Free Talk Live

It only took nearly a year of hiatus and $1 billion in sunk costs, but the Department of Homeland Security has finally gotten rid of the networked suite of sensors that made up its virtual border fence.

The virtual fence “cannot meet its original objective of providing a single, integrated border-security technology solution,”

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No shit?!

The US Department of Homeland Security, despite budget cuts and construction delays, is planning to add 17,000 employees into its consolidated headquarters in southeast Washington.

The Homeland Security Department's customs enforcement division has gone on a Web site shutdown spree, closing down at least 76 domains this week, according to online reports.

The Department of Homeland Security appears to have shut down the ability to use Dwolla, a mobile payment service, to withdraw and deposit money into Mt. Gox, a Bitcoin trading platform. A Dwolla representative confirmed the move to Betabeat. Chris Coyne, cofounder of OKCupid, posted a screenshot of an email he received from Dwolla, stating that due to recent orders from the Department of Homeland Security, Dwolla cannot complete the bank transfer to Mt. Gox.

Online rumors about a big government munitions purchase are true, sort of.

The Homeland Security Department wants to buy more than 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition in the next four or five years. It says it needs them — roughly the equivalent of five bullets for every person in the United States — for law enforcement agents in training and on duty.

One might expect the lady in charge of the US Federal Government's Homeland Security department—the person leading US "cyber security" policy—to have an inbox full of briefings, encrypted strategies, and plans for keeping America safe from "Terrorists." But, she doesn't. In fact, Janet Napolitano, in her own words, doesn't use email "at all."

It was an open secret that the National Security Agency was bolstering a Homeland Security program to detect and respond to cyber attacks on government systems, but a summary of that program declassified Tuesday provides more details of NSA’s role in a Homeland program known as Einstein.

A privacy advocacy group has swayed Congress to hold a hearing next week into the Department of Homeland Security’s practice of monitoring social networks such as Twitter and Facebook, as well as media reports and organizations, including The Drudge Report.

"To help spot and track smugglers, the Homeland Security Department is expanding its use of drones, the unmanned aircraft widely used in Iraq and other war zones, beyond the Mexican and Canadian borders to the Caribbean and possibly other seas."

"Homeland Security officials praised the aircraft as a safe and important tool that over land has contributed to the seizing of more than 22,000 pounds of marijuana and the apprehension of 5,000 illegal immigrants."