Gerald Zawahiri hasn't been heard from in 2 or 3 months.
UPDATE: Taliban deny al-Qaida No. 2 hit by missile
2 hours ago
PESHAWAR, Pakistan (AP) — A spokesman for a top Taliban official in Pakistan denied Saturday a U.S. media report that al-Qaida's No. 2 leader, Ayman al-Zawahri, may have been critically wounded or killed in a missile strike in recent days.
CBS News reported Friday it had obtained a copy of an intercepted letter from unidentified sources in Pakistan which urgently requested a doctor to treat al-Zawahri. The letter was purportedly from Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud and said al-Zawahri was in "severe pain" and his "injuries are infected."
Mehsud spokesman Maulvi Umar said, "We deny it categorically."
Tehran, 1 August: The official Iranian news agency (IRNA) quotes Expediency Council chief, Ayatollah Ali Akbar Hashemi-Rafsanjani as saying, "We have started the first activities of nuclear fusion."
Rafsanjani made the remarks today during a speech delivered to a gathering of students at Tehran's Jamaran Hoseynieh.
Source: Fars News Agency website, Tehran, in Persian 0905 gmt 1 Aug 08
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WASHINGTON (AFP) - The United States on Friday reaffirmed a weekend deadline for Iran to answer an international offer to freeze its nuclear drive and warned of new sanctions if it rejects the package. ADVERTISEMENT
During a visit to Washington, Israel's deputy Prime Minister Shaul Mofaz warned meanwhile that Iran was playing for time in dealing with the world community and was heading for a "major breakthrough" in its nuclear capability.
The US State Department had been vague about the deadline for Iran to reply to the offer but narrowed it down on Friday.
"We want and we expect a response this weekend," the State Department's acting spokesman Gonzalo Gallegos told reporters. "They were given two weeks. The two weeks is up this weekend."
Menlo Park based Cuil will launch later this evening with an index of 120 billion web pages, making them arguably the most comprehensive search engine on the web (Google doesn’t disclose the size of their index, although they claim to know about a trillion unique web pages) (Update: see our very early testing here). They’ve also dropped one of the “l’s” from their name - previously the company was “Cuill.” Either way, it’s pronounced “cool.”
The super-stealth search project was founded by highly respected search experts. Husband and wife team Tom Costello (CEO) and Anna Patterson (VP Engineering) were joined by Russell Power. Patterson and Power are also ex-Google employees, and the company has been the subject of intense speculation over the last couple of years.
Much of the secret sauce of Cuil is in the way they index the web and handle actual queries by users. Both are costly to scale, and Cuil claims to have found a way to massively reduce those costs. That allows them to run the search engine a lot cheaper, even at Google-scale should it ever reach that point. By some estimates, Google spends a billion dollars a year to run the back end infrastructure of it’s search business.
Image via WikipediaBin Laden has not been able to strike on U.S. soil since 9/11 or in Europe since the London bombings three summers ago. In Iraq, his most successful franchise operation is on the ropes. Across the Muslim world, opinion polls suggest his popularity has faded, and many of his early supporters -- including prominent jihadi ideologues -- have denounced him. Even his messages on the Internet scarcely merit headlines in the mainstream media......
According to this assessment, two decades since its founding in Peshawar, Pakistan, al-Qaeda remains a source of inspiration for certain extremists around the world. But it's far from clear that bin Laden commands them......
...a few days after bin Laden's most recent Internet postings. The officials told me they've found no evidence of al-Qaeda operations in their countries. If bin Laden has any role in the jihad, say the Europeans, it is merely as an icon. Alain Grignard, Belgium's top terrorism investigator, says bin Laden is now a "Robin Hood figure; 100 people are inspired by him, but very few respond to do what he wants."....
al Qaeda's efforts in Paki and Afghan are thier last stand so to speak, they are fast becoming irrelevant. And they are in a war of survival. Hoping to find a palace to exist, survive.
al Qaeda's top leader ship is gone, and the new leaders don't have the connections or pull of the old leaders.
We are in a mop up phase with al Qaeda and may be able to get the Taliban to deal, survival for the remaining al Qaeda leadership. The Taliban are hurting, and are experiencing some of the highest attrition rtes of mid-level management they have ever experienced, they are experiencing some relief from deserters from Iraq, but this will be short lived as they too are attrited.
This is not to say aQ isn't looking for a big punch if they get the chance.
Paki Intel helping to kill Americans?, Taliban says YES.G
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By Carol Grisanti, NBC News Producer, Pakistan A prominent Taliban commander boasted to NBC News in an interview that Afghan officials are aiding his forces in fighting U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan.
In the interview, wanted Taliban commander Sirajuddin Haqqani said that the corrupted Afghan officials are a key to the Taliban's military success. “There are some people with government portfolios who are supporting us because they are worried about their own security,” Haqqani said. “They inform us of the movements of U.S. and NATO troops. There have even been some instances where they have assisted us in carrying out attacks,” he added.
Sirajuddin Haqqani, 28, controls the Taliban in the Afghan border areas with Pakistan, and in the area surrounding Kabul. Under tight security, he consented to an interview with NBC News’ Mushtaq Yusufzai in a safe house in Khost, the Afghan province that borders Pakistan.
An NBC producer interviews Taliban commander Sirajuddin Haqqani (whose back faces the camera). Haqqani would not reveal his face. SOURCE: MSNBC xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
There are more infected computers on the WWW now than at any other time in its short history. I've seen quotes from professionals that your Chances are 6 of 10 are infected with something. Your chances of being infected are better than 50% , yes Yes YOU.
NONSENSE, I HAVE A FIREWALL, ANTI-VIRUS, MALWARE SWEEPER...
I rember the first time I heard of a virus, and searched until I found one to play with. Back then I could lock down everything and just watch it try and do things.
Back then all vectors were known. Then came along the anti-virus companys, and again I felt secure, even used more than one just to be safe, and then firewalls, something very exotic felt most secure and safe.
AT ONE TIME YOU COULD SURF THE INTERNET WITHOUT A FIREWALL OR ANTI-VIRUS. IF YOU DO NOW YOUR AN IDIOT.
Then came spy ware, rootkits and SLQ injection.
There are rootkits that can't be detected. ( Whoever gets to root first. )
Most of the computer security companies have become frauds, with names like " total security" and other misnomers.
Now you need Firewalls, anti-virus, anti-spyware sweepers and SLQ protection black lists. And they can still walk thru all of that.
But I don't want you to believe me, but I do want you to think.
SLQ injection gets into the top sites, and infects them, so your security views them as trusted sites and allows them to do things that circumvent security because you don't expect Google or yahoo to infect you, your PC automatically uses lower security settings for trusted sites.
THERE IS NO SAFETY WHEN SURFING THE INTERNET. The security vendors can't keep up with the threat, vectors or methods. And you Mac users, don't smile your risk may be equal to the PCs.
"It is estimated that the total number of unique malware samples in existence now exceeds 11 million, with Sophos currently receiving approximately 20,000 new samples of suspicious software every single day - one every four seconds."................
Given the speed in which malware authors are lauching a DDoS attack against AV vendors by crunching out dozens of malware variants parts of a single family, their actions could start directly driving the data storage market, and if they continue maintaining the same rhythm, soon you'll be partitioning a separate GB for the signatures files.
http://ddanchev.blogspot.com/
http://snipurl.com/383ki
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Credit cards numbers are considered a commodity on the criminal net, because they are so easy to get, I was offered 400 American express cards, and contacted their security offices in Chicago and NY and they were not interested.
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"Prices charged by cybercriminals selling hacked bank and credit card details have fallen sharply as the volume of data on offer has soared, forcing them to look elsewhere to boost profit margins, a new report says. Researchers for Finjan, a Web security firm, said the high volumes traded had led to bank and credit card information becoming "commoditized" - account details with PIN codes that once fetched $100 or more each might now go for $10 or $20. In its latest quarterly survey of Web trends, the California-based company said cybercrime had evolved into "a major shadow economy ruled by business rules and logic that closely mimics the legitimate business world."
Legit Websites Heavily Compromised July 30, 2008 By Richard Adhikari
Instead of putting up their own Websites, malicious hackers are now focusing their efforts on corrupting legitimate sites. A survey released today, and conducted between January and June by Websense, found that hackers compromised 50 percent more legitimate Websites during this period than between July and December 2007.
According to the study by messaging and data protection vendor Websense, more than 75 percent of Websites containing malicious code are legitimate sites that have been infected. The survey found that 60 of the 100 most popular Websites either hosted, or were involved in, malicious activity between January and June 2008.
SORRY IF VID DOES NOT WORK GOOGLES YOUTUBE HANDING OUT BAD CODE, POSTED CODE TWICE, WORKED FOR A DAY THEN IT QUIT WORKING.
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My scanners pick up 20 or 30 major sites a day handing out malware.G
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How much does it cost to send 1 million spam emails these days? According to a random spamming service, $100 excluding the discounts based on the speed of sending desired, namely 10-20 per second or 20-30 per second. Let's dissect the service, and emphasize on its key differentiation factors, as well as the customerization offered in the form of a dedicated server if the customer would like to send billions of emails :
http://ddanchev.blogspot.com/
http://snipurl.com/383ki
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The point behind this is there could be an Agamemnon hidding behind this.
Gerald What can you do, don't use a credit card on the Internet, use debit cards, they can only steal what you have in the account, no credit. If the Internet went down for a month say, how would that effect you, do some planning. Cell phones would be out, CB's would be in an in great demand. Cable TV out, shortwave radios IN. Give it some thought, Don't believe me Just THINK, Plan.
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While it will have taken 27 years to reach 1 billion PCs, Forrester says it will take only five years to reach the next billion. The analyst firm attributes this boom to lower prices and growing demand as the world population becomes "technology-aware."
The Brazil, Russia, India and China market will account for more than 775 million new PCs by 2015.
Image via Wikipedia In a new study by RAND the nonpartisan Corp. says USA has it all wrong in the GWOT, in fact they say its not a WAR, but should be an investigative function. RAND is using an old paradigm.
The study was based in part on an analysis of more than 600 terrorist movements tracked over decades by Rand and the Memorial Institute for the Prevention of Terrorism. From 1968 on, before the Internet, and aQ is the only terrorist org that has had a search for WMD.
The terrorist from 1970's and 80's even the early 90's era bare only a nominal comparison to aQ and the Taliban. Apples and Oranges, and we can't get this wrong.
Rand argues the Military may not be needed at all, or at least a smaller foot print.
Rands paradigm rings false, out of tune with current conditions.
In the past dealing with terror groups there was not much of a concern about terrorist using WMD, or employing the Internet for survial thru world wide recruiting.
Because of the WMD potential and Iran's diligent work towards a nuke, there are many time constraints.
The GWOT does not have unlimited time, if al Qaeda survives long enough at some point they will have WMD.
Paki ISI involvement with the terrorists provide an example of why the Military must be involved. Neither the CIA nor the FBI are equipped to strike at targets deep in side Paki. The only reason the CIA and FBI can operate there is BECAUSE of the US Military presents.
The mere presents of the Mililary in Afgahn and near Paki have denied al Qaeda and the Taliban the ability to mass forces, and concentrate on targets en mass.
Neither the FBI or the CIA have the Militarys resources, manpower or crushing power world wide. Without which the terrorists would have established armys around the world.
RAND is operating from an old paradigm and has not mixed WMD and the Internet into their study. If it wasn't for the Internet al Qaeda would have died a natural death years ago. The internet provides here to fore unknown ability to recruit world wide, and a very resilient C2 struture, never seen before.
Rand doesn't even mention the WWW or how WMD figure into the Paradigm. And the major news outlets bleat like sheep the RAND study, completely lacking any critical thinking.Two words "Bosnia and Herzegovina".
Rands new study D+ marks, not current, and using old paradigms to define curent NEW situation. Missing two key elements, WWW and WMD.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A top Central Intelligence Agency official travelled to Islamabad and confronted senior officials with evidence of ties between Pakistan's spy agency and militants operating in that country's tribal areas, the New York Times reported in Wednesday editions.
The CIA envoy presented information linking members of Pakistan's Directorate for Inter-Services Intelligence (ISI) with some militant groups responsible for a string of attacks including the suicide bombing of the Indian Embassy in Kabul this month which killed 58 people, the newspaper said.
The report, based on accounts by U.S. military and intelligence officials, described the decision to confront Pakistan over ISI's activities as the bluntest warning to Islamabad since shortly after the September 11, 2001 attacks.
It was published a day after Pakistani Prime Minister Yousaf Raza Gilani visited the White House and made a commitment to U.S. President George W. Bush to secure Pakistan's border with Afghanistan.
The New York Times said the CIA assessment specifically raised links between ISI members and the militant network led by Maulavi Jalaluddin Haqqani, believed by the U.S. intelligence community to have close ties to senior al Qaeda figures in Pakistan's tribal areas.
The Haqqani network and other militants operating in the tribal areas along Pakistan's Afghan border are thought to be behind increasingly deadly attacks inside Afghanistan, the newspaper said.
Gilani told PBS television in Washington on Tuesday the ISI was a "great institution" and said reports some members of the agency were sympathetic to the militants are "not believable."
"We would not allow that ... because the ISI is directly working under the Prime Minister," he told the NewsHour with Jim Lehrer in an interview.
(Reporting by Paul Eckert, editing by Alan Elsner)
Saraj Haqqani, son of veteran warlord Jalalludin Haqqani and
believed to have connections with al-Qaida.
Mujahideen commander Jalaluddin Haqqani (here shown with his son Nasrudin) operates in eastern Afghan provinces and North Waziristan. Facilitates attacks against US and Afghan troops and commands thousands of men.
Court upholds long sentences for Border Patrol agents By Michelle Malkin • July 28, 2008 06:56 PM
I'm posting the ruling by the Fifth Circuit Court of the Appeals in the case of Border Patrol agents Ignacio Ramos and Jose Alonso Compean that came down today.
In a blog post today Google says they’ve identified 1 trillion unique URLs on the web. It’s actually more, they say, but some web pages have multiple URLs with exactly the same content or URLs that are auto-generated copies of each other.
What they note way down in the fourth paragraph, however, is that they don’t actually index all of those pages, so you can’t find them on Google. Estimates on the true size of the Google index are a mere 40 billion pages or so.
Why don’t they index all the pages they’ve found? Some of them are spam. But it’s also very expensive to index sites. And the fact that Google indexes many news sites, blogs and other rapidly changing web sites every 15 minutes makes all that indexing even more expensive. So they make value judgment on what to actually index and what not to. And most of the web is left out.
Google also says “But we’re proud to have the most comprehensive index of any search engine.”
Even after removing those exact duplicates, we saw a trillion unique URLs, and the number of individual web pages out there is growing by several billion pages per day.
Iran has begun a new charm offensive to head off, or to mitigate, possible new international economic sanctions following its latest refusal to suspend, or even slow down its uranium enrichment program. Iran's President, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad gave an interview to NBC news anchor Brian Williams, which was broadcast tonight, denying that Iran had any nuclear weapons ambitions and stating that Iran is ready to meet the United States, gesture for gesture, in improving relations. Playing up on the Bush Administration's decision to have Assistant Secretary William Burns sit in on the latest round of nuclear negotiations with Iran, he stated that Iran would respond "positively" if the US, has, in fact, adopted a new "non confrontational" approach.
Breaking up the Syrian-Iranian axis might be quite helpful in significantly weakening Tehran. Recently, Syrian President Bashar al Assad has been sending signals that he might be willing to do so. But with assad, you never know... In an article called "Is Assad bluffing?" that i wrote for the Middle East Times, I tackle this issue. You can read the whole article here.
First, in February, Hezbollah terror master Imad Mugnieh was assassinated in Damascus in what is likely a Syrian-made operation. The investigation over Mugnieh's death was quickly terminated and Iran and Hezbollah did not get the answers they were waiting for.
Second, Assef Shawkat, the powerful head of Syrian security and Assad's brother-in-law was suddenly pushed aside. Shawkat is close to Tehran and has allegedly a hand in former Lebanese Prime Minister Rafik Hariri's murder in Beirut in 2005.
Third, Assad acknowledged publicly peace negotiations with Israel.
Fourth, Assad agreed on opening a Syrian embassy in Beirut, something his country has always refused since it considered that Lebanon is just a Syrian province. This was a huge condition for the French who see it a pledge given by Damascus to Lebanese sovereignty.
Victor Comras and Olivier Guitta need to read eaqch others posts.
Iran has launched a charm offensive across the board including Syrian actions who are in on the charm offensive..
Iran has just doubled nuke material production. 3,000 to 6,000.
And both Iran and Syria are trying to sucker the world into this charm offensive to buy more time to finish their Nuke.
This effort announces Iran is desperate to buy more time and the charm offensive is working. For the first time USA doesn't have an Air craft carrier fleet in the Mediterranean and USA has announced a new round of talks.
Image by Boris from Vienna via FlickrReligion of Irony alert. Al Qaeda's #3 has called for the death of Saudi Arabia's King Abdullah for meeting with the Pope and calling for interfaith dialogue.
FOR all their old-fashioned ideas, the Taliban in Afghanistan are waging a dangerously effective information war using the internet and other modern communications systems to spread their message among tribes people and the international Muslim community.
A new report by Gareth Evans' International Crisis Group says the extraordinary information campaign being waged by the Taliban is driving a dangerous wedge between the Karzai Government, along with its international backers, and the Afghan people.
It warns that along with the traditional shabnamah — "night letters" in leaflets that usually contain threats and traditional nationalist songs and poems — the Taliban are using the full range of media to tap into strains of Afghan nationalism and to create the impression they are much stronger than they are.
Crisis Group analyst Joanna Nathan said the Taliban were adept at projecting themselves as stronger than they were in numbers and resources.
"The Taliban have created a sophisticated communications apparatus that projects an increasingly confident movement," Ms Nathan said. They tried to "wear out their opponents".
She said Kabul and its international supporters needed to respond in a more timely and co-ordinated manner if they were to effectively counter Taliban allegations.
Along with the internet, the Taliban were issuing DVDs, tape cassettes and mobile phone messages to create the impression they were a patriotic organisation defending Afghan traditions.
They also have their own website and statements from their leaders are put out in five languages, with regular updates.
The Crisis Group said the information campaign, complete with exaggerated battle reports, was having a big impact on the largely rural and illiterate population.
The Taliban PR campaign is so effective because they are using 5 languages on the Internet.
The USA is limited to two languages, English and Arabic, even the civilian sector is ham strung by Googles lack of translation capabilities for Urdu and Pashtoon.
The Taliban are lying and spinning the truth and winning the hearts and minds because USA can't even communicate with the indigenous, and if you can't communicate you can't win any hearts and minds.
Gareth Evans' International Crisis Group says the "extraordinary information campaign". This is so much BS, it is not an "extraordinary information campaign", it is the only information campaign being run in Urdu and Pashto, they are winning by default, not by genius.
THE US MILITARY IS NOT ENGAGING THE ENEMY IN AN INFORMATION WAR ON THE WWW, the Taliban are winning by default.
La presidenta de la India, Pratibha Patil, llamó "al pueblo de Ahmenabad a que preserve la paz y la armonía" ya que existe una fuerte conmoción por el estallido de 16 bombas, en el lapso de una hora, en diferentes lugares de la capital del estado de Gujarat .
The president of India, Pratibha Patil, called "the people of Ahmenabad to preserve peace and harmony" as there is a strong shock at the outbreak of 16 bombs in the space of one hour in different parts of the capital State of Gujarat.
La cifra de muertos por la ola de atentados se elevó a 45, y más de 162 personas continúan siendo atendidas dada la gravedad de las heridas.
The death toll in the wave of attacks rose to 45, and more than 162 people are still served because of the severity of injuries.
No se descarta que el número de víctimas pueda seguir aumentando.
Do not rule out that the death toll could increase further.
Según fuentes locales, las fuerzas de seguridad han informado que todo el país se encuentran en estado de alerta máxima, ya que especialistas de la policía desactivaron tres bombas más: dos en la misma ciudad y una Surat, a 200 kilómetros.
According to local sources, security forces have reported that across the country are on maximum alert since specialists police defused three bombs more: two in the same town and Surat, 200 kilometres.
La Policía se encuentra sumida en un intenso operativo en el estado de Guajarat, que ya dejó la detención de más de 30 sospechosos y el registro de una gran cantidad de viviendas, publica el medio argentino Clarín.
The Police is mired in an intense operational in the state of Guajarat, already left the detention of more than 30 suspects and the registration of a large number of houses, publishes the middle Argentine Clarin.
En tanto, la agencia Ansa informa sobre posibles autores.
Meanwhile, the agency Ansa reported on possible perpetrators.
Primero, al grupo musulmán llamado "Mujahidines indios", pues un email con su firma llegó cinco minutos después de la primera explosión a la central de policía de Gujarat.
First, the Muslim group called Mujahideen Indians ", as an email with his signature came five minutes after the first explosion in the central Gujarat police.
También el grupo terrorista de Bangladesh Harkat-ul-Jihad-al Islami (HuJi), reivindicó los atentados de Ahmedabad.
Also, the terrorist group in Bangladesh Harkat-ul-Jihad al-Islami (huji), claimed the attacks in Ahmedabad.
Sin embargo, los servicios de Inteligencia india acusan a los grupos terroristas paquistaníes, como Lashkar-e-Taiba, cercano a la red Al Qaeda.
However, intelligence services india accuse Pakistani terrorist groups like Lashkar-e-Taiba, close to the Al Qaeda network.
The intelligence and law enforcement agencies have been put on high alert based on the news that Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan chief Baitullah Mehsud has prepared a hit list of around 300 high-profile figures, including political leaders.
"Of course this type of information is received from time to time," said CID Chief DIG Saud Mirza, adding that the country was still under threat. "We are in coordination with all the intelligence agencies." Source close to an intelligence agency said that it was assumed that the leadership of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP), Muttahida Qaumi Movement (MQM), Awami National Party (ANP), anti-Taliban Shia, Sunni clerics, personnel from the intelligence and law enforcement agencies, officials from the interior and provincial ministries and journalists could be targeted by the Pakistani Taliban. Their families were also believed to be at risk.
The MQM leadership was also informed by the LEAs when Jundullah members were arrested on charges of attacking the then corps commander of Karachi Lt Gen Ahsan Hayat. During interrogations, these men confessed that they targeted the party's leadership as its members were perceived as 'American agents'.
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