Cyberattacks and holiday disruptions: In The News for Thursday, Sept. 15, 2022

The report by researchers at the University of Quebec at Montreal’s Observatoire des conflits multidimensionnels found cyberespionage accounted for more than half of these episodes.

The analysis focuses on what the centre considers geopolitical or strategic cyberincidents — events not primarily linked to criminal or domestic political activity but rather global rivalries and strategic competition.

It says these events originate most often outside Canada, usually orchestrated by foreign governments for political, economic or other purposes.

Targets include Canadian public authorities, the general public, research institutions and companies, individuals or international organizations based in Canada.

Cyberespionage directed at state secrets and intellectual property, as well as the targeted surveillance of individuals, accounted for 49 of the 75 incidents analyzed by the centre.

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Also this …

Workers are scrambling to find last-minute child care in parts of Canada after governments announced the sudden closure of schools to mourn Queen Elizabeth.

The four Atlantic provinces, British Columbia and Yukon all declared Monday a holiday for provincial and territorial public-sector employees, including teachers and school staff.

Yet most private-sector businesses will remain open, leaving many workers to find child care or, in some cases, take an unpaid day off.

Some parents say after two years of pandemic-related school disruptions, it’s frustrating for families to once again grapple with unexpected closures.

Businesses are also left juggling schedules to accommodate workers who need to stay home to care for children.

It comes as some businesses are already contending with reduced hours due to staffing shortages.

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What we are watching in the U.S. …

A looming freight rail strike is threatening to disrupt numerous commuter rail services across the United States.

Commuter rail services in Chicago, Washington, D.C., Seattle, The San Francisco Bay Area and elsewhere would be forced into full or partial shutdowns because they use tracks owned by the freight railroads.

A trade group representing commuter rails said the systems can do little but wait to see whether railroads and unions can settle their differences.

The potential strike has left President Joe Biden in an awkward position of espousing the virtues of unionization as members of his administration work to keep talks going in Washington between the two sides aimed at averting a shutdown.

A strike, which could begin as soon as Friday if no deal is reached, would disrupt shipping networks that keep factories rolling, stock the shelves of stores and stitches the U.S. together as an economic power.

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What we are watching in the rest of the world …

A senior Armenian official says Armenia and Azerbaijan negotiated a cease-fire to end a flare-up of fighting that has killed 155 soldiers on both sides.

The secretary of Armenia’s Security Council announced the truce in televised remarks early Thursday, saying it took effect hours earlier — at 8 p.m. (1600 GMT) Wednesday.

A previous cease-fire brokered by Russia on Tuesday quickly failed.

The announcement follows two days of heavy fighting that marked the largest outbreak of hostilities between the two longtime adversaries in nearly two years.

Shortly before Grigoryan’s announcement, thousands of protesters took to the streets of Armenia’s capital accusing Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan of betraying his country by trying to appease Azerbaijan and demanding his resignation.

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On this day in 2008, global markets plummeted after investment bank Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc. filed for bankruptcy protection, rival Merrill Lynch agreed to be taken over by Bank of America and the U.S. Federal Reserve threw a lifeline to the battered financial industry. In Toronto, the S&P/TSX composite index dropped 515.26 points to 12,254.32.

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In entertainment …

A federal jury in Chicago convicted R. Kelly on Wednesday of producing child pornography and enticing girls for sex after a monthlong trial in his hometown, delivering another legal blow to the Grammy Award singer who was once one of the world’s biggest R&B stars.

Prosecutors won convictions on six of the 13 counts against him, with many of the convictions carrying long mandatory sentences. But the government lost the marquee count — that Kelly and his then-business manager successfully rigged his state child pornography trial in 2008.

Both of his co-defendants, including longtime business manager Derrel McDavid — who had told jurors that testimony from four Kelly accusers had led him to change his mind about Kelly’s believability — were acquitted of all charges.

The trial was, in ways, a do-over of Kelly’s 2008 child pornography trial, with a key video critical to both. Kelly, who shed tears of joy when jurors acquitted him in 2008, gave a thumbs-up sign to spectators after Wednesday’s verdict but otherwise showed little emotion.

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Did you see this?

A newly launched website that draws on Canadian data and research is being heralded as the most comprehensive summary of bird migration patterns ever assembled.

The National Audubon Society unveiled its Bird Migration Explorer today, which combines millions of observations on hundreds of bird species into an interactive online platform, full of connections linking continents and countries, including Canada.

The Explorer, according to an executive with the society, helped pinpoint the summer nesting area of the snowy owl: the Seal River watershed in northern Manitoba.

The website is the result of four years of work and millions of dollars.

It uses more than 500 peer-reviewed studies from 283 institutions. The project draws on decades of bird-banding data from agencies such as the Canadian Wildlife Service, as well as tracking data from hundreds of transceiver-implanted birds.

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This report by The Canadian Press was first published Sept. 15, 2022.

The Canadian Press

by Canadian Press

Cyberattacks and holiday disruptions: In The News for Thursday, Sept. 15, 2022

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