Less pull-ups, more intellect: The new approach to Special Operations recruitment

It is no secret that Special Operations Command (SOCOM) has a growing shortage of operators and is experiencing an ongoing struggle to meet training quotas. In previous articles, I have talked about the manning shortfalls within the Special Operations community and the dwindling number of people that are capable and willing to make it through […]

Amazon Alexa’s eavesdropping is worse than you thought

Since the inception of smart-speaker assistants such as Amazon’s Alexa, Apple’s Siri, Microsoft’s Cortana, and others, consumers have to live with the fact that by using these products and services, their data is being collected. How much, though? This is a frequent topic of debate. Some experts say the sheer bandwidth and storage required would […]

Read the fine print: Are Big Tech ‘privacy’ offerings really private?

Privacy is a popular area of interest amongst tech companies these days. With well-documented battles related to personal data abuse by companies like Facebook, other tech giants are looking for ways to sell their current or potential customers on the idea of protecting their personal data. Unfortunately, what a lot of people are not aware […]

Russia’s hypersonic nuclear missile just entered into service

Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin made headlines with his claim that the Russian military is the only force on the planet with fully operational hypersonic weapons. Russia’s growing hypersonic arsenal already includes the Kinzhal (Dagger), which has a range of around 1,250 miles and can travel 10 times faster than the speed of sound […]

An Air Force F-16 just shot down a cruise missile with a laser guided rocket

A U.S. Air Force F-16 Fighting Falcon successfully shot down a mock cruise missile over the Gulf of Mexico, marking the first airborne intercept of a cruise missile with a GR-20A Advanced Precision Kill Weapon System. As missile technology continues to mature, a number of national militaries have made missile defense a high priority; the […]

Pentagon: Testing your DNA more dangerous than you might think

The Pentagon has issued a directive advising military members to beware of the growing popularity of the home DNA and ancestry kits, as they pose a higher security risk for military members than for their civilian counterparts. The home kits are growing in popularity and are at this time of year a popular Christmas gift […]

An energy startup in Oregon may have just changed everything about nuclear power

Here in the United States, nuclear power is usually looked at in a negative light. As a result, America‘s nuclear power plants tend to be rather old, inefficient and expensive. The newest nuclear power plant in the United States was powered on sometime in the 1990s. There are others that have been in operation since […]

Watch: Turkey’s newest drones are quad-copters armed with machine guns

The use of unmanned aerial vehicles has becomes commonplace on the battlefields of today. But more often than not, the types of drones seeing widespread use in combat are of the high-flying, reconnaissance or air-strike launching variety. However, multiple programs all around the world have begun surfacing in recent months with the aim of using […]

SOCOM is testing a ‘mind reading’ system that can help SOF troops conduct interrogations

In the Netflix series, “Daredevil,” superhero-lawyer Matt Murdock has an, arguably, unfair advantage over criminals in court: He can use his heightened senses to measure changes in a person’s biometrics like heart rate, perspiration and temperature. Over the years, he’s developed a pretty attuned understanding of how these physiological responses correlate with things like nervousness […]