Latest news with #Houthi-rebels
Yahoo
26-03-2025
- Politics
- Yahoo
Carney says we must 'look out for ourselves' in wake of U.S. intelligence leak on Yemen strike
Liberal Leader Mark Carney says the leak by top U.S. national security officials of plans for military strikes in Yemen — and the shifting security priorities of the Trump administration — mean "we have to look out for ourselves." "My responsibility is to plan for the worst, is to think about the most difficult evolution of the new threat environment, what it means for Canada and how do we best protect Canada," Carney said during a campaign stop in Halifax on Tuesday. "Part of that response is to be more and more Canadian in our defence capabilities, more and more Canadian in our decisions.… We have to look out for ourselves," he added. Carney made the remarks a day after a report that U.S. Secretary of Defence Pete Hegseth and U.S. Vice-President J.D. Vance texted war plans for upcoming military strikes in Yemen to a Signal group chat that included the editor-in-chief for The Atlantic magazine, Jeffrey Goldberg. The material in the text chain "contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Iran-backed Houthi-rebels in Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the U.S. would be deploying, and attack sequencing," Goldberg reported. Hegseth's first comments on the story attacked Goldberg as "deceitful" and a "discredited so-called journalist," while alluding to previous critical reporting of Trump from the publication. "Nobody was texting war plans and that's all I have to say about that," Hegseth said in an exchange with reporters Monday. But Brian Hughes, a U.S. National Security Council spokesperson, later said the text chain "appears to be authentic and we are reviewing how an inadvertent number was added to the chain." 'Its a serious, serious issue,' Carney says Carney noted that he currently has top-level security clearance and has also enjoyed that access previously in Canada and in the U.K., and is aware that information can leak from time to time. "It's a serious, serious issue and all lessons must be taken from any of those, including in this circumstance," he said Tuesday. "What's important is how people react to those mistakes and how they tie them up," he added. "They don't deny the mistakes, but they are clear and transparent and [are] progressing them." Carney said Canada has a strong intelligence and security relationship with the United States, but that association is evolving as the relationship between the two countries continues to change. U.S. Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth in the Oval Office on March 21. (Carlos Barria/Reuters) "Our world is changing, is becoming more divided and dangerous," he said. "Our adversaries are increasingly emboldened, and the norms that have kept Canada and the world secure are in peril. "The priorities of the United States, once closely aligned to our own, have shifted. Our sovereignty is under threat … President Trump wants to break us so America can own us," he added. Stephanie Carvin, an associate professor at Carleton University and a former national security analyst, told CBC News that Canada's changing relationship with the U.S. means we are "going to have to do more with what we have," and make significant investments. "As the U.S. is clearly going into a new direction, as it no longer values Canada as a partner, we are going to have to look after ourselves because the United States has in the past looked out for us and provided us information that has been useful and helpful," she said. Going forward, Carvin said, Canada is going to need to consider not only strengthening its military but also its foreign intelligence efforts, because Canada can no longer be certain the U.S. will share vital intelligence with its northern neighbour. Carney says more defence announcements to come Carney's campaign statement on strengthening Canada's military was made Tuesday at the Irving shipyard in Halifax, which has built the navy and coast guard's Arctic offshore patrol vessels and will soon begin construction on a fleet of destroyers to replace the country's frigates. Much of what the Liberal leader had to say was a rehash of existing plans and proposals, including the purchase of new submarines for the navy and a proposal to give members of the military a substantial raise. There were, however, some interesting suggestions including a notion that Canadian steel and aluminum would be given priority in defence production, and that the coast guard would be given a new, perhaps para-military surveillance mandate. There was no reference in his statement to earlier pledges to review and possibly buy only a handful of F-35 fighters and to pivot to another aircraft maker in order to meet the air force's needs. He suggested the review was ongoing, but that the bottom line is how beneficial the deal with U.S.-based Lockheed Martin is for Canadian workers and the economy. The navy's new destroyers will contain a Lockheed Martin-built combat management system. Carney, however, declined to say whether that particular defence purchase would be reviewed along with the F-35. Details of how the Liberals would like to overhaul, should they win on April 28, will be contained in the party's platform, which has yet to be released, he said. "We will have more defence announcements with the platform, before the platform comes out," Carney said. "So we will lay all of that out as well. We will cost our broader ... electoral platform so you can see ... how we're balancing the budget."
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Yahoo
What is Signal, the chat app used by US officials to share attack plans?
A magazine journalist's account of being added to a group chat of U.S. national security officials coordinating plans for airstrikes has raised questions about how highly sensitive information is supposed to be handled. Atlantic Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg detailed a discussion that happened over the Signal messaging app hours before strikes on Iran-backed Houthi-rebels in Yemen ordered by U.S. President Donald Trump. The National Security Council has since said the text chain 'appears to be authentic' and that it is looking into how a journalist's number was added to the chain. Here's a look at the app in question. It's an app that can be used for direct messaging and group chats as well as phone and video calls. Signal uses end-to-end encryption for its messaging and calling services that prevents any third-party from viewing conversation content or listening in on calls. In other words, messages and calls sent on Signal are scrambled and only the sender and recipient at each end will have the key to decipher them. Signal's encryption protocol is open source, meaning that it's freely available for anyone to inspect, use or modify. The encryption protocol is also used by another popular chat service, social media company Meta's WhatsApp platform. Encryption on Signal is turned on by default, unlike another popular messaging app, Telegram, which requires users to turn it on and does not make it available for group chats. Signal has features that are found on other messaging apps. It allows users to host group chats with up to 1,000 people and messages can be set to automatically disappear after a certain time. Signal touts the privacy of its service and its head defended the app's security practices on Tuesday. 'Signal is the gold standard in private comms,' Meredith Whittaker, president of Signal, said on X, without directly addressing the Atlantic report. Experts agree Signal is more secure than conventional texting. But it could be hacked. Government officials have used Signal for organizational correspondence, such as scheduling sensitive meetings, but in the Biden administration, people who had permission to download it on their White House-issued phones were instructed to use the app sparingly, according to a former national security official who served in the administration. The official, who requested anonymity to speak about methods used to share sensitive information, said Signal was most commonly used to notify someone that they should check for a classified message sent through other means. Beyond concerns about security, Signal and other similar apps may allow users to skirt open records laws. Without special archiving software, the messages frequently aren't returned under public information requests. In the Atlantic article, Goldberg wrote that some messages were set to disappear after one week and some after four. Encrypted messaging apps are increasingly popular with government officials, according to a recent Associated Press review. State, local and federal officials in nearly every state have accounts on encrypted messaging apps, according to the review, which found many of those accounts registered to government cellphone numbers. Some were also registered to personal numbers. The app's origins date back more than a decade, when it was set up by an entrepreneur who goes by the name Moxie Marlinspike, who was briefly head of product security at Twitter after he sold his mobile security startup to the social media company. Marlinspike merged two existing open source apps, one for texting and one for voice calls, to create Signal. The nonprofit Signal Foundation was set up in 2018 to support the app's operations as well as 'investigate the future of private communication,' according to the foundation's website. The foundation says it is a nonprofit 'with no advertisers or investors, sustained only by the people who use and value it.' The foundation's board has five members, including Brian Acton, who cofounded WhatsApp and donated $50 million to set up the foundation. ___ Associated Press writers Tara Copp, Aamer Madhani and Eric Tucker contributed to this report from Washington. Download the FREE WPXI News app for breaking news alerts. Follow Channel 11 News on Facebook and Twitter. | Watch WPXI NOW
South China Morning Post
25-03-2025
- Politics
- South China Morning Post
Signal chat furore may push US workers to China's side, Democrat warns
A senior Democrat linked political fallout from US President Donald Trump's top officials' use of Signal to discuss war plans to national security threats caused by China, warning that an 'erosion of trust' among America's intelligence officials emboldens attempts by Beijing and Moscow to recruit them. Advertisement Grilling five of the nation's spy chiefs, including CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, on Tuesday in a previously scheduled Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, Senator Mark Warner, the body's vice chair, chided the group for 'a pattern' of actions by the administration that 'make America less safe'. The hearing came just one day after The Atlantic published a report revealing that the publication's Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg was mistakenly added to a Signal group chat with top Trump officials, including Ratcliffe, in which they finalised plans to strike Yemen. The material in the text chain 'contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Iran-backed Houthi-rebels in Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the US would be deploying, and attack sequencing,' Goldberg said in his report. 'Chinese intelligence agencies are posting on social media sites in the hopes of luring individuals with national security clearance who've been pushed out, perhaps arbitrarily, to come into their service,' Warner said. Advertisement 'So no, the Signal fiasco is not a one off. It is, unfortunately, a pattern we're seeing too often repeated.'
South China Morning Post
25-03-2025
- Politics
- South China Morning Post
Democrat ties Signal chat controversy to China, warning about recruitment of fired US workers
A senior Democrat linked political fallout from US President Donald Trump's top officials' use of Signal to discuss war plans to national security threats caused by China, warning that an 'erosion of trust' among America's intelligence officials emboldens attempts by Beijing and Moscow to recruit them. Advertisement Grilling five of the nation's spy chiefs, including CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, on Tuesday in a previously scheduled Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, Mark Warner, the body's vice chair, chided the group for 'a pattern' of actions by the administration that 'make America less safe'. The hearing came just one day after The Atlantic published a report revealing that the publication's Editor-in-Chief Jeffrey Goldberg was mistakenly added to a Signal group chat with top Trump officials, including Ratcliffe, in which they finalised plans to strike Yemen. The material in the text chain 'contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Iran-backed Houthi-rebels in Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the US would be deploying, and attack sequencing,' Goldberg said in his report. 'Chinese intelligence agencies are posting on social media sites in the hopes of luring individuals with national security clearance who've been pushed out, perhaps arbitrarily, to come into their service. So no, the Signal fiasco is not a one off. It is, unfortunately, a pattern we're seeing too often repeated,' Warner said. (L-R) Sen. Mark Warner (D-VA) seated next to Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) addresses top intelligence officials including FBI Director Kash Patel, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, Central Intelligence Agency Director John Ratcliffe, and Defense Intelligence Agency Director Jeffrey Kruse as they appear during a Senate Committee on Intelligence Hearing on Tuesday. Photo: AFP The Democrat from Washington state was referring to broad federal workforce cost-cutting measures directed by Trump and carried out by billionaire Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (Doge), underscoring how deeply divided the two parties have become on an issue where there has traditionally seen more cooperation
Boston Globe
25-03-2025
- Politics
- Boston Globe
Trump backs national security adviser after war plans were shared with journalist, says official ‘learned a lesson'
Goldberg published a story Monday saying that top Trump administration officials unknowingly included him in a messaging group about plans to launch strikes on Houthi targets in Yemen. Just two hours after Goldberg received details of the attack plans on March 15, the Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up The material in the messages 'contained operational details of forthcoming strikes on Iran-backed Houthi-rebels in Yemen, including information about targets, weapons the US would be deploying, and attack sequencing,' Advertisement 'Michael Waltz learned a lesson, and he's a good man,' Trump told Garrett Haake of NBC News. Trump, whose comments came hours before his In his report, Goldberg said he was added to a Signal group chat after receiving a connection request from a user identified as Michael Waltz. In addition to Waltz, the group chat included Vice President JD Vance, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Secretary of State Marco Rubio, and Tulsi Gabbard, Trump's director of national intelligence. Hegseth Advertisement 'Nobody was texting war plans, and that's all I have to say about that,' Hegseth told reporters. Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt Brian Hughes, a spokesperson for the National Security Council, confirmed on Monday that the message chain that Goldberg detailed in The Atlantic was authentic. It was not immediately clear if the specifics of the military operation were classified. According to CIA Director John Ratcliffe, FBI Director Kash Patel, and Gabbard testified Tuesday before the Senate panel about the security breach. Ratcliffe told lawmakers Tuesday that the military plans shared with Goldberg in the Signal chat contained no classified information. 'My communications, to be clear in the Signal message group, were entirely permissible and lawful and did not include classified information,' Ratcliffe testified. Material from previous Globe coverage and the Associated Press was used in this report.
