NSA COVER UP

Spy agency ducks questions about ‘back doors’ in tech products

PUBLISHED WED, OCT 28 2020

KEY POINTS

The U.S. National Security Agency is rebuffing efforts by a leading Congressional critic to determine whether it is continuing to place so-called back doors into commercial technology products, in a controversial practice that critics say damages both U.S. industry and national security.

The NSA has long sought agreements with technology companies under which they would build special access for the spy agency into their products.

These so-called back doors enable the NSA and other agencies to scan large amounts of traffic without a warrant.


Paul Nakasone, director of the National Security Agency, arrives to a Senate Armed Services Committee confirmation hearing in Washington.
Bloomberg | Bloomberg | Getty Images


The U.S. National Security Agency is rebuffing efforts by a leading Congressional critic to determine whether it is continuing to place so-called back doors into commercial technology products, in a controversial practice that critics say damages both U.S. industry and national security.

The NSA has long sought agreements with technology companies under which they would build special access for the spy agency into their products, according to disclosures by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden and reporting by Reuters and others.

These so-called back doors enable the NSA and other agencies to scan large amounts of traffic without a warrant. Agency advocates say the practice has eased collection of vital intelligence in other countries, including interception of terrorist communications.

The agency developed new rules for such practices after the Snowden leaks in order to reduce the chances of exposure and compromise, three former intelligence officials told Reuters. But aides to Senator Ron Wyden, a leading Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, say the NSA has stonewalled on providing even the gist of the new guidelines.

“Secret encryption back doors are a threat to national security and the safety of our families – it’s only a matter of time before foreign hackers or criminals exploit them in ways that undermine American national security,” Wyden told Reuters. “The government shouldn’t have any role in planting secret back doors in encryption technology used by Americans.”

The agency declined to say how it had updated its policies on obtaining special access to commercial products. NSA officials said the agency has been rebuilding trust with the private sector through such measures as offering warnings about software flaws.

“At NSA, it’s common practice to constantly assess processes to identify and determine best practices,” said Anne Neuberger, who heads NSA’s year-old Cybersecurity Directorate. “We don’t share specific processes and procedures.”

Three former senior intelligence agency figures told Reuters that the NSA now requires that before a back door is sought, the agency must weigh the potential fallout and arrange for some kind of warning if the back door gets discovered and manipulated by adversaries.

The continuing quest for hidden access comes as governments in the United States, the United Kingdom and elsewhere seek laws that would require tech companies to let governments see unencrypted traffic. Defenders of strong encryption say the NSA’s sometimes-botched efforts to install back doors in commercial products show the dangers of such requirements.

Critics of the NSA’s practices say they create targets for adversaries, undermine trust in U.S. technology and compromise efforts to persuade allies to reject Chinese technology that could be used for espionage, since U.S. gear can also be turned to such purposes.

In at least one instance, a foreign adversary was able to take advantage of a back door invented by U.S. intelligence, according to Juniper Networks, which said in 2015 its equipment had been compromised. In a previously unreported statement to members of Congress in July seen by Reuters, Juniper said an unnamed national government had converted the mechanism first created by the NSA. The NSA told Wyden staffers in 2018 that there was a “lessons learned” report about the Juniper incident and others, according to Wyden spokesman Keith Chu.

“NSA now asserts that it cannot locate this document,” Chu told Reuters.

NSA and Juniper declined to comment on the matter.

Juniper’s compromise

The NSA has pursued many means for getting inside equipment, sometimes striking commercial deals to induce companies to insert back doors, and in other cases manipulating standards -- namely by setting processes so that companies unknowingly adopt software that NSA experts can break, according to reports from Reuters and other media outlets.

The tactics drew widespread attention starting in 2013, when Snowden leaked documents referencing these practices.

Tech companies that were later exposed for having cut deals that allowed backdoor access, including security pioneer RSA, lost credibility and customers. Other U.S. firms lost business overseas as customers grew wary of the NSA’s reach.

All of that prompted a White House policy review.

“There were all sorts of ‘lessons learned’ processes,” said former White House cybersecurity coordinator Michael Daniel, who was advising then-president Barack Obama when the Snowden files erupted. A special commission appointed by Obama said the government should never “subvert” or “weaken” tech products or compromise standards.

The White House did not publicly embrace that recommendation, instead beefing up review procedures for whether to use newly discovered software flaws for offensive cyber operations or get them fixed to improve defense, Daniel and others said.

The secret government contracts for special access remained outside of the formal review.

“The NSA had contracts with companies across the board to help them out, but that’s extremely protected,” said an intelligence community lawyer.

The starkest example of the risks inherent in the NSA’s approach involved an encryption-system component known as Dual Elliptic Curve, or Dual EC. The intelligence agency worked with the Commerce Department to get the technology accepted as a global standard, but cryptographers later showed that the NSA could exploit Dual EC to access encrypted data.

RSA accepted a $10 million contract to incorporate Dual EC into a widely used web security system, Reuters reported in 2013. RSA said publicly that it would not have knowingly installed a back door, but its reputation was tarnished and the company was sold.

Juniper Networks got into hot water over Dual EC two years later. At the end of 2015, the maker of internet switches disclosed that it had detected malicious code in some firewall products. Researchers later determined that hackers had turned the firewalls into their own spy tool by altering Juniper’s version of Dual EC.

Juniper said little about the incident. But the company acknowledged to security researcher Andy Isaacson in 2016 that it had installed Dual EC as part of a “customer requirement,” according to a previously undisclosed contemporaneous message seen by Reuters. Isaacson and other researchers believe that customer was a U.S. government agency, since only the U.S. is known to have insisted on Dual EC elsewhere.

Juniper has never identified the customer, and declined to comment for this story.

Likewise, the company never identified the hackers. But two people familiar with the case told Reuters that investigators concluded the Chinese government was behind it. They declined to detail the evidence they used.

The Chinese government has long denied involvement in hacking of any kind. In a statement to Reuters, the Chinese foreign ministry said that cyberspace is “highly virtual and difficult to trace. It is extremely irresponsible to make accusations of hacker attacks without complete and conclusive evidence. At the same time, we also noticed that the report mentioned that it was the U.S. intelligence agency - the National Security Agency - that created this backdoor technology.”

Nervous companies

Wyden remains determined to find out exactly what happened at Juniper and what has changed since as the encryption wars heat up.

This July, in previously unreported responses to questions from Wyden and allies in Congress, Juniper said that an unidentified nation was believed to be behind the hack into its firewall code but that it had never investigated why it installed Dual EC in the first place.

“We understand that there is a vigorous policy debate about whether and how to provide government access to encrypted content,” it said in a July letter. “Juniper does not and will not insert back doors into its products and we oppose any legislation mandating back doors.”

A former senior NSA official told Reuters that many tech companies remain nervous about working covertly with the government. But the agencies’ efforts continue, the person said, because special access is seen as too valuable to give up.

WHERE THERE IS SMOKE THERE IS WORK

Lower air quality in some Chinese cities points to iPhone 12 production surge, Morgan Stanley says

Morgan Stanley analysts on Wednesday said that they were tracking air quality reports in Chinese cities that suggested an increase in industrial activity tied to iPhone 12 production.

In Zhengzhou, China, a major production site for Apple's manufacturing partners, Morgan Stanley analysts believe air quality data suggests a ramp in production for new iPhone models.

Morgan Stanley says its air quality analysis shows signs of iPhone 12 mass production ramping up one month later than historical patterns

.

© Provided by CNBC

Morgan Stanley analysts on Wednesday said they are tracking air quality reports in Chinese cities that suggests an increase in industrial activity tied to iPhone 12 production.

Two new iPhone 12 models went on sale last week and two more will go on sale next month. This is a few weeks later than Apple's traditional cadence, which aims to release new iPhones in September, and the delay is most likely due to disruptions caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Apple investors are looking for clues as to how the production of the finished devices is going in order to better project sales in the coming quarters.

For Morgan Stanley, air quality is one such clue.

"Using air quality data from a non-profit platform that collects and publishes air quality data in China, we track nitrogen dioxide levels (controlling for temperature, humidity, wind, etc.), which, according to the European Space Agency, is a first-level indicator of industrial activity, in four Chinese cities where Apple's manufacturing partners have a large manufacturing presence," the analysts wrote.

In Zhengzhou, China, a major production site for Apple's manufacturing partners, the analysts suggest lower air quality shows a ramp in production.

"As of October 26th, air quality data from Zhengzhou, also known as 'iPhone City,' shows that industrial production levels have spiked higher recently, about a month later than historical seasonality, which we believe coincides with the ramp in iPhone 12 mass production," Morgan Stanley analysts led by Katy Huberty wrote in a note this week.

In Shenzhen, Morgan Stanley believes industrial production ramped higher in early September, but dipped below historical seasonal levels. In Chengdu, the analysts found that industrial activity is ramping higher in recent days. In Chongqing, industrial production has ramped meaningfully higher in recent days after an uptick and pullback in September.

Apple reports its fourth fiscal quarter earnings on Thursday. However, the period Apple is reporting results for ends in September, so it will not have any iPhone 12 sales included.

Junior hockey employment lawsuit on thin ice; judges refuse to OK $30-million deal

TORONTO — A $30-million settlement of three class actions over the alleged failure to pay junior hockey players the minimum wage has been thrown into jeopardy after three judges refused to sign off on the agreement.

© Provided by The Canadian Press

In their decisions, the judges in Ontario, Quebec and Alberta objected to wording in the settlement they said was too broad and could prevent the players from pressing other legitimate claims.

More precisely, Ontario Superior Court Justice Paul Perell said, class members would get an average of about $8,400 but could end up barred from suing leagues for damages related to concussions, sexual assaults or physical harassment, or alleged anti-competitive behaviour.

"Class members may be foreclosed from suing the defendants in other class actions for compensation for significant injuries," Perell said. "A release of the claims in those other actions makes the settlement in the immediate case an improvident settlement and one that is not fair and reasonable, nor in the best interests of the class members."

The plaintiffs in the three lawsuits alleged the Ontario Hockey League, Western Hockey League and Quebec Major Junior Hockey League and their affiliated clubs — all operate under the umbrella of the Canadian Hockey League — failed to treat them as employees.

According to the plaintiffs, some players were paid as little as $35 per week for working between 35 and 65 hours weekly. The leagues, they asserted, should have paid them minimum wage, overtime pay, and provided other employment benefits.

The first lawsuit, launched in Ontario in 2014, sought about $175 million in outstanding compensation.

In response, the leagues argued, among other things, that the players were amateur athletes and not employees. Nevertheless, in March, the leagues agreed after mediation to pay $30 million to settle the lawsuits — with about $9 million going to the players' lawyers.

The settlement was set for court approval when two representative plaintiffs — Kobe Mohr and Anthony Poulin — objected to the wording of the final release, which would insulate the leagues from any related lawsuits in the future.

As a result of the objection, the courts learned of other actions against the Canadian Hockey League, including one filed in British Columbia over player concussions. Another filed in Ontario alleges players younger than 18 suffered sexual abuse, while a third in Federal Court alleges various leagues engaged in anti-competitive practices.

"To be blunt about it, in the immediate case, in my opinion, once the 11th-hour objection arrived, class counsel should have withdrawn their motion for settlement approval until the matter of the prejudicial scope of the release was resolved," Perell said. "What is required is a renegotiation of the release provisions of the settlement agreement."

In a similar ruling, Justice Robert Hall of the Alberta Court of Queen’s Bench leaned on Perell's analysis for refusing to go along with the settlement.

"The class members cannot be unwittingly releasing the defendants from other claims beyond the one being settled," Hall wrote. Quebec Superior Court Justice Chantal Corriveau expressed similar sentiments.

The judges did say the parties could reapply for settlement approval after fixing the issue with the release given that the other provisions of the deal were reasonable.

If an agreement isn't reached on the release, the settlement could be terminated within weeks and lead to a resumption of the litigation.

Neither the Canadian Hockey League nor the plaintiffs' counsel had any comment.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Oct. 28, 2020.

Colin Perkel, The Canadian Press

Two Black former DC Comics editors describe the career obstacles they faced, from white leadership saying they'd never be promoted to their achievements being undercut

tclark@businessinsider.com (Travis Clark) 

© DC Comics; Samantha Lee/Business Insider DC Comics; Samantha Lee/Business Insider

Harvey Richards and Lateef Ade "L.A." Williams, two Black former DC Comics editorial staffers, told Business Insider they felt their careers at the company were hindered because of their race.

Richards was fired in December 2019 after 22 years and was the only Black editorial staffer at DC when he left. He was only promoted once. 

Williams exited in 2000 after six years without a promotion and after disputes with white members of DC leadership.

The careers of Richards and Williams cut across two decades, but the similarities in their experiences, from being told they'd never be promoted to a feeling that their achievements were not valued, show how little has changed for Black staffers.

DC's small editorial team shapes the comics that inspire lucrative movies, video games, and merchandise. Richards and Williams said that it's important for Black editors at DC to be in a position to champion diversity.

Harvey Richards and Lateef Ade "L.A." Williams have a lot in common. They both grew up reading comics with aspirations to work in the industry one day. They both ultimately nabbed roles on the editorial staff of DC Comics in the 1990s.

And they are both Black men who say they never achieved their full potential at DC Comics because of their race.

There are differences in their stories — notably, the time periods. Williams exited his role as an assistant editor in 2000 after six years without a promotion, while Richards spent 22 years at the comics giant with just one promotion before he was fired in December 2019.

But the similarities that cut across those two decades are striking and speak to how little has changed for Black editorial staffers at DC Comics and in the comics industry at large.

Richards was the only Black staffer in the main DC editorial department at the time of his exit in 2019, which included about 15 people, he said. He added that DC had since hired a Black assistant editor. DC declined to comment on personnel matters.

DC, which is home to Batman, Superman, and other iconic characters, is much larger than its comics editorial department, with around 200 employees on the publishing side. But the small team of editors shape the comics and characters that inspire lucrative movies, video games, TV shows, and merchandise.

"You need [Black] editors to help nurture talent to foster diverse characters," Richards said.

Besides being the only Black editorial staffer at the time of his exit, Richards felt stymied in his own career, he said. In his 22 years at the company, he was only promoted once. He began as an assistant editor and 12 years later, in 2009, he was promoted to associate editor.

L.A. Williams can relate.

"My personality and work style is different than Harvey's, who is different from every other name I could rattle off," Williams said. "But no matter how different our work styles or personalities are, the reality is that every one of our stories ended up the same. When it keeps happening year after year, person after person, you have to ask yourself what all of these people have in common."

A Latinx former assistant editor, who exited in 1999 after five years without a promotion, shared similar concerns with Business Insider about a lack of a career path forward at DC and a sense that her work was undervalued.

The stories of these three former DC editors are also similar to that of Charles Beacham, a former Marvel editor who spoke with Business Insider in July. Beacham was one of two Black editorial staffers Marvel had employed in the last five years and quit in 2017 because he felt his voice wasn't heard.

For Richards, there were many instances during his time at DC where he felt he was treated unfairly because of his race. He recalled specific instances with Paul Levitz, the DC publisher at the time, like when Levitz told Richards he had "grammar problems," and when Levitz told him "some people think you deserve this" when Richards won an award. Richards was never promoted while Levitz was publisher and president.

Williams also described a confrontation with Levitz, in which Levitz told Williams that he would never be promoted as long as he was publisher.

In response to a request for comment, Levitz said: "I'm not going to comment on decades old incidents. I'm proud of the increasing diversity at DC in my time as an executive there, and while we didn't achieve an ideal balance, I think much changed for the better."

Since Richards' departure, DC has taken some steps to promote diversity and inclusion.

Two women — Marie Javins and Michele Wells — were named interim editors-in-chief after recent layoffs. DC recently hired former Activision Blizzard exec Daniel Cherry, who is Black, as its new senior vice president and general manager, overseeing marketing, sales, and more for the company.

DC is also reviving Milestone, a division of DC that focused on Black characters like Static Shock and was founded in 1993 by four Black men. It ceased operations in 1997 but will return in February.

But for Richards and Williams, it's essential to have Black voices on the editorial front to help inspire change and champion a diverse set of voices and characters.

© DC Comics/Jim Lee Milestone Comics, including Static Shock, is returning in 2021. DC Comics/Jim Lee

'I've had my doubts about you'

For Williams, comics were his life. He had written his senior thesis in Afro-American studies at the University of Massachusetts on the history of Black characters in superhero comics.

So when he got a job at DC Comics in 1994, it was a dream come true. But he faced roadblocks that previewed Richards' own experiences in the coming years.

Williams, 51, recalled an instance in 2000 when some assistant editors were given a monthly comic to edit on their own by then-executive-editor Mike Carlin, who is now a DC Entertainment creative director. Williams said the assistant editors of color were set up to fail and given comics that were doomed from the start.

But Williams turned his assigned book, "Impulse," starring a Flash sidekick that had been hurting in sales, into a success.

Carlin wasn't happy. Williams said Carlin cursed him out for getting veteran comics creator Walt Simonson to draw two issues of the comic, and "wasting his time on Impulse when he should be drawing other characters like Superman."

Carlin did not return a request for comment. DC declined to provide a comment on his behalf.

That sense of not being valued even when he succeeded was a hallmark of Williams' time at DC, he said.

After a white associate editor was fired, Carlin offered Williams to take over that editor's books, which included one of DC's best-selling comics at the time, "Wonder Woman."

Williams remembered vividly what Carlin told him: "I've had my doubts about you, but you've delivered. Everything is always on time, it sells, and critics like it."

"I thanked him for my promotion," Williams said. "And he interrupted me and said it didn't come with a promotion. I feel so stupid now, but at the time I was so confused and asked why it wouldn't come with a promotion."

More than two decades later, Williams said the answer was obvious to him.

© Harvey Richards Richards. Harvey Richards

'Some people think you deserve this'

Williams' DC career ended just as Richards' was just getting started.

Richards, 48, moved from Akron, Ohio, to New York City in 1995 and began his comics career with an internship at the original Milestone, which then shut down in 1997. His Milestone connections eventually led him to DC, where he started in the mailroom and then became an assistant editor.

"I was living my dream at this point," Richards said.

In 2001, after four years as an assistant editor, Richards was offered the chance to work on the Superman titles. It wouldn't have been a promotion, but a chance to prove himself (the chain generally went like this: assistant editor, associate editor, editor, group editor, and executive editor).

But Richards was given what he said was the "unusual" task to write about what he "could bring to the Superman books." Paul Levitz, then the EVP and publisher of DC, told Richards he had "grammar problems" after he completed the assignment.

"After that, Levitz made up his mind about me," Richards said. "I felt he already had because most people are promoted after four years. But after that, it was over, even if I got a good review or worked on good projects or got company awards for going above and beyond."

Richards won two such awards, called "Carrots," which were given by DC's parent company, Warner Bros. After he won the second time, Levitz handed it to him and said "some people think you deserve this," Richards said.

Richards was finally promoted to associate editor in 2009, 12 years after he was hired, when Diane Nelson took over as president of DC Entertainment.
'Change is going to come'

Richards' time at DC came to an end in December.

He had been put on zero-tolerance probation in August of last year. The document Richards provided Business Insider outlined "poor time management skills and an inability to meet deadlines." Richards said he was being overworked.

The day after he returned to the office from Thanksgiving break last year, he was let go with a six-month severance and told he "no longer fit company standards."

He's still looking for work while honing his digital art skills. He said a potential employer asked him why he was only promoted once in all that time at DC.

"It wasn't because of my work performance," Richards said. "I feel like they blacklisted me."

19 years earlier, Williams had left DC with similar sentiments.

After a confrontation over Williams using the likeness of the Alabama governor in an issue of "Impulse," Levitz told him: "As long as I am publisher of DC Comics, you will never be promoted. You're welcome to stay here in the role of assistant editor for as long as you like."

Williams thought the timing of the dispute — shortly after he had filed a racial-discrimination complaint with human resources against Carlin — was suspect. He quit shortly after.

"I naively thought that as long as I do good work, the comics sell, and the critics like them, I'm going to do well," he said. "As a Black man in America, I knew I wouldn't be able to make as many mistakes as others. But I thought the solution was, work harder and do better."

Their experiences highlight why editors of color are so important, Richards said. They can help "realize a creator's vision" and promote more diversity in comics. He lamented that he never got that opportunity. And Black editors in senior positions could provide a source of support for ones in assistant or associate roles, he said.

"Ideas came down, they didn't go up," he said. "And I didn't have anyone above me advocating for me."

He hopes the recent shakeup at DC affords marginalized groups more opportunities and he sees more women in comics than ever before. Jessica Chen, who is Asian American, was promoted from associate editor to editor last year, for example. But Richards also noted there is still a lack of Black women in the industry.

"Change is going to come," he said. "It has to."

"This Day In Weather History”
October 28, 1707 - The Great Japan Earthquake of 1707

© Provided by The Weather Network

The Oct. 28, 1707 Hōei earthquake struck south-central Japan at 2 p.m. local time. At the time, it was the largest earthquake in Japanese history. Photo: Pixabay.

Japan is located along an intersection of four tectonic plates. As a result of this, a tremor occurs in the country every five minutes at least. This results in a total of 2,000 quakes each year, which is a recipe for disaster.

The Oct. 28, 1707 Hōei earthquake struck south-central Japan at 2 p.m. local time. At the time, it was the largest earthquake in Japanese history. This stood for 304 years until the 2011 Sendai earthquake, which destroyed the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant.

But this very early 18th century quake caused severe damage throughout southwestern Honshu, Shikoku and southeastern Kyūshu. The earthquake was powerful enough to trigger an accompanying destructive tsunami, which alone caused more than 5,000 deaths.

This 1707 event ruptured all of the segments of the Nankai megathrust simultaneously, the only earthquake known to have done this, with an estimated magnitude of 8.6 or 8.7. It is also reported to have triggered the last eruption of Mount Fuji some 49 days later.

On today's podcast, Chris Mei talks about the infamous 1707 earthquake, its catastrophic damage and specific details on what made it so devastating.

"This Day In Weather History” is a daily podcast by The Weather Network that features unique and informative stories from host Chris Mei.

#ANTICOLONIALISM

Activist attempts to steal artwork from Louvre in latest stage of campaign

By Jack Guy, Barbara Wojazer and Gaelle Fournier, CNN

European cultural institutions are under mounting pressure to return colonial artifacts to their countries of origin, and one Congolese activist has taken matters into his own hands.

© Bardos Florent/Abaca/Zuma Activist Emery Mwazulu Diyabanza made the latest in a series of protest actions at the Louvre museum in Paris on October 22.

Emery Mwazulu Diyabanza appeared in court Monday accused of joint theft of a cultural asset after attempting to steal an artwork from the Louvre museum in Paris, a judicial source told CNN Wednesday.


Diyabanza tried to make off with an 18th-century "swimming sculpture" from eastern Indonesia on October 22, according to a statement from the Louvre.

Museum staff intervened to stop the theft and prevented any damage to the artifact, said the museum.

"The perpetrators have been taken in for questioning by the police," read the statement ."A complaint was immediately filed."

Hakim Chergui, a lawyer representing Diyabanza, told CNN his client will return to court on December 3.

Diyabanza is the spokesperson of a pan-African group named Unité Dignité Courage, which strives for the "liberation and transformation of Africa" and the restitution of African heritage.

Diyabanza uploaded a video of the incident to his personal Facebook page detailing his motivations for stealing the artifact.

The Louvre contains "inestimable richness that some people have given themselves the right to steal and to keep for their benefit," says Diyabanza.

"I came to take what has been stolen, what has been looted from Africa," he adds, picking up the sculpture.

"The day when we will ask for permission to a thief to get back what is ours, is the day our mission will have failed," says Diyabanza in the video. "Millions of African children need to have access to this."

This is not the first action Diyabanza has taken in his campaign.

On June 12 UDC uploaded a video to YouTube showing Diyabanza taking an artifact from the Musee de Quai Branly-Jacques Chirac in Paris.

He was initially accused of "attempted theft" but later convicted of "aggravated theft" by a criminal court in Paris, which handed him a 1,000 euro ($1174) fine on October 14, his lawyer Hakim Chergui told CNN.

Three other activists were handed down suspended fines for their role in the incident, while another was acquitted.

Diyabanza and the other activists are appealing their sentences, said Chergui.

"For my clients, as well as for millions of people in Africa, to keep goods that belong to their history is experienced as an affront, it's a form of violence. These goods have been despoiled and stolen," said Chergui.

The group aims to encourage the French government to return artifacts currently held in the country to Africa, but the Louvre action was intended to demonstrate how the issue affects countries around the world, said Chergui.

"He targeted an Indonesian statuette to show that the issue of the restitution of cultural property is not only about the relationship between France and Africa," the lawyer explained.

"It is much wider and concerns the domination of the relationships between the North and the South. Goods have been despoiled by other colonial powers."

In November 2018, a report commissioned by French President Emmanuel Macron advised him to pull thousands of African artifacts looted during the colonial era out of French museums and return them to the continent.

French collections house at least 90,000 pieces originating from sub-Saharan Afric,a with around 70,000 works in Paris' Quai Branly museum alone, according to French historian Bénédicte Savoy and Senegalese writer and academic Felwine Sarr, the co-authors of the report.

They also estimated a further 20,000 objects are held across several port cities throughout the country

Biden’s space policy: One giant leap for climate change
By Jacqueline Feldscher POLITICO

Don’t expect a President Joe Biden to jettison the Space Force.

© Drew Angerer/Getty Images Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden speaks during a drive-in campaign rally.

If the Democratic nominee wins the Nov. 3 election, he'll likely maintain the fledgling military service branch — along with many of President Donald Trump’s other space initiatives, from returning humans to the moon to sending them to Mars to reforming government regulations so space companies can flourish.

But he’ll also be turning NASA’s attention closer to home.

Biden’s pledge to rededicate the U.S. to combating climate change would mean a greater role for NASA’s Earth science research, an area that has been squeezed by Trump, according to space leaders who are advising or supporting Biden’s campaign, and outside analysts.

“If they talk about the Green New Deal, that would rely heavily on NASA to be a part of getting that implemented using technology in orbit,” said retired Maj. Gen. Charles Bolden, who served as NASA administrator in the Obama administration.

The space agency already uses satellites to study and understand the environmental changes that are causing more droughts, rising sea levels, more frequent deadly storms and natural disasters, while figuring out what human actions might reverse or minimize the damage.

And those tools could be central to the government-wide effort that Biden has proposed to invest in clean energy and beef up infrastructure to withstand climate change, which he has called an “existential threat.”

“We believe in continuing the spirit of discovery that has animated NASA’s human space exploration, in addition to its scientific and medical research, technological innovation, and educational mission that allows us to better understand our own planet and place in the universe,” states the Democratic Party’s platform.

It also calls for “strengthening NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Earth observation missions to better understand how climate change is impacting our home planet.”

That would be a major shift from the Trump administration.

Every year Trump's federal budget proposals have sought to cut the space agency’s Earth science programs, including attempts to cancel programs aimed at the environment.

In its budget request for the fiscal year that began Oct. 1, for example, the administration zeroed out a program to study the oceans and another aimed at making more accurate climate measurements. Overall, the White House requested $1.8 billion for Earth science for this fiscal year. The House increased that to $2 billion in its version of the spending bill, but Congress has yet to pass a budget for the year and the space agency is operating under a continuing resolution.

Democrats on Capitol Hill have successfully restored some of the funding in the final budgets, a fight they are unlikely to have to wage if Biden is in the White House and the programs get higher billing in the new president’s budget request.

That’s not to say that a Biden administration won’t continue to pursue NASA’s ambitious programs to explore the heavens, many of which have been accelerated under Trump.

Biden is expected to support NASA’s Project Artemis to develop a long term presence on the moon, but could push back the timeline established by Trump to reach the lunar surface by 2024.

“I suspect that they will continue with Artemis and returning humans back to the moon, but my guess is they might not be on the same timeline as the current administration,” said Eric Stallmer, head of the Commercial Spaceflight Federation.

Bolden also says the former vice president is “a big fan of Mars,” which has been established as a longer-term goal for NASA’s human space exploration. The Trump administration has not set a date for the first crewed mission to Mars, but one think tank report predicted it would be feasible in the late 2030s at the earliest.

Another former NASA administrator who has endorsed Biden sees the former vice president as uniquely suited to expanding international cooperation on space exploration.

Sean O’Keefe, who ran NASA under President George W. Bush, cited the “sheer amount of experience, background, and temperament that Joe Biden possesses in dealing with international coalition and partnership arrangements.”

He said Biden knows “how you piece together a coalition necessary to move an agenda forward.”

Biden is likely to also maintain another of Trump’s space achievements: the Space Force.

The newly established military branch, which will mark its first anniversary in December, has broad bipartisan support in Congress as lawmakers agree that the military’s growing space mission needs a dedicated organization.

The Biden campaign declined to comment about the candidate’s space priorities, instead pointing to past statements depicting his support for the overall space program.

Biden said in May that he would focus on “advancing America’s commitment to pursuing space exploration and unlocking scientific discoveries that will inspire a new generation of dreams to gaze up at the sky.”

A number of questions still remain. One is whether Biden would retain the Cabinet-level White House National Space Council now led by Vice President Mike Pence that has energized space policy over the past few years.

Keeping the council functioning could offer Biden’s running mate Sen. Kamala Harris a high-profile role to bolster her resume for future political ambitions, said Peter Garretson, co-director of the American Foreign Council’s Space Policy Initiative

“That’s an extremely powerful format and one that I think commands the respect of most Americans and our overseas partners,” he said.

The Biden team has begun to consider who will lead the administration’s space efforts, including a number of contenders to be the first women to lead the space agency, according to an industry official who spoke on background to share ongoing discussions.

One potential candidate mentioned by multiple space industry insiders is Pam Melroy, a retired Air Force test pilot and astronaut who serves on the National Space Council’s User Advisory Group.

Others in consideration include Wanda Sigur, a former Lockheed Martin executive who worked on the Orion deep space capsule; Wanda Austin, a former CEO of the Aerospace Corporation; Gretchen McClain, who serves on the board of Booz Allen Hamilton; and Waleed Abdalati, a former chief scientist at NASA, according to the industry official.

O’Keefe also said he’s watching for John Grunsfeld, a former astronaut, to play some role in shaping Biden’s space policy.

Whoever rounds out the space leadership in a Biden administration is likely to play a role in furthering its domestic agenda.

Refocusing NASA on climate change could allow Biden to frame space as integral to a number of his policy priorities, including economic recovery and workforce diversity.

But that also means NASA, like all federal agencies, will have to grapple with where to prioritize its limited dollars.

“Part of the problem specific to a Biden-Harris administration,” Garretson said, “is how can they sustain the momentum despite lots of tugs on resources for other things?”CORRECTION: An earlier version of this story incorrectly attributed the final quote. It was made by Peter Garretson.

Washington Post: Trump administration to roll back federal protections from Alaska's Tongass National Forest

By Devan Cole, CNN 

Federal protections for Alaska's Tongass National Forest will be lifted this week by the Trump administration, allowing "logging and other forms of development" to occur in the world's largest intact temperate rainforest known as America's Amazon, The Washington Post reported Wednesday.

© Julian Quiñones/CNN The arrival of tourism cruise ships helped the forest, as visitors didn't want to see bare slopes, locals say.

"As of Thursday, it will be legal for logging companies to build roads and cut and remove timber throughout more than 9.3 million acres of forest," the Post said.

The newspaper, which noted that the federal protections were put in place in 2001 during the waning days of Bill Clinton's presidency, said the rollback by President Donald Trump represents "one of the most sweeping public lands rollbacks" Trump has made during his tenure. The President previously removed acreage from two national monuments and worked to open more federal lands and waters to oil drilling and mining.

The forest -- about the size of West Virginia -- and region form the world's largest intact temperate rainforest. The area is a vibrant habitat for bear, eagle and salmon, plus towering old-growth cedar, hemlock and spruce. It includes Alaska's capital, Juneau, and 31 other communities.

The area also features "old-growth stands of red and yellow cedar, Sitka spruce and Western hemlock," according to the Post, which said some of the trees "are between 300 and 1,000 years old (and) absorb at least 8 percent of all the carbon stored in the entire Lower 48′s forests combined."

Dominick DellaSala, the chief scientist with the Earth Island Institute's Wild Heritage project, told the Post that although "tropical rainforests are the lungs of the planet, the Tongass is the lungs of North America," adding that the forest is "America's last climate sanctuary."

Environmentalists plan to mount a legal challenge to the rollback, according to the Post, which said advocates have successfully protected the forest since the 1970s.

"There's never been a strong economic argument for logging, and neither has there been a strong biological or cultural argument. And we're confident we'll continue to prevail in the courts," Sam Sankar, the vice president for programs at Earthjustice, told the newspaper.

Both supporters and opponents of the rollback say it has important economic implications.

Robert Venables, the executive director of the Southeast Conference, told the Post that Alaska's economy "is collapsing" amid the coronavirus pandemic, so the rollback might allow loggers to access timber from the area.

"There's some common-sense, near-term relief," he said, according to the newspaper.

But all five of Alaska's native tribal nations have opposed the action, going so far as to recently withdraw as cooperating agencies in the process after the US Forest Service published a blueprint for opening up the entire forest for development, the Post said.

In an interview with the newspaper, Marina Anderson, the tribal administrator for the Organized Village of Kasaan on Prince of Wales Island, said "tribal officials oppose extensive logging because old-growth trees help lower stream temperatures and provide key wildlife habitat," which the village relies on for food.

"It will only devastate even more what is already in progress," Anderson told the Post.

© Sergi Reboredo/VW PICS/Universal Images Group via Getty Images Icebergs near the Dawes Glacier, Endicott Arm, Tongass National Forest, Alaska.

Trump rally attendees stranded in the cold for hours in Omaha

Caitlin O'Kane

President Trump held a rally in Omaha, Nebraska, on Tuesday night – but it's what happened after the rally that many reporters and attendees are talking about. Police said the last person was loaded into a bus from the site of the rally close to midnight, hours after it ended. 

© Aaron Sanderford/The World-Herald omaha-1-mandatory-creidt-aaron-sanderford-omaha-world-herald.jpg

Fox News' West Coast correspondent Jeff Paul tweeted videos from the rally at Eppley Airfield, writing: "Thousands of people left out in the cold and stranded in Omaha, Nebraska after a Trump rally."

"I'm told the shuttles aren't operating & there aren't enough busses," Paul's tweet continued. "Police didn't seem to know what to do. Some walked. I saw at least one woman getting medical attention." The video he shared showed lines of people standing outside in the dark.

"The above video & this one were taken around 10:15pm," he wrote in a second tweet, sharing another similar video of stranded attendees. "The #Trump rally ended around 8:45pm. Some just gave up and walked from the airfield, back to wherever they parked. It was about 32° out at the time. Many had already spent hours outside as they waited for POTUS to arrive."

CNN's senior Washington correspondent Jeff Zeleny also tweeted: "President Trump took off in Air Force One 1 hr 20 minutes ago, but thousands of his supporters remain stranded on a dark road outside the rally. 'We need at least 30 more buses,' an Omaha police officer just said, shaking his head at the chaotic cluster that is unfolding."

In an emailed statement to CBS News, Samantha Zager, deputy national press secretary for Mr. Trump's campaign, said: "President Trump loves his supporters and was thrilled to visit Omaha last night. Despite the cold, tens of thousands of people showed up for his rally."

"Because of the sheer size of the crowd, we deployed 40 shuttle buses – double the normal allotment – but local road closures and resulting congestion caused delays," the statement continued. "At the guest departure location, we had tents, heaters, generators, hot cocoa, and handwarmers available for guests. We always strive to provide the best guest experience at our events and we care about their safety."

According to a preliminary report, seven people were transported to area hospitals "with a variety of medical conditions," Michael Pecha, public information officer for the Omaha Police Department, said in an email to CBS News. He said 30 people were contacted for medical reasons.

"Those needing medical attention were contacted by medics over the duration of the event, not just at the end," Pecha said. "Eppley Airport Fire Department will have a better accounting of the total number of medical contacts, reasons and times."

According to Pecha, 40 buses took about 25,000 people to the event site over a 10-hour period, from 10:00 a.m. to the start of the rally at 8 p.m.

© Provided by CBS News According to a preliminary report, seven people were transported to area hospitals

"Law enforcement did assist people out of the area who wanted to leave or couldn't make it on buses before the rally ended," Pecha said. "When the speech was over at about 9 p.m., people flooded to the waiting buses."

There were buses specifically for handicap people in attendance and additional Metro Area Transit buses were called in to get people back to their cars, Pecha said.

"Many people elected to walk back to the parking areas instead of waiting for a bus. The shortest walk to the nearest parking lot was approximately 2.5 miles," his email continued. "The foot traffic on Lindberg Drive slowed bus traffic and delayed bus trips considerably. There was an abundance of uniformed officers in marked cars and on foot attempting to direct traffic to clear the congestion."

Pecha said officers gave rides to some elderly and some others. "Many people underestimated the distance from the event back to the parking lot on foot. The last person was loaded into a bus from the rally site at about 11:50 p.m.," Pecha said.

At around 12:30 a.m., pedestrian traffic returned to normal, he said.

Kris Surface Beckenbach, who was a volunteer at the rally, told CBS News that "attendees waiting for transport had no information until an officer started providing updates."

She said there was a 90-minute stretch where they saw no buses, and she saw people who needed assistance, but did not see any emergency situations. "I was alone and it was dark," Beckenbach told CBS News via Facebook message, adding that some of her friends chose to walk to their cars in the cold.

"It was no one's fault that traffic was a mess," Beckenbach said. "No one expected the number of attendees and vehicles."

"Most people were dressed appropriately. But everyone gets tired after hours of standing," she continued. "I personally shared a beanie I had bought for a friend, an ear warmer, a blanket, and hand warmer I had in my bag. We take personal responsibility, and we take care of each other."

Beckenbach said the rally ended at 9 p.m. and she got back to her car at 12:15 a.m.

© Provided by CBS News Kris Surface

Teens, tweens volunteer for vaccine trials while opponents call the move 'absurd,' 'crazy'

When Abhinav, an Ohio seventh grader, learned that a Covid-19 vaccine trial near his hometown was enrolling children, he wanted to participate. But there was one aspect of the study that had him worried

.

© Provided by NBC News

“I was mostly a bit nervous about the blood draws, because I had one about five years ago, and it wasn’t so comfortable,” Abhinav, 12, said.

Nonetheless, he decided to enlist in the trial, which is run by Pfizer Inc.

“I think that it could really benefit the world, and I think it could also help scientists know more about the coronavirus,” said Abhinav, whose family asked that their last name not be used to protect their privacy.

Abhinav received his first injection at Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center last Thursday, making him among the youngest participants in the world to take part in a Covid-19 vaccine trial. His father, Sharat, a bone marrow transplant physician, had already been in the trial himself, and encouraged Abhinav to sign up after experiencing no ill effects other than a fever that lasted for a day or two.

“I’m happy that he’s doing his bit for science,” Sharat said of his son. “With the Pfizer study, no major side effects have been reported so far, so that made me comfortable with enrolling Abhinav as well.”

Earlier this month, Pfizer became the first pharmaceutical company in the United States to receive approval from the Food and Drug Administration to test its vaccine on children as young as 12. The kids who have signed up say they are proud to be participating — and say they feel safe doing so.

“They were talking about symptoms, and they were just fatigue, low-grade fever, headache. I was thinking, ‘I hope I don’t have anything like that because I don’t want it to mess with school or work,’” Katelyn Evans, 16, of Green Township, Ohio, said. “But I wasn’t thinking about my permanent health for a short-term inconvenience.

”

© Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center Katelyn Evans, 16, receives a Covid-19 vaccine during a trial at Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center on Oct. 14. (Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center)

Like most of the other coronavirus vaccine trials, Pfizer’s involves getting two shots. Participants are given the shots three weeks apart and then have their health monitored for two years by researchers. The participants do not know whether they are receiving a placebo injection or an actual Covid-19 vaccine.

Either way, the youngest trial volunteers say they have confidence in the vaccines that are being developed — putting them at odds with many adults across the country.

Manufactured during a highly politicized pandemic in a matter of months versus the years or decades that a vaccine typically takes, the Covid-19 vaccines have prompted growing skepticism. A survey in October from Stat News and the Harris Poll found that only 58 percent of the American public would get a vaccine when it becomes available, down from 69 percent of those polled in August.

But researchers say the vaccines they are testing are safe.

“There is a perception that corners are being cut. That is the perception; it’s not the truth,” said Dr. Robert Frenck, director of Gamble Vaccine Research Center at Cincinnati Children’s and the lead site researcher for the Pfizer trial there. “It’s not that anyone is doing anything less, it’s just more compressed.”

Pauses in other trials, including those of AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson, show that proper safety protocols being observed across the board, Frenck said. Both AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson recently resumed their studies in the U.S. after briefly putting them on hold to investigate whether an adverse event in a participant was related to the vaccines — something experts say is common in large-scale trials.

Pfizer has not reported any unexpected illnesses among its participants, and has said it could be ready to apply for emergency use authorization of its vaccine by late November.

For the study in Cincinnati, one of several Pfizer sites testing children, dozens of parents contacted by researchers were eager to get their kids involved, Frenck said.

“Parents were asking how many times they’re going to have to come in, how many doses it would have to be,” he said. “But it hasn’t been, ‘Oh, heck no.’”
Why include children if they are least likely to get ill?

While the parents of the children in the trial are comfortable with the level of risk they are assuming, others find it mind-boggling that children are being asked to enroll.

Bianca De La Cruz, 33, a paraprofessional for the New York City Department of Education, works with elementary school students and has a 13-year-old daughter. She said she feels Pfizer is using children as “guinea pigs.”

“It’s absurd,” she said. “We really don’t even know much about Covid to begin with, and then to be testing a vaccine that they developed within six months? It’s crazy.”

Pfizer argues otherwise. The decision to include children came only after the pharmaceutical giant gathered "satisfactory" safety and efficacy data on adults and older adolescents first, Jerica Pitts, Pfizer's director of global media relations, said. In September, Pfizer expanded its study from 30,000 adults to about 44,000 people, which included teenagers as young as 16 and individuals with chronic conditions, such as HIV and hepatitis B and C. After receiving FDA approval to test younger children and reviewing the data on the 16- and 17-year-olds, Pfizer added children ages 12 through 15.

© Courtesy Bianca De La Cruz Bianca De La Cruz with her daughter, Noelia. (Courtesy Bianca De La Cruz)

Opponents like De La Cruz still question why kids need to be part of the study. Children generally fare much better than adults when they catch the coronavirus, and the science still is murky on whether children, especially those under the age of 10, transmit the virus as easily as adults do.

Yet, the American Academy of Pediatrics believes it is crucial for children to be in vaccine trials. On Sept. 29, the group wrote a letter to Secretary of Health and Human Services Alex Azar and FDA commissioner Dr. Stephen Hahn urging them to allow children to be tested, pointing out that more than 587,000 cases of the coronavirus have been reported in children.

“While the likelihood of spreading the disease may vary among different aged children, we know that children can and do spread the virus to household members, grandparents, teachers, and other children,” the letter said. It added, “Children must be included in vaccine trials to best understand any potential unique immune responses and/or unique safety concerns.”

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Dr. Yvonne “Bonnie” Maldonado, a professor of pediatrics, epidemiology and population health at Stanford Medicine, is among those who support children being in Covid-19 vaccine trials.

“We really feel that while, at this point, it doesn’t appear that Covid-19 is really targeting the pediatric age group, children are not immune to this disease,” she said, pointing out that while children only comprise about 10 percent of the coronavirus cases in the U.S., and typically display milder symptoms than adults, more than 100 children have died in this country from the virus.

And it is possible that children may respond differently to the vaccines than adults do.

“Our belief would be you would get the same kind of response in children,” Frenck said. “But you won’t know until you test for sure and if you need to change the dose, the number of doses — we need to know that so we’re making sure we’re giving the right vaccine at the right time.”
‘Pride’ in contributing to medical research

So far at Cincinnati Children’s, there have been seven participants in the 12-15 age group and 10 participants in the 16-17 age group, the hospital said.

Katelyn, the Ohio 16-year-old, did not have any side effects from the shot she received.

“It’s really not scary. There’s nothing dangerous or intimidating about it,” she said, adding that she hopes others her age join the study.

© Courtesy Laurie Evans Laurie Evans with her children, Katelyn and Andrew. (Courtesy Laurie Evans)

Katelyn’s mother, Laurie Evans, an elementary school teacher, said most friends and family members were supportive of Katelyn’s decision to join, although some questioned whether it was safe to get a vaccine developed at record speed.

“She’s got a big heart. She obviously had no fear of this,” Evans said. “I guess I’m more afraid of Covid than I am of the vaccine.”

Other parents whose children have participated in medical research say they felt the same way.  

© Courtesy of Heather Hannon Image: Heather Hannon with family (Courtesy of Heather Hannon)

Heather Hannon, 48, an oncology nurse practitioner who lives in Chesterfield, Virginia, signed two of her children up for a late-stage vaccine trial for H1N1, or swine flu, during that pandemic in 2009. Her kids, 16 and 14 now, were just 5 and 3 at the time, and Hannon used the opportunity as a teaching moment for them.

“It was excitement, it was pride, it was an understanding that life is about more than just you,” Hannon said.

“I imagine many parents these days would think I was quite nuts,” she added. “But I think the thing about a clinical trial is there are lots of safety mechanisms built into that, so you’re not totally in the dark, and it’s really exciting to be involved in research.”

Sharat, the father of 12-year-old Abhinav who is participating in Cincinnati Children’s Covid-19 vaccine trial, hopes his son will feel the same sense of helping others that Hannon’s children did.

“While most kids are going to do fine if they’re exposed to Covid, a small portion might get very sick, and up front, we don’t know who is going to get very sick,” Sharat said. “By being part of this study, we help others. It’s a small contribution