Today, we look at an Internet breech blamed on a Russian syndicate that allegedly amassed 1.2 billion username and password combinations. Then we discuss the closure of temporary shelters for unaccompanied migrant children. Plus, the scoop on DARPA's special military smartphones, our weekly sports update, and more.
Migrant children face exploitation, abuse in Mexico
The flood of migrants from Central America is news in the U.S., but Mexico has long been dealing with a influx of children from countries like Honduras, Guatemala and El Salvador.
Many of the children who can't complete the long journey to the U.S. end up staying in Mexico, where they're left vulnerable to exploitation and abuse at the hands of corrupt Mexican officials.
Los Angeles Times reporter Tracy Wilkinson joins Take Two for more on the story.
Rosetta spacecraft: Scientists about to harpoon their big space whale
Scientists at the European Space Agency came one step closer to harpooning their white whale last night. After a 10-year chase, the Rosetta spacecraft is now orbiting a comet. While comets have been studied before, this is the first time that scientists have raced down and attached a spacecraft to one of them.
Scientists want to study the make up of the space rock and see how it changes as it gets closer to the sun. And by moving the spacecraft to orbit the comet, they'll be able to monitor it with photographs that are sent back to Earth.
Bruce Betts - the Director of Science and Technology for The Planetary Society - notes in a conversation with A Martinez that the comet is likely just a ball of dirty ice. However, scientists won't know exactly what it's made up of until they launch a probe into the surface of the comet. The hope is that the harpoon attached to the probe will be able to stick into the rock, allowing scientists to study it.
And while the mission is only planned for a year and a half, if all goes well, we could be seeing photos of this comet's development for much longer.
Officials are shifting $405M to handle the border crisis
Federal officials are moving around $405 million from other departments to address migrant children entering the U.S. from Central America.
But that's a far cry from the $3.7 billion that the White House asked Congress to free up.
This balancing act may be a sign that the White House is struggling to address the crisis. Lawmakers are already on summer recess and they haven't passed an emergency spending bill.
, reporter for the
, joins Take Two to explain.
3 temporary shelters for migrant children will close
Federal officials announced this week that they'll soon close three of the temporary shelters housing migrant children.
Tens of thousands of kids have been crossing the border on foot from Central America, often entering the U.S. alone. They've been sent to emergency housing sites, including military bases — but over the next few weeks, several of those will be emptied.
One of the housing sites to be closed is in California at the Port Hueneme Naval Base in Ventura County; another at Fort Sill in Oklahoma; and the third at Lackland Air Force Base in Texas.
is a reporter for The Texas Observer and has been covering this crisis. She joins Take Two to explain what will happen to these children, and if there's a chance these facilities could open again.
NBA hires its first full-time female assistant coach
For many reasons, the NBA's San Antonio Spurs are considered one of the premiere franchises in the league — but this week they probably got a lot more fans. Yesterday the team announced they'd hired WNBA player Becky Hammon to be their new assistant coach.
Hammon, who was a standout player for the San Antonio Stars, will become the first full-time female coach in the NBA – but you might be surprised to find out that this isn't an isolated event for the NBA.
Guest host Tess Vigeland talks to
, a writer for Slate who wrote a recent column about the NBA and a number of high-profile hires they've done over the years.
We'll ask why the NBA seems to be so open to hiring women, and how that compares with other sports leagues.
Sports Roundup: the NBA and women, the NCAA may loosen things up and Lebron slims down
Cleveland is expecting a big dose of LOVE, the NCAA may relax some of their rules and John McEnroe was so-so on clay but he really liked... grass.
That means it's time for sports with
, they cover clay, grass and everything else for ESPN.
The NBA and women
The Spurs make news by hiring Becky Harmon as an assistant coach. The NBA has had a history of inclusion as back in 1997 they hired two women to officiate games and Violet Palmer is still on the job. Combine that with Jason Collins coming out last year, how they quickly dealt with Donald Sterling. Is the NBA feeling pretty good about how it looks?
The eventual Eastern Champs?
And it appears to a matter of time before T-Wolves superstar Kevin Love will be traded to the Cavaliers to team up with Lebron James. The Cavs cannot make the deal until August 23rd because of rule regarding having to wait 30 days before they can trade draft picks as they top pick Andrew Wiggans is at the center of the trade. Brian, Lebron, Love and All-Star point guard Kyrie Irving on the same team? Can we pencil them in for the NBA Finals?
A brand new King James
And speaking of Lebron, he's listed at 6'8, 250 pounds, some say he's the most perfect physical package in sports. But he caused a bit of a stir because he says he has started to curb his carb intake and on pics he posted on Instagram he definitely looks slimmer.
The NCAA may relax some of their most contentious rules ... for a few
And the NCAA appears to set to allow schools from the so-called Big 5 conferences more freedom to pay athletes more money than their scholarship allows, they'll also loosen restrictions against agents and advisors and change recruiting rules to make it easier to contact top prospects. The conferences include the Pac-12, Big 10, Big 12, SEC and ACC. What does this apparent change of heart mean about the NCAA?
An app for snipers? Why the military is developing its own smartphones
If you parachuted onto a military base and you took a look at the equipment service members use, you might think you'd dropped into 1985, seeing all of the paper maps and phones the size of bricks.
That might be changing. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) has been designing its own smartphone for military use. It has apps for snipers, weapons guides, radiation detection and a pseudo-Facebook for soldiers to keep track of friends and enemies called WhoDat.
Adam Clark Estes wrote about the phone for Gizmodo:
"Doran [Michels], [DARPA Program Manager] went on to explain why the awesome technology that Silicon Valley sells to us normals simply won't work for the tactical community, especially soldiers fighting in Afghanistan. These devices work mostly because the network they're connected to also works. Take away that network—which the vast majority of combat troops don't have access to—and you're left with a really expensive calculator. Just think of how useless your smartphone is when you can't get a signal. It's like that all of the time for soldiers.
"However, if you could build a secure network, one that troops could actually use in the most remote stretches of wilderness and the most war torn cities, even the simplest of smartphone functions would be tremendous tools not only for communicating but also for other simple tasks that are quickly complicated in battlefield scenarios. The ability to view and manipulate maps in real time, for instance, is clearly a step up from the existing paper-and-pencil approach on which many soldiers currently rely. And yes, of course, smartphones would also be great communication tools, especially compared to the old brick-sized radios soldiers now use.
"So the Pentagon launched the Transformative Apps program under the DARPA umbrella. The TransApp mission, as stated on DARPA's website, is to "develop a diverse array of militarily-relevant software applications using an innovative new development and acquisition process." The hardware itself is basically the same as what everyday Americans are walking around with every day. The big difference comes in how they're connected. Since civilian networks can't be trusted, soldiers must constantly set up secure networks on the fly using a suite of radios and networking equipment. Accordingly, TransApp developed a system that soldiers could plug smartphones into and gain basic connectivity. The corresponding apps are also designed to maintain functionality, even when they go offline."
Estes joins Tess Vigeland on the line from New York for a chat.
Outdoor group strives to reconnect African Americans with nature
Diversity in the national parks has been a key issue over the last year.
Here in California, parks are gearing up for a huge revamp, and that includes expanding its outreach to hire and appeal to more people of color.
The Oakland-based group Outdoor Afro has been working to connect people of color with the outdoors and nature using social media. Rue Mapp is the founder of the organization and she joins Take Two to talk more about some of the challenges people of color face and what can be done.
How did Russian hackers get passwords for more than a billlion users?
It's the biggest computer hack of online passwords known to date, affecting more than one billion user names.
Computer hackers in Russia have gotten their hands on the passwords from more than 400,000 websites — some of which, authorities say, are still vulnerable.
For more, we're joined by Edward Felten, director of the Center for Information Technology Policy at Princeton University.
According to Hold Security, which first reported the breach Tuesday:
"After more than seven months of research, Hold Security identified a Russian cyber gang which is currently in possession of the largest cache of stolen data. While the gang did not have a name, we dubbed it “CyberVor” (“vor” meaning “thief” in Russian).
The CyberVor gang amassed over 4.5 billion records, mostly consisting of stolen credentials. 1.2 billion of these credentials appear to be unique, belonging to over half a billion e-mail addresses. To get such an impressive number of credentials, the CyberVors robbed over 420,000 web and FTP sites."