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Russia's naval activity near undersea cables is reportedly drawing the scrutiny of US officials, further sparking concerns that the Kremlin may be plotting to "sabotage" underwater infrastructure via a secretive, dedicated military unit called the General Staff Main Directorate for Deep Sea Research (GUGI).

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Knocking out internet and telecommunications traffic traveling across these fiber-optic cables would have a devastating effect on government, military, and private-sector communications.

More than 95 percent of international data flows through those submarine cables, which puts them at increasing risk of both cyber and physical attacks .

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Last year, public broadcasters of Sweden, Denmark, Norway, and Finland uncovered a Russian fleet of suspected spy ships operating in Nordic waters, reportedly for purposes of sabotaging both submarine cables and wind farms.

**In addition to communications, the cables also carry electricity between European countries. **

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"Any activities that damaged seabed infrastructure including undersea cables especially during periods of heightened tensions risks misunderstandings and misperceptions that could lead to unintended escalation," [said an] US official. "The US would be especially concerned about damage to our or our allies' critical undersea infrastructure."

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According to the Hungarian media outlet Válasz Online, Father Gergő Bese, the “star priest” of the Orbán regime, there were a series of documents proving that Mr Bese participated in gay parties and maintained intimate relationships with other men.

Things like that are, of course, part of private life, and should remain so. However, the case of Gergő Bese is different. He is one of the flag-bearers of Orbán’s political Christianity, a strong protector of Fidesz from critics from inside the church, an influencer regularly publishing pro-government writings, a public figure, and it seems a financial beneficiary of the Orbán cabinet.

Moreover, he kept slamming the LGBTQ movement, supporting and authenticating the government’s campaign by wearing a cassock.

He blessed PM Orbán’s office in Buda Castle’s Carmelite Monastery and the government-close Megafon Centre. He campaigned for the government during the 2022 general elections, writing that those voting for the opposition choose tuition fees in schools, unbearable payments in social institutes and the lockdown of village temples.

He slammed Hungarian singer Gabi Tóth because of her divorce and the drag queens performing at the 2024 Paris Olympics’ opening ceremony. Bese wrote about the LGBTQ ideology and its aim to conquer the world and how difficult it was for a kid living in a single-parent family to find an identity. That is when LGBTQ propaganda can find and “change” them, he argued.

He slammed the demonstration of church school teachers, Péter Magyar, whom he called the Judas of Fidesz, accepting the 30 pieces of silver.

In the last six years, Bese and his family received HUF 41 million (EUR 101 thousand) from a civil fund supporting almost only the Fidesz-close NGOs. Even though the two NGOs applying are officially led by Bese’s mother and sibling, his email address and phone number were given under the contact details. Apart from the subvention, they received more than HUF 60 million (EUR 152 thousand) through different programmes from the Hungarian Prime Minister’s Office, the Cultural Ministry and the Bethlen Gábor Fund. Moreover, he is renting the Regina Hungarorum in Medjugorje.

The Archbishop of Kalocsa-Kecskemét suspended Bese today.

Apple has been told to pay €13bn (£11bn; $14bn) in unpaid taxes to Ireland by the European Court of Justice (ECJ).

The European Commission accused Ireland of giving Apple illegal tax advantages eight years ago but the Irish government has consistently argued against the need for the tax to be paid.

The ECJ said its decision on the matter was final and that "Ireland granted Apple unlawful aid which Ireland is required to recover".

The Irish government said it would respect the ruling, while Apple said it was disappointed with the decision and accused the European Commission of "trying to retroactively change the rules".

A separate ECJ ruling on Tuesday also brought an end to a long-running case with Google, with the company ordered to pay a fine of €2.4bn (£2bn) fine for market dominance abuse.

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If a social media account is spreading Russian disinformation - does sharing content from the account give it legitimacy?

No, says Carl-Oskar Bohlin, Minister for Civil Defence. But at the authority the minister is responsible for, the answer sounds different.

— In any case, you spread something that a foreign power might intend to spread to make us worried, says Mikael Östlund, press officer at the authority.

It was a year ago that Carl-Oskar Bohlin shared a tweet from the American influencer Lauren Southern, known for her far-right advocacy. The original video warned of how AI is used in influence operations, something the minister forwarded to his around 45,000 followers. "The ability and height of the impact operations risk increasing avalanche-like with disruptive technology shifts," wrote Carl-Oskar Bohlin on X.

Now, an American indictment against two Russian government employees shows that the production company Tenet media, where Lauren Southern is employed, must have been secretly financed by the Russian news agency RT. A total of just over SEK 100 million is said to have been transferred from the Russian state employees to the American company. In turn, influencers would push specific issues—such as questioning support for Ukraine—to their millions of followers. On YouTube alone, the videos have received more than 16 million views.

In light of the American indictment, Carl-Oskar Bohlin has been criticized for not checking his sources better. But the Minister of Civil Defense lets the tweet stay on X.

"For the simple reason that it is difficult to misunderstand." writes Bohlin to DN.

"One should of course refrain from spreading harmful narratives from foreign powers. However, it is a somewhat strange indictment that my warning about deepfakes and doctored videos would in itself constitute Russian disinformation. With such a threshold, it will be difficult to talk about or warn about the phenomenon at all," continues the minister.

Carl-Oskar Bohlin is responsible for the agency for psychological defence, MPF. Countering misdirection and misinformation, including rumor spreading and propaganda, is one of the agency's main missions.

In case you wonder, mr. Bohlin is from the conservative party (Moderaterna).

Borrowed from that other site...

New EU report: “Europe is stuck in a static industrial structure… [N]o EU company with a market capitalisation over EUR 100 billion that has been set up from scratch in the last fifty years, while all six US companies with a valuation above EUR 1 trillion have been created in this period.”

An Ifop poll commissioned by the French weekly Journal du Dimanche found that 52 percent of respondents said they were satisfied with newly appointed Prime Minister Michel Barnier, who was named by Emmanuel Macron after two months of political deadlock. The poll, which had a margin of error of up to 3.1 points, also found that almost three out of four respondents believed the conservative prime minister would quickly be toppled by a no-confidence vote.

The former Italian prime minister proposes "radical change" as the bloc faces aggressive competition from China and the US. Draghi touts use of controversial eurobonds; proposed plan for decarbonisation and competitiveness could entail defensive trade measures, he says.

Germany's domestic intelligence agency, the BfV, issued a warning on Monday that a cybercrime group belonging to Russian military intelligence (GRU) had been behind a number of online attacks against NATO and EU countries.

Together with US intelligence and other international partners, the BfV found that groups belonging to GRU Unit 29155 were "responsible for computer network operations against global targets for the purposes of espionage, sabotage, and reputational harm since at least 2020."

It cautioned that the unit, also known as Cadet Blizzard or Ember Bear, was behind the WhisperGate malware attacks against Ukrainian targets in January 2022, a month before Russia invaded the country.

Unit 29155 also "attacked networks in NATO member states in Europe and North America as well as countries in Latin America and Central Asia," the BfV said.

One of UK's oldest nuclear waste storage silos is currently leaking radioactive liquid into the ground. That is a “recurrence of a historic leak” that Sellafield Ltd, the company that operates the site, says first started in the 1970s.

Sellafield has also faced questions about its working culture and adherence to safety rules. The company is currently awaiting sentencing after it pleaded guilty, in June, to charges related to cyber-security failings.

Two German warships are set to pass through the Taiwan Strait in the middle of this month, becoming the first German naval vessels to do so in 22 years, Der Spiegel reported on Saturday.

Media last month reported that the warships, the frigate Baden-Wuerttemberg and the replenishment ship Frankfurt am Main, were awaiting orders from Berlin to sail the Strait, prompting a rebuke to Germany from Beijing.

Reports cited unspecified sources as saying Beijing would not be formally notified of the German ships’ passage to emphasize that Berlin views the trip as normal.

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While the US and other nations, including Canada, have sent warships through the Strait in the past few weeks, it would be the German Navy’s first passage since 2002.

China says it has jurisdiction over the nearly 180km-wide waterway between it and Taiwan.

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The Taiwan Strait is a major trade route through which about half of global container ships pass, and both the US and Taiwan say it is an international waterway.

The commander of the German naval task group, Rear Admiral Axel Schulz, last month said that such a passage would demonstrate Germany’s commitment to a rules-based order and the peaceful solution of territorial conflicts.

“We are showing our flag here to demonstrate that we stand by our partners and friends, our commitment to the rules-based order, the peaceful solution of territorial conflicts and free and secure shipping lanes,” Schulz said at the time.

Romania and Latvia, both NATO members and supporters of Ukraine in its 2 1/2-year-old war with Russia, on Sunday were investigating instances of Russian drones that crashed after breaching their airspace, authorities in both countries said.

The incidents prompted officials to call for measures to act jointly to counter Russia air incursions.

NATO Deputy Secretary General Mircea Geoana denounced the incidents as “irresponsible and potentially dangerous”, while saying there was no indication of a deliberate attack on Alliance member-states.

The Romanian defence ministry said the “radar supervision system identified and tracked the path of a drone which entered national airspace and then exited towards Ukraine”.

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In Latvia, which borders both Russia and its close ally Belarus, President Edgars Rinkevics posted on social media platform X that his government sought a common NATO response.

“The number of such incidents is increasing along the Eastern flank of NATO and we must address them collectively,” Rinkevics wrote.

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“There weren’t serious issues on the ground,” Romanian Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu told reporters on Sunday after consulting with the defence minister.

“(Attacks) will continue. That is it, we have a war on the border.”

cross-posted from: https://lemm.ee/post/41785145

cross-posted from: https://sopuli.xyz/post/16759425

https://t.me/astrapress/63733

Lithuania installed "dragon's teeth" and mines in front of the bridge on the border with the Kaliningrad region

"This is a precautionary step to ensure more effective defense," the Lithuanian Defense Ministry said on Twitter. The ministry explained that the Queen Louise Bridge is Russian property, so Lithuania cannot install "dragon's teeth" and mines on the bridge itself, but only in front of it.

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Estonia has revealed that Moscow was behind a series of cyber attacks targeting several Estonian ministries in 2020, in a rare move that publically accuses another state actor of a cyber attack.

Four years after Estonian ministries’ IT services, including the foreign ministry, were hit by cyberattacks, Tallinn identified the members of Unit 29155 of Russia’s military intelligence service (GRU) as the perpetrators, the prosecutor’s office stated in a press release on Thursday (5 September).

This is the first time the Baltic country has attributed a cyber attack targeting the state to a perpetrator, the statement adds.

“The Prosecutor’s Office sought the arrest of three GRU officers and they are wanted internationally based on the arrest warrant issued by the Harju County Court,” a press release from the Foreign Ministry reads.