Can math models of gaming strategies be used to detect terrorism networks?

May 16, 2013 ? The answer is yes, according to a paper in the SIAM Journal on Discrete Mathematics.

In a paper published in the journal last month, authors Anthony Bonato, Dieter Mitsche, and Pawel Pralat describe a mathematical model to disrupt flow of information in a complex real-world network, such as a terrorist organization, using minimal resources.

Terror networks are comparable in their structure to hierarchical organization in companies and certain online social networks, where information flows in one direction from a source, which produces the information or data, downwards to sinks, which consume it. Such networks are called hierarchical social networks.

"In such networks, the flow of information is often one way," explains author Pawel Pralat. "For example, a celebrity such as Justin Bieber sends out a tweet, which is sent to millions of his followers. These followers send out their own retweets, and so on. We may therefore view hierarchical social networks as directed networks without cycles, or directed acyclic graphs (DAGs)."

Here, there is no requirement for reciprocity (the celebrity does not necessarily follow his or her followers). Similarly, in a terrorist network, the leaders pass plans down to the foot soldiers, and usually only one messenger needs to receive the message for the plan to be executed.

Disruption of the flow of information would correspond to halting the spread of news in an online social network or intercepting messages in a terror network.

The authors propose a generalized stochastic model for the flow and disruption of information based on a two-player outdoor game called "Seepage," where players who depict agents attempt to block the movement of another player, an intruder, from a source node to a sink. "The game -- motivated by the 1973 eruption of the Eldfell volcano in Iceland -- displays some similarities to an approach used in mathematical counterterrorism, where special kinds of DAGs are used to model the disruption of terrorist cells," says Pralat.

The motivating eruption caused a major crisis at the time, as lava flow threatened to close off the harbor, the island's main source of income. In the game, inhabitants attempt to protect the harbor by pouring water on the volcanic lava to halt its progress. A mathematical model of the game pits two opponents against each other -- the sludge, or intruder, against the greens, or agents -- forming a directed acyclic graph, with one source (the top of the volcano) and many sinks representing the lake. The parameter, "seepage," represents the amount of contamination, and the "green number" corresponds to the number of agents required to halt it.

A previous study modeled terrorist cells as partially ordered sets (a special kind of DAG), which are often used in mathematics to analyze an ordering, sequencing, or arrangement of distinct objects. In such a system, terrorist plans are formulated by nodes at the top of the hierarchy, which represent the leaders or maximal nodes of the set. The plans are transmitted down to the nodes at the bottom: these represent foot soldiers in a terror network or minimal nodes in the set who would be presumed to carry out these plans. The assumption is that one messenger is sufficient for reception and execution of the plan. Thus, if the partially ordered set represents a courier network for a terrorist organization, the intention would be to block all routes from the maximal node to the minimal nodes by capturing or killing a subset of agents.

In this paper, the authors utilize the similarities in the previous terrorist cell model to Seepage, where greens try to prevent the sludge from moving to the sinks by blocking nodes. A number of different winning strategies employed by both players are explored when played on a DAG. The seepage and green number for disrupting a given hierarchical social network are analyzed.

The primary difference from the previous study's model is that the Seepage model is dynamic: greens can move and choose new sets of nodes over time. The authors determine that Seepage is a more realistic model of counterterrorism, as the agents do not necessarily act all at once, but over time.

The analysis is made in two types of terrorist network structures, as Pralat explains, "We consider two extreme profiles: one where the network is regular, where every agent has about the same number of connections. The second profile is power law, where some agents have many connections, but most have very few." This is analyzed by considering the total degree distribution of nodes in the DAG. In regular DAGs, each level of the DAG would have nodes with about the same out-degree (number of outgoing edges emanating from a node), while power law DAGs would have many more low-degree nodes and a few with high degrees.

Mathematical analysis allows the authors to determine what point in a network would be most effective for disrupting messages. "Our mathematical results reinforce the view that intercepting the information or message in a hierarchical social network following a power law is more difficult close to levels near the source. For regular networks, it does not matter as much where the message is disrupted," says Pralat. "Future work could look at more complex profiles of networks, along with developing effective algorithms for disrupting the flow of information in a DAG using our game-theoretic approach."

Source: http://feeds.sciencedaily.com/~r/sciencedaily/top_news/~3/Adpbt4Zmc_4/130516142656.htm

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Holder defends subpoenas for AP telephone records

WASHINGTON (AP) ? Attorney General Eric Holder told Congress Wednesday that a serious national security leak required the secret gathering of telephone records at The Associated Press as he stood by an investigation in which he insisted he had no involvement.

Pestered by Republicans and some Democrats, Holder testified that he has faith in the individuals conducting the broad investigation, driven in large part by GOP outrage last year over the possibility that administration officials leaked information to enhance President Barack Obama's national security reputation in an election year.

Holder said he had recused himself from the case because "I am a possessor of information eventually leaked." He said he was unable to answer questions on the subpoenas and why the Justice Department failed to negotiate with the AP prior to the subpoenas, a standard practice.

That elicited frustration from some committee members with the Obama administration and the attorney general.

"There doesn't appear to be any acceptance of responsibility for things that have gone wrong," Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., told Holder. He suggested that administration officials travel to the Harry S. Truman Presidential Library and take a photo of the famous sign, "the buck stops here."

It was the Justice Department's No. 2 official, Deputy Attorney General James Cole, who made the decision to seek news media phone records, Holder said.

Last year, Holder appointed two U.S. attorneys to lead a Justice inquiry into who leaked information about U.S. involvement in cyber-attacks on Iran and an al-Qaida plot to place an explosive device aboard a U.S.-bound flight. Holder had resisted calls for a special counsel, telling lawmakers that the two attorneys, Ron Machen and Rod Rosenstein, are experienced, independent and thorough.

Holder was grilled on several scandals rocking the administration, including the targeting of conservative groups by the Internal Revenue Service and any missteps in sharing intelligence information prior to the bombings in Boston.

Responding to news of the gathering of AP records, Sen. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., planned to revive a 2009 media shield bill that protects journalists and their employers from having to reveal information, including the identity of sources who had been promised confidentiality.

The law does contain some exceptions in instances of national security.

"This kind of law would balance national security needs against the public's right to the free flow of information," Schumer said in a statement. "At minimum, our bill would have ensured a fairer, more deliberate process in this case."

The White House threw its support behind the legislation, said a White House official, who was not authorized to speak on the record about the topic and demanded anonymity. Ed Pagano, President Barack Obama's liaison to the Senate, placed a call Wednesday morning to Schumer's office to ask him to revive the bill, a move the senator had planned to make.

Obama's support for the bill signaled an effort by the White House to show action in the face of heated criticism from lawmakers from both parties and news organizations about his commitment to protecting civil liberties and freedom of the press.

White House officials have said they are unable to comment publicly on the incident at the heart of the controversy because the Justice Department's leak probe essentially amounts to a criminal investigation of administration officials.

Holder on Tuesday defended the move to collect AP phone records in an effort to hunt down the sources of information for a May 7, 2012, AP story that disclosed details of a CIA operation in Yemen to stop an airliner bombing plot around the anniversary of the killing of terrorist leader Osama bin Laden. The attorney general called the story the result of "a very serious leak, a very grave leak."

Sen. Dianne Feinstein, D-Calif., chairwoman of the Senate Intelligence committee, said Wednesday that the leak was "within the most serious leaks because it definitely endangered some lives."

Feinstein said it was her understanding that the information gathering did not focus on the "content of phone calls," but rather "to see who reporters have spoken to, that somebody did provide this information with respect to this bomb."

At a news conference Tuesday, Holder defended the subpoenas to the AP and disclosed that the department was investigating the IRS for giving tea party groups extra scrutiny when they applied for tax exempt status.

Documents obtained by the AP suggest the targeting of conservative groups could be more widespread than the IRS has acknowledged. The agency has said it was limited to low-level workers in a Cincinnati office.

At Tuesday's news conference, Holder said the U.S. has gotten good cooperation from the Russians on the Boston bombings investigation. U.S. law enforcement officials are trying to determine whether Tamerlan Tsarnaev was indoctrinated or trained by militants during his visit to Dagestan, a Caspian Sea province of Russia that has become the center of a simmering Islamic insurgency.

___

Associated Press writers Josh Lederman, Erica Werner and Donna Cassata contributed to this report.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/holder-defends-subpoenas-ap-telephone-records-183112739.html

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Boehner spokesman reacts to White House email release (Washington Bureau)

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Distrustful Rohingya resist cyclone evacuation

A Bangladeshi fisherman uses an anchored ropes of his boat to come on the banks of the river Kornofuli, in Chittagong, Bangladesh, Wednesday, May 15, 2013. Cyclone Mahasen is expected to make landfall early Friday. The storm was heading toward Chittagong, Bangladesh, but could shift east and deliver a more direct hit on Rakhine state in Myanmar. (AP Photo/ A.M.Ahad)

A Bangladeshi fisherman uses an anchored ropes of his boat to come on the banks of the river Kornofuli, in Chittagong, Bangladesh, Wednesday, May 15, 2013. Cyclone Mahasen is expected to make landfall early Friday. The storm was heading toward Chittagong, Bangladesh, but could shift east and deliver a more direct hit on Rakhine state in Myanmar. (AP Photo/ A.M.Ahad)

An internally displaced Rohingya boy wraps himself with a sarong as he walks in rain at a makeshift camp for Rohingya people in Sittwe, northwestern Rakhine State, Myanmar, ahead of the arrival of Cyclone Mahasen, Tuesday, May 14, 2013. The U.N. said the cyclone, expected later this week, could swamp makeshift housing camps sheltering tens of thousands of Rohingya. Myanmar state television reported Monday that 5,158 people were relocated from low-lying camps in Rakhine state to safer shelters. But far more people are considered vulnerable. (AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe)

This image provided by the Naval Research Lab shows tropical cyclone Mahasen taken Wednesday May 15, 2013 at 0600 GMT. Cyclone Mahasen is forecast to reach land early Friday and has been downgraded to a Category 1 storm, the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs said Wednesday. The U.N. says although the cyclone churning through the Indian Ocean appears to have weakened it could still bring "life-threatening" conditions to 8.2 million people along the coasts of India, Bangladesh and Myanmar. (AP Photo/

Internally displaced Rohingya girl walks with a sibling in rain at a makeshift camp for Rohingya people in Sittwe, northwestern Rakhine State, Myanmar, ahead of the arrival of Cyclone Mahasen, Tuesday, May 14, 2013. The U.N. said the cyclone, expected later this week, could swamp makeshift housing camps sheltering tens of thousands of Rohingya. Myanmar state television reported Monday that 5,158 people were relocated from low-lying camps in Rakhine state to safer shelters. But far more people are considered vulnerable. (AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe)

Internally displaced Rohingya boys shiver in rain in a makeshift camp for Rohingya people in Sittwe, northwestern Rakhine State, Myanmar, ahead of the arrival of Cyclone Mahasen expected later this week, Tuesday, May 14, 2013. The U.N. said they cyclone could swamp makeshift housing camps sheltering tens of thousands of Rohingya. Myanmar state television reported Monday that 5,158 people were relocated from low-lying camps in Rakhine state to safer shelters. But far more people are considered vulnerable. (AP Photo/Gemunu Amarasinghe)

SITTWE, Myanmar (AP) ? A massive evacuation to clear low-lying camps ahead of a cyclone has run into a potentially deadly snag: Many members of the displaced Rohingya minority living in the camps have refused to leave, distrustful of Myanmar authorities.

Around 140,000 people ? mostly Rohingya ? have been living in cramped tents and makeshift shelters in Rakhine state since last year, when two outbreaks of sectarian violence between the Muslim minority and ethnic Rahkine Buddhists forced many Rohingya from their homes. Nearly half those displaced are in coastal areas considered highly vulnerable to storm surges and flooding Cyclone Mahasen, which is expected to make landfall early Friday.

Outside the state capital of Sittwe on Wednesday, one community of several hundred Rohingya refused to budge, despite coaxing from soldiers.

"When we told them the storm was coming, they didn't believe us," said army Lt. Lin Lin. "They're still refusing to move."

Inside the camp, cycle rickshaw driver U Kyaung Wa said his people were tired of being ordered around by Myanmar authorities. First, he said, they were forced to move into the camps because they were Rohingya.

"Now they say, 'You have to move because of the storm,'" he said. "We keep refusing to go. ... If they point guns at us, only then will we move."

The cyclone churning through the Indian Ocean appears to have weakened but could still bring "life-threatening" conditions to more than 8 million people in coastal parts of India, Bangladesh and Myanmar, the U.N. said Wednesday.

Mahasen has been downgraded to a Category 1 storm, said the U.N.'s Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs.

Heavy rains and flooding in Sri Lanka were blamed for eight deaths earlier this week, said to Sarath Lal Kumara, spokesman for Sri Lanka's disaster management center.

The brunt of the cyclone was barreling toward Chittagong, Bangladesh, but could, "depending on its final trajectory, bring life-threatening conditions for 8.2 million people in northeast India, Bangladesh and Myanmar," the U.N. office said in a storm update issued Friday.

Much attention was focused on western Myanmar because of fears that heavy rains will swamp low-lying Rohingya camps.

Myanmar's government had planned to relocate 38,000 people within Rakhine state by Tuesday but "it is unclear how many people have been relocated," the U.N. office said, adding that Muslim leaders in the country have called on people to cooperate with the government's evacuation.

The issue has been complicated by widespread anti-Muslim sentiment in Rakine. Rohingya have suffered decades of discrimination in largely Buddhist Myanmar, which does not consider them citizens.

Tensions are still running high in Rakhine state nearly a year after unrest that killed at least 192 people and left hundreds of Rohingya homes in ruins. The violence has largely segregated Rakhine state along religious lines, with prominent Buddhists ? including monks ? urging people to boycott Muslim businesses.

International rights and aid agencies urged that the evacuations be stepped up.

"If the government fails to evacuate those at risk, any disaster that results will not be natural, but man-made," said Brad Adams, Asia director at Human Rights Watch.

Weather experts have warned that the storm could shift and change in intensity before hitting land.

Myanmar's southern delta was devastated in 2008 by Cyclone Nargis, which swept away entire farming villages and killed more than 130,000 people. Two days before hitting Myanmar, Nargis weakened to a Category 1 cyclone before strengthening to a Category 4 storm.

___

AP writers Krishan Francis in Colombo, Sri Lanka, and Jocelyn Gecker in Bangkok contributed to this report.

Associated Press

Source: http://hosted2.ap.org/APDEFAULT/3d281c11a96b4ad082fe88aa0db04305/Article_2013-05-15-Asia-Cyclone/id-31262d3df2144a0fb2b5abb2e7b275e0

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Nigeria declares emergency in areas hit by Islamists

By Joe Brock and Felix Onuah

ABUJA (Reuters) - Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan declared a state of emergency in three northeastern states on Tuesday, ordering in more troops to try to stem an increasingly violent Islamist insurgency.

Islamist sect Boko Haram has intensified its attacks on security forces and government targets in its northeast stronghold this month, prompting Jonathan to declare an emergency in Borno, Yobe and Adamawa states.

"We are facing ... a rebellion and insurgency by terrorist groups which pose a very serious threat to our national unity," Jonathan said in a televised address.

"They have attacked government buildings and facilities. They have murdered innocent citizens and state officials. They have set houses ablaze, and taken women and children as hostages. These actions amount to a declaration of war."

His orders followed growing evidence that Boko Haram now control parts of the northeastern territory around Lake Chad, where local government officials have fled.

Security officials say they control at least 10 local government areas of northeastern Borno state, the epicenter of the insurgency.

Dozens of Boko Haram fighters in buses and machine gun-mounted trucks laid siege to the town of Bama, in Borno, last week, freeing over 100 prison inmates and leaving 55 people dead, mostly police and other security forces.

Days earlier, scores were killed in the fishing village of Baga, also in Borno, on the shores of Lake Chad, when troops from Nigeria, Niger and Chad raided it looking for Islamists. Local residents said soldiers were responsible for many civilian deaths.

Jonathan ordered his chief of defense to deploy extra soldiers to the states.

The decree is likely to bring him into conflict with the powerful governors and northern leaders, with whom he already has a tense relationship.

On Monday, the Nigeria Governors' Forum, representing the governors of Nigeria's 36 states, warned Jonathan against imposing emergency rule in response to the insurgency.

Umar Gusau, spokesman for the Borno state Governor Kassim Shettima, declined to comment on the decree. Other influential northern figures were against it.

"It's not the right thing to do," said Bashir Tofa, a former presidential candidate and northern politician.

Boko Haram and other Islamist groups such as al Qaeda-linked Ansaru have become the biggest threat to stability in Africa's second biggest economy and top oil exporter.

Boko Haram leader Abubakar Shekau said in a video this week that the group had kidnapped several women and children in retaliation against security forces who, it says, have detained the wives and children of its members without just cause.

In December 2011, Jonathan declared a state of emergency over some limited local government areas in the states, after a church bombing blamed on Boko Haram killed 37 people, but he lifted it in July last year.

There has been an uptick in violence in other regions of Nigeria too, with 46 police officers killed by gunmen in an ambush in the central state of Nassarawa last week. Officials blamed a local cult not linked to Islamists.

(Editing by Tim Cocks and Cynthia Osterman)

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/nigeria-declares-state-emergency-areas-hit-islamists-185302129.html

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Firefox 21 Launches With Social API Support For msnNOW, Mixi And Cliqz, Android App Gets New Fonts, HTML5 Improvements

Mozilla today launched the latest version of its Firefox browser for Mac, Windows and Linux, and the highlight of Firefox 21 is additional support for Mozilla’s Social API. This API allows social providers to integrated directly with Firefox and the organization launched in cooperation with Facebook at the end of last year. Today, it is adding Cliqz, Mixi and msnNOW to the mix. The new Social API integrations, Mozilla says, “help you stay connected to your social networks, no matter where you go on the Web.” Once installed, users can access these integrations from buttons in the browser toolbar. Cliqz users, for example, will be able to see content recommendations right in the new social sidebar in Firefox, share links across their social networks and preview Twitter commentary, all without actually going to Cliqz. The integration with Japan’s Mixi and Microsoft’s msnNOW works in the same way. The Social API, Mozilla writes, “has endless potential for integrating social networks, e-mail, finance, music, cloud possibilities, services, to-do lists, sports, news and other applications into your Firefox experience.” Now that it has landed in Firefox stable, chances are we will see a number of additional integrations in the near future. Also new in this version is preliminary support for the new Firefox Health Report. Similar to what Microsoft is doing with Internet Explorer, Firefox will now also provide users with suggestions for how to improve the application’s startup time. Firefox For Android The Android version of Firefox was also bumped up to version 21 today and with it, the team has integrated support for two new open source fonts, Charis and Open Sans. The fonts will replace the three Android default fonts to enable “a more visually appealing and clear reading experience on the Web.” The difference is “subtle, but beautiful,” Mozilla says. Also new are the ability to save media files through a long tap and access to your recent browsing history through the back and forward buttons. This new version for Android also includes some HTML5 improvements and the browser now scores 421 out of the 500 possible points on HTML5test.com (plus 14 bonus points).

Source: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/Techcrunch/~3/pHe4vfd4NsU/

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'Hangover' star Cooper could pursue ninja career

Movies

Randee Dawn TODAY contributor

1 hour ago

He may have gotten an Oscar nomination for his "Silver Linings Playbook" role, but don't think Bradley Cooper's head has gotten too big for movies like "The Hangover." Now, the franchise that helped make him a household name is back -- with a third and final installment.

"It's all gravy," Cooper told TODAY's Matt Lauer Monday during a visit (before that, however, he graciously presented the recently-engaged Savannah Guthrie with a bouquet of roses). "We made the first movie never thinking it was going to be a trilogy. So the fact that I'm sitting with you here now, three movies in, is incredible.... No, it's over, mainly because (director)Todd Phillips; he's the reason we're all here. He just spent the last six years of his life making 'Hangover' movies, and it's time for him to move on."

While it'll be a shame not to get to see the Wolfpack showing up semi-regularly on feature screens, Cooper himself has gone on to any number of feature roles. And there's always his first great obsessive interest to fall back on -- as Lauer reminded him, for a long time as a boy, Cooper wanted to be a ninja.

"You know on the back of magazines when you were a kid, you could buy all these little things if you had enough tickets?" explained Cooper. "I wanted a like, a Chinese (Throwing) Star and nunchucks and all that stuff." He even asked his dad if he could relocate to Japan until he was 21.

Don't count that possibility out, said Cooper. "You never know what could happen, Matt! I'm still healthy!"

"The Hangover Part III" opens in nationwide theaters May 23.

Source: http://www.today.com/entertainment/bradley-cooper-has-last-hangover-could-pursue-career-ninja-1C9898084

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