By Aara Ramesh Among the many verdicts handed down by the U.S. Supreme Court last month was the unanimous affirmation of the right of tribal law enforcement officers to detain non-Native people who they reasonably suspect to have been involved in a...
By a Biometrica staffer A triple threat of record high temperatures, wildfires, and drought have set ablaze large swathes of the western United States, leading to electricity shortages, mass evacuations, smoke warnings, and the deaths of at least two firefighters. According to...
By a Biometrica staffer In a big win for those arguing for greater autonomy for consumers on how companies collect and use their personal data, this week, Colorado became the third state, after Virginia and California, to implement a sweeping piece of...
By Aara Ramesh According to a study released by the Mozilla Foundation on Wednesday, July 7, the video platform giant YouTube is continuing to push to users “disturbing and hateful” content that violates its own Community Guidelines, continuing the long-standing controversy over...
By Aara Ramesh On Tuesday, July 6, Governor Andrew Cuomo issued a first-of-its-kind executive order declaring the escalating gun violence in New York a disaster emergency. The new edict is just the first step in a broader seven-step plan outlined by the...
By a Biometrica staffer Over the years, American attitudes towards gambling have changed significantly. According to the American Gaming Association (AGA) about nine in ten Americans “view gaming as a mainstream and acceptable form of entertainment,” and, as of 2020, just about...
By Aara Ramesh On Thursday, July 1, Attorney General (AG) Merrick B. Garland issued an order staying all federal executions until a comprehensive review of the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) policies and procedures can be completed. This is a sharp about-turn from...
By Aara Ramesh On Wednesday, June 30, California’s Department of Justice (DOJ) released a recently compiled report on hate crime events and offenses throughout the state in 2020, alongside a series of recommendations, resources, and guidelines directed at the public and at...
By Aara Ramesh The nation’s continued struggle with the opioid epidemic and its fallout entered a new phase on Tuesday, June 29, when a dozen companies faced in court, for the first time, a six-member jury in a case brought by the...
By Aara Ramesh Last week on June 22, Secretary of the Interior Deb Haaland announced the “Federal Indian Boarding School Initiative,” at a conference of the National Congress of American Indians, the country’s largest coalition of Indigenous Peoples. The Initiative will undertake...
By a Biometrica staffer In a move likely may have a far-reaching ripple effect, on Friday, June 25, the Texas Supreme Court ruled that Facebook can be held responsible for its users engaging in illegal sex trafficking activities on the site, regardless...
By Aara Ramesh A landmark law intended to radically alter the landscape of sex trafficking online has had a limited impact in the three years since it was enacted, according to a recent report released by the U.S. Government Accountability Office (GAO)....
By Aara Ramesh In the late evening of Wednesday, June 23, John David McAfee, whose name is virtually synonymous with anti-virus software world over, was found unresponsive in his cell in a prison near Barcelona. He was being held there pending extradition...
By Aara Ramesh On Tuesday, June 22, the Governors Highway Safety Association (GHSA) released a report showing that Black and Indigenous people are disproportionately dying in traffic accidents, according to an analysis of federal data. This comes on the heels of a...
By Aara Ramesh In January 2017, one 20-day tournament sent ripples of shock through the tech industry, when Libratus, an AI-powered robot, beat four of the world’s best poker players in a series of no-limit Texas Hold ‘Em games. This was seen...
By Aara Ramesh Despite many countries closing their borders and restricting travel during the Covid-19 pandemic, the United Nations (UN) has said that the plight of refugees and asylum-seekers actually worsened in 2020. As of the end of the year, over 82.4...
By a Biometrica staffer On Wednesday, June 16, the Justice Department’s Inspector General (IG) released an audit report about the U.S. Marshals (USMS) judicial security activities, concluding that the department “does not have the resources or proactive threat detection capabilities” needed to...
By Aara Ramesh On Tuesday, June 15, the White House published the first-ever “National Strategy for Countering Domestic Terrorism,” an all-government framework devised to combat what President Joe Biden deemed “the most urgent terrorism threat the United States faces today.” The National...
By Aara Ramesh The sport of horse racing is a unique one due to its long-standing, storied relationship with wagering. It is one of the few forms of entertainment whose inception and endurance is directly linked to betting on the outcome of...
By Aara Ramesh Earlier this month, the Bureau of Justice Statistics (BJS) released its report concerning the application and execution of capital punishments in the U.S. in 2019. As of the year under review, capital punishment was legal in 32 states and...
By a Biometrica staffer In what was supposed to be the International Year for the Elimination of Child Labour, a joint report published by the International Labour Organization (ILO) and the United Nations Children’s Fund (UNICEF) has sounded an urgent alarm over...
By a Biometrica staffer INTERPOL announced on June 8 that it had succeeded in taking down a “record number” of fraudulent online pharmacies and arresting 277 people worldwide with the help of law enforcement, customs and health regulatory authorities in 92 countries....
By Aara Ramesh In what is being called the “largest and most sophisticated” operation ever against encrypted criminal activities, Europol, the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) and law enforcement agencies in 16 countries across the world have managed to take down hundreds...
By Aara Ramesh The Covid-19 pandemic may yet add another casualty to its list. The days of smoke-filled casino floors might just be a relic of the past. As cities like Las Vegas begin the long road to recovery, stakeholders in the...
By Aara Ramesh As of June 1, downtown Vegas is completely open for the first time in over twelve months and the buzz is almost palpable. Already, live music has returned to the Strip. Casinos are taking down plexiglass dividers and are...
By a Biometrica staffer On Thursday, June 3, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) announced that preliminary data seems to indicate that U.S. traffic deaths shot up by 7.2% in 2020 (as compared to 2019), despite the pandemic and associated lockdowns...
By Aara Ramesh The U.S. Supreme Court earlier this week ruled decisively in favor of tribal law enforcement, reaffirming their authority over federal crimes on their land. In a unanimous opinion written by Justice Stephen Breyer, the land’s highest court on June...
By a Biometrica staffer On Monday, May 31, the Center for The Defense of Children’s Rights, published a report in which it said it had uncovered a “disturbing pattern” of child sexual abuse at as many as 18 schools and childcare centers...
By Aara Ramesh As the dust settles, more details are emerging about the past of the gunman who killed nine people and then himself in San Jose on Wednesday, May 26, in what is the Bay Area’s deadliest mass shooting. Samuel Cassidy,...
By a Biometrica staffer Americans appear to be preparing to flock to Las Vegas this Memorial Day Weekend to kickstart the summer in true pre-Covid style. Authorities in the City of Lights are expecting to have their busiest weekend yet since the...
By Aara Ramesh The Gordian knot that is the gun control debate in America has flared up in recent weeks, as the number of mass shootings has surged and as the National Rifle Association (NRA) is battling bankruptcy and corruption charges in...
By a Biometrica staffer Summer is almost upon us and the country seems to be gearing up for a truly lively few months. With around 39% of the population fully vaccinated and the Covid-19 case count dropping to its lowest level yet...
By Aara Ramesh On May 18, Governor Doug Ducey signed into law a bill that excludes narcotic drug testing products from an existing law that classifies them as illegal drug paraphernalia. The particular target of this action are fentanyl test strips (FTS),...
By a Biometrica staffer On Wednesday, 24 hours after the Florida Senate overwhelmingly voted to approve a potentially precedent-setting gaming compact with the Seminole Tribe, the ayes in the Florida House also held sway in a bipartisan vote, sending the measure negotiated...
By a Biometrica staffer The US House of Representatives on Tuesday, May 18, passed the Covid-19 Hate Crimes Act in a 364–62 vote, sending it to President Joe Biden to be signed into law. The initiative to pass the bill was led...
By Aara Ramesh On Monday, May 17, the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) released data about cryptocurrency investment scams, as reported by consumers in October 2020–March 2021. In that six-month period, the FTC received almost 7,000 complaints, amounting to a total of $80...
By Aara Ramesh Four months later, America is just starting to grapple with the iceberg that is the January 6 riot at the U.S. Capitol in Washington. While the political debate over the nature of the insurrection rages on, federal law enforcement...
By Aara Ramesh It might be tempting to think that child sexual abuse is a phenomenon of the digital age, a purely modern trend. While it is true that the epidemic has worsened with the advent of the internet, it has been...
By Aara Ramesh The fallout of last week’s ransomware cyberattack on Colonial Pipeline continues. On Wednesday, May 12, the Biden–Harris administration announced that it was implementing an all-of-government plan to combat fuel shortages resulting from the attack, with the president also issuing...