GlobalSecurity.org is a company based out of Alexandria, VA that serves as a hub for security and intelligence news. They are considered one of the leading sources for developing news stories in the intelligence and military communities. The site attracts a large range of users all the way from retired military serviceman to AP reporters. Congressional members working in defense policy even use it as a research tool. A graph from the site shows that GlobalSecurity.org had an average of 15 million monthly page views in 2005. While the site may have a tacky appearance, the staff and senior fellows of GlobalSecurity.org are extremely qualified and credible subject matter experts.

GlobalSecurity.org organizes its content into six different categories: Military, Intelligence, Homeland Security, Space, and the Public Eye. Each section has recent articles about ongoing events, access to government documents, and links to various special interest areas within each category.

On top of providing these breaking news stories, GlobalSecuirty.org is rich in technical reference documents and reports. For example, you can find very reliable and accurate information about the different yields or delivery systems of the US Nuclear arsenal or find a complete overview of the military and intelligence operations throughout the world past or present.

I’ve really become an avid reader of this site over the past few months, and I highly reccommend it to anyone interested in security or intelligence news.

This is a cause and consequence paper that I did for my English class. I just thought that I would share.

“Tibet is Not Free! Tibet is Not Free!”

When China allowed the first foreign journalists back in Lhasa in a government-lead tour, on March 27, a sobering realization was reported to the rest of the free world. During the middle of an interview in the Jokhang Temple with the temple’s administrative head, a group of about thirty, young Tibetan monks surrounded the journalists and Chinese government officials. With tears streaming from their eyes, they shouted, “Tibet is not free! Tibet is not free!” Before the journalists could even question the monks, the Chinese officials who were sponsoring the tour ushered the journalists away and quarantined the Temple for “investigation”. The thirty young monks have since been missing (Shai, Lhasa). By strategically starting prior to the upcoming summer Olympics, the recent outbreak of Tibetan civil unrest has brought the decades of Chinese oppression to an emotional climax. China has quickly responded with a strict crackdown on the protests and cut internet and media sources that carry the Tibetan cries for independence. These unfolding events highlight the reasons that Tibet has remained such a politically, socially, and religiously charged issue and also sheds light on the consequences that it has incurred for the fight of Tibetan sovereignty.

The root of the Tibetan independence issue began in 1950 when the newly formed People’s Republic of China claimed Tibet to be an integral part of China. The Dali Lama, the religious leader of Tibetan Buddhism, had recently assumed political leadership of the Tibetan government. Through measures of force, China annexed Tibet shortly after a Tibetan delegation signed the Seventeen Article Agreement which essentially ensured the “peaceful transfer of power.” The credibility of the People’s Republic of China’s claim to the Tibetan region is still controversial and widely disputed today (Moh). In respect to the 2008 riots, 1950 serves as a starting point of Tibetan people and PRC‘s relationship. Even after fifty years, Tibet’s brief period of independence is still a very vivid memory to the several generations of Tibetans that have grown up under the PRC’s rule.

During the 1950s, the PRC and Tibetan government maintained a peaceful but apprehensive relationship. Finally, after a failed rebellion in 1959, the Dali Lama was forced to flee to India where he created a government-in-exile and appealed to the international community for Tibet’s independence. The PRC quickly denounced the Dali Lama and installed the Panchen Lama, another Buddhist religious leader, as a figurehead (Moh). In a society where the Tibetan Buddhist religion reaches beyond social and moral code and into the political realm, the removal of the Dali Lama and China’s interference with the religious authorities incensed the Tibetan people. For several decades, the Chinese government actively oppressed the Tibetan Buddhist religion and slowly cut out integral parts of Tibetan culture. The Chinese government called it “cultural revolution,” but the Tibetan Buddhists called it “cultural genocide.”(Moh) Fifty years of religious oppression and interference has bottled up a lot of anger and frustration. This bottle was just waiting to be uncorked. In March 2008, the conditions were just right.

March 14, 2008 marked the largest and most controversial wave of protests that occurred in China since the 1989 Tiananmen Square massacre. Four days after Buddhist monks demonstrated the anniversary of the 1959 failed uprising against Chinese rule, violent riots ravaged the streets of Lhasa, the traditional capital of Tibet. The demonstration about the unsuccessful revolution transcended into a fierce and renewed call for Tibetan independence and sovereignty after decades of being under China’s oppressive rule. Within several days, the riots and civil unrest spread to Lhasa’s surrounding providences. The Tibetan protesters mostly targeted the ethic Han Chinese, the majority of all Chinese, with violence and vandalism. Many businesses owned by ethic Han Chinese or government friendly Tibetans where destroyed. In swift show of force, the People’s Republic of China deployed thousands of security personnel and paramilitary forces to disperse the rioters and deter potential outbreaks. The security forces quickly enacted a military state of emergency and tightened physical security in Lhasa and the surrounding providences (Oster, “In China”).

China immediately ordered the expulsion of all foreigners from Lhasa and enforced a week-long media “blackout” of Tibet. News about the protests and the military crackdown slowly trickled out of China’s state-sponsored media (In China). While it has always been know for a heavily-censored media, China did not hesitate when it completely blocked video sharing sites such as YouTube to anyone in China. Video footage of the Tibetan riots and calls to action had surfaced on these video sharing sites. By blocking these Internet sites from China, the Chinese government effectively eliminated a vital link between Tibet and the rest of the world. The Western media reported this action as an infringement of free speech. The attempted control over what news goes in and out of Tibet has resulted in many conflicting reports of what exactly happened. The total extent of the riots and civil unrest is still not completely known. China’s official figures put the death toll at 22 in Lhasa, but the exiled Tibetan government puts the total death toll at 140 after taking into account of the riots in entire region of Tibet (Chinese). The battle between Chinese and international press over censorship and bias, has united various Western media conglomerates in an outcry. The ongoing Tibetan incident has consequently been widely publicized in the Western media.

Another one of the more interesting circumstances of this outbreak of civil unrest is the fact that China will host upcoming 2008 summer Olympic Games. The Olympics has always been synonymous with human rights, and the Tibetan protests couldn’t happen at a better time. China’s quick crackdown and clean-up of the situation is an attempt to alleviate and minimize the damage the Tibetan riots have caused China’s “unified” Olympic image. However, it might be possible that some countries will boycott the Olympics because of the protests and China’s mishandling of the situation.

A long-term effect of China’s strict crackdown could also be further oppression of Tibetan society and culture. Because Tibetan Buddhist monks were the originators of the protest, Tibetan Buddhism may face future repercussions from the Chinese government. China may end up fully suppressing the Buddhist religious culture and ultimately place stricter laws in response to Tibet’s civil unrest. Sadly, the only course of action that China will most likely take in response to the Tibetan protests will be to take away more individual freedoms. China’s decision to cut off various communication mediums between Tibet and the rest of the world is a precursor to this path of tyranny.

Tibet is a vivid illustration of a battle over religious, social, and political freedom. The sequence of events that paved the way to the 2008 Tibetan protests was set in motion nearly fifty years ago. The upcoming Olympics and the anniversary of a failed uprising provided the perfect opportunity to unleash the rage of over fifty years of oppression. The Chinese government has only responded to the recent Tibetan outcry with further oppression and cultural genocide. The March riots in Tibet, however, are proof, yet again, of what happens when a government oppresses a people, its religion, and its culture. Oppressors can’t expect the oppressed to endure in silence. While it is a crime against humanity to take away the right to practice a religion, take away the right of free speech, and forcefully take a “home” from an entire people, the real cost of Tibet’s campaign for independence and sovereignty is paid by the innocence people that have been swept away by the tide of the ongoing Tibetan revolution. This recent squall may not bring Tibet’s independence or even be the last storm of its kind, but when the waves finally settle and there is a free Tibet, the damage inflicted by the generations of oppression and resulting conflict will be able to heal.

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Renovation on Maiselog is finally complete. I have uploaded the posts from the other sites. I will also now be using WordPress 2.5 from here on out. This blog is officially live as of April 10, 2008 at 7:40pm. I still have to update some links and tags from earlier posts and reorganize the categories.

I wrote this paper for a classification and division assignment in my English class this semester. I hope you enjoy.

World of Warcraft has become a historical achievement for the video gaming industry, and consequently a popular social icon. Over the past three years, it has gained an almost religious following of over 10 million people. If the entire population in New York City and Philadelphia sat down and played World of Warcraft at the same time, it would still be short of 10,000,000 by about 250,000. World of Warcraft, or WoW for short, is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG). Thousands of players can be on the same seamless and persistent virtual world. Players assume the life of a fictional charter in the fantasy world of Azeroth, a brainchild of the software developing company Blizzard. Azeroth is an intricate universe of swords and sorcery. Players create their own customized character based on race, class, and appearance. The underlying theme of the game is a continuing epic war between the Alliance and Horde. The Alliance is made up of Humans, Night Elves, Dwarves, Draenei, and Gnomes. The Horde is composed of Orcs, Undead, Tauren, and Blood Elves. On top of nine different races, there are nine different classes. Each of these classes have unique abilities and traits that allow them to compliment other classes when players work as groups. Teamwork is integral part of WoW, and consequently one of features that WoW is most renowned for. Players must often work in groups of up to forty players to defeat powerful bosses and fight back mobs of monsters; this is called dungeon raiding. Some of these raids can literally last days. Another interesting element of WoW is Player versus Player (PvP). WoW allows players to fight each other. This makes the Horde versus Alliance storyline very interesting and competitive. The role-playing aspect of the game allows players to complete quests or kill monsters to gain experience and level up. With the recent expansion pack, characters can be leveled up to 70. WoW is probably the most sophistically engineered game every made; it would take a thousand- page guide to properly explain the game play completely.

This immense complexity and vastness of WoW is most likely the reason why it remains such an enigma to anyone not in the gaming community. WoW culture has come under scrutiny in television series such as Family Guy and the Office. These shows basically give people the impression that WoWers have no social life what so every. People need to understand that not all people who play WoW are friendless and girlfriendless geeks. After all, WoW is without a doubt a prime example of how the internet serves as a vehicle of communication that can span across the world. It is a social network phenomenon. The global connectivity that WoW creates brings a lot of diverse players to the same magical world; consequently, there are several different groups that players could be classified under. While these categories may not be all-inclusive or entirely realistic, understanding the kinds of people and reasons why they play may give the public a better appreciation of exactly what World of Warcraft is all about.

The Noob

A noob, a slang term for newbie with variations such as noobie and nooblet, is someone who is completely and utterly clueless about what he or she is doing in World of Warcraft. It could possibly be the first time that the noob is playing WoW, or it could be a derogatory name used for someone who is acting retarded in-game. Most of the time, however, noobs are genuinely new to the game. Most noobs are often the older players, rather than the younger ones. Noobs often annoyingly ask the more experienced players where to go for quests or how to get to a certain location. A level 70 human paladin player was quoted, “One day, a random noob came up to me and said that he wanted to be like me some day. I almost rolled out of my seat laughing.” Being slapped across the face with the term boob is very insulting to an experience gamer, but people often forget, that at one time they were a noob. It is just a stage in one’s gaming development.

The Causal WoWer

Most noobs generally become a casual WoWer in due time. This type of players does not make WoW an integral part of their life. They may have a high level character, but it probably took them a year or two to achieve this. Casuals may be involved in a clan, but they are mostly likely not active participants. On average they play between two and four hours a day. In real life, they definitely have friends, family, a job, a girlfriend, and maybe even married. This type of player is statically the plurality of all WoW players. In WoW, they may be a level fifty-four Warlock, but in real life they are a high school science teacher. In WoW, they may have an armored white war stallion, but in real life have a dog named Bozo. Yes, it’s true; the majority of people that play Wow are not obsessed about it. They are contributing members of society. They have lives outside of the game.

The WoW Addict

In his gleaming armor from the depths of dungeon Zul’Gurub, the WoW addict has mastered every class and every race. His attacks or spells can instantly kill, and his battle cry is something to be terrified of. The WoW addict spends the majority of his or her day playing WoW. It holds a higher priority than going to college classes or a job. His relationships have been ruined and he is receding from his social life and friends. WoW addicts, have the World of Warcraft certified keyboard to better help them navigate and make battle with other players. On average, WoW addicts spend between six and ten hours playing. They have not only financially invested in the game, but also emotionally. There is no distinction between the fictional character and the addict’s individual consciousness. His only friends are WoW friends. He may be the leader a guild, or a loner wreaking havoc in his enemy’s territory. He is the raid leader, commanding all thirty-nine of the other group members in a strategically coordinated attack on a dark fortress floating in the sky. The game enthralls his imagination. The ability to be someone else in alternate fantasy universe never ceases to wet his appetite for adventure. He becomes so immersed in this magical world that he begins to forget the important of the real world, where he feels that his feet must always remain on the ground and head out of the clouds. Some readers may feel that a WoW addict has stepped over the boundaries of rationality, but in the gaming community, putting six hours or so into a video game daily is common. The WoW addict simply loves the game and cannot live real life each day without being taken away to this limitless environment where imagination is the only inhibitor.

The WoW Rehabber

The adage, “Life in moderation,” is a piece of advice that WoW players need to remember. World of Warcraft has ruined the WoW rehabber’s life. The WoW rehabber is someone that has identified that they have a problem and ceases engagement with the game. They have put so much time into the game that it is physically, emotionally, and even financially impossible to continue playing the game. A WoW rehabber is someone who was once an addict but has quit playing WoW .To correct this damaging addiction, a WoW rehabber deletes characters or in worst case scenario deletes their accounts. This is one of the hardest things that a WoWer can do in his or her life. They are in a sense deleting a part of their soul or consciousness. Going through withdrawal and rehab is very prevalent in the WoW community. In Korea, it was reported that a child died due to neglect by her World of Warcraft addicted parents. China even imposed laws setting time limits on WoW. There are even guides out on the internet with instructions on how to go through WoW rehabilitation. The key concept here is self-responsibility. Responsible WoW players will never have to go through rehabilitation.

World of Warcraft is not merely a game to some people, but an on-going story that they are actors participating in. It represents a tiny fraction of what future virtual technologies could be capable of creating for the human imagination and mind. These four types of WoW classifications are very broad. Even in this attempt to tear down stereotypes about World of Warcraft, the four classifications are stereotypes in themselves. There are many different kinds of WoW players, and each person has their own reasons for playing. The real question that needs to be answered is whether a character in World of Warcraft is merely a pixilated avatar on a computer screen or an extension of someone’s life. Can someone truly live their life in the World of Warcraft universe? It may like a silly question in this century, but in a hundred years or so, when developers can create a virtual environment so realistic and vivid, who is going to be able to tell the difference?

i2 is a company based out of the UK that designs and distributes a wide variety of visual analysis software tools. Analyst Notebook 7 is their link and social network analysis software that they create for law enforcement, government, and the security industry. It is very similar to Sentinel: Threat Management System, a product that I reviewed earlier. Analyst Notebook, unlike Sentinel, has been around for longer, and thus, is one of the industry standards. Most of the alphabet soup agencies use this product, hence the importance of being familiar with it.

Analyst Notebook has some very interesting capabilities that set it apart from Sentinel. i2 focuses it its ability to do link analysis by utilizing visualization functions in a chronological, transactional, and geographical manner. It has a powerful data importer that makes it very easy to import from different types of files and databases. Combing Analyst Notebook 7 with other i2 solutions would make any organization have a quick and simple process of uploading and sharing vast amounts of critical information for analysis.

The Timeline feature displays entities in a chronological order, and allows the user to represent links between entities over time.

The Transactional feature allows users to see trends of monetary transfers between bank accounts or telephone calls between people.

Finally, the link analysis feature gives users the ability to morph the network of entities into different hierarchical structures, insert multimedia associated with entities, or even put a geographical map as a background to give perspective of location.

Check it out for yourself
i2 Analyst Notebook 7

Sentinel Visualizer is a intelligence analysis program developed by FMS Advanced Systems Groups. FMS does work in data analysis, visualization, and also creates solutions in the area of Geospatial/Temporal Analysis and Situational Awareness. Sentinel TMS allows users to input data and values to create a graphic visualization to represent patterns and relationships between people, places, meetings, buildings, organizations, and events. It uses Social Network Analysis metrics to give value to different types of data. These values are then used to rank centrality, threat level, and other key metrics within large complex datasets. Sentinel has a powerful query search that allows

Here is an example visualization map of the terrorist network behind 9/11:

I heard about this tool from a presentation from retired NSA analysts Kirk Wiebe and Bill Binney at an SRA club meeting. The software costs between $2500 and $5000 depending on the version and amount of users registered. Thankfully, they allow a 45-day free trial version that is fully functioning. I downloaded soon after the presentation by these two retired NSA analysts to play with myself. I found it to be a very cool program, and I could only imagine at how useful it could be in the intelligence community. I could see how great it would be for Law Enforcement if used to map out networks for cases. The private sector could also use Sentinel for security audits or analysis by mapping out assets and employee’s access to them.

I strongly advise anyone interested in a security related job to download the trial version and play around with it. While your future employer may not necessary use the same software, but the same ideas in approaching data analysis.

“20 terabytes of unique multi-media information generated every minute world-wide.”

— Kirk Wiebe and Bill Binney

I just picked Mass Effect up when I got back from school for winter break, and I have to say that it goes beyond all of my expectations. I was of a big fan of Knights of the Old Republic, and when BioWare announced a title for the 360, I was psyched. Over past two days, I have put about 12 hours into my career, and there never was a dull moment. Mass Effect has a non-linear storyline that never ceases to amaze you. There are always three or more leads that you can choose to pursue at any given time to continue the main story. There are also other many another side-quests that take you across the many galaxies, clusters, systems, and planets available to explore in Mass Effect.

The games starts out with the creation of your character. You can choose your first name (your last name is always Shepard), your Psychological profile (Lone Survivor, War Hero, or Ruthless) , your character class ( Solider, Engineer, Adept, Infiltrator, Vanguard, and Sentinel), and customize your character’s face. Your psychological profile determines what some NPC’s think of your during gameplay.

Lone Survivor:
You where the only survivor of a mission that you and a team of marines went on. You are know as a survivor.

War Hero:
In a mission where the chances of living where slim to none, you rescued soldiers on your team, and defeated the enemy.

Ruthless:
You have always gotten the job done, no matter what the costs, no matter what the conditions.

Picking a character class is very important, because it dictates what skills and weapons are available to you during the game.

Solider (Combat):
Improved health and health regeneration, widest selection of weapons, massive melee damage

Engineer (Tech):
Improved tech resistance, reduced recharge time for tech abilities, can only be trained with the pistol.

Adept ( Biotic):
Improved biotic resistance, reduced recharge time for biotic abilities

Infiltrator (Combat/Tech):
Increased damage by tech mines, reduced overheating of sniper rifles and pistols

Vanguard (Biotic/Combat):
Reduced recharge time for tech and biotic abilities, increased damage and accuracy of pistols

Sentinel (Biotic/Tech):
Increased biotic resistance and damage of shotguns and pistols

One of the coolest and jaw-dropping parts of this game is the character interaction. Dialog is ridiculously realistic. The characters body and facial movement makes the game look almost like a sci-fi movie. You can pick what you say, and just like Knights of the Old Republic, character alignment is determined by how you interact with other characters in the game.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2gZK15KcA2k&rel=1]

Mass Effect is a game that puts you in the driver seat of an epic blockbuster space opera.

Moments ago, Maiselog came into existence from WordPress’ womb. And thanks to Caroline Furey, Maiselog will have its own domain name and server space. The switch will come in the following month.

Yes it is true, a Russian based chat bot nicked named, “CyberLover,” is fooling chatroom goers into giving it there personal information in an attempt to steal their identities Note that this is just another reason not to mess with Russia, or they will send their CyberLover bots out in swarms to seduce you out of your social security card and bank PIN numbers.Security software company PC Tools warns that the bot can easily be used for malicious purposes. The company said that the program’s ability to mimic human behavior to dupe chatters is worrisome, and could readily be used to collect all manner of information. The creators of the bot are denying that it was intentionally created to do these evil acts.

For that one assignment way back in the beginning of the year about the bloggers evaluation, I posted an entry about a blog titled Cobalt Blue. I looked at the amount of posts, comments, and people on the Cobalt Blue blogroll to better understand how blogs worked. I was just checking Google Reader to sees what today’s RSS feeds brought to me, when I noticed that Cobalt Blue had recently posted a new entry on a Youtube video.

Cobalt Blue has posted about three or four posts a month since my analysis. I still have never seen more than one or two comments on each of his posts, but that doesn’t mean people don’t read his blog. Basically all of his posts are videos or audio clips. His blogroll has a couple more people than it did than last time. He also updated his profile as well. It appears that his blog has experienced a small amout of growth in fan base. His content also steadily is added as well.