Bulgarian prosecutors charged the head of a non-governmental organization (NGO) on Tuesday with spying for Russia as part of a scheme they said aimed to draw Bulgaria away from its Western allies and toward Moscow.

Bulgaria, Moscow’s most loyal satellite in Soviet times, is now a member of NATO and the European Union but has close cultural and historic ties to Russia, which remains its biggest energy supplier.

The prosecutors said Nikolai Malinov, 50, head of the National Russophile Movement, had worked for the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies, run mainly by former foreign intelligence officials, and also for a Russian NGO, the Double-Headed Eagle, since 2010.

Reuters was not able to immediately reach Malinov for comment on the charges as his phone was switched off. The Russian embassy in Sofia has not issued a public statement on the charges.

“Nikolai Malinov has been charged with putting himself in the service of foreign organizations to work for them as a spy,” Deputy Chief Prosecutor Ivan Geshev told reporters.

Malinov has been released on bail but is barred from leaving the country, Chief Prosecutor Sotir Tsatsarov said.

Russian-language document 

Prosecutors said they had found a Russian-language document prepared by Malinov that spoke of “the necessary geopolitical re-orientation of Bulgaria.”

“The document outlines the steps needed to be taken to completely overhaul the geopolitical orientation of Bulgaria away from the West toward Russia,” Geshev said.

The prosecutors did not say when the document was written.

The document, which prosecutors did not date, showed Malinov planned to create internet sites, a TV channel, an influential think-tank and a political party to encourage Bulgarians to form more positive views of Russia based on their shared Slavic traditions and Orthodox Christianity.

‘Very serious’ charges

Bulgarian President Rumen Radev, who is friendly toward Russia, said the charges against Malinov were “very serious” and that prosecutors needed to come up with indisputable evidence of wrongdoing.

The U.S. embassy in Sofia said in a statement it was aware of the investigation into an alleged case of espionage and fully supported “Bulgaria’s efforts to defend its sovereignty from malign influence.”

Some opposition politicians saw the case as an attempt to influence public opinion ahead of local elections on Oct. 27.

The prosecutors also said on Tuesday they had banned a veteran Russian foreign intelligence official, Leonid Reshetnikov, from entering Bulgaria for 10 years. Reshetnikov is deputy chair of the Double-Headed Eagle and the former head of the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies.

Malinov had traveled regularly to Russia to meet with Reshetnikov and Konstantin Malofeev, an influential Russian financier and head of the Double-Headed Eagle, where he was given funds and assigned tasks, Geshev said.

Chad’s parliament voted on Tuesday to extend a state of emergency by four months in three provinces where fighting between rival ethnic groups have surged in recent weeks.

The state of emergency is in place in the western Tibesti region bordering Niger and the eastern Sila and Ouaddai regions bordering Sudan. It was first declared by Chad’s Council of Ministers on Aug. 19.

At least 50 people were killed in clashes between semi-nomadic cattle herders of President Idriss Deby’s Zaghawa ethnic group and settled farmers mostly from the Ouaddian community last month.

“The next four months will allow the government to roll out enough armed forces to re-establish order and achieve disarmament,” said Ismael Chaibo, minister of territorial administration.

Chadian armed forces already face security threats on multiple fronts, including a Boko Haram Islamist insurgency in its southwest, near Lake Chad, and a northern rebellion based in neighboring Libya that French warplanes in February intervened to halt.

Deby’s fight against Islamist militants — he has deployed troops to counter groups linked to al-Qaida and Islamic State in the Sahel and Lake Chad region — has strained the military, leaving it ill-equipped to tackle a new source of insecurity.

President Donald Trump has fired his National Security Adviser John Bolton.  

“I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House. I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions, as did others in the Administration, and therefore….
….I asked John for his resignation, which was given to me this morning,” Trump said on Twitter Tuesday.

I informed John Bolton last night that his services are no longer needed at the White House. I disagreed strongly with many of his suggestions, as did others in the Administration, and therefore….

— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 10, 2019

He thanked Bolton for his service and said he would be naming a replacement next week.

An Israeli spyware company that has been accused of helping authoritarian governments stifle dissent says it has adopted “a new human rights policy” to ensure its software is not misused.
 
The NSO Group said Tuesday it would institute a series of oversight measures to ensure adherence and would henceforth evaluate potential clients’ “past human rights performance.”

NSO has come under fire in the past year for selling its surveillance software to repressive governments who use it against dissidents. It does not disclose clients, but they are believed to include Middle Eastern and Latin American states. A Saudi dissident has accused NSO of involvement in Saudi journalist Jamal Khashoggi’s killing last year.
 
The company says its product is used by law enforcement and intelligence agencies to fight “crime and terrorism.”

President Donald Trump’s administration is stepping up its campaign to get other nations to boost pressure on Iran as world leaders prepare to meet at the United Nations this month.

The administration says the world should take note of and act on admitted Iranian noncompliance with the 2015 nuclear deal and new questions about Iran’s activities raised by the U.N. atomic watchdog. The U.S. has been ratcheting up its own sanctions on Iran since Trump withdrew from the nuclear deal last year.

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo (pahm-PAY’-oh) said Tuesday that Iran is trying to deceive the world by refusing to fully cooperate with the International Atomic Energy Agency. The agency’s head said Monday he’d stressed the importance of “full” cooperation with it.

Iran says it has begun using advanced centrifuges in violation of the 2015 nuclear deal.

Malawians have crowned a Mr. and Ms. Albinism during the country’s first ever beauty pageant for albinos, held in the capital Lilongwe. The Association of People with Albinism organized the event as part of efforts to destroy myths which have led to attacks on albinos in Malawi and other African countries.

There were cheers and ululations when beauty contestants with albinism strutted their stuff at a first-ever competition in Malawi.

In a country where they face stigma and the threat of attack because of how they look, some 20 contestants demonstrated that albinism can be beautiful.

Patience Phiri was among them.

“I am here because I have ever experienced the threat. Even my real friends I chat with, they have even said I am money. This has really affected my family because they are there, just to protect me,” Phiri said.

People with albinism in Malawi have been attacked because of false beliefs that their body parts, if used in magical potions, can bring good luck and wealth.

More than two dozen have been killed since 2014 and more than 100 are missing.

Twenty-three-year-old Chikondi Kadzanja won the Ms. Albinism Malawi title.

She told VOA that she will use her position to help end the attacks.

“What I am going to do now is firstly to bring awareness to communities, especially the rural communities that hold negative attitudes, myths and misconceptions about persons with albinism,” Kanjadza said.

Twenty-four-year-old Burnet Phunyanya won the Mr. Albinism Malawi title.

He says his task will be to motivate albinos to be self-reliant. 

“I am going to stand still and help persons with albinism. First of all making them to trust in themselves, trust their ideas, and believe in themselves,” Phunyanya said.

Pageant organizers plan to hold the event every year.

Hundreds of Australians have fled their homes in the eastern states as 140 fires ravaged parts of Queensland and New South Wales (NSW), officials said on Tuesday.

Strong winds have fanned bushfires in the two Australian states since Monday, with flames out of control in some areas, ravaging thousands of hectares of land.

At least eight of those fires are suspicious and will be investigated, Queensland Police Commissioner Katrina Carroll told reporters.

“Some of the fires have involved children playing and obviously the consequences are dire as a result of that and … some of them have been purposeful and malicious,” she said. “The consequences of some of these fires are dire. People can die. Buildings and residences are being destroyed.”

In the northeastern state of Queensland alone, low humidity levels, high winds and dried out vegetation have fueled 85 fires that have destroyed or damaged 84 houses across the state, fire service officials said.

There were more than 400 people in evacuation centers, acting Queensland premier Jackie Trad told reporters. She added that there are none dead or missing.

“Apart from Sunshine Coast, we are still seeing fires right throughout the state,” she said.

In neighboring New South Wales, firefighters were battling about 55 fires and about five properties had been confirmed destroyed, the NSW Rural Fire Service said on Monday.

Bushfires have started earlier than normal in the southern hemisphere spring. Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology said winds would intensify throughout the day on Tuesday, but fire threats should abate on Wednesday.

India’s space agency says it has located the lunar probe that was feared lost as it was making its final approach towards the surface last weekend.

The Vikram lander was just two kilometers above the moon’s South Pole Saturday when ground controllers lost contact with the spacecraft. The Indian Space Research Organization said Tuesday the Chandrayaan-2 probe has discovered the lander on the surface, but had not yet established communications with Vikram, named after Vikram Sarabhai, the scientist regarded as the “father” of India’s space program.

If the probe landed intact, India will join the United States, Russia and China as the only nations to achieve a soft landing of a spacecraft on the moon. It will also become the first nation to attempt a controlled landing on the moon’s South Pole.

The $141 million Chandrayaan-2 mothership entered lunar orbit nearly a month after it was launched aboard India’s powerful Geosynchronous Satellite Launch Vehicle Mark Three rocket.  The Vikram lander was designed to release a small rover that will roam the moon’s surface in search for signs of water, and to assess its topography and geology. 

Chandrayaan-2 was a huge step up from India’s previous space explorations, such as its first moon mission in 2008 and a mission to Mars in 2013 that involved sending a spacecraft to the Red Planet.  

Hundreds of Guatemalan soldiers were deployed on Monday to an area near the border with Honduras and Mexico, home to long-standing social conflicts, in a bid to improve security after three soldiers were gunned down by suspected drug runners.

Defense Minister Luis Miguel Ralda told reporters that 2,000 soldiers had been sent as part of the mission following a declaration of emergency powers granted by the Congress two days ago.

“We expect them to bring calm, security and peace to the people of this region,” he said, acknowledging that the area was marked by lawlessness due to extortion and other drug-related crime.

The area has played host over decades to a range of conflicts among locals and land owners, miners and palm oil plantations, including indigenous communities.

Guatemala’s army said last week a group of suspected drug traffickers ambushed a patrol of nine soldiers in Izabal province who were sent to detain an aircraft allegedly transporting drugs. Three of the soldiers were killed.

While some community members dispute parts of the army’s account, officials say they identified nearly 50 illegal runways that they say are used to transport drugs.

The attack on the soldiers, one of the worst incidents of violence perpetrated against the army in years, prompted lawmakers to authorize a 30-day emergency decree on Saturday that imposes a night-time curfew in the northeastern provinces of Alta Verapaz, El Progreso, Izabal, Peten, Zacapa and Baja Verapaz.

The six provinces make up a drug-trafficking corridor that runs from Honduras to Mexican border.

The decree also gives the military new powers to arrest and interrogate suspects and prohibits organized protests in the targeted areas.

Soldiers could be seen in the lush Izabal countryside on Monday stopping and inspecting passing vehicles and setting up new bases.

A school in the town of Semuy II, where the soldiers were attacked, was empty on Monday because classes have been suspended indefinitely.

Guatemala, like neighbors El Salvador and Honduras, is a hub for the trafficking of drugs from South America to the United States.

Coast Guard rescuers pulled four trapped men alive from a capsized cargo ship Monday, drilling into the hull’s steel plates to extract the crew members more than a day after their vessel overturned while leaving a Georgia port.

All four were described as alert and in relatively good condition and were taken to a hospital for further evaluation.

“Best day of my 16-year career,” Lt. Lloyd Heflin, who was coordinating the effort, wrote in a text message to The Associated Press.

A video posted online by the Coast Guard showed responders clapping and cheering as the final man, wearing only shorts, climbed out of a hole in the hull and stood up.

Three of the South Korean crew members came out in the mid-afternoon. The fourth man, who was trapped in a separate compartment, emerged three hours later.

The rescues followed nearly 36 hours of work after the Golden Ray, a giant ship that carries automobiles, rolled onto its side early Sunday as it was leaving Brunswick, bound for Baltimore.

“All crew members are accounted for,” Coast Guard Southeast wrote on Twitter. “Operations will now shift fully to environmental protection, removing the vessel and resuming commerce.”

In the hours immediately after the accident, the Coast Guard lifted 20 crew members into helicopters before determining that smoke and flames and unstable cargo made it too risky to venture further inside the vessel. Officials were concerned that some of the 4,000 vehicles aboard may have broken loose.

That left responders looking for the remaining four crew members. At first, rescuers thought the noises they were hearing inside could be some of the vehicles crashing around. But by dawn Monday, they were confident that the taps were responses to their own taps, indicating someone was alive inside.

“It was outstanding when I heard the news this morning that we had taps back throughout the night,” Capt. John Reed said. Those sounds helped lead rescuers to the right place on the 656-foot (200 meter) vessel and provided motivation.

“They were charged up knowing the people were alive,” Reed said.

On Monday morning, rescuers landed on the side of the Golden Ray and rappelled down the hull. Heflin, who was coordinating the search, said they found three men in a room close to the propeller shaft, near the bottom of the stern. Responders began drilling, starting with a 3-inch (7.5-centimeter) hole. Coast Guard officials brought the ship’s chief engineer, who was rescued Sunday, out to the ship to translate, and found the three men were “on board and OK,” as Heflin put it.

Reed said rescuers passed food and water through the hole to the men. They also provided fresh air to the propeller room, which Reed said was even hotter than outside, where the high was 93 degrees (34 Celsius).

Responders set up a tent on the hull and began drilling additional holes, eventually making an opening large enough to insert a ladder and help the men climb out.

“It was like connect the dots,” Reed said of the hole, which grew to 2 feet by 3 feet (0.6 meters by 1 meter).

The fourth rescue was a greater challenge. That crewman was behind glass in a separate engineering compartment on another deck, Reed said.

The Golden Ray is now stuck in the shipping channel, closing one of the busiest U.S. seaports for shipping automobiles. One ship is unable to leave port and four more are lined up outside waiting to come in, according to ship-tracking website Marine Traffic.

A statement issued Monday by the South Korea foreign ministry said the crew members were isolated in an engine room. It said 10 South Koreans and 13 Filipinos had been on board, along with a U.S. harbor pilot, when the ship began tilting.

Position records for the Golden Ray show the ship arrived in port in Brunswick Saturday evening after making the short sail from a prior stop in Jacksonville, Florida. The ship then departed the dock in Brunswick shortly after midnight and was underway only 23 minutes before its movement stopped in the mouth of the harbor where it capsized, according to satellite data recorded by Marine Traffic.

Port officials were “working closely with the Coast Guard to reopen the channel,” Georgia Ports Authority Executive Director Griff Lynch said in a statement after the final man was rescued.

The cause of the capsizing remains under investigation. Marine Traffic shows the Golden Ray overturned as it was passed by another car carrier entering St. Simons Sound.

At the time, the skies were clear and the weather calm, with a southerly breeze of only 5 miles per hour, according to National Weather Service records.

Many of those rescued were taken to the International Seafarers’ Center in Brunswick. Sailors arrived with only what they were wearing when rescued. A restaurant donated a meal, and the volunteer-run center provided the seamen with clothes, toiletries and Bibles.

The vessel is owned by Hyundai Glovis, which carries cars for automakers Hyundai and Kia as well as others.

In a statement, the company thanked the Coast Guard for saving the crew and sought to assure the public that it would now focus on “mitigating damage to property and the environment.”

It’s a warm night in Indonesia and the air is filled with excitement as villagers watch a puppet show accompanied by traditional music.

To the rhythmic beat of cymbals, drums and a bamboo harmonica, the hand-held puppets wearing brightly colored batik headdresses and sarongs fight, and one gets flung off the stage.

This vivid performance is the brainchild of Drajat Iskandar, who has been lending a hand to revive the near-extinct art of “wayang bambu,” or bamboo puppetry.

Once enjoyed by generations of Sundanese, Indonesia’s second most-populous ethnic group who originate from the central island of Java, the delicate art has almost disappeared from modern stages.

Iskandar, 47, has updated his bamboo puppets by making them three-dimensional, unlike conventional two-dimensional ones.

This is done by weaving bamboo strips together to form an intricate head and torso fixed over two perpendicular bamboo sticks. The puppet is then dressed in a headdress and sarong.

The narratives Iskandar’s puppet troupe perform are also updated to reflect modern society, instead of the usual stories from Hindu epics such as the Ramayana and Mahabharata.

“I try to portray local stories and folklore from our community with bamboo puppets,” Iskandar said. “The stories we perform are also inspired by current issues, like brawls between students, drug problems, sexual freedom, and politics.”

Iskandar learned the art of “wayang bambu” from his father, who was also a puppeteer. A former artist, he started developing his own “wayang bambu” style of performance nearly two decades ago.

Now he has a full puppet troupe, along with an orchestra of 12 musicians that accompany each show, and has been training pupils to preserve the art form.

Iskandar and his pupils regularly visit a bamboo grove near his home to gather materials to assemble new puppets and make the minor repairs needed after the sometimes frenetic shows.

He says bookings for his troupe’s performances have steadily increased over the years. They’re also a hit since they perform in the Sundanese language.

“Members of the community, from children to the elderly, can understand and enjoy this new form of Sundanese culture, and the storyline is also very interesting,” said Pupung Syaiful Rohman, a resident of Ciapus village, in West Java province, where the recent performance was staged.

The U.S. military is likely to accelerate the pace of its operations in Afghanistan to counter an increase in Taliban attacks, a senior U.S. general said Monday following Washington’s suspension of peace talks with the insurgents.

U.S. Marine General Kenneth McKenzie, the head of U.S. Central Command, said during a visit to Afghanistan that the Taliban overplayed its hand in peace negotiations by carrying out a spate of high profile attacks, including one that killed a U.S. soldier last week.

The Taliban, which controls more territory than at any time since 2001 when it governed the country, said on Sunday that more American lives would be lost.

McKenzie declined to comment on the Taliban statement. But he noted that U.S. troops in Afghanistan were hardly “defenseless.”

“We’re certainly not going to sit still and let them carry out some self-described race to victory. That’s not going to happen,” McKenzie told a group of reporters traveling with him during a stop at Bagram Airfield in northeastern Afghanistan.

Asked whether increasing operations against the Taliban could include airstrikes and raids by U.S. and Afghan commandos, McKenzie responded: “I think we’re talking a total spectrum.”

“And, again, whatever targets are available, whatever targets can be lawfully and ethically struck, I think we’re going to pursue those targets,” he said.

Taliban miscalculation

The insurgents’ determination to step up both attacks on provincial centers and suicide bombings even as peace talks were taking place was a major factor in pushing U.S. President Donald Trump to announce on Saturday that he was canceling the talks aimed at ending America’s longest war of 18 years.

The halt to the negotiations has fueled fears of even more violence across Afghanistan, with heightened security warnings in the capital Kabul and other centers ahead of a presidential election scheduled for Sept. 28.

Trump, a longtime critic of the Afghan war, and the billions of dollars it costs, had been preparing an unprecedented meeting with the insurgency’s leaders at the presidential compound in Camp David, Maryland.

But he called off the event after the latest violence.

Reuters has reported on growing misgivings that had been building within Trump’s administration about the peace deal negotiated by a special U.S. envoy, Zalmay Khalilzad. McKenzie said he believed the Taliban underestimated the delicate nature of the talks with Washington, even in their later stages.

“I think they overplayed their hand,” McKenzie said. “They misjudged the character of the American people. I think they misjudged the character of the president of the United States.”

U.S. troops

The growing tension on the ground in Afghanistan adds to the uncertainty about the future course for American forces, many of whom must now simultaneously brace for an increase in fighting while also awaiting potential orders to withdraw.

The United States has about 14,000 troops in Afghanistan, a figure that Trump has said he would like to reduce to about 8,600.

McKenzie declined to speculate on next steps even as he visited American troops at bases in Afghanistan, flying in from neighboring Pakistan over rugged, mountainous terrain.

Asked what his message was in his talks on Monday with U.S. special operations forces, medical teams and other personnel, McKenzie told reporters that they would need to keep fighting the “hard fight” for now.

“We just have to hold the line right now,” McKenzie said.

“We’re going to make some decisions, I think, back in our nation’s capital over the next few days and that will give us increased guidance going ahead,” he added, without elaborating.

The United Nations’ chief human rights official said Monday that millions of Venezuelans continue to suffer rights violations, including dozens of possible extrajudicial killings carried out by a special police force.
 
Nongovernmental organizations report that the Special Action police force carried out 57 suspected extrajudicial killings in July alone within Caracas, Michelle Bachelet said in an oral presentation on Venezuela to the U.N. Human Rights Council in Geneva.

Bachelet’s presentation followed a scathing written report issued in early July that drew a government backlash. It found a “pattern of torture” under the government of President Nicolas Maduro and citing violations like arbitrary detention, extrajudicial killings, sexual violence and enforced disappearances.

Bachelet’s latest presentation noted some areas of progress, while pointing to more cases of human rights violations and declining conditions as more than 4 million Venezuelans have fled a country beset by hyperinflation that leaves monthly minimum wages equal to $2.
 
While Bachelet said she had called for officials to dismantle the feared Special Action police force, the unit has actually received ongoing support from the highest levels of the government, she said.
 
Bachelet raised concern that groups that collaborated with her in the earlier report have since come under criticism and threats by senior officials.
 
“Reprisals for having cooperated with the United Nations are unacceptable,” she said. “I urge the authorities to take preventative measures.”

Bachelet said she worried about a proposed law criminalizing the activities of human rights organizations that receive money from abroad, which could further erode democracy in Venezuela, a once wealthy oil nation.

Areas of progress
 
Highlighting advances, Bachelet said a member of her team recently was allowed to visit the Ramo Verde Military Center — a prison commonly used to hold what opposition leaders consider political prisoners — with an agreement for visits to come. The government also has released 83 people whose arrests human rights observers considered arbitrary, she said, adding that officials have agreed to consider another 27 cases, expecting action soon.
 
The only way to overcome Venezuela’s human rights crisis is for Maduro’s government and the opposition led by National Assembly President Juan Guaido to return to negotiations overseen by Norway, Bachelet said, and renewed her offer to support all such efforts.

Maduro’s government didn’t immediately respond to Bachelet’s latest comments, but officials rejected earlier criticism as biased and demanded she make corrections.

Fifty U.S. states and territories, led by Texas, announced an investigation into Google’s “potential monopolistic behavior.”
 
The Monday announcement closely followed one from a separate group of states Friday that disclosed an investigation into Facebook’s market dominance. The two probes widen the antitrust scrutiny of big tech companies beyond sweeping federal and congressional investigations and enforcement action by European regulators.

Nebraska attorney general Doug Peterson, a Republican, said at a press conference held in Washington that 50 attorneys general joining together sends a “strong message to Google.”
 
California and Alabama are not part of the investigation, although it does include the District of Columbia and Puerto Rico. Tara Gallegos, a spokeswoman for California Attorney General Xavier Becerra, declined to confirm or deny any state investigation and would not comment on the announcement by the other states.

Mike Lewis, a spokesman for Alabama Attorney General Steve Marshall, also said the state’s legal team had no comment on the probe.

The news conference featured a dozen Republican attorneys general plus the Democratic attorney general of Washington, D.C.

Google’s parent company, Alphabet, has a market value of more than $820 billion and controls so many facets of the internet that it’s fairly impossible to surf the web for long without running into at least one of its services. Google’s dominance in online search and advertising enables it to target millions of consumers for their personal data.
 
Google expects the state authorities will ask the company about past similar investigations in the U.S. and internationally, senior vice president of global affairs Kent Walker wrote in a blog post Friday.
 
Critics often point to Google’s 2007 acquisition of online advertising company DoubleClick as pivotal to its advertising dominance.
 
Europe’s antitrust regulators slapped Google with a $1.7 billion fine in March for unfairly inserting exclusivity clauses into contracts with advertisers, disadvantaging rivals in the online ad business.
 
One outcome antitrust regulators might explore is forcing Google to spin off search as a separate company, experts say. Regulators also could focus on areas such as Google’s popular video site YouTube, an acquisition Google scored in 2006.
 
Joining Paxton, a Republican, in the investigation are the attorneys general of almost all U.S. states and the District of Columbia.

Google response
 
Google has long argued that although its businesses are large, they are useful and beneficial to consumers.
 
“Google is one of America’s top spenders on research and development, making investments that spur innovation,” Walker wrote. “Things that were science fiction a few years ago are now free for everyone — translating any language instantaneously, learning about objects by pointing your phone, getting an answer to pretty much any question you might have.”
 
But federal and state regulators and policymakers are growing more concerned not just with the company’s impact on ordinary internet users, but also on smaller companies striving to compete in Google’s markets.
 
“On the one hand, you could just say, ‘well Google is dominant because they’re good,’” said Jen King, the director of privacy at Stanford’s Center for Internet and Society. “But at the same time, it’s created an ecosystem where people’s whole internet experience is mediated through Google’s home page and Google’s other products.”

Three possible targets

Experts believe the probe could focus on at least one of three areas that have caught regulators’ eyes.
 
A good first place to look might be online advertising. Google will control 31.1% of global digital ad dollars in 2019, according to eMarketer estimates, crushing a distant second-place Facebook. And many smaller advertisers have argued that Google has such a stranglehold on the market that it becomes a system of whatever Google says, goes — because the alternative could be not reaching customers.
 
“There’s definitely concern on the part of the advertisers themselves that Google wields way too much power in setting rates and favoring their own services over others,” King said.

Another visibly huge piece of Google’s business is its search platform, often the starting point for millions of people when they go online. Google dwarfs other search competitors and has faced harsh criticism in the past for favoring its own products over competitors at the top of search results. European regulators also have investigated in this area, ultimately fining Google for promoting its own shopping service. Google is appealing the fine.
 
Google’s smartphone operating system, Android, is the most widely used in the world.
 
European regulators have fined Google $5 billion for tactics involving Android, finding that Google forced smartphone makers to install Google apps, thereby expanding its reach. Google has since allowed more options for alternative browser and search apps to European Android phones.
 
The U.S. Justice Department opened a sweeping investigation of big tech companies this summer, looking at whether their online platforms have hurt competition, suppressed innovation or otherwise harmed consumers. The Federal Trade Commission has been conducting its own competition probe of Big Tech, as has the House Judiciary subcommittee on antitrust.

The head of the National Weather Service is defending forecasters who contradicted President Donald Trump’s claim that Hurricane Dorian posed a threat to Alabama as it approached the United States.
 
Director Louis Uccellini told a meteorology convention Monday that forecasters in Birmingham did the right thing when they tried to combat public panic and rumors that Dorian posed a threat to Alabama. Uccellini says it was only later that they found out the source of the mistaken information.

Speaking at a meeting of the National Weather Association in Huntsville, Alabama, Uccellini said Birmingham forecasters “did what any office would do” to protect the public.
 
Trump has defended his tweet about Alabama and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration issued an unsigned statement critical of the Birmingham forecasters on Friday.

President Donald Trump on Monday denied anything improper in the use by military personnel and Vice President Mike Pence of his luxury golf resorts while on official travel abroad.

The Air Force announced a review following an uproar over the revelation that the crew of a C-17 transport plane stayed at the Trump Turnberry in Scotland during a layover between Kuwait and Alaska.

Similar questions have been raised over the ethics of Pence and his entourage staying at the Trump family’s Doonbeg golf resort in Ireland this month while on an official visit to the country.

Trump, who has raised eyebrows by integrating his family business empire’s golf courses into his own presidential schedule, said that government officials’ use of his properties was a coincidence.

“NOTHING TO DO WITH ME,” he tweeted about the Air Force use of Turnberry, although he added that the officers “have good taste!”

He also defended the Pence group’s use of Doonbeg, saying the vice president wanted to visit the town because of family links, even though his official meetings were in Dublin, on the other side of Ireland.

“I had nothing to do with the decision of our great @VP Mike Pence to stay overnight at one of the Trump owned resorts in Doonbeg, Ireland. Mike’s family has lived in Doonbeg for many years, and he thought that during his very busy European visit, he would stop and see his family!”

The Pentagon said in a statement that the Scottish layover “adhered to all guidance and procedures,” but it acknowledged that there might be at least an image problem.

“We understand that US Service members lodging at higher-end accommodations, even if within government rates, might be allowable but not advisable,” the military said.

“We must still be considerate of perceptions of not being good stewards of taxpayer funds that might be created through the appearance of aircrew staying at such locations,” it said.

“Therefore, we are reviewing all associated guidance.”

Democrats, who control the House of Representatives, said last Friday that they will probe whether Trump has broken laws against profiting from the presidency.

Trump has separated himself from his family’s real estate and golf business. However, he makes regular use of his own golf courses in Florida, New Jersey and Virginia.

While at the G7 summit in France, he pitched his Doral resort in Florida as the venue for next year’s gathering, arguing that his property is almost unique in the United States as a suitable location for the huge event.

Security officials these days are anything but shy when they describe the dangers facing the United States in cyberspace.

“We’re in the midst, I think we all know, of a global cyber pandemic,” the National Security Agency’s top lawyer warned at a conference last week.

And NSA General Counsel Glenn Gerstell did not stop there.

“I think it’s probably fair to say it’s going to get worse before it gets better,” he added.  “The opportunities for cyber mischief are increasing at a great rate… The opportunities for our ability to defend against it are not increasing at the same rate.”

The costs are significant.  

The Federal Bureau of Investigation’s Internet Crime Complaint Center took in more than 351,000 complaints in 2018, the last full year for which data is available, with losses to companies and individuals topping $2.7 billion.

And officials are quick to point out, those are only the cases they know about. Many go unreported. And the potential impact is not insignificant.

U.S. officials have described the country’s economy as a “cross-cutting” of various systems that have been integrated into a “common fabric.” But they say U.S. adversaries, like China, see a web of interconnected targets, much of which is not within the purview of U.S. government agencies.

 “Much of what we care about in the U.S. is in private hands,” said Tonya Ugoretz, the deputy assistant director for cyber, at the Federal Bureau of Investigation.

“There’s no shortage of vulnerabilities and opportunities for malicious actors,” she added, speaking this past week at a security conference.  “We see that landscape only growing in complexity.”

Smart devices vulnerabilities

A chief concern is what is often referred to as the Internet of Things (IoT), which include a whole host of so-called smart devices, from mobile phones to refrigerators to teddy bears, that are connected to the internet.

While being able to use a smart phone to talk to a refrigerator to figure out what to pick up at the grocery store may be convenient, it can also be risky.  A criminal who can hack into the home network and the refrigerator could theoretically use that opening to access a bank account or other sensitive material.

When experts add in the impact of new and growing technologies, like artificial intelligence or 5G wireless networks, many see danger.

“It’s increasing the opportunities or the attack surfaces, as military folks like to call it, for mischief,” according to the NSA’s Gerstell. “That’s increasing at an extraordinary, breathtaking rate.”

Extensive damage

Defending the growing target list for cyberattacks is difficult, as is undoing the damage.

While the U.S. has had some success in recovering lost or stolen funds — the FBI reported a recovery rate of about 75% in 2018 — the damage from stolen data or trade secrets can linger.

At the same time, there is a growing frustration especially among private sector companies that the U.S. government is holding them back from taking more aggressive, and perhaps more effective, action.

“What they are facing is not just routine criminal activity but it’s often blended, that the criminals are linked to nation states and that nation states are increasingly conducting criminal activities,” said John Carlin, a former assistant attorney general with the U.S. Department of Justice, who now represents companies that have been victimized by cyberattacks.

Limited powers

“They are neither permitted because of the national security implications to take steps on their own to disrupt attacks that are occurring or to take acts to collect information outside of their networks,” he said. “Nor are they getting additional actionable intelligence on the front end of the threat so that they can take precautionary steps to protect themselves.”
 
As a result, there has been persistent talk that companies should be allowed to “hack back,” to track and retaliate against cyber actors who have targeted them.

There are already indications that companies are going after their attackers.

“There are signs it is going on in an international sort of emerging market for what you might call defense services,” according to Wyatt Hoffman with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace’s Cyber Policy Initiative.

“Much of the evidence is anecdotal,” he said. “But there is evidence that, for instance, in the financial sector in different parts of the world, there are banks that will hire firms to do kind of server take down services where if they’re if they’re suffering from a [denial of service] attack or a persistent threat, they’ll hire a firm in a jurisdiction where it’s a little more permissive.”

For now, such “hack backs” are not legal in the U.S. and attempts by lawmakers to make it legal have not gained sufficient traction in Congress.

U.S. government officials also continue to request that any companies that suspect they have been hacked contact law enforcement.

“Most of the studies I’ve seen suggest that the average time it takes to discover a data breach is about six months, certainly months,” Deputy Assistant Attorney General Adam Hickey said during a recent panel discussion on hacking back.

“The odds that the hackers will have transferred it [the data] only once to an identified IP address and left it there without copying it or removing it from the United States in that time strikes me as very, very unlikely,” he added.

Some software providers agree, and have joined with government officials to warn companies against taking matters into their own hands.

“It just doesn’t work,” said Rich Boscovich with Microsoft’s, Digital Crime Unit, warning of unintended consequences. “The liability there is enormous. So, hacking back is not something that you want to do.”

 

 

 

Russian voters handed setbacks to Kremlin-affiliated candidates in Moscow and other local elections nationwide — losses that came despite a near total ban on opposition candidates that sparked a summer of street protests and mass arrests in the capital.  

With most of the vote counted, returns showed pro-Kremlin candidates lost over a third of seats in the race for Moscow’s city council — suggesting a plan by the opposition to consolidate votes around targeted opponents of the Kremlin had been relatively successful. 

Meanwhile, Kremlin-backed candidates appeared poised to hold on to the important governor posts in 16 regions, including Russia’s second capital, Saint Petersburg.

The independent election monitoring organization Golos reported  “the mass use” of cash incentives and busing of voters to election precincts in Siberia and the Far East.  It also complained of a lack of access by vote monitors and journalists to precincts. 

Ella Pamfilova, the head of Russia’s Election Commission, who had been subject of a mysterious attack on the even of the vote, accused Golos of reproducing claims of fraud from previous elections. 

The closely watched Moscow elections — which have been marred by past vote rigging —proceeded largely without incident.  Several videos, however, circulated on social media showing ballot stuffing at a few polling stations. 

Election Repression 

For many, the vote was characterized by which candidates were not in the race.

Russia’s Election Commission banned the vast majority of opposition candidates alleging they did not have the required number of signatures to participate. 

The move prompted a rolling series of street protests in Moscow and Saint Petersburg that saw some 2,500 arrests — effectively turning a somewhat minor race into a test of political freedoms in President Vladimir Putin’s managed democracy.

Banned opposition candidates spent much of the summer in prison. A handful of protesters faced even harsher punishment — several receiving prison terms of 3-5 years for participating in what the government says are “unauthorized rallies.” 

Yet Russian President Vladimir Putin dismissed complaints about the lack of competition.

“It’s not important how many candidates there are — what matters is the quality,” said the Russian leader as he cast his vote in Moscow. 

Putin has said Russians have the right to protest but has also warned that authorities would not tolerate those who break exiting laws.  

In a reminder of that threat, a dozen demonstrators were arrested in Moscow Sunday while trying to raise public awareness over the harsh sentences issued by Russian courts earlier in the week. 

Where is the Party of Power? 

The vote seemed to confirm recent polls that showed a collapse in support for the government and its ruling United Russia party. 

Indeed, United Russia — formally, still the ‘party of power’ in Russia’s Parliament — was nearly absent from the ballot as party regulars recast themselves as ‘independents’ to avoid voters’ ire. 

Yet they faced another challenge. 

With opposition candidates barred from participation, Russian opposition leader Alexey Navalny called on voters to avoid diving their votes and embrace a ‘smart voting’ strategy.  The plan amounted to outing Kremlin-affiliated candidates and urging voters to strategically cast their ballots for whatever other candidate has the best chance of winning. 

I’ll vote for whatever smart vote candidate Navalny tells me to,”  said Sergey Shepetev, 38, who spoke to VOA at outside a precinct in central Moscow. 

“I don’t even remember his name. But I’ll vote for him.  Anything to beat United Russia.” 

Still, Navalny’s plan clearly tested the limits of opposition voters loyalty — in effect asking them to support candidates with ideas they clearly despised. 

“I went and Smart Voted. What could be more repulsive?” asked Konstantin Sonin, a leading Russian economist, in a post to Facebook where he detailed his vote for a communist candidate. 

“Voting for him, I voted “against all” — against everyone who ruined the Moscow elections.” 

Election interference

The election was also characterized by accusations of foreign interference.

In advance of the vote, Russia’s Duma held investigations accusing the US and several media companies of trying to foment a street revolution. 

On Sunday, Roskomnadzor, Russia’s Internet governing body, made similar “election interference” charges against American tech giants Google and Facebook, saying the companies had run online political ads banned on election day.   

Yet the biggest factor in the race appeared to be low voter turnout — which hovered in the upper teens across the country and just over 20% in the capital. 

“What elections? I have to work,” grumbled a cashier in Moscow when asked about the elections.   

“I couldn’t vote if I wanted to.” 

Hezbollah said Monday its fighters shot down an Israeli drone over southern Lebanon.

The militant group said in a statement it used “suitable weapons” to take down the drone, and that the aircraft was in its possession.

The Israeli military reported one of its drones went down in the same area, but did not specify a cause.  Israel said it was a “simple drone” and that there were no concerns about important information being taken from it.

Hezbollah leader Hassan Nasrallah warned last month that his fighters would attack any Israeli drones that entered Lebanese airspace.

The development comes a week after Hezbollah and the Israeli army traded fire for the first time in years as Hezbollah launched anti-tank missiles into Israel and the Israeli forces responded with artillery.

The two sides fought a month-long war in 2006.

The Bahamians are burying their dead and looking for survivors after Category 5 storm ravaged parts of the archipelago leaving 70,000 homeless