The Vanderbilt University Public Safety team is reminding students and staff that it exists to keep them as safe as possible and provide a welcoming educational environment.
Though extremism is not a new concept, the rise in radical and extremist ideals and incidents in recent years, puts this risk on the radar of security leaders across all market sectors. How can enterprise security professionals follow and stay on top of the threat of extremism and radicalism? With a strong understanding of their organization’s risk profile, security leaders can thwart potential incidents related to extremism that could potentially harm individuals, company assets, brand reputation or more.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA), NASCAR, the Talladega Superspeedway, state and local first responders, law enforcement officials, and local businesses recently held a tabletop exercise to test response plans around hypothetical public safety incidents on the day of the GEICO 500.
Deepfakes –mostly falsified videos and images combining the terms “deep learning” and “fake” – weren’t limited in 2019 to the Nixon presentation and were not uncommon before that. But today they are more numerous and realistic-looking and, most important, increasingly dangerous. And there is no better example of that than the warning this month (March 2021) by the FBI that nation-states are virtually certain to use deepfakes to help propagate increasingly misleading campaigns in the U.S. in coming weeks.
It comes as no surprise that the number of deaths attributed to gun violence in 2020 far surpassed years prior and the trend is now continuing into 2021. Gun violence has been weighing heavily on law enforcement officials, especially after the recent riots and presidential inauguration threats. Organizations, institutions, government agencies, and public venues have the responsibility to take a more proactive approach in protecting their people. Now is the time for serious conversations around upgrading and modernizing security technologies.
CEO and co-founder of social media platform Gab said the site had suffered a data breach. WIRED reported that the far-right platform had more than 70 gigabytes of data, and 40 million posts, leaked by a hacktivist who self-identifies as "JaXpArO and My Little Anonymous Revival Project."
Some 200 individuals have been charged with federal offenses connected to the siege at the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021. Among them are at least 15 examples of family affiliated extremism. These instances include: five sets of husbands and wives; two cases of fathers and sons, mothers and sons, brothers, and cousins; and an instance of father/daughter and brother/sister participation. Although of a different strain and less serious offenses—none specifically terrorism nor involving murder —such kin-connected radicalism is neither a new phenomenon nor one unique to the United States or elsewhere.
Multiple Interactive Learning Objectives (MILO) — recently implemented by Michigan Medicine Security — provides realistic, life-sized scenario training. The learner is surrounded by screens upon which scenarios are projected. The scenario library includes a disruptive visitor at the nurse’s station, a breakroom argument that escalates to an unsafe level, a person experiencing a mental health crisis and many others.
Rave Mobile Safety (Rave) announced the findings of its 2021 Emergency Communication and Public Safety Trust Survey, which showed a general lack of trust in information the public receives from local officials and a lack of confidence in states’ abilities to successfully distribute the coronavirus vaccine.
As lawmakers and law enforcement continue to unravel the events and impact of the crisis at the U.S. Capitol on Wednesday, January 6th, attention is turning to identification and prosecution of those that illegally entered, attacked, and looted the Capitol and the offices of the legislature housed there. We’re learning more about the litany of security failings and it is imperative that we take the lessons offered by this example and make the changes they demand now, at our state capitol buildings, as well as in our businesses.
