Tag: theft

Chinese engineer stole US military and NASA software for years

International espionage isn’t always about sophisticated malware and zero-day bugs. Sometimes it’s as simple as pretending to be someone else asking for a favor.

For four years, a Chinese aerospace engineer did just that. Dozens of researchers at NASA, the US military, and major universities handed him exactly what he asked for, and possibly violated US laws in the process.

His name is Song Wu. He’s been on the FBI’s wanted list since September 2024, charged with 14 counts of wire fraud and 14 counts of aggravated identity theft, and he’s still at large.

Wu’s day job was as an engineer at the Aviation Industry Corporation of China (AVIC), a Beijing-headquartered state-owned aerospace and defense conglomerate with over 400,000 employees. The US has AVIC and several subsidiaries on a sanctions list.

His side hustle was simpler. From January 2017 through December 2021, Wu set up email accounts impersonating real US researchers and engineers, then emailed their colleagues asking for source code and proprietary software. He targeted employees at NASA, the Air Force, Navy, Army, and FAA, and faculty at universities across the US.

When software is a weapon

The applications Wu was after handle aerospace engineering and computational fluid dynamics. It’s the kind of intellectual property that helps develop advanced tactical missiles and evaluate weapons performance, and it sits squarely inside US export controls, according to NASA’s Office of the Inspector General. Sharing it with the wrong person, even by accident, is a federal problem.

Some victims did transmit the requested code. They were, in the OIG’s careful phrasing, “unwittingly” violating export control law.

How a four-year campaign finally broke

It wasn’t a firewall that caught Wu. It was a tip.

NASA’s Cyber Crimes Division got a report that someone had set up a Gmail account claiming to be an established aerospace professor who frequently collaborated with NASA. From that single thread, investigators unwound a campaign that had quietly targeted dozens of researchers across the federal government and academia.

The OIG also noted the giveaways: Wu asked for the same software multiple times and never explained why he needed it. Those are tells that anyone could have spotted on a slow afternoon if they’d been looking.

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An Arsenal of Guns Were Stolen From Epstein’s Zorro Ranch Back in 2018, but Staff Would Not Cooperate With Police Investigation

No cooperation with the cops was the norm.

During the absolute deluge of DOJ-released information about the Jeffrey Epstein trafficking ring that we’ve had access to, plenty of information concerned his many properties: his Manhattan townhouse, his Palm Beach mansion, and of course, his ‘Pedophile Island’ of Little Saint James in the US Virgin Islands.

The property less talked about, until now, was the New Mexico ‘Zorro’ Ranch – but now, more and more information is coming to light – to the point where New Mexico police raided the property, looking for the bodies of two young women reportedly buried in the desert after getting killed during a rough sex session.

And yesterday (28), it was reported that ‘dozens of guns were reportedly stolen from Jeffrey Epstein’s Zorro Ranch back in 2018’ a year before he was arrested.

Not only that, but also that Epstein’s staff refused to cooperate when police tried to investigate.

The New York Post reported:

“Much of the 32-weapon arsenal was stolen from a ‘very large gun safe’ in a garage at the pedo’s mysterious New Mexico property, while some were also snatched from two other buildings on the grounds in August 2018, a New Mexico State Police report obtained by the Santa Fe New Mexican showed.

The buildings had apparently been broken into, with at least one window smashed in the garage. Tire tracks were also found cutting across the desert grounds and leading to a slashed-open fence.”

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The Moral Malaise: The New York Times Makes The Case For “Microlooting” To Murder

“It is so hard to live ethically in an unethical society.” That lament heard this week from New York Times opinion culture editor Nadja Spiegelman could well be the Democratic Party’s epitaph.

Spiegelman was interviewing two left-wing influencers about how everything from shoplifting to murder may be excusable today in light of the unfairness they see in society.

The podcast, a product of the nation’s newspaper of record, reveled in the moral relativism that has taken over the American left. It featured the ravings of the antisemitic Marxist streamer Hasan Piker, who calmly explained how the murder of United Healthcare executive Brian Thompson was perfectly understandable. His rationalization came from Marxist revolutionary Friedrich Engels, who had called capitalism “social murder.” If capitalists are “social murderers,” then why not kill them? The logic is liberating and lethal for some on the left looking for a license for violence.

Mind you, this same newspaper had once condemned and effectively banned a U.S. senator for writing an op-ed advocating the use of the military to quell violent protests during the summer of George Floyd’s death. The Times even forced out its own opinion editor for having the temerity to publish such an opinion.

But glorifying murder? The suggestion of open hunting season on corporate executives did not appear to shock or repel Spiegelman. After all, we are living in “an unethical society.” She explained that many felt that the murder of Thompson, the father of two, meant that “finally, someone can actually do something about health care.”

Even liberal comedians are practicing a literal version of slapstick. Margaret Cho this week declared that “we need a feral, bloodthirsty, violent Democrat.”

To be fair, Spiegelman did concede that it might seem a bit “scary” for some to start murdering our way to social justice.

She also explained that shoplifting can be justifiable because people are “stealing from Whole Foods — not just for the thrill of it, but out of a feeling of anger and moral justification.”

New Yorker writer Jia Tolentino also contributed to the podcast, titled “The Rich Don’t Play by the Rules. So Why Should I?” She immediately threw in her own experience with “microlooting” and explained why it is arguably moral: “I have, under very specific circumstances. I will say, I think that stealing from a big-box store [isn’t] significant as a moral wrong, nor is it significant in any way as protest.”

She detailed her own past thefts and added, “I didn’t feel bad about it at all, in part because the store was a corporation. And it certainly felt, in a utilitarian sense, I was like, this is not a big deal. Right, guys?”

Not in the confines of the New York Times, where apparently you are entitled to all goods that are fit to pilfer.

The bizarre exchange highlighted the moral chasm that is opening its maw on today’s political left. In my book “Rage and the Republic,” I write about how rage helps people excuse any offense or attack. It dismisses the humanity of others and provides a license to hate completely and without reservation.

It is not really murder or theft if there are no real humans on the other side, is it?

Other columnists have defended such property crimes. Washington Post writer Maura Judkis ran a column mocking shoplifting stories as the “moral panic” of a nation built on “stolen land.” It is reminiscent of those who excused rioting in past summers “as an expression of power” and demanded that the media refer to looters as “protesters.”

Former New York Times writer (and now Howard University Journalism Professor) Nikole Hannah-Jones went so far as to call on journalists not to cover shoplifting crimes.

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Sophisticated Theft of 15 Cop-Drones in New Jersey Sparks Bioterrorism Fears

The theft of 15 crop-drones in New Jersey has sparked concerns among the FBI.

National security news outlet High Side reported that 15 agricultural Ceres Air C31 drones were stolen from a New Jersey warehouse last month.

According to the report, a man impersonating a delivery driver deceived logistics company CAC International into giving him the fleet of drones.

The drones have the ability to spray up to 40 gallons of liquid chemicals such as pesticides and fertilizers, but authorities are concerned the drones could be used to disperse chemical or biological weapons.

Per Yahoo News:

Fifteen industrial spray drones vanished from a New Jersey facility last month in what investigators call a sophisticated, coordinated theft. These aren’t hobby quadcopters—they’re precision farming machines capable of dispersing 40 gallons of liquid across 30 acres per flight, all guided by GPS autopilot.

Federal investigators launched a probe amid bioterrorism concerns, treating the theft as more than expensive equipment loss. Each drone operates as a potential delivery system that could disperse hazardous materials over wide areas without human pilots at risk.

Retired FBI agent Steve Lazarus warned of serious consequences and called it a concerning scenario, emphasizing these are industrial sprayers designed for precision agriculture, not weekend flying. The sophisticated coordination required suggests professional thieves who understood the equipment’s capabilities and value.

The theft revives post-September 11th anxieties about agricultural aircraft being weaponized for chemical or biological attacks. Today’s threat multiplies exponentially—instead of recruiting and training pilots for single planes, bad actors could deploy swarms of pre-programmed drones simultaneously.

The report comes a month after The Gateway Pundit reported that the U.S. Army Fort Campbell Facebook Page revealed that four Skydio X10D Drone Systems were stolen from the 326th Division Engineer Battalion building.

A spokesperson at Fort Campbell has since announced that the suspects behind the drone theft have been identified, but did not release their names.

Drone threats have reportedly increased since the United States began military operations in Iran.

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What the Hell Is Microlooting?

When one of my sisters was a tween, she was walking down the street with my grandparents when some change fell out of her purse. She didn’t turn back. “It’s just pennies,” she announced. “It’s worthless. Who cares?” My grandfather had her turn around and pick up each one. We don’t just throw away money, and we don’t act with casual indifference to things of value, even if they’re of small value, he explained. He didn’t take this stance because he worshipped the almighty dollar, nor because he grew up very poor—though he did, living above another family’s garage with his widowed mother—but because he considered it careless and fundamentally ungrateful.

I thought back to this bit of family lore this morning, when I watched New Yorker staff writer Jia Tolentino and the socialist Twitch streamer Hasan Piker debate the merits of microlooting, a made-up word that just means committing theft but feeling good about it. The conversation was hosted by The New York Times Opinion section, and took place in a tastefully decorated whitewashed loft.

Piker is a proud champagne socialist; he sported designer sunglasses on a propaganda trip to Cuba, an island he says has been “asphyxiated” by the U.S., while Tolentino is the cultural critic for the internet age: photogenic and constantly virtue signaling. She, of The New Yorker and a New York Times bestseller, is from the old media world—while Piker is the king of the internet stream, appealing to disaffected young men. But they’re both getting at the same thing.

The headline of the interview, interestingly, is: “The Rich Don’t Play by the Rules. So Why Should I?” The subhead: “Why petty theft might be the new political protest.” It is worth watching the whole thing for a glimpse into how the very online left—for which Piker and Tolentino are avatars—is responding to the much-discussed death of woke. Answer: a litigation of the Ten Commandments, one by one. According to the very polished, perfectly comfortable class avengers: Murder is up for debate. So is stealing, provided that it’s not from a Zohran Mamdani–sponsored grocery store.

The host, Nadja Spiegelman, began the conversation by establishing her guest’s theft threshold: “Would you share your Netflix password?” “Would you steal from the Louvre?” “Would you steal from Whole Foods?”

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SAY WHAT? Los Angeles Proposes New TAX to Pay to Fix Street Lights Broken by Copper Wire Thieves

The city of Los Angeles has a major street light problem. Thousands of the lights are out because thieves strip them of copper wire which they then turn around and sell for cash.

To deal with this problem and fix the lights, the city government is proposing a new TAX on the law abiding citizens who did not steal the copper wire. Can you even believe this?

The city wants to punish the people who didn’t ruin the street lights and make them pay to fix it. Unreal.

FOX 11 in Los Angeles reports:

Los Angeles voters to weigh fee increase for streetlight repairs amid copper theft concerns

A citywide plan to replace thousands of broken streetlights across Los Angeles could come with a cost increase for property owners under a proposed Proposition 218 assessment.

Mayor Karen Bass is urging voters to approve the measure, which would raise property-owner fees by an estimated 120% to help fund a $125 million program aimed at replacing more than 200,000 streetlights citywide. City officials say the current system generates roughly $45 million and has not been significantly updated since the 1990s, when Proposition 218 was adopted by California voters to require property-owner approval for new or increased local assessments.

Under the law, the city cannot raise streetlighting fees without a majority vote from affected property owners, a process that has kept much of the funding system largely unchanged for decades.

Ballots are expected to be mailed this week.

Across Los Angeles, officials say copper theft continues to worsen infrastructure problems, with thieves stripping wire from underground fiber lines and disabling streetlights in neighborhoods across the city. More than 32,000 streetlight repair requests remain pending.

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Indicted Democrat Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick to resign from Congress amid expulsion threat

Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, D-Fla., announced Tuesday she is resigning from the House of Representatives after Republicans vowed to force a vote to expel her from the chamber.

“Rather than play these political games, I choose to step away so I can devote my time to fighting for my neighbors in Florida’s 20th District,” she wrote on social media Tuesday afternoon. “I hereby resign from the 119th Congress, effective immediately.”

“This fight is far from over,” Cherfilus-McCormick, who was indicted by a grand jury last year for allegedly stealing COVID-19 emergency funds, added in her statement. 

She is facing 53 years in prison as part of a separate criminal indictment.

Cherfilus-McCormick’s abrupt announcement came after Rep. Greg Steube, R-Fla., pledged to file a motion to expel her, teeing up a vote later this week. It takes two-thirds of the House to remove a lawmaker, but a growing number of Democrats have voiced support for the expulsion effort.

It also came just minutes prior to a House Ethics Committee hearing that was slated to recommend sanctions against her for committing a bevy of violations involving financial misconduct. 

House Ethics Chairman Michael Guest, R-Miss., announced the panel lost jurisdiction with Cherfilus-Mccormick’s eleventh-hour decision to quit Congress. 

The committee panel found “clear and convincing evidence” in March that the Florida Democrat misused federal disaster relief money that was improperly paid to her family’s healthcare company, among other misconduct. 

Cherfilus-McCormick has denied any wrongdoing and repeatedly rebuffed speculation she would resign if confronted with an expulsion vote. 

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Boss of London Pride parade is sacked after ‘spending £7,000 of donations on luxury perfumes and Apple products’

The boss of Pride in London has been sacked after allegedly spending £7,000 of donated vouchers on luxury perfumes and Apple products.

Christopher Joell-Deshields was let go after an investigation was launched into allegations of misuse of company funds, financial mismanagement, and a failure to safeguard volunteers against bullying.

He had been CEO since 2021 and was often seen rubbing shoulders with celebrity supporters such as Naomi Campbell – but was suspended accused of using vouchers donated by a sponsor to purchase luxury products.

Whistleblowers claimed he had spent £7,125 of vouchers intended for volunteers on items including an Apple HomePod speaker, Apple AirPod earphones and colognes including Creed Aventus, which retails from £165. 

The pattern of the purchases suggested they were for ‘personal – rather than organisational – benefit’, the whistleblowers said. 

It was reported that he was being paid his full £87,500 salary whilst suspended, prior to his dismissal at the end of last month. He has denied any wrongdoing.

In a statement, Pride in London’s board of management said Mr Joell-Deshields is ‘no longer employed by or affiliated with London LGBT Community Pride’ – the community interest company that runs the annual event.

He appealed against the decision, but it was subsequently upheld by an independent reviewer. Pride did not say whether it had found the allegations against him proved.

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Marine Corporal Arrested for Allegedly Stealing Missile System, Ammo

A 23-year-old Marine Corporal is under arrest for allegedly stealing a missile system and other “weapons of war” from his California base and selling them for personal profit.

AZ Family reported the Marine, Andrew Paul Amarillas, is “accused of stealing a Javelin missile system and cans of ammunition… to sell on the streets in Arizona.”

Amarillas is an ammunition technician specialist at Camp Pendleton.

The New York Post noted that the Javelin missile system “is capable of punching through heavy tank armor from miles away.”

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Democrat Congresswoman Indicted Over Stolen Millions, Radio Silence From Legacy Media

Political commentator Scott Jennings raised concerns about allegations against Florida Democratic Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus McCormick, who has been indicted in connection with an alleged scheme involving $5 million in FEMA disaster relief funds.

“By the way, have you heard the one about the sitting Florida Congresswoman who stole millions of dollars in FEMA disaster relief funds and then used the money on her campaign for Congress?” Jennings said.

He questioned the level of public attention surrounding the case, adding, “No, you haven’t heard this story? Well, I wonder why that might be.”

Political commentator Scott Jennings raised concerns about allegations against Florida Democratic Congresswoman Sheila Cherfilus McCormick, who has been indicted in connection with an alleged scheme involving $5 million in FEMA disaster relief funds.

“By the way, have you heard the one about the sitting Florida Congresswoman who stole millions of dollars in FEMA disaster relief funds and then used the money on her campaign for Congress?” Jennings said.

He questioned the level of public attention surrounding the case, adding, “No, you haven’t heard this story? Well, I wonder why that might be.”

Jennings continued, “Because I’ll tell you why the congresswoman in question is a Democrat, and that tells you everything you need to know about the state of the American media.”

He described the allegations as significant, stating, “Now this is not some minor ethics flap.”

Jennings emphasized the seriousness of the case, saying, “This is not a paperwork error. This is not a technicality here, folks.”

He added, “This is one of the most serious corruption cases involving a sitting member of Congress to come along in years.”

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