• Trump acknowledges for first time that in 2018, he okayed covert cyberattack against Russia’s Internet Research Agency, St. Petersburg-based troll farm that led Russian attacks on 2016 U.S. presidential election, and on 2018 midterms.

Donald Trump, for the first time, confirmed the United States conducted a covert cyberattack in 2018 against Russia's Internet Research Agency, and intelligence experts say -- yikes, he probably wasn't supposed to reveal that information. Read the rest

Quite the scoop at CNN.com from Carl Bernstein, yes, the Watergate reporter Carl Bernstein, with a 109-word one sentence lede. One wonders why none of the president's ex-men bothered to do anything about their revelation that Trump is unfit for office, beyond cashing in with speaking engagements and books. Read the rest

“Prepared by a CIA task force, the report was introduced as evidence in the trial of Joshua Schulte, a former employee of an agency hacking unit”

Trump's pick follows 9/11 truther and QAnon conspiracies

LOL, nothing matters.

Florida Sen. Marco Rubio has been promoted to a new position is temporarily going to become chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, Republican leaders announced on Tuesday. Read the rest

Very cool and normal.

📷 Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro’s communications secretary, Fabio Wajngarten [RIGHT] instagrammed this selfie of himself hanging out with Trump and Pence before he tested positive for coronavirus.

Bolsonaro's press secretary hung out with Trump and Pence on Saturday and today tested positive for coronavirus.

U.S. President Donald Trump and Vice President Mike Pence both met this week with a government official from Brazil who has since tested positive for coronavirus. Read the rest

“The risk to the American people remains very low,” Trump said, flanked by VP Pence and US public health officials.

• U.S. intelligence briefed House on Russia to ensure Trump's re-election. • Classified briefing to lawmakers made Trump angry • Trump said Democrats would “weaponize” news of Russian military campaign • Trump was mad DNI Joseph Maguire would let staff appear • That's why Maguire's out, Richard Grenell's in as 'acting' DNI.

In Washington last week, U.S. intelligence officials told lawmakers that Russia is carrying out a military-grade attack on the 2020 elections, with the goal of making Americans doubt the integrity of the vote and ensure re-election for impeached, manifestly unfit and corrupt President Donald Trump, Reuters reported Thursday. Read the rest

A leaked demo has bright red and orange marks on 'harmfully misleading' tweets

• U.S. State Department blames Russia for cyberattacks that hit neighboring Georgia in October 2019

• By identifying Russia's digital assaults on neighbors, US hopes to raise awareness of ongoing GRU attacks on US Read the rest

“Russia has sent intelligence agents to Ireland to map the precise location of the fibre-optic, ocean-bed cables that connect Europe to America,” Ireland's security agency suspects, according to this report in The Times of London.

“This has raised concerns that Russian agents are checking the cables for weak points, with a view to tapping or even damaging them in the future.”

Irish security officials believe Russia may be targeting Ireland as a regional base for military intelligence operations because the country's counterintelligence abilities are limited, and Moscow presumably views Ireland as a vulnerable spot.

Additionally, various tech giants that have placed their offices in Dublin to evade U.S. taxes might be juicy targets for Vladimir Putin's corporate espionage programs.

Excerpt:

Ireland is the landing point for undersea cables which carry internet traffic between America, Britain and Europe. The cables enable millions of people to communicate and allow financial transactions to take place seamlessly.

Garda and military sources believe the agents were sent by the GRU, the military intelligence branch of the Russian armed forces which was blamed for the nerve agent attack in Britain on Sergei Skripal, a former Russian intelligence officer.

Read more: Russian agents plunge to new ocean depths in Ireland to crack transatlantic cables

[thetimes.co.uk] Read the rest

Researchers at MIT say the voting app Voatz, which is being used by at least 4 states in the 2020 elections, has major security flaws that could allow an attacker to intercept and alter votes, while making voters think their votes have been cast correctly, or trick the votes server into accepting connections from an attacker. Read the rest

A U.S. judge on Thursday ordered the Pentagon to temporarily halt work on the cloud computing 'JEDI' contract, in what represents a major win for Amazon.com and Jeff Bezos. Read the rest

For more than half a century, governments all over the world trusted a single company to keep the communications of their spies, soldiers and diplomats secret. That company was secretly run by the CIA, which had the ability to read all those communications for decades. Read the rest

Impeached American president Donald John Trump wants a 25% reduction in the military fund designed to deter Russian aggression against the U.S., no reason, why are you asking, no really, why, you seem kind of obsessed. Read the rest

Four or more top U.S. national security officials were so upset by Donald Trump’s attempts to pressure Ukraine for Joe Biden dirt that they spoke to a White House lawyer with their concerns “both before and immediately after President Trump’s July 25 call with that country’s president,” the Washington Post reports tonight citing “U.S. officials and other people familiar with the matter.” Read the rest