Al Sharpton’s Secret Work As FBI Informant
April 8th, 2014Via: The Smoking Gun:
The former mob snitch has become a regular in the White House, where he has met with the 44th president in the East Room, the Roosevelt Room, and the Oval Office. He has also attended Obama Christmas parties, speeches, policy announcements, and even watched a Super Bowl with the First Family (an evening the man has called “one of the highlights of my life”). During these gatherings, he has mingled with cabinet members, top Obama aides, military leaders, business executives, and members of Congress. His former confederates were a decidedly dicier lot: ex-convicts, extortionists, heroin traffickers, and mob henchmen. The man’s surreptitious recordings, FBI records show, aided his government handlers in the successful targeting of powerful Mafia figures with nicknames like Benny Eggs, Chin, Fritzy, Corky, and Baldy Dom.
Later this week, Obama will travel to New York and appear in a Manhattan hotel ballroom at the side of the man whom FBI agents primarily referred to as “CI-7”–short for confidential informant #7–in secret court filings. In those documents, investigators vouched for him as a reliable, productive, and accurate source of information about underworld figures.
The ex-informant has been one of Obama’s most unwavering backers, a cheerleader who has nightly bludgeoned the president’s Republican opponents in televised broadsides. For his part, Obama has sought the man’s counsel, embraced him publicly, and saluted his “commitment to fight injustice and inequality.” The president has even commented favorably on his friend’s svelte figure, the physical manifestation of a rehabilitation effort that coincided with Obama’s ascension to the White House. This radical makeover has brought the man wealth, a daily TV show, bespoke suits, a luxury Upper West Side apartment, and a spot on best seller lists.
Most importantly, he has the ear of the President of the United States, an equally remarkable and perplexing achievement for the former FBI asset known as “CI-7,” the Rev. Al Sharpton.
‘Heartbleed’ Bug in OpenSSL Puts Encrypted Communications at Risk
April 8th, 2014Via: PC World:
Computer security experts are advising administrators to patch a severe flaw in a software library used by millions of websites to encrypt sensitive communications.
The flaw, nicknamed “Heartbleed,” is contained in several versions of OpenSSL, a cryptographic library that enables SSL (Secure Sockets Layer) or TLS (Transport Security Layer) encryption. Most websites use either SSL or TLS, which is indicated in browsers with a padlock symbol.
The flaw, which was introduced in December 2011, has been fixed in OpenSSL 1.0.1g, which was released on Monday.
The vulnerable versions of OpenSSL are 1.0.1 through 1.0.1f with two exceptions: OpenSSL 1.0.0 branch and 0.9.8, according to a special website set up by researchers who found the problem.
If exploited, the flaw could allow attackers to monitor all information passed between a user and a Web service or even decrypt past traffic they’ve collected.
“This allows attackers to eavesdrop communications, steal data directly from the services and users and to impersonate services and users,” the researchers wrote.
The bug was discovered by three researchers from Codenomicon, a computer security company, and Neel Mehta, who works on security for Google.
U.S. Navy Scaling Up Fuel from Seawater Program
April 8th, 2014Via: U.S. Naval Research Lab:
Navy researchers at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), Materials Science and Technology Division, demonstrate proof-of-concept of novel NRL technologies developed for the recovery of carbon dioxide (CO2) and hydrogen (H2) from seawater and conversion to a liquid hydrocarbon fuel.
Research Credit: ottilie
Liechtenstein Banker Shot Dead in Reported Investment Feud
April 7th, 2014Via: Bloomberg:
A Liechtenstein banker was shot dead after a feud involving an investment fund, and police said they believe the alleged killer later committed suicide.
The 48-year-old man was shot in the underground garage of a financial institution in Balzers at 7:30 a.m. local time, the Liechtenstein police said on their website today. Neither the victim nor the institution was identified in the statement. The deceased was Juergen Frick, CEO of Bank Frick & Co. AG, according to Switzerland’s Radio 1, which cited employees of his bank.
The suspect, Juergen Hermann, fled the scene in a Smart car with Liechtenstein license plates, according to police. The authorities later said Hermann appears to have committed suicide after they found the vehicle in Ruggell, 25 kilometers (16 miles) north of Balzers, with his passport and a confession.
Research Credit: spOILer
Ex-ABN Banker Schmittmann, Wife, Daughter Found Dead at Home
April 6th, 2014Via: Bloomberg:
Former ABN Amro Group NV Netherlands Chief Executive Officer Jan Peter Schmittmann, his wife and a daughter were found dead at their home yesterday after a possible “family tragedy,” Dutch police said.
“The bodies of a father and mother and their daughter were found at the property” in the town of Laren, 32 kilometers (20 miles) southeast of Amsterdam, Dutch police said in a statement on their website. Leonie Bosselaar, a police spokeswoman, said in a telephone call with Bloomberg News that the deceased were Schmittmann, 57, and two family members.
The police received a call around 10:30 a.m. local time from a family acquaintance who said something may be wrong at the property, according to the statement. Bosselaar declined to comment further. The police said the two deceased women were 57 and 22.
The Dutch newspaper AD reported, without citing anyone, that the family was discovered by Schmittmann’s second daughter when she arrived home yesterday morning. She was scheduled to travel with her parents to India, where she had an internship lined up, the newspaper said.
Schmittmann joined ABN Amro in 1983 as assistant relationship manager and was named head of the lender’s Dutch unit in 2003. He stepped down from the Amsterdam-based bank in December 2008, after the company was nationalized earlier that year.
U.S. Navy $100 Million Program to Develop New Autonomous Aircraft
April 6th, 2014Via: Wall Street Journal:
Rear Adm. Matthew Klunder has positioned himself to become the Jeff Bezos of the Pentagon.
Much as the Amazon.com Inc. founder envisions mini-drones that deliver small packages across America, Adm. Klunder, the Navy’s research chief, wants to create innovative unmanned helicopters able to perform tasks now carried out by humans: resupplying troops in remote areas and rescuing wounded Marines from the battlefield.
His plan is moving ahead, and Navy officials will unveil new technology Saturday that with the push of a button allows helicopters—manned or unmanned—to choose their own routes, take off and land.
The Navy views the five-year, $100 million program as a major advance in the Pentagon’s hopes for taking the “manned out of unmanned” aircraft. Over the next decade, the military is aiming to create autonomous drones that can help soldiers carry out night raids, search oceans for trouble, and select targets for attack.
This is “truly leap-ahead technology,” Adm. Klunder said of the new autonomous helicopter advances.
“What we’re talking about doing with full size helicopters—and we’ve done it—we’re talking about delivering 5,000 pounds of cargo,” he said.
The Navy program has put the system through successful test runs at the Marine Corps Base in Quantico, Va.
Using a special app and a tablet, operators given only a half-hour of training were able to direct small helicopters to land on their own. The helicopters can choose their own routes, pick landing sites and change their destination if they spot unexpected obstacles that emerge at the last minute.
Autonomous technology will make it easier for the military, which won’t have to rely on highly trained operators to route and land helicopters.
CIA Official Dies in Apparent Suicide
April 5th, 2014I thought that we would have the name by now, but they are not releasing it.
Via: Washington Free Beacon:
A senior CIA official has died in an apparent suicide this week from injuries sustained after jumping off a building in northern Virginia, according to sources close to the CIA.
CIA spokesman Christopher White confirmed the death and said the incident did not take place at CIA headquarters in McLean, Va.
“We can confirm that there was an individual fatally injured at a facility where agency work is done,” White told the Washington Free Beacon. “He was rushed to a local area hospital where he subsequently died. Due to privacy reasons and out of respect for the family, we are not releasing additional information at this time.”
A source close to the agency said the man who died was a middle manager and the incident occurred after the man jumped from the fifth floor a building in Fairfax County.
Catherine Austin Fitts: The UFO Economy
April 5th, 2014Via: Dark Journalist:
Related: Blank Spots on the Map: The Dark Geography of the Pentagon’s Secret World by Trevor Paglen
$6 Billion Goes Missing at State Department
April 5th, 2014Via: Fiscal Times:
The State Department has no idea what happened to $6 billion used to pay its contractors.
In a special “management alert” made public Thursday, the State Department’s Inspector General Steve Linick warned “significant financial risk and a lack of internal control at the department has led to billions of unaccounted dollars over the last six years.
Japan Orders Military to Strike Any New North Korea Missile Launches
April 5th, 2014Via: Reuters:
Japan has ordered a destroyer in the Sea of Japan to strike any ballistic missiles that may be launched by North Korea in the coming weeks after Pyongyang fired a Rodong medium-range missile over the sea, a government source said on Saturday.
