On 16 December 1784 – barely a year after the first crewed flight – a British cartoonist published a sketch entitled The Battle of the Balloons, depicting airships belonging to the leading powers of the day firing cannons at each other from among the clouds. In his book Falling Upwards, Richard Holmes adduces the drawing as evidence of the intimate relationship between balloons and military competition, with, for instance, the first French company of aeronauts formed on the remarkably early date of 29 March 1794. Today we might contemplate another…
Tag: Surveillance
Tuesday briefing: Why is the US suddenly spying so many UFOs?
Good morning. UFOs are being shot down over North America, and one of them is octagonal. OK, that’s a slightly breathless account of events since a Chinese balloon was sighted over Montana 10 days ago, and aliens probably aren’t involved – but the full story is almost as interesting. After that first balloon was brought down and US secretary of state Anthony Blinken postponed a trip to Beijing in response, three other mysterious objects have been taken out in US and Canadian airspace in the last few days – the…
China ‘spy balloon’ wakes up world to new era of war at edge of space
Last Friday, Enildo Altamar and his neighbours looked up into the clear morning sky above Arroyo de Piedra, near Colombia’s Caribbean coast, and saw a white orb floating above them, a smaller version of the moon. “We are used to seeing drones in the area as they monitor local mines but they fly around, whereas this thing was massive and just hung in the air,” Altamar said. Soon his phone was pinging with messages from panicked friends in surrounding towns asking what the mysterious object could be. As if in…
Chinese-made security cameras to be removed from Australian government buildings
The federal government has committed to removing Chinese-made security cameras at government buildings across Australia, admitting there is a potential security problem that needs to be addressed. An audit of surveillance equipment, conducted by the shadow cybersecurity minister, James Paterson, has confirmed that more than 900 products built by Chinese companies Hikvision and Dahua are installed at government locations. The US and the UK have already banned these products at government locations, with the US Federal Communications Commission warning of an “unacceptable risk to national security” due to possible espionage…
Downed balloon one of a ‘fleet’ of Chinese surveillance devices, US alleges
China has a “fleet” of surveillance balloons of different shapes and sizes, which it has deployed over five continents, US officials have claimed. The allegations on Wednesday came as salvage work continued off the South Carolina coast for the debris from a high-altitude Chinese balloon a US jet fighter downed on Saturday after it had crossed the whole of the continental US. “We’re not alone in this,” said the US secretary of state, Antony Blinken. “We’ve already shared information with dozens of countries around the world both from Washington and…
The spy balloon saga says far more about Biden’s political weakness than China’s strength | Yu Jie
Surveillance balloons have appeared over US soil before – the president’s reaction is a sign of how boxed in he is by Republicans The gigantic spy balloon that flew from China to the US lies punctured, shot down by an F-22 jet. Similarly in tatters is any optimism that Beijing and Washington might be able to salvage their relationship – and the alarming high stakes of global economic and geopolitical turmoil will be shared by the rest of the world, if their febrile bilateral tie is to unravel. The incident…
The moment a suspected Chinese spy balloon is shot down over east coast of US – video
Footage shows a suspected Chinese spy balloon being shot down over the Carolina coast. Two US fighter jets circled the balloon before launching an air missile to destroy it. Beijing claimed it was a weather observation airship that had been blown off course, but the Pentagon claimed it had been able to manoeuvre and make deliberate turns. The US said it reached Montana, home to some of the US arsenal of nuclear ballistic missiles. Some Republicans called for the balloon to be shot down over land, despite the risk of…
The Observer view on the real threat behind China’s spy balloon | Observer editorial
It must be admitted that the flap over an enormous Chinese balloon that flew or blew, unannounced, over the US and Canada last week has a certain funny side. Pentagon generals went on high alert, fearful that their missile silos in Montana were being spied on. Joe Biden, not normally a trigger-happy man, had to be persuaded not to shoot it down, and then changed his mind. Republicans accused the president of being weak on balloon defence. Red-faced officials in Beijing scrambled to talk the over-excited Americans down. The balloon,…
Now the Chinese ‘spy balloon’ is down, the question is: what was it for?
Now the Chinese balloon has been brought down in a puff of smoke and debris by a US air-launched missile, after perplexing Washington with its three-day odyssey over the continental United States, the question is what was it all for? Once the balloon was spotted, Beijing claimed it was a weather observation airship that had been blown of course, drawing a snort of derision from the Pentagon, which said the balloon was able to manoeuvre and had made some deliberate turns, bringing it at one point over Montana, home of…
Police in China can track protests by enabling ‘alarms’ on Hikvision software
Chinese police can set up “alarms” for various protest activities using a software platform provided by Hikvision, a major Chinese camera and surveillance manufacturer, the Guardian has learned. Descriptions of protest activity listed among the “alarms” include “gathering crowds to disrupt order in public places”, “unlawful assembly, procession, demonstration” and threats to “petition”. These activities are listed alongside offenses such as “gambling” or disruptive events such as “fire hazard” in technical documents available on Hikvision’s website and flagged to the Guardian by surveillance research firm IPVM, or Internet Protocol Video…