This is the image posted on UK's spider.io after Google's acquisition.
Google said Friday it was buying the British-based startup spider.io for its technology to weed out fraud in online advertising.
"Advertising helps fund the digital world we love today... but this vibrant ecosystem only flourishes if marketers can buy media online with the confidence that their ads are reaching real people, that results they see are based on actual interest," said Neal Mohan at Google's DoubleClick unit which develops targeted ads.
With the new acquisition, Mohan said, "our immediate priority is to include their fraud detection technology in our video and display ads products, where they will complement our existing efforts."
He added that "by including spider.io's fraud-fighting expertise in our products, we can scale our efforts to weed out bad actors and improve the entire digital ecosystem."
The move helps Google combat the practice of click fraud, where criminals use automatic programs to boost the number of clicks on an online ad to boost revenues.
Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
There is a view that the recent China's attempt to capture a satellite in space by using mechanical arm actually demonstrates their capability to develop counter-space technologies. This article attempts to put this experimentation in space by China into context.
The 'test' under discussion was initially viewed as a scientific experiment. China had launched three satellites on July 19, 2013 by using their Long March-4C launcher.
Officially, China has identified these satellites as 'scientific experimentation satellites to perform experiments on space maintenance technologies.' Also, these satellites are expected to be used for the observation of space debris. Amongst these three satellites (Chuang Xin-3, the Shiyan Weixing-7 and the Shijian-15) the satellite Shiyan Weixing-7 made a sudden manoeuvre on Aug 19, 2013.
It was a surprise rendezvous with a completely different satellite, Shijian 7 (SJ-7, Practice 7), launched by China in 2005. Interestingly, since its launch Shiyan Weixing-7 (SY-7) had completed a series of orbital changes and was put close to Chuang Xin-3(CX-3) but as mentioned, suddenly it conducted an unusual manoeuvre with a different satellite.
Space analysts are of the opinion that SY-7 has a robotic arm and it could rendezvous with CX-3 which might have been developed to act as target for the robotic arm experiment. But, instated it rendezvoused with SJ-7.
Presently, there is no clarity in regards to the exact nature of this 'maintenance technology' tested by China by doing such manoeuvre. It is likely that the mechanical arm was used to capture another satellite in space. But, as per some analysts, another possibility is that, 'the test involved detaching a part of one satellite and its release into a separate orbit, and the subsequent recapturing of this component by using the extension arm'.
Now, the basic challenge is to know whether this activity is a part of China's space warfare programme.
NASA has shut down access to an online database and banned new requests from Chinese and some other foreign nationals seeking access to its facilities amid mounting concerns about espionage and export control violations, the U.S. space agency's administrator said on Wednesday.
The security measures include a complete ban on remote computer access by Chinese and some other non-U.S. contractors already working at NASA centers, agency chief Charles Bolden said at a congressional oversight hearing in Washington.
The tightening of security follows the arrest on Saturday of Chinese national Bo Jiang, a former NASA contractor.
He was attempting to return to China with "a large amount of information technology that he may not have been entitled to possess," said Representative Frank Wolf, a Republican whose Virginia district includes the NASA Langley Research Center, where Jiang worked.
The FBI arrested Jiang at Dulles International Airport outside Washington, where he had boarded a flight to Beijing, court papers provided by Wolf's office show.
Jiang was arraigned on Monday in U.S. district court in Norfolk, Virginia. A detention hearing is scheduled for Thursday.
He is charged with lying to federal law enforcement agents about computer hardware he planned to take with him to China, the court documents show.
Wolf, who chairs the House Appropriations subcommittee on commerce, justice and science, identified Jiang last week during another hearing on possible security lapses at NASA field centers.
"We know that China is an active, aggressive espionage threat," Wolf, a longtime China critic, said during Wednesday's hearing.
"A recent White House report said that the technologies NASA works on - aerospace and aeronautics - are those that the Chinese have most heavily targeted," Wolf added.
NASA is cooperating with federal investigators, in addition to conducting two internal reviews, Bolden said.
The reviews are expected to be completed within a week, likely to be followed by an external investigation, Bolden added.
In the interim, NASA closed its Technical Reports database "while we review whether there is a risk of export control documents being made available on this website," Bolden said.
Other security upgrades include a moratorium on granting any new access to NASA facilities for individuals from China, Myanmar, Eritrea, Iran, North Korea, Saudi Arabia, Sudan and Uzbekistan.
In addition, 281 foreign nationals, including 192 from China, who currently have access to NASA facilities have had their remote computer access shut down, Bolden said.
"This is about national security, not about NASA security, and I take that personally. I'm responsible and I will hold myself accountable once those reviews are completed," Bolden said.
According to a US Government paper, NASA said hackers stole employee credentials and gained access to mission-critical projects last year in 13 major network breaches that could compromise U.S. national security.
National Aeronautics and Space Administration Inspector General Paul Martin testified before Congress this week on the breaches, which appear to be among the more significant in a string of security problems for federal agencies.
The space agency discovered in November that hackers working through an Internet Protocol address in China broke into the -network of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Martin said in testimony released on Wednesday.
One of NASA's key labs, JPL manages 23 spacecraft conducting active space missions, including missions to Jupiter, Mars and Saturn.
The hackers gained full system access, which allowed them to modify, copy, or delete sensitive files, create new user accounts and upload hacking tools to steal user credentials and compromise other NASA systems. They were also able to modify system logs to conceal their actions.
"Our review disclosed that the intruders had compromised the accounts of the most privileged JPL users, giving the intruders access to most of JPL's networks," he said.
In another attack last year, intruders stole credentials for accessing NASA systems from more than 150 employees. Martin said the his office identified thousands of computer security lapses at the agency in 2010 and 2011.
He also said NASA has moved too slowly to encrypt or scramble the data on its laptop computers to protect information from falling into the wrong hands.
Unencrypted notebook computers that have been lost or stolen include ones containing codes for controlling the International Space Station, as well as sensitive data on NASA's Constellation and Orion programs, Martin said.
A NASA spokesman told Reuters on Friday the agency was implementing recommendations made by the Inspector General's Office.
"NASA takes the issue of IT security very seriously, and at no point in time have operations of the International Space Station been in jeopardy due to a data breach," said NASA spokesman Michael Cabbagehe.
“It’s been clear from the very beginning that we’re not going along with the code of conduct,” Ellen Tauscher, undersecretary of state for arms control and international security, said during a Jan. 12 breakfast with reporters in Washington.
Asked why the U.S. government would not sign the document, Tauscher said, “It’s too restrictive.”
The European Union has been working the voluntary code of conduct for several years. The document lays out rules of the road for operating satellites and other space vehicles as space becomes increasingly congested, the idea being to minimize the chances of collisions or misunderstandings that could escalate.
The code also focuses on space debris mitigation, an area that began getting greater public attention in 2007 after China destroyed one of its own orbiting satellites with a ground-launched missile.
“We made it very definitive that we were not going to go ahead with the European Code of Conduct; what we haven’t announced is what we’re going to do, but we will be doing that soon,” Tauscher said.
Up to now, the U.S. government has been circumspect about its intentions with regard to the code. In April, for example, Ambassador Greg Schulte, U.S. deputy assistant secretary of defense for space policy, described the code as a “positive approach” but stressed that the U.S. government had not yet decided whether to sign the document.
Some U.S. lawmakers have raised concerns that the nonbinding agreement would tie the U.S. military’s hands in space.
“We’ve advanced further technologically in development and actual deployment of these systems than anyone else, and agreements [and] codes of conduct tend to … constrain our military,” Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.) said during a hearing on the subject in May.
“We had never said we were going to do it; we just hadn’t said ‘no,’” Tauscher said.
Hinting at new U.S.-written rules of the road for space, Taushcer said, “You wouldn’t be surprised to find out that we’ve found a nice sweet spot.”
The Pentagon had concerns with the European strategy for space traffic management, but there are also “ways to deal with it,” according to Michael Krepon, co-founder of the Stimson Center, a think tank here.
The U.S. Defense Department did a lengthy assessment of the code of conduct and particular provisions reviewed “would make sense for our national security.”
“If the satellite is stealthy, or we want it to be stealthy, how does that fit into a traffic management system?” he said.
“Now you argue … major spacefaring nations can figure out the orbital characteristics of objects in space, but it you want to move an object in space do you provide advance notice of this or how do you handle that?”
If the Obama administration is going ahead with a new strategy, then the Pentagon’s concerns have likely been addressed, Krepon said.
Council underlined the importance of space systems for security. They drew attention to the role of satellite systems – particularly Galileo, EGNOS and GMES – as the backbone for improving Europe’s response to emergencies.
Pre-operational Global Monitoring for Environment and Security (GMES) services are already available. The ministers from EU and ESA Member States urged the European Commission to accelerate the transition to full operations, in support of EU external actions.
The ministers reaffirmed GMES as a priority for the EU, and urged the European Commission to take the necessary and timely actions to secure the continuity of the programme and the services it supplies to users.
Ministers highlighted the fact that the policy governing the availability of GMES data is crucial to the secure use of services and to the development of sustainable markets in the value-adding sector.
GMES will work hand-in-hand with the high-accuracy Public Regulated Service of Europe’s Galileo navigation satellite system.
Ministers also stressed that satellite communications represent a key capability in any crisis management operation, especially when ground infrastructures are damaged or destroyed.
As well as calling on the European Commission to ensure the optimal use of space solutions in Europe’s coordination of civil protection, the ministers also turned their attention to the need to protect the satellites.
Ministers expressed concern about the risks that space weather and space debris can pose to space assets.
They took good note of the recently established user requirements for systems designed to monitor and protect space assets and called on the EU, ESA and their Member States initially to exploit fully all existing capacities in this area.
The SSI is an annual report on trends and developments related to security and outer space.
The goal of the Index is to improve transparency with respect to space activities and provide a common, comprehensive knowledge base to support the development of national and international policies that contribute to space security.
Secure World Foundation and the Mission of Canada to the European Union partnered to organize the 2011 Space Security Index Launch in Europe.
The event was held November 3 in Brussels, Belgium, and was part of Secure World Foundation's Brussels Space Policy Round Table.
Last week's gathering convened leading authorities from Canada, the European Union, the European Space Agency, the Non-Proliferation and Disarmament Directorate of the European External Action Service, as well as the European Satellite Operators Association and the Societe europeenne des satellites (SES).
The open discussion took place at the French Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Brussels.
"Space security is not a topic often discussed in Brussels, thus it was very pertinent to launch the 2011 Space Security Index here," said Agnieszka Lukaszczyk, Secure World Foundation (SWF) European Program Manager, moderator of the round table dialogue, assisted by SWF's Natassa Antoniou.
"Europe needs to be involved in the outer space security discussion and this event facilitated exactly that need," Lukaszczyk. She added that SWF will continue to engage European actors in the space security debate among a host of relevant outer space topics.
Sustainability of outer space
Discussions at the space policy round table focused on significant global activities within outer space, with a particular emphasis on Europe, driven by a number of important occurrences in the space sector. The event centered on the issuing of the 2011 Space Security Index (SSI).
"The Space Security Index has steadily grown in sophistication, and has become a trusted source of information on the activities that may have an impact on the sustainability of outer space," said Cesar Jaramillo, Program Officer, Space Security and Nuclear Disarmament for Project Ploughshares, headquartered in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada.
Jaramillo said that the launching of the 2011 edition of the SSI in Brussels "is a testament to the active and relevant role that Europe is playing in current space security discussions."
The Indian Space Research Organisation has refused to make public the minutes of meetings of the Space Commission where the controversial Antrix-Devas deal was discussed.
Replying to an RTI application, ISRO said the minutes of the Space Commission meetings where the deal between its commercial arm Antrix Corporation and Devas Multimedia over the leasing of scarce S-band spectrum was discussed cannot be provided as they relate to national security.
Last July, the Commission had recommended annulment of the contract with Devas under which the private firm, floated by ex-ISRO officials, was to get on lease 90 per cent of the S-band transponders on two satellites - GSAT 6 and GSAT 6A for its novel Digital Broadcast Audio Service.
After uproar over the issue, the Cabinet Committee of Security headed by the Prime Minister decided to annul the deal on February 17.
The RTI applicant had sought to know from the Department of Space the minutes of all Space Commission meetings since 2005 where issue of the Devas-Antrix deal, which has now been annulled, had figured.
Section 10 of the RTI Act has severability clause which allows a public authority to remove the information, which is exempted from disclosure under the transparency law but the Central Public Information Officer of the ISRO did not apply the clause and summarily rejected the application saying, "Information is related to security and scientific interests of the State."
Antrix had signed the contract in January 2005 and had got sanction of the Space Commission and the Union Cabinet for the two satellites without informing them that bulk capacity would be leased to Devas Multimedia.
In December 2009, the ISRO ordered a review of the deal, and subsequently, the Space Commission recommended its annulment on July 2, 2010.
WHAT'S the difference between a suicide bomber and a cleaner? It sounds like the opening line of a sick joke, but for computer scientists working on intelligent video-surveillance software, being able to make that distinction is a key goal.
Current CCTV systems can collect masses of data, but little of it is used, says Shaogang Gong, a computer-vision computation researcher at Queen Mary, University of London. "What we really need are better ways to mine that data," he says.
Gong is leading an international team of researchers to develop a next-generation CCTV system, called Samurai, which is capable of identifying and tracking individuals that act suspiciously in crowded public spaces. It uses algorithms to profile people's behaviour, learning about how people usually behave in the environments where it is deployed. It can also take changes in lighting conditions into account, enabling it to track people as they move from one camera's viewing field to another.
To improve the tracking of an individual at an airport, the system can also learn the routes people are likely to take - straight from the entrance to check-in, say. It can even follow a target as they move in a crowd, using the characteristic shape of the person, their luggage and the people they are walking with, to follow them as they walk between different camera views.
Samurai is designed to issue alerts when it detects behaviour that differs from the norm, and adjusts its reasoning based on feedback. So an operator might reassure the system that the person with a mop appearing to loiter in a busy thoroughfare is no threat. When another person with a mop exhibits similar behaviour, it will remember that this is not a situation that needs flagging up.
While video analysis tools already exist, they tend to operate according to rigid, predefined rules, says Gong, and cannot follow a large number of people across multiple cameras situated in busy public spaces.
The Samurai team last month demonstrated the system to commercial partners including BAA Airports in the UK. The researchers claim the prototype system successfully identified potential threats which may have been missed by human operators, using footage collected at Heathrow airport. The Samurai team has funding to continue refining their software until the end of 2011.
"The use of relevant feedback from human operators will be a very important part of these technologies," says Paul Miller, of Queen's University's Centre for Secure Information Technologies in Belfast, UK, who is leading a project to develop a video-analysis system capable of predicting assaults on buses. "The key is developing learning algorithms that work not only in the lab but that are robust in real-world applications."
The Transportation Security Administration inadvertently revealed closely guarded secrets related to airport passenger screening practices when it posted online this spring a document as part of a contract solicitation, the agency confirmed Tuesday.
The 93-page TSA operating manual details procedures for screening passengers and checked baggage, such as technical settings used by X-ray machines and explosives detectors. It also includes pictures of credentials used by members of Congress, CIA employees and federal air marshals, and it identifies 12 countries whose passport holders are automatically subjected to added scrutiny.
TSA officials said that the manual was posted online in a redacted form on a federal procurement Web site, but that the digital redactions were inadequate. They allowed computer users to recover blacked-out passages by copying and pasting them into a new document or an e-mail.
China's Leaders are leaving nothing to chance, China is undertaking a massive security clampdown for a celebration next month to mark the founding of the Communist state.
The festivities at Tiananmen Square on October 1 will commemorate the 60th anniversary of National Day. President Hu Jintao is expected to deliver a speech, and a military parade and fireworks are also planned.
As part of its security measures, the government is building a security "wall" around Beijing, the state media reported.
The government will deploy 220,000 security guards and 300,000 community volunteers for the ceremony, the Xinhua news agency said.
Adjoining provinces and municipalities will conduct security checks on roads leading to China's capital city to ward off potential threats.
Chinese residents traveling to Beijing, will be required to register their names. Every bus bound into the capital also has to be registered.
Thousands of police officers will stand guard at railway stations and the government will not only ground air traffic flights during the parade, but kite-flying will also not be permitted.
The Chinese will enjoy eight days off, from October 1 to October 8, both for the National Day and the Mid-Autumn Festival.
As early as March, police began a nationwide crackdown on March that will continue until October 1. By the end of August, authorities had confiscated close to 53,000 guns and 2 million bullets, Xinhua said.
The security measures are intended to ward off a 'spillover' or escalation of the disturbances that have shaken the western city of Urumqi. Long-simmering resentment between the indigenous minority of resident Uyghurs and the dominant majority of incoming Han Chinese, erupted into riots and left more than 200 people dead in July this year.
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