Cybersecurity 2020: What Estonia knows about thwarting Russians

In Israel, approaches to help traumatized IDF soldiers were emotionally focused and did not succeed in restoring well-being. The Six C’s model presents a cognitive approach by Dr. Farchi, which involves stimulating the individual through mental and physical action—such as giving them tasks to complete or make complex decisions.

Military suicides has grown dramatically in recent years, and new programs are trying to educate and reduce the stigma of confronting mental health. A new 10-day intensive outpatient program has been implemented as well as other programs and resources.

Frequent deployments and relocations create career hurdles for military spouses and pull families away from their support networks. Blue Star Families, a nonprofit founded in 2009, is working with volunteers in 35 chapters around the world to help military families connect and communicate their experiences to policymakers and the American public. More than half of surveyed families say that they would not recommend military service to their children, a potentially serious issue for the all-volunteer force which recruits heavily from families with histories of service.

Who Was In Command, is a database that publishes the “names, ranks, and command responsibilities of security forces in Nigeria, Egypt, and Mexico.” That’s because when security forces use excessive force, and commit human rights abuses, often people don’t know their name, and can’t report them. Now, the names are all available in one website.

For people living in Syria, minutes can save people from dying due to bomb strikes. So three men got together and created Hala, and launched a warning system that uses data from aircraft to predict where and when warplanes will strike, then notifies nearby people. Now, the Hala team has 60,000 followers on Facebook, and 16,400 Telegram channel subscribers. “Without the Sentry warning, my family and I would probably be dead.”

By collecting and sharing its data on Internet scams and phishing attacks, the Anti-Phishing Working Group (APWG), a cyber security nonprofit, acts like a clearinghouse for records. The APWG brings together other international partners, such as companies, universities, governments, and other nonprofits to use its data to develop new strategies to product Internet users against malware and phishing attacks.

Estonia is bolstering its cybersecurity against Russian would-be hackers on a shoestring budget and a brigade of volunteers, called the "nerd reserves." Hailing from Estonia's rich IT community, as well as other industries like education and law, the volunteers engage in a range of defensive activities like planning elaborate simulated cyberexercises and giving talks at elementary schools.

Environmental scientists are using modern computing software to correct, orient, and analyze satellite images from the Corona spy project, launched in the 1960s and ’70s to monitor the Soviet military. The images have revealed human environmental impacts, challenged long-held assumptions, and helped predict future challenges. Within the last two years alone, the images have contributed to new information about climate change including rock glacier movements in Central Asia, shoreline changes in Saudi Arabia, and ice loss in Peru, helping scientists fill in knowledge gaps.

France was the first country to publicly release documents about government investigations of UFOs and other unexplained phenomena. Around 100,000 documents were released on an online archive, with the oldest record dating back to 1937. The archive includes police and expert reports, witness sketches, maps, and photos, video, and audio recordings. The archive has about 1,650 cases on record and 6,000 witness accounts. Web traffic to the archive exceed expectations. Only 9% of reported strange phenomena have been fully explained, with 28% inexplicable despite precise testimonies and high-quality evidence.

To bolster the security of the 2022 midterm election, officials released frequent alerts and updates about disinformation, cyber threats, and potential physical threats to election workers. A special task force investigated threats against election officials and brought forward four federal cases and several state prosecutions related to the incidents.