned assets of our citizens. The public we serve deserves nothing less.”

“The Secret Service remains committed to aggressively investigating and pursuing those responsible for cyber-enabled financial crimes,” said U.S. Secret Service Director Randolph “Tex” Alles. “Although the explosive expansion of the cyber domain has forced us to develop innovative ways of conducting these types of investigations, our proven model remains the same.”

“FinCEN has been a leader in the fight against BEC and other cyber-enabled crime,” said FinCEN Director Kenneth A. Blanco. “Since 2014, working with our domestic and international partners, our Rapid Response Program has helped recover over $350 million stolen from innocent Americans. We must continue to be smarter, quicker, and better than the criminals that we face every day. Today’s action is a victory, but it will take vigilance, time, and resources to take this fight into the future. In defense of the victims of these crimes, we are ready for the challenge.”

“The U.S. Postal Inspection Service has a long history of successfully investigating complex fraud and corruption cases,” said Chief Postal Inspector Guy Cottrell. “We are proud to work alongside our fellow law enforcement partners in major efforts, such as Operation Wire Wire, to target those individuals who take advantage of the American public for illegal profits. Anyone who engages in deceptive practices like this should know they will not go undetected and will be held accountable, regardless of where they are. Postal Inspectors will continue to work tirelessly to protect our customers from fraud.”

A number of cases involved international criminal organizations that defrauded small to large sized businesses, while others involved individual victims who transferred high dollar funds or sensitive records in the course of business. The devastating effects these cases have on victims and victim companies, affect not only the individual business but also the global economy. Since the Internet Crime Complaint Center (IC3) began keeping track of BEC and its variant, Email Account Compromise (EAC), as a complaint category, there has been a loss of over $3.7 billion reported to the IC3. BEC and EAC is a prevalent scam and the Justice Department along with our partners will continue to aggressively pursue and prosecute the perpetrators, including money mules, regardless of where they are located.

Money mules may be witting or unwitting accomplices who receive ill-gotten funds from the victims and then transfer the funds as directed by the fraudsters. The money is wired or sent by check to the money mule who then deposits it in his or her own bank account. Usually the mules keep a fraction for “their trouble” and then wire the money as directed by the fraudster. The fraudsters enlist and manipulate the money mules through romance scams or “work-at-home” scams.

Starting in January 2018, this coordinated enforcement action targeted hundreds of BEC scammers. In addition, law enforcement agents executed over 51 domestic actions including search warrants, money mule warning letters, and asset seizure warrants totaling nearly $1 million. Local and state law enforcement partners on FBI task forces across the country, with the assistance of multiple District Attorney’s Offices, charged 15 alleged money mules for their role in defrauding victims. These money mules were employed by the fraudsters to launder their ill-gotten gains by draining the funds into other accounts that are difficult to trace.

Among those arrested on federal charges in BEC schemes include:

Following an investigation by the FBI and the U.S. Secret Service, 23 individuals were charged in the Southern District of Florida with laundering at least $10 million from proceeds of BEC scams, including eight people charged in an indictment unsealed last week in Miami. These eight defendants are alleged to have conspired to launder proceeds from numerous BEC scams, totaling at least approximately $5 million, including approximately $1.4 million from a victim corporation in Seattle, as well as various title companies and a law firm.
Following an investigation led by the FBI with the assistance of the IRS Criminal Investigation, Gloria Okolie and Paul Aisosa, both Nigerian nationals residing in Dallas, Texas, were charged in an indictment filed on June 6 in the Southern District of Georgia. According to the indictment, they are alleged to have victimized a real estate closing attorney by sending the lawyer a spoofing email posing as the seller and requesting that proceeds of a real estate sale in the amount of $246,000 be wired to Okolie’s account. They are charged with laundering approximately $665,000 in illicit funds. The attorney experienced $130,000 in losses after the bank was notified of the fraud and froze $116,000.
Adeyemi Odufuye aka “Micky,” “Micky Bricks,” “Yemi,” “GMB,” “Bawz” and “Jefe,” 32, and Stanley Hugochukwu Nwoke, aka Stanley Banks,” “Banks,” “Hugo Banks,” “Banky,” and “Jose Calderon,” 27, were charged in a seven-count indictment in the District of Connecticut in a BEC scheme involving an attempted loss to victims of approximately $2.6 million, including at least $440,000 in actual losses to one victim in Connecticut. A third co-conspirator Olumuyiwa Yahtrip Adejumo, aka “Ade,” “Slimwaco,” “Waco,” “Waco Jamon,” “Hade,” and “Hadey,” 32, of Toledo, Ohio, pleaded guilty on April 20 to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud. Odufuye was extradited from the United Kingdom to the United States and on Jan. 3, pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to commit wire fraud and one count of aggravated identity theft. Nwoke was extradited to the United States from Mauritius on May 25, marking the first extradition in over 15 years from Mauritius. His case is pending.
Richard Emem Jackson, aka Auwire, 23, of Lagos, Nigeria, was charged in an indictment filed on May 17 in the District of Massachusetts with two counts of unlawful possession of a means of identification as part of a larger fraud scheme. According to the indictment, on two occasions in 2017, Jackson is alleged to have possessed the identifications of two victims with the intent to commit wire fraud conspiracy. In another case being prosecuted in the District of Massachusetts, a 25-year-old Fort Lauderdale, Florida man was indicted in federal court in Boston on June 6 on one count of money laundering conspiracy. According to the indictment, the individual was part of a conspiracy that engaged in wire fraud. It is alleged that in early 2018, the defendant’s co-conspirators gained access to email accounts belonging to a Massachusetts real estate attorney and sent emails to recipients in Massachusetts that “spoofed” the real estate attorney’s account in an attempt to cause the email recipient to transfer nearly $500,000, which was intended to be used for payment in connection with a real estate transaction, to a shell account belonging to a money mule recruited and controlled by the defendant.

The BEC scam is related to other forms of fraud such as:

“Romance scams,” which lull victims to believe that their online paramour needs funds for an international business transaction, a U.S. visit or some other purpose;
“Employment opportunities scams,” which recruits prospective employees for work-from-home employment opportunities where employees are required to provide their PII as new “hires” and then are significantly overpaid by check whereby the employees wire the overpayment to the employers’ bank;
“Fraudulent online vehicle sales scams,” which convinces intended buyers to purchase prepaid gift cards in the amount of the agreed upon sale price and are instructed to share the prepaid card codes with the “sellers” who ignore future communications and do not deliver the goods;
“Rental scams” occur when renters forward a check in excess of the agreed upon deposit for the rental property to the victims and request the remainder be returned via wire or check and back out of the rental agreements and ask for a refund; and
“Lottery scams,” which involves persons randomly contacting email addresses advising them they have been selected as the winner of an international lottery.

The cases were investigated by the FBI, U.S. Secret Service, U.S. Postal Inspection Service, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement’s Homeland Security Investigations, the U.S. Department of the Treasury Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) and IRS Criminal Investigation. U.S. Attorney’s Offices in the Districts of Central California, Connecticut, Eastern Virginia, Massachusetts, Nebraska, New Jersey, Southern Florida, Southern Georgia, Southern Texas, Eastern Pennsylvania, Eastern Washington, Western Pennsylvania, Western Tennessee, Western Washington, Utah, and elsewhere have ongoing investigations some of which have resulted in arrests in Nigeria. The Justice Department’s Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section, Money Laundering and Asset Recovery Section and Office of International Affairs of the Criminal Division provided assistance. District Attorney’s Offices of Caddo Parrish in Shreveport, Louisiana; Harris County, Texas and Los Angeles are handling state prosecutions. Additionally, private sector partners and the Nigerian Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, Canadian law enforcement including the Toronto Police Service, the Mauritian Attorney-General and the Commissioner of Police, Polish Police Central Bureau of Investigation, Indonesian National Police Cyber Crimes Unit, and the Royal Malaysia Police provided significant assistance.

This operation, which was funded and coordinated by the FBI, serves as a model for international cooperation against specific threats that endanger the financial well-being of each member country’s residents. Attorney General Sessions expressed gratitude for the outstanding efforts of the participating countries, including law enforcement actions that were coordinated and executed by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) in Nigeria to curb business email compromise schemes that defraud businesses and individuals alike.

Victims are encouraged to file a complaint online with the IC3 at bec.ic3.gov. The IC3 staff reviews complaints, looking for patterns or other indicators of significant criminal activity, and refers investigative packages of complaints to the appropriate law enforcement authorities in a particular city or region. The FBI provides a variety of resources relating to BEC through the IC3, which can be reached at www.ic3.gov.

For more information on BEC scams, visit: www.ic3.gov/media/2018/180611.aspx

Fed Gov Spent $76 Billion in 2017 for Cyber Security, Fail v Success

Posted on June 1, 2018June 1, 2018 by Denise Simon

Go here for the Forum Part One

Go here for the Forum Part Two

Fascinating speakers from private industry, state government and the Federal government describe where we are, the history on cyber threats and how fast, meaning hour by hour the speed at which real hacks, intrusions or compromise happen.

David Hoge of NSA’s Threat Security Operations Center for non-classified hosts worldwide describes the global reach of NSA including the FBI, DHS and the Department of Defense.

NSA Built Own 'Google-Like' Search Engine To Share ... photo

When the Federal government spent $76 billion in 2017 and we are in much the same condition, Hoge stays awake at night.

With North Korea in the constant news, FireEye published a report in 2017 known as APT37 (Reaper): The Overlooked North Korea Actor. North Korea is hardly the worst actor. Others include Russia, China, Iran and proxies.

Targeting: With North Korea primarily South Korea – though also Japan, Vietnam and the Middle East – in various industry verticals, including chemicals, electronics, manufacturing, aerospace, automotive, and healthcare.
Initial Infection Tactics: Social engineering tactics tailored specifically to desired targets, strategic web compromises typical of targeted cyber espionage operations, and the use of torrent file-sharing sites to distribute malware more indiscriminately.
Exploited Vulnerabilities: Frequent exploitation of vulnerabilities in Hangul Word Processor (HWP), as well as Adobe Flash. The group has demonstrated access to zero-day vulnerabilities (CVE-2018-0802), and the ability to incorporate them into operations.
Command and Control Infrastructure: Compromised servers, messaging platforms, and cloud service providers to avoid detection. The group has shown increasing sophistication by improving their operational security over time.
Malware: A diverse suite of malware for initial intrusion and exfiltration. Along with custom malware used for espionage purposes, APT37 also has access to destructive malware.

More information on this threat actor is found in our report, APT37 (Reaper): The Overlooked North Korean Actor.

** NSA 'building quantum computer to crack security codes ... photo

Beyond NSA, DHS as with other agencies have cyber divisions. The DHS cyber strategy is found here. The fact sheet has 5 pillars:

DHS CYBERSECURITY GOALS

Goal 1: Assess Evolving

Cybersecurity Risks.

We will understand the evolving

national cybersecurity risk posture

to inform and prioritize risk management activities.

Goal 2: Protect Federal Government

Information Systems.

We will reduce vulnerabilities of federal agencies to ensure they achieve

an adequate level of cybersecurity.

Goal 3: Protect Critical

Infrastructure.

We will partner with key stakeholders

to ensure that national cybersecurity

risks are adequately managed.

Goal 4: Prevent and Disrupt Criminal

Use of Cyberspace.

We will reduce cyber threats by

countering transnational criminal

organizations and sophisticated cyber

criminals.

Goal 5: Respond Effectively to Cyber

Incidents.

We will minimize consequences from

potentially significant cyber incidents

through coordinated community-wide

response efforts.

Goal 6: Strengthen the Security and

Reliability of the Cyber Ecosystem.

We will support policies and activities

that enable improved global cybersecurity risk management.

Goal 7: Improve Management of

DHS Cybersecurity Activities.

We will execute our departmental

cybersecurity efforts in an integrated

and prioritized way.

NPPD’s vision is a safe, secure, and resilient infrastructure where the American way of life can thrive. NPPD leads the national effort to protect and enhance the resilience of the nation’s physical and cyber infrastructure.

*** Going forward as devices are invented and added to the internet and rogue nations along with criminal actors, the industry is forecasted to expand with experts and costs.

Research reveals in its new report that organizations are expected to increase spending on IT security by almost 9% by 2018 to safeguard their cyberspaces, leading to big growth rates in the global markets for cyber security.

The cyber security market comprises companies that provide products and services to improve security measures for IT assets, data and privacy across different domains such as IT, telecom and industrial sectors.

The global cyber security market should reach $85.3 billion and $187.1 billion in 2016 and 2021, respectively, reflecting a five-year compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 17.0%. The American market, the largest segment, should grow from $39.5 billion in 2016 to $78.0 billion by 2021, demonstrating a five-year CAGR of 14.6%. The Asia-Pacific region is expected to grow the fastest among all major regions at a five-year CAGR of 21.4%, due to stringent government policies to mitigate cyber threats, and a booming IT industry.

Factors such as the growing complexity and frequency of threats, increasing severity of cyber security, stringent government regulations and compliance requirements, ubiquity of online communication, digital data and social media cumulatively should drive the market. Moreover, organizations are expected to increase IT spending on security solutions and services, as well. Rising adoption of technologies such as Internet of things, evolution of big data and cloud computing, increasing smartphone penetration and the developing market for mobile and web platforms should provide ample opportunities for vendors.

By solution type, the banking and financial segment generated the most revenue in 2015 at $22.2 billion. However, the defense and intelligence segment should generate revenues of $50.7 billion in 2021 to lead all segments. The healthcare sector should experience substantial growth with an anticipated 16.2% five-year CAGR.

Network security, which had the highest market revenue in 2015 based on solution type, should remain dominant through the analysis period. Substantial growth is anticipated in the cloud security market, as the segment is expected to have a 27.2% five-year CAGR, owing to increasing adoption of cloud-based services across different applications.

“IT security is a priority in the prevailing highly competitive environment,” says BCC Research analyst Basudeo Singh. “About $100 billion will be spent globally on information security in 2018, as compared with $76.7 billion in 2015.”

Chinese Spy Networks in Britain and United States

Posted on May 29, 2018May 29, 2018 by Denise Simon

The agents are thought to have handed over secrets while still in service for France’s external DGSE intelligence agency, similar to Britain’s MI6 and America’s CIA, Ms Parly told CNews television. The third person – believed to be the wife – has been indicted for “concealment of treasonable crimes” and placed under “judicial control”, meaning judges keep close tabs on her pending trial. More here.

photo

France has confirmed the arrest of two French intelligence officers who are accused of spying for the Chinese government. It appears that the two officers were captured and charged in December. However, their arrests were not publicized at the time, because French counterintelligence officials wanted to avoid alerting more members of a possible spy ring, which some say may include up to five French citizens. It was only last Friday, a day after French media published leaked reports of the arrests, that the French government spoke publicly about the case.

France’s Minister of the Armed Forces, Florence Parly, told France’s CNews television on Friday that two French intelligence officers were “accused of extremely serious acts of treason” against the French state. The two officers had been charged with delivering classified information to a foreign power”, she said. Parly added that the spouse of one of the officers was also being investigated for participating in acts of espionage on behalf of a foreign country. When asked to identify the country that the two officers are accused of spying for, the minister refused to respond. But the Agence France Presse news agency cited an anonymous “security source”, who said that the two intelligence officers were being suspected of spying for China and that they had been captured following a sting operation by French counterintelligence officers.

French television station TFI1 said on Friday that both spy suspects are officers in the General Directorate of External Security (DGSE), France’s primary external intelligence agency. The station added that at least one of the two suspects was stationed at the embassy of France in Beijing when French counterintelligence became aware of the alleged espionage. According to some reports, the two suspects had retired from the DGSE by the time they were arrested, but committed their alleged espionage while still in the service of the spy agency. French government officials have refused to provide information about the length of the alleged espionage or the nature of the classified information believed to have been compromised. Additionally, no information is available about whether the two alleged spies were working in cooperation with each other. The BBC asked China last week about the arrests in France, but the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs said it was not aware of the incident.

*** As a reminder, the United States has it’s own Chinese spy network. Jerry Chun Shing Lee was charged with aiding China dismantle a U.S. informant network in China in exchange for money. He has plead not guilty.

It was this past February that FBI Director Chris Wray provided testimony to the Senate Intelligence Committee that Chinese spies have fully infiltrated U.S. universities. Additionally, China continues to gain access and in many cases successfully, of U.S. technologies and intellectual properties through telecommunications companies, academia and most especially with joint business adventures.

China has launched an ‘all society’ approach to gain access to intellectual property and some universities are pushing back on the warnings put forth by Director Wray as there are an estimated 400,000 Chinese students studying in the United States, many attending cash strapped colleges.