Tag Archive for: immigration

Chinese Hackers Stole Over 95 GB Of Indian Immigration Data

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Chinese hackers have conducted extensive cyber intrusions against foreign governments and companies, including India. The Washington Post reported that Chinese intelligence and cyber-surveillance accessed 95.2 GB (gigabytes) of Indian immigration data. 

Other targeted countries include Malaysia, Taiwan, South Korea, Hong Kong, Thailand, the United Kingdom, Nepal, Mongolia and Kazakhstan, among others.

According to the report, Chinese hackers are targeting software vulnerabilities in companies like Apple, Google and Microsoft. 

Leaked documents, posted a week ago on Github, reveal successful breaches of 80 overseas targets, including the acquisition of immigration data from India and call logs from South Korea’s LG U Plus telecom provider.

These documents belonged to a Chinese company called ISoon, headquartered in Shanghai. It is known to sell third-party hacking and data gathering services to state-owned companies and Chinese government bureaus.

The leaked cache contains more than 570 leaked files, images, and chat logs of users. These hacks were initiated by a Shanghai-based company Isoon, offering hacking and data collection services to Chinese government agencies and state-owned businesses.

Chinese state agents are using these hacking tools to identify users of social media platforms like X (erstwhile Twitter), access emails, and conceal the online activities of overseas agents. Additionally, the documents describe disguised devices such as power strips and batteries also used to compromise Wi-Fi networks.

Concerns about Chinese hacking campaigns have been raised by US intelligence officials, who view it as a significant long-term threat to national security. Similarly, the Indian government has taken measures to block Chinese mobile applications due to concerns about potential monitoring by Beijing.

This is just a part of the rampant cyberattacks that the country has been witnessing in recent times. India witnessed 13.91 Lakh cyber security incidents in 2022, Minister of State for Electronics and Information and Technology Rajeev Chandrasekhar informed the Parliament.

Those numbers still do not give an entire picture of cyberattacks on the country as these statistics…

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Experts Say Biden’s Latest Immigration Proposal Will Do Little To Alleviate Border Crisis

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President Joe Biden is pledging to get tough on the border, but the measures he proposed won’t alleviate the crisis unless he starts enforcing the laws on the books, immigration experts say.

At the center of Biden’s plan to deter migrants from flooding to the border is a mobile phone application that allows migrants in Venezuela, Nicaragua, Haiti, and Cuba to apply for asylum from their home country. But critics say that until the Biden administration enforces federal law that mandates the detention of all migrants, even those with credible asylum claims, until they come before an immigration judge, migrants will continue to flood to the border.

Without enforcing that law, those who cross the southern border and claim a credible fear of returning home will simply be released into the United States. Biden’s proposal, which makes it easier for migrants to get into the country, sidesteps that central problem, experts say.

“This program started with Ukraine, expanded to Venezuela, and now includes three other countries. It will be expanded further and further because the Biden administration looks for any way to staunch the flow at the border that doesn’t include enforcing the laws,” a senior Department of Homeland Security official told the Washington Free Beacon. “They have learned nothing in two years and figure packing airports with immigrants will relieve the pressure amassing at the border. Something for Americans to think about as they experience long lines at customs.”

Given court backlogs, asylum seekers may not see an immigration judge for years. In the meantime, they can live in the United States, get work permits, and apply for social services in some cities and states. Even if their asylum claims are ultimately denied, the Biden administration has ground deportations to a halt, with Immigrations and Customs Enforcement removing the smallest number of illegal aliens since 2015.

Although Biden pointed to studies showing that pilot versions of the program led to a lower number of Venezuelans applying for asylum, the total number that aimed to apply is unknown due to migrants who were never detained by law enforcement. In 2022, Customs and Border Protection recorded more…

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The missing piece in Biden’s microchip ambitions: STEM immigration

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But those subsidies, as well as new tax credits for the chip industry, were finally sent to Biden’s desk in late July. Intel isn’t the only company that’s promised to supercharge U.S. projects once that money comes through — Samsung, for example, is suggesting it will expand its new $17 billion chip plant outside of Austin, Texas, to a nearly $200 billion investment. Lawmakers are already touting the subsidies as a key step toward an American renaissance in high-tech manufacturing.

Quietly, however, many of those same lawmakers — along with industry lobbyists and national security experts — fear all the chip subsidies in the world will fall flat without enough high-skilled STEM workers. And they accuse Congress of failing to seize multiple opportunities to address the problem.

STEM help wanted

In Columbus, just miles from the Johnstown field where Intel is breaking ground, most officials don’t mince words: The tech workers needed to staff two microchip factories, let alone eight, don’t exist in the region at the levels needed.

“We’re going to need a STEM workforce,” admitted Jon Husted, Ohio’s Republican lieutenant governor.

But Husted and others say they’re optimistic the network of higher ed institutions spread across Columbus — including Ohio State University and Columbus State Community College — can beef up the region’s workforce fast.

“I feel like we’re built for this,” said David Harrison, president of Columbus State Community College. He highlighted the repeated refrain from Intel officials that 70 percent of the 3,000 jobs needed to fill the first two factories will be “technician-level” jobs requiring two-year associate degrees. “These are our jobs,” Harrison said.

Harrison is anxious, however, over how quickly he and other leaders in higher ed are expected to convince thousands of students to sign up for the required STEM courses and join Intel after graduation. The first two factories are slated to be fully operational within three years, and will need significant numbers of workers well before then. He said his university still lacks the requisite infrastructure for instruction on chip manufacturing — “we’re…

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The Long History of the U.S. Immigration Crisis

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Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, millions of Americans have commiserated with the plight of Ukrainian refugees who are being forced to flee their country. But many of these same Americans remain oblivious or unsympathetic to the continuing horrors faced by the refugees arriving at their own shores. In December 2021, the Biden administration announced that it would be relaunching the Migrant Protection Protocols (MPP), best known as the Remain in Mexico policy. This policy, which began in 2019 under the Trump administration, allowed U.S. authorities to send asylum seekers to wait out the duration of their U.S. immigration proceedings on the Mexican side of the border.

The Biden administration explained the policy’s reinstatement by citing a Texas district court decision that ordered the government to “reinstate MPP in good faith.” But the Biden administration went beyond reinstating the existing policy: it expanded the program to include migrants from Haiti and other parts of the Caribbean, as well as the Mexican and Central American asylum seekers to whom it initially applied. The Biden administration has also continued to enforce Title 42, an obscure public health law that the Trump administration used to allow U.S. officials to summarily expel migrants without providing them the opportunity to seek asylum in the United States. Although Biden’s rhetoric on immigrants is unquestionably different than Trump’s, his policy is similar to that of his predecessor, and is based on a strategy with roots in a deeper history of U.S. immigration policy.

The Trump administration designed the MPP to offshore U.S. immigration enforcement practices south of the border. During its two years in operation, the program forced nearly 70,000 asylum seekers to wait out their claims to U.S. asylum in Mexico, where they were subjected to terrible human rights violations including physical and sexual abuse, extortion, and murder. The MPP thus made Mexico responsible for U.S. immigration interests. But Washington’s practice of exporting immigration control policies is nothing new, nor is Trump much of an outlier: U.S officials have been forcing Mexico to do its dirty immigration work…

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