Authored by Mark Mason via BitcoinMagazine.com,

In the intricate dance of global finance, few metrics are as telling as the M2 money supply—a measure of global liquidity.

Currently sitting at a staggering $97 trillion and climbing, this figure encapsulates the vast flow of cash, deposits, and near-money circulating across the global economy.

Global M2 money supply is at $97T and increasing. 💵

One of the most important charts to watch for the remainder of this cycle 👇 👇 👇 pic.twitter.com/ugInOcjdIQ

— Bitcoin Magazine Pro (@BitcoinMagPro) January 29, 2025

For Bitcoin investors, this metric is far more than an academic curiosity; it’s a compass guiding market sentiment and price trends.

What is Global Liquidity?

Global liquidity, often equated with M2 money supply, represents the total volume of currency and near-money available in the financial system.

This includes physical cash, checking and savings deposits, money market accounts, retail mutual funds, and short-term time deposits under $100,000. Importantly, M2 reflects not just static wealth but the fluid potential for spending and investing.

The Central Banks Driving Liquidity

Global liquidity isn’t monolithic. It’s the aggregate result of monetary policies from the world’s most influential central banks:

• USA: Federal Reserve

• China: People’s Bank of China

• EU: European Central Bank

• UK: Bank of England

• Japan: Bank of Japan

• Canada: Bank of Canada

• Russia: Bank of Russia

• Australia: Reserve Bank of Australia

When these central banks lower interest rates or implement quantitative easing (QE) measures, such as purchasing government bonds and securities, they effectively inject fresh liquidity into the global financial system. As liquidity expands, it opens the door for increased spending and investment in risk assets, including Bitcoin.

Why Investors Should Care

For strategic investors, tracking global liquidity is akin to weather forecasting for the financial markets. Historically, Bitcoin bull markets have coincided with periods of rapid global liquidity expansion. The logic is straightforward: when central banks flood the system with cash, investors are emboldened to seek higher-yielding opportunities in safe-haven assets like Bitcoin.

Bitcoin’s appeal as a non-correlated, deflationary asset makes it uniquely positioned in this environment. Unlike fiat currencies, which central banks can create in unlimited quantities, Bitcoin operates on a fixed monetary schedule capped at 21 million coins. This scarcity is a direct contrast to the seemingly limitless expansion of M2, reinforcing Bitcoin’s narrative as “digital gold.”

The $97 Trillion Marker: A Call to Action

The $97 trillion global M2 supply underscores the relentless expansion of fiat liquidity.

While this might seem like an abstract figure, its implications are very tangible for Bitcoin investors. Here’s why:

1. Liquidity-Driven Price Momentum: Increased liquidity has historically aligned with Bitcoin’s most explosive growth phases. Investors who monitor these trends gain a crucial edge in timing their market entries.

2. Hedge Against Inflation: As central banks expand liquidity to manage economic downturns, the purchasing power of fiat currencies erodes. Bitcoin’s fixed supply serves as a hedge against this debasement.

3. Institutional Adoption: As professional and institutional investors increasingly integrate Bitcoin into portfolios, monitoring global liquidity becomes essential for aligning strategies with macroeconomic conditions.

Looking Ahead: The Bitcoin Opportunity

Bitcoin’s relationship with global liquidity isn’t just a trend; it’s a testament to its maturation as a financial asset. For those who view Bitcoin as an alternative to traditional financial systems, the current $97 trillion liquidity landscape presents a compelling backdrop.

As central banks continue to grapple with economic uncertainties, Bitcoin remains a beacon for investors seeking transparency, predictability, and security in an unpredictable world. The rising tide of global liquidity isn’t just a narrative; it’s an invitation to reevaluate Bitcoin’s role in your investment strategy.

Now is the time to harness the power of data and foresight. Monitor liquidity. Watch Bitcoin. Invest strategically.

Authored by Andrew Korybko via substack,

Trump signed an Executive Order to build an Iron Dome for America, which aims to defend the homeland “against ballistic, hypersonic, advanced cruise missiles, and other next-generation aerial attacks.”

It’ll also importantly include space-based monitoring and interception systems. Some of the latter will have “non-kinetic capabilities” too, likely referring to directed-energy weapons (DEWs), but it’s unclear whether they’ll be deployed on the ground and/or in space.

Here are five takeaways from this monumental move:

*  *  *

1. Strategic Stability Will Never Look The Same

Bush Jr.’s unilateral withdrawal from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty in 2002 prompted Russia to develop hypersonic technology so as to prevent the US from feeling comfortable enough with its missile defense shield that it one day plots a first strike after thinking that it could intercept Russia’s second one. Trump’s Iron Dome plans mean that there’s no going back to the era of mutual restrictions on missile defense, which was already dubious after what Bush Jr. did, thus worsening the Russian-US security dilemma.

2. The US Just Sped Up The Second Space Race

The second Space Race has already been underway since Trump created the Space Force in 2019, but his latest Executive Order sped it up by compelling Russia and China to further prioritize their space-based defense plans, which will inevitably result in the hyper-militarization of space. There’s no way that those two won’t suit through the deployment of their own defensive systems there that could also disguise offensive weapons just like the US might secretly be plotting to do under this pretext.

3. “Rods From God” Are The Next Superweapon

Whichever country is the first to position itself to carry out kinetic bombardments against others, which refers to dropping space-based projectiles onto their opponent, will obtain dominance. These weapons are popularly known as “rods from God” and are poised to become the next superweapon since they might be impossible to intercept and can promptly strike opponents due to menacingly orbiting above their targets or in close enough proximity to them at all times. This makes them a military game-changer.

4. This Is An Unprecedented Power Play By The US

The preceding points prove that Trump’s Iron Dome plans are an unprecedented power play against Russia and China. The unofficial “rods from God” offensive element raises the chances that the US can destroy their land-based second-strike capability in a first strike while the official missile defense one is meant to neutralize their remaining (submarine-based) capabilities. The combined effect is intended to place them in positions of nuclear blackmail from which concessions can then be perpetually extracted.

5. Space-Based Arms Control Should Be A Priority

Russia and China will work to counteract the US’ aforesaid power play and then unveil their own such systems so as to try to place it in the same position of nuclear blackmail that it wants to place them. This is a dangerous dynamic since one of these three might feel like time is running out before they’re placed in such a position and that they must thus launch a first strike without delay. The only way to reduce this risk is through a space-based arms control pact with credible monitoring and enforcement mechanisms.

*  *  *

Trump’s plans to build an Iron Dome for America are a game-changer in the New Cold War since they’ll take the US’ rivalry with Russia and China to a qualitatively more dangerous level.

The consequent hyper-militarization of space that’ll occur as a result of him wanting to deploy interceptors there, which could disguise offensive arms like “rods from God”, spikes the risk of war by miscalculation.

A space-based arms control pact between them is unlikely anytime soon, but it’s the only way to reduce this risk.

Just as multiple air travel related tragedies have taken place, it’s been reported that the FAA is fighting a class action lawsuit alleging it denied 1,000 people air traffic controller jobs based on diversity hiring targets, according to the New York Post.

The lawsuit, originally filed in 2015, resurfaced following a fatal midair collision in Washington, DC, that claimed 67 lives—the deadliest U.S. aviation disaster in nearly 25 years. Hours later, a small private plane crashed in Northeast Philadelphia, putting emphasis on the role of air traffic control.

At the time of the blackhawk helicopter incident, staffing levels were reportedly “not normal.” Andrew Brigida, the lead plaintiff in the lawsuit, criticized the FAA’s focus on diversity and inclusion, suggesting it contributed to the likelihood of such an accident.

The New York Post report says that the lawsuit claims the FAA, under the Obama administration, replaced a skill-based hiring system with a “biographical assessment” to increase minority hires.

Andrew Brigida, a white applicant, alleges racial discrimination after being rejected despite scoring 100% on his training exam at Arizona State University’s aviation program in 2013.

The FAA faces growing criticism over its hiring policies, with some, including former President Trump, blaming diversity programs for understaffing and lower air traffic control standards.

Lead plaintiff Andrew Brigida suggested diversity-focused hiring made an aviation accident inevitable. He pointed to the FAA’s preliminary report, which revealed the controller on duty during the fatal plane-helicopter crash was handling two roles due to staffing shortages. The report also noted that Ronald Reagan National Airport had fewer controllers than recommended.

Brigida, now an FAA program manager, hopes Trump will address the staffing crisis if re-elected. Meanwhile, the FAA continues struggling with shortages since 2020’s pandemic layoffs.

The lawsuit, which the FAA and the Department of Transportation are contesting, is set for trial next year. Government lawyers argue that expanding hiring eligibility doesn’t constitute discrimination under Title VII, as it ensures equal access rather than preserving prior advantages.

Authored by Ted Snider via TheAmericanConservative.com,

It is no longer easy to tell what the Ukraine War was for. Very early on, U.S. goals got grafted onto Ukrainian goals, and the hybrid braid became hard to disentangle. “This is a war that is in many ways… bigger than Ukraine,” the State Department announced in the first weeks of the war. But, whatever those goals, few of them remain: There will be no NATO membership for Ukraine, there will be no recovery of all of its territory, and there will be no weakening of Russia.

Former President Joe Biden has a lot of explaining to do, as does Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Zelensky will need to explain to his exhausted nation why choosing the path of war over the path of diplomacy after the Istanbul talks in March and April of 2022 was worth the cost. At that time, what still seemed to be the Ukrainian goals—continued sovereignty and the withdrawal of Russian troops to pre-war boundaries—might have been met. Zelensky must explain why he succumbed to Western pressure to pursue wider ones.

He is going to have to explain why pursuing those wider goals was worth the loss of so much life, limb and land. And, if he is to survive politically and, perhaps, even physically, he is going to have to find someone to blame.

He already fired Valery Zaluzhny, who served as Ukraine’s military commander-in-chief until last year. Now, Ukraine’s security service has arrested two generals and a colonel on the charge of failing to protect Ukrainian territory from Russian advances. 

But blaming the generals won’t be enough to acquit Zelensky. The war went on after Zaluzhny and continued to worsen. And no one will buy the blaming of field commanders. “We were defending a huge swath of the border, we fought to the death in the first hours of the attack,” said soldiers in one brigade after their former commander was arrested. “We were short of people, ammunition and support but we fought, we fought under the leadership of our commander!”

Ukraine no longer has the capacity to field the men nor the weapons to hold off the Russian advance. More land will be lost the longer the war goes on, and more men and weapons are not on their way. “The problem with Ukraine is not that they’re running out of money,” Marco Rubio said at his confirmation hearing for his nomination as secretary of state, “but that they’re running out of Ukrainians.”

Zelensky will need to blame someone higher up than the field commanders. In recent weeks, he’s laid some of that blame on Biden, complaining of insufficient support. “With all due respect to the United States and the administration,” Zelensky said in a podcast interview, “I don’t want the same situation like we had with Biden.”

One day, Zelensky will need to explain to Ukrainians his part in the tragedy. He will have to defend his decision to yield to the West’s pressure not to sign anything with Russia but to “just fight,” as then-British Prime Minister Boris Johnson reportedly put it. As American President Donald Trump said in his first Oval Office interview, “Zelensky… shouldn’t have allowed this to happen either. He’s no angel. Zelensky decided that ‘I want to fight.’”

But that does not exonerate the U.S. or mean that Zelensky is unjustified in blaming Biden. Biden, too, is one day going to have to explain what the war in Ukraine was for subsequent to the promising talks in Istanbul. 

The Biden administration repeatedly promised Ukraine whatever they needed for as long as it takes. But that promise evolved into whatever we agree to for as long as convenient. And a clear answer to the question “Whatever they need to do what?” was never provided.

According to Biden National Security Council official Eric Green, U.S. support for Ukraine was never intended to push Russia out of its territory, recover its lost land, and reassert its territorial integrity.

“We were deliberately not talking about the territorial parameters,” Green said in an interview with Time. “The more important objective,” he explained, “was for Ukraine to survive as a sovereign, democratic country free to pursue integration with the West.” 

But reclaiming territory was all that was left for the Ukrainians after the West pressured them to keep fighting rather than abandon aspirations to join NATO. Neutrality for Kiev was “the key point” for Russian negotiators, according to one Ukrainian lawmaker who participated in peace talks. If an agreement had been made, a still-sovereign Ukraine would remain free to pursue economic and cultural—but not military—integration with the West.

Green’s assertion, at first, seems unlikely. The U.S. pushed Ukraine to carry out a counteroffensive in the Donbas and endorsed strikes on military targets in Crimea.

But that was for public consumption. Privately, they knew that Ukraine’s counteroffensive likely couldn’t succeed, that Kiev didn’t have the training or weapons needed to expel Russian forces from the Donbas. And, according to a report from early 2023, they knew it was not “a wise move” to recapture Crimea and were not “actively encouraging Ukraine” to do so.

If Biden was not prepared to give Ukraine whatever it needed to reclaim its territory, and if he was not prepared to offer Ukraine NATO membership, then what was American support for the war all about? Was it really just about weakening Russia or asserting NATO’s unchallenged right to expand wherever it wants, including right up to Russia’s borders? If so, then the people of Ukraine have been cruelly used by America. 

In the first weeks of the war, there was a plausible hope worth exploring that Ukraine might retain much of its territory while avoiding catastrophic bloodshed and destruction of lives. Washington chose a different path, and it is incumbent on Biden to explain why.

In apparent continuity with the GWOT era of the prior two decades, the Trump White House has announced the president ordered a wave of airstrikes on Islamic State cells in Somalia on Saturday, in the very first US strikes abroad since Donald Trump entered his second term.

The Pentagon announced that “multiple” terrorists were killed and that it further assessed no civilians were harmed. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said US Africa Command carried out the strikes as directed by Trump as Commander-in-Chief. Trump on social media hailed that the attacks destroyed the “caves” that ISIS terrorists live in.

“The strikes destroyed the caves they live in, and killed many terrorists without, in any way, harming civilians. Our Military has targeted this ISIS Attack Planner for years, but Biden and his cronies wouldn’t act quickly enough to get the job done. I did!” Trump wrote.

“The message to ISIS and all others who would attack Americans is that “WE WILL FIND YOU, AND WE WILL KILL YOU!” – he added in caps.

But specifics haven’t been offered, such as the identities of those targeted and killed, or the precise location. However the government of Somalia confirmed the operation was done with its approval and coordination.

“Our initial assessment is that multiple operatives were killed in the airstrikes and no civilians were harmed,” Defense Secretary Hegseth said. “This action further degrades ISIS’s ability to plot and conduct terrorist attacks threatening U.S. citizens, our partners, and innocent civilians and sends a clear signal that the United States always stands ready to find and eliminate terrorists who threaten the United States and our allies.”

The office of Somalia’s president announced that the operation “reinforces the strong security partnership” between the two countries in “combating extremist threats.” Somalia “remains resolute in working with its allies to eliminate international terrorism and ensure regional stability,” it said on X.

Past presidents have also targeted Somalia with similar such sporadic strikes against Islamist militants. It’s part of the dangerous and ongoing post-9/11 trend of ordering acts of war on foreign soil but without any Congressional debate, review, or authorization whatsoever.

Libertarian and former Independent Congressman from Michigan Justin Amash complained about this lack of Congressional input:

Congress hasn’t authorized war in Somalia—even against ISIS. The separation of powers exists to protect both the liberty and safety of Americans. Offensive missile strikes are acts of war and can’t be justified without the express approval of Congress for the specific conflict.

…Presidents can’t declare war. No congressional authorization grants the power to target “terrorists” as a general grouping.

Continuing the decades-old tradition of bombing Somalia https://t.co/6YOG1zw0B9

— Dave DeCamp (@DecampDave) February 1, 2025

But hawks will look to the law enacted just days after 9/11, the Authorization for Use of Military Force (AUMF), as providing legal cover and grounds for the president to do that. It has remained an extremely controversial law and position, granting wide and ambiguous powers to the Executive Branch.

Via American Greatness,

Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson has told members of the press that members of Congress should be focusing less on arresting and deporting illegal alien criminals and more on slavery reparations.

Johnson was asked on Thursday about whether he would he would honor an invitation to appear with a handful of U.S. mayors before the U.S. House Oversight Committee to testify about so-called “sanctuary cities” like Chicago, New York, Denver and Boston.

Rather than answering the question, Johnson chose to play the race card instead and went off on a diatribe about slavery, reparations and how the U.S. today represents “what our country would look like had the confederacy won.”

🚨 CHICAGO MAYOR DEFLECTS FROM ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION WITH SLAVERY TALK—BUT IGNORES REAL SLAVERY HAPPENING TODAY

• What Happened:
• Chicago Mayor Brandon Johnson tried to dodge the illegal immigration crisis by ranting about colonization and slavery.
• Instead of addressing… pic.twitter.com/YqPj3oJ3PB

— Shred Newz (@Shreddick0) January 31, 2025

According to the Chicago City Wire, Johnson insisted that the Oversight Committee should be looking at the White House rather than cities like his which have promised to protect illegal immigrant criminals from federal efforts to arrest and deport them.

Echoing a familiar theme of identity politics, the Chicago mayor told reporters, “If they want to have a real discussion about (illegal aliens) who are criminals, they should look at the very individuals who enslaved my people and colonized this land.”

The Chicago mayor also had strong words about the newly sworn in Trump administration, saying, “That White House is being ran in one of the most raggedy forms of government that I have ever seen,” Johnson added, “I will not be intimidated by some weak individual who won’t stand up who believes he’s a supreme being right now.”

Chairman of the House Oversight Committee Rep. Jim Comer (R-KY) invited Johnson to testify on Feb 11 and told reporters that if Johnson refuses, he may subpoena the mayor to compel him to appear under the threat of being held in contempt of Congress.

In that letter, Comer wrote:

Sanctuary jurisdictions and their misguided and obstructionist policies hinder the ability of federal law enforcement officers to effectuate safe arrests and remove dangerous criminals from American communities, making Americans less safe. Chicago is a sanctuary jurisdiction that refuses to fully cooperate with federal immigration enforcement. To provide much needed oversight of this matter, the Committee requests documents and information related to the sanctuary policies of Chicago.

The mayors of Boston, Denver and New York were also invited to appear before the Oversight Committee to account for the impact of sanctuary jurisdictions and “their impact on public safety and the effectiveness of federal efforts to enforce the immigration laws of the United States.”

Authored by Pepe Escobar,

Let’s start with the tale of an Empire bragging to the wind.

Mr. Disco Inferno orders OPEC and OPEC+ to lower the price of oil, because, in his mind, that may solve the war in Ukraine – as in forcing Moscow to the table because of dwindling energy revenues.

That in itself summarizes the level of garbage being fed to POTUS by his cornucopia of acronyms passing for intel.

Trump at Davos:

“I’m going to ask Saudi Arabia and OPEC to bring down the cost of oil (…) If the price came down, the Russia-Ukraine war would end immediately. Right now, the price is high enough that that war will continue (…) With oil prices going down, I’ll demand that interest rates drop immediately. And, likewise, they should be dropping all over the world. Interest rates should follow us.”

Quite predictably, OPEC+ – basically run by Saudi Arabia and Russia – said Nyet. Apart from the fact they don’t care much about interest rates, on the energy front they’ll keep doing what they have planned to do, including soon decreasing production, but at acceptable levels.

Standard Chartered, a major player, noted that OPEC has limited power to end the war immediately by reducing the oil price, with OPEC ministers considering this attempt at “strategy” as very inefficient and costly.

So much for imperial diktats.

The Chihuahua Strategic Victory Plan

As highlighted before, the U.S. – via fracking – has enough gas for domestic consumption, but not enough to export en masse to the EU, because of liquification problems. That explains why even buying more American energy for exorbitant prices, the EU de facto remains largely dependent on Russian LNG – and non-U.S. sources – since the sabotage of the Nord Streams, unveiled in detail by Sy Hersh.

Even at full capacity, the Empire of Chaos simply cannot deliver all the gas the EU needs; add to it virtually no investment in both badly needed extra exploration plus the infrastructure necessary to meet increased EU demand.

On the domestic U.S. oil market, things do get positively Kafkaesque. U.S. trucking – a massive service industry – is dependent on imported Russian diesel, which needs to be mixed with Made in America oil in order to be suitable for trucks.

Now cut again to Davos, which came and went barely registering a blip. Toxic EC Medusa von der Leyen told Davos that Europe had “substantially reduced”, and “in record time”, its dependency on Russian fossil fuels.

Nonsense. Europe’s energy reality is bleak. Russian LNG from Novatek is currently priced at around $4.5–$4.7 per MMBtu. That’s more expensive than pipeline gas but still much (italics mine) cheaper than American LNG.

Every industry pro from the Persian Gulf to Antwerp knows that Europe is now importing Russian LNG like it never did before. That’s it – or a dry death. In parallel, Russia will triple its LNG supply capacity by 2035. End result: whatever those “energy commissioners” in Brussels may come up with, Russia will remain essential when it comes to European energy security.

There are no limits – even stratospheric – for Eurocracy stupidity, which corrodes the system like a plague. The Europeans not only have managed to shut off their own gas pipelines but are still “investigating” the Nord Stream de facto terror attack.

End result: they are now importing more (italics mine) Russian gas, but by different means, from third-party suppliers, and paying a fortune.

This is what can be described as the Chihuahua Strategic Victory Plan.

U.S. Treasury sanctions Mr. Disco Inferno

Russia’s LNG exports hit a record high last year, growing by 4% – and delivering 33.6 million tons. The monthly record was 3.25 million tons in December 2024 – 13.7% more than November.

The largest Russian exporter is Yamal LNG: 21.1 million tons, 6% more than in 2023.

Now cut to proverbial American rumble, in the form of Assistant Secretary of State for Energy Resources Geoffrey Pyatt ordering the “full termination” of Russian gas exported to Europe.

To hell with what nations like Hungary, Austria and Slovakia may think – and do need.

Pyatt told the Atlantic Council, “Today we are the largest LNG exporter in the world, and by the end of the Trump administration, we will have doubled what we’re doing today […] The decision has clearly been made in Brussels to get to zero [gas supplies from Russia] by 2027…and the United States strongly supports that goal.”

Oh dear. Do these people even read the basic headlines?

As reported by Politico, the EU is “devouring” Russian gas at unprecedented levels since the start of 2025, importing 837,300 metric tons of LNG just in the first two weeks of the year.

The Ukraine transit deal was shut off for good – at least for now – starting on January 1st. The action now is on the maritime routes.

Enter the U.S. Treasury with a new – what else – sanctions package against Russian oil trade, targeting up to 5.8 million barrels a day shipped by sea.

As it stands, the global oil market is experiencing a surplus of about 0.8 million barrels a day. Oil prices for 2025 should remain at around $71 for a barrel of Brent crude (as it stands, it’s $76.2). Not exactly what Mr. Disco Inferno wants.

So let’s assume these 5.8 million barrels of Russian oil – under stiff sanctions – would vanish from the global market. In this case we would have oil prices skyrocketing to an average of $150 to $160 a barrel. Once again, not what Mr. Disco Inferno wants: he vociferously promised – and keeps promising – a MAGA oil superpower, while lowering oil prices to max $50 a barrel.

According to Russia’s 2025 budget, oil is priced at $65.9 a barrel.

If the U.S. Treasury manages to work its magic and “disappear” with those 5.8 million barrels, Russian revenues would go up to around $88.2 billion, even considering much lower exports.

High oil prices hurt American competitiveness. So somebody should tell Mr. Disco Inferno this U.S. Treasury gambit is actually more negative to Trumpian dreams than to Russia.

Across Eurasia, Russia is sitting pretty, especially with its BRICS partners. Power of Siberia to China is on a roll, and Power of Siberia II should start operating by 2030. A boost on LNG exports to Iran is a done deal – especially after the signing of the strategic partnership earlier this month.

This year a deal will also be signed in Russia to transport LNG to Afghanistan via tanker convoys. Next step will be Pipelineistan: perhaps, finally, the necessary steps to build a variant of TAPI (the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India) pipeline, but with gas coming from Russia.

The biggest customer for Russian LNG, apart from China, is of course BRICS partner India. It’s in the interests of Russia, Iran, Afghanistan and India to have a stabilized Pakistan – not an Islamabad remote-controlled by Washington, as in the current setup – for the final opening of Russian LNG routes to India. That will happen, in time.

As for the European chihuahuas, enjoy your “strategic defeat” fantasies. Keep yapping – and buying Russian LNG.

They’ve hacked everything else in the U.S., so why would we be surprised to find out that patient health data collected by Chinese-made health monitors was being sent, via ‘backdoor’ to China. 

Now China has access to Janet Yellen’s photos (god we hope there’s no nudes) and your blood pressure on a random Tuesday. 

The U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) warns that Contec CMS8000, a widely used patient monitoring device, contains a backdoor that transmits patient data to a remote IP and downloads executable files, according to BleepingComputer.

Contec, a China-based healthcare tech company, produces various medical devices. CISA was alerted by an external researcher and, after testing the device’s firmware, found unusual network traffic linking to a hard-coded external IP tied to a university, not the company.

CISA discovered a backdoor in Contec CMS8000 firmware, enabling remote execution and full control of patient monitors. The device also secretly transmits patient data to a hard-coded IP upon startup, with no logs to alert administrators.

Though CISA withheld details, BleepingComputer linked the IP to a Chinese university, and the same address appears in other medical devices, including a pregnancy monitor. The FDA confirmed the backdoor also exists in Epsimed MN-120 monitors, rebranded versions of Contec CMS8000.

The BleepingComputer report says:

On analyzing the firmware, CISA found that one of the device’s executables, ‘monitor,’ contains a backdoor that issues a series of Linux commands that enable the device’s network adapter (eth0) and then attempts to mount a remote NFS share at the hard-coded IP address belonging to the university.

The NFS share is mounted at /mnt/ and the backdoor recursively copies the files from the /mnt/ folder to the /opt/bin folder.

The backdoor will continue to copy files from /opt/bin to the /opt folder and, when done, unmount the remote NFS share.

“Though the /opt/bin directory is not part of default Linux installations, it is nonetheless a common Linux directory structure,” explains CISA’s advisory.

CISA warned: “Generally, Linux stores third-party software installations in the /opt directory and thirdparty binaries in the /opt/bin directory. The ability to overwrite files within the /opt/bin directory provides a powerful primitive for remotely taking over the device and remotely altering the device configuration.”

“Additionally, the use of symbolic links could provide a primitive to overwrite files anywhere on the device filesystem. When executed, this function offers a formidable primitive allowing for a third-party operating at the hard-coded IP address to potentially take full control of the device remotely.”

You can read more of the technicals on the backdoor here. Oh, and go ahead and keep plugging your personal data into Deepseek, we’re sure that’s just fine. 

Authored by Eva Fu via The Epoch Times,

Prosecutors on Jan. 31 arrested a former senior Federal Reserve advisor, accusing him of stealing trade secrets from the agency that could allow China to manipulate the U.S. market.

John Harold Rogers, 63, worked for 11 years as a senior advisor for the international finance division of the Federal Reserve Board of Governors, the main governing body for the U.S. central bank.

A federal indictment alleged that Rogers began working with Chinese conspirators since at least 2018. The Chinese handlers worked for the Chinese intelligence and security apparatus and posed as graduate students at a Chinese university, according to the filing.

Rogers, in the collaboration, allegedly solicited trade-secret information that included proprietary economic data sets, China tariff deliberations, and briefing books for specific board governors. He also allegedly solicited internal discussions and forthcoming announcements from the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC), a 12-member body consisting of the seven Federal Reserve board of governors, the New York Federal Reserve Bank president, and four of the remaining 11 Reserve Bank presidents that rotate on an annual basis.

Such confidential information is economically valuable, prosecutors noted. By knowing in advance U.S. economic policy, such as federal funds rate changes, China can gain an advantage in selling or buying U.S. bonds and securities in a manner not unlike insider trading, prosecutors said in a Department of Justice (DOJ) statement.

The Federal Reserve’s international finance division is in charge of basic research, policy analysis, and reporting of areas such as foreign economic activity, U.S. trade and capital outflow, and developments in international financial markets and institutions, the agency’s website states.

Rogers is charged with conspiracy to commit economic espionage and with making false statements. A judge ordered Rogers to be held until a detention hearing on Feb. 4, a spokesperson from the U.S. Attorney’s Office in Washington told The Epoch Times. The charges carry a total of 20 years in prison on top of up to $5 million in fines.

“Let this indictment serve as a warning to all who seek to betray or exploit the United States: law enforcement will find you and hold you accountable,” said interim U.S. Attorney for the District of Columbia Edward Martin, who President Donald Trump appointed minutes after taking office on Jan. 20.

FBI assistant director in charge, David Sundberg, said his agency aims to protect U.S. national security interests.

“The Chinese Communist Party has expanded its economic espionage campaign to target U.S. government financial policies and trade secrets in an effort to undermine the U.S. and become the sole superpower,” he said in the DOJ statement.

Ed Martin speaks at an event in Washington on June 13, 2023. Martin is the current U.S. attorney for the District of Columbia. Amanda Andrade-Rhoades/AP Photo

Meetings Under Another Purpose

One of the Chinese handlers, identified in the indictment as co-conspirator 1, presented himself as a graduate student at China’s Shandong University of Finance and Economics who was interested in learning about sensitive U.S. fiscal policy to benefit the eastern Chinese province. He approached Rogers in May 2013 after creating an email that he used almost exclusively with Rogers and a handful of Rogers’s associates, according to the document. When Rogers shared that he was beginning a new project with a Chinese co-author on monetary policy, the co-conspirator allegedly invited Rogers to visit his research institute, offering to cover his airfare and hotel on the trip.

Court documents allege that Rogers took up the offer and visited China twice in 2017, telling the co-conspirator, on his second trip, that he wanted to stay in the same hotel, saying “That place was great!”

The co-conspirator purported to be working on an essay around May 2018 and requested information about the Federal Reserve’s policy measures and timetable, including its responses to China-related issues, the indictment alleges.

Rogers emailed his colleagues for input, including U.S.–China trade issues, Federal Reserve staff’s thinking on exchange rates, and views on the market-clearing price of the Chinese currency, prosecutors said. He boarded a Shanghai-bound flight days after. On May 10, 2018, Rogers emailed one document his colleague sent him to the co-conspirator, the indictment shows.

That September, the two began to discuss their meetings in more veiled terms, according to prosecutors.

At Rogers’s request, they allegedly described those activities as classes so they would appear “legitimate in the eyes of the Fed,” prosecutors noted.

Between then and February 2022, they discussed hosting about a dozen such classes in Chinese hotel rooms, according to message records the investigators intercepted.

Some of these meetings focused on forecasting Federal Reserve policy trends. One of them, initiated in late November 2018, was titled “the trend of U.S. monetary policy in 2019,” according to the indictment. The Chinese co-conspirator, the filing said, asked for an “official fed statement and presentation from current FOMC members.”

The “topic is perfect,” Rogers allegedly responded. He emailed a colleague for the “most straightforward way of accessing” Federal Reserve’s forecast data, as far back as 1994, the prosecutors said.

Rogers allegedly held the said “class” on Dec. 10, 2018, with a man identified as “Jack,” before meeting the Chinese co-conspirator for dinner. On Dec. 20, 2018, a day after a Fed interest rate hike, Rogers allegedly wrote to the co-conspirator alerting him to the change.

The Chinese co-conspirator’s response indicates Rogers had discussed the issue during the earlier meeting.

“Aha, just like what we talked about at dinner,” the co-conspirator wrote, according to the court document.

The pair talked about setting up three more “classes” in Shanghai and Beijing to cover “how the Fed will shrink the balance-sheet in 2019” and the U.S. economic situation in the first half of 2019 in the following months, according to the federal filing.

On June 19, 2019, five days after Rogers flew to Beijing for one of the meetings, the Federal Reserve announced it wouldn’t cut rates but cut the word “patient” in describing the monetary policy outlook, a hint for future actions.

“Same as you predicted!” the co-conspirator allegedly wrote to Rogers.

Rogers allegedly obtained or attempted to access at least six trade secrets for Chinese officials, according to the indictment. Among them were a briefing book dated October 2018 titled “International Economic Topics”; summary and assessment of a European Central Bank announcement dated March 7, 2019, labeled sensitive; a sensitive June 6, 2019 document that contains briefing notes to the Federal Reserve board, and spreadsheets containing proprietary information from the board, according to prosecutors.

The filing alleged that Rogers obtained the board governor’s briefing book, which contained a bold red warning “do not disseminate,” from a colleague by stating it was for his personal use as a “concrete example of ‘information flow.’”

Against his colleague’s request, Rogers allegedly forwarded the document to his personal account, court documents note. Rogers, in October 2018, also allegedly sent internal files on trade policy uncertainty and U.S. investment to the Chinese co-conspirator.

Rogers denied his China ties when the Federal Reserve Board Office of Inspector General investigated in February 2020. Asked in a recorded interview whether he had shared restricted board information with anyone outside of the board, Rogers allegedly responded, “Never.”

He insisted that he had refused money from the Chinese co-conspirator, according to the indictment.

“I set them straight. Don’t put this money in front of me,” he was quoted as saying.

The pair’s connection apparently continued after that, prosecutors say.

In February 2022, the co-conspirator messaged Rogers, inviting him and his wife to Shandong’s Qingdao City for a “class,” the court filing said.

“All related expenses will be covered by us, and we can pay for the class,” the co-conspirator allegedly said.

It’s unclear how or if Rogers responded to the message. But in August 2023, investigators said, Rogers emailed his former colleagues still with the Federal Reserve Board and asked for two internal Excel spreadsheets.

In 2023, Rogers was paid approximately $450,000 as a part-time professor at a Chinese university, according to the DOJ.

Ever wonder who the sociopaths are you see in Netflix documentaries, catfishing people from the internet using dating apps?

Well, look no further. Australia’s News.com.au profiled one such person this week, a young worker inside of a “mass scamming call center”. 

The person, named “Beard”, said that he “fled war-torn Syria for Dubai” and was desperately looking for work. Thinking he landed an advertising role, he told news.com.au he found himself at a “bizarre office location in the middle of the Dubai desert where those inside tried to confiscate his passport”.

He was eventually held captive and forced to scam people for a living, the report says. 

Then he became part of a large-scale “pig butchering” romance scam operation, designed to swindle unsuspecting victims out of their money. News.com.au said this type of fraud devastates thousands of Australians annually.

Beard worked night shifts, 12 hours a day, six days a week, pretending to be a woman named Annie to deceive victims. The scam center housed over 1,000 workers, mostly foreign migrants from Africa and India, all controlled by a Chinese-run syndicate. Workers were confined to the premises, only leaving to buy food from vendors serving the scammers.

Victims, already catfished on dating apps, believed they were chatting with a woman who led a glamorous lifestyle. Beard’s job was to extract financial information and convince them to invest in cryptocurrency.

“It’s not the important information I give them,” he explained. “It’s the important information I got out of them.”

A real woman, half-Turkish, half-Ukrainian, was employed to take brief video calls to reassure victims they weren’t being scammed. “She had a line of people waiting for her to also talk to other victims.”

Beard typically juggled 12 victims at once before handing them over to another team that finalized the scam, the report said.

Despite working inside the operation, Beard never scammed anyone. Instead, he deliberately stalled conversations and warned victims about the risks of crypto investments.

Inspired by YouTube scam-buster Jim Browning, he secretly sent videos and photos from inside the scam center. When he finally decided to leave, he tricked the scammers into letting him go by claiming he needed to return home.

After he left, the scam center eventually shut down.

“The joke is that these scams gave me an incentive to work for them,” he concluded. “Like I had a bed, Wi-Fi, electricity, and water all covered. If someone gets a legal job with worse conditions, they’d be incentivized to go back to the scam centers.”