The Department Of Homeland Security Is Buying 450 Million New Bullets

Eloise Lee | Mar. 28, 2012 | Business Insider
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and its Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) office is getting an "indefinite delivery" of an "indefinite quantity" of .40 caliber ammunition from defense contractor ATK.

U.S. agents will receive a maximum of 450 million rounds over five years, according to a press release on the deal.

The high performance HST bullets are designed for law enforcement and ATK says they offer "optimum penetration for terminal performance."

This refers to the the bullet's hollow-point tip that passes through barriers and expands for a bigger impact without the rest of the bullet getting warped out of shape: "this bullet holds its jacket in the toughest conditions."

We've also learned that the Department has an open bid for a stockpile of rifle ammo. Listed on the federal business opportunities network, they're looking for up to 175 million rounds of .223 caliber ammo to be exact. The .223 is almost exactly the same round used by NATO forces, the 5.56 x 45mm.

The deadline for earlier this month was extended because the right contractor just hadn't come along.

Looks like the Department of Homeland Security means business.

US gov't claims right to seize any .com domain

By Andrew Couts | Digital Trends

If your domain ends in .com, the United States government says it has the right to seize it from your control, reports Wired. The same goes for any URL that ends in .net, .cc, .tv, .name, and .org.

This troubling declaration of power comes after US authorities shutdown the online sports gambling site Bodog.com last week — even though the website was owned by a Canadian company, which many assumed put it outside of US jurisdiction. Not so, apparently. That’s because the only company allowed to issue new .com domains is VeriSign, which is based — you guessed it — in the US.

According to a spokesperson for the department of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), anytime the US government wants to take down a .com, .net, .tv, or .name domain, all it has to do is issue a court order to VeriSign, which quickly complies. The same process applies to the Public Interest Registry, which controls the .org top-level domain.

VeriSign, for its part, argues that it is simply obeying the law.

“VeriSign responds to lawful court orders subject to its technical capabilities,” the company said in a statement. “When law enforcement presents us with such lawful orders impacting domain names within our registries, we respond within our technical capabilities.”

The seizure of Bodog is an extension of a government initiative called Operation in Our Sites, which launched in June 2010, and has mainly focused on the seizure of US-based domains hocking counterfeit NFL jerseys, and other knockoff goods. As of November of last year, Operation in Our Sites had successfully seized 352 domains. And it obviously doesn’t look like they plan to stop anytime soon.

There a few reasons this brazen flaunting of power is troubling. First, it suggests that the federal government plans to impose its authority on a wider swath of the Web. Second, it shows that while the Internet is a global service, it is still at the mercy of the US government and US law. Online gambling, for instance, isn’t illegal in all countries that have Internet access. And yet Bodog was shut down simply because US citizens could access it.

Finally, the federal government’s apparent determination to assert its authority on the Web should serve as a wake up call to anyone who thinks that the temporary defeat of SOPA and PIPA marked the end of the fight for Internet freedom. It didn’t. It marked the beginning.