intelligence news stories on Newser

Interrogator on bin Laden Wives: 1 Interesting, 2 Boring

Matt Cantor — Fri, 25 May 2012 10:25:07 CDT

Osama bin Laden's three wives mostly stayed mum while being questioned, reveals the Pakistani intelligence agent who interrogated them. Despite speaking with them (or, at least, trying to) once or twice a week for months, the agent tells Reuters he didn't garner much that was useful. But it seemed clear...

Baboon 'Readers' Pick Out Real Words

Matt Cantor — Fri, 13 Apr 2012 11:59:05 CDT

Don't expect him to pick up a novel anytime soon—but Dan the baboon and five buddies know real English words when they see them. For instance, if Dan sees the letters BRRU, ITCS, and KITE, he'll pick out the last one as the real word, even though he doesn't...

FBI, CIA Infighting Killed Chance to Gain 9/11 Intel

Kate Schwartz — Wed, 28 Mar 2012 07:49:22 CDT

The FBI missed a big chance to gain intel—compliments of a tapped phone network in Afghanistan—before 9/11 because it was busy fighting with the CIA, according to testimony heard yesterday in Britain's House of Commons. Stay with us on this one: As the Guardian reports, the revelation was...

People Aren't Smart Enough to Pick Smart Candidates

Matt Cantor — Thu, 01 Mar 2012 16:05:13 CST

When it comes to choosing a leader, we may simply be victims of our own ignorance. Researchers say that voters can't be trusted to choose experts on topics they themselves know little about—meaning, for instance, that we can't pick the candidate with the best tax policy without having a...

NYPD Tracked Muslim Students Far Beyond City

Sat, 18 Feb 2012 17:29:36 CST

The New York Police Department monitored Muslim college students far more broadly than previously known, at schools far beyond the city limits, including the elite Ivy League colleges of Yale and the University of Pennsylvania. Police talked with local authorities about professors 300 miles away in Buffalo and even sent...

Meetings Make You Dumber

Evann Gastaldo — Sat, 28 Jan 2012 12:18:21 CST

If you've ever felt that a work meeting sucked IQ points right out of your skull, you might be right. A new study finds that group interactions can actually lower your intelligence, the Daily Mail reports. Scientists in Virginia matched groups according to IQ, ranked members' performance on cognitive tasks...

Low IQ Linked to Racism, Conservatism, Study Claims

Rob Quinn — Thu, 26 Jan 2012 15:13:00 CST

Children with low IQs are more likely to embrace conservative ideologies and to be prejudiced against gays and people of other races as they get older, according to research certain to spark a few heated conversations. The researchers say people with lower intelligence tend to be attracted to the structure...

High IQ Children Grow Up to Be... High

Mark Russell — Sun, 20 Nov 2011 13:14:01 CST

Smartypants kids are much more likely to use all sorts of illegal drugs as teenagers and adults, according to a new study of 8,000 Brits born in 1970. Five-year-olds who scored high IQ scores were more likely to have tried marijuana by age 16, reports the LA Times , and...

Perry Dumb? Like a Fox, Maybe

John Johnson — Sat, 17 Sep 2011 11:34:06 CDT

Modern politics has reduced Democrats and Republicans into stereotypes, writes Kathleen Parker. Democrats are the Ivy League know-it-alls who think government can solve all, while Republicans prefer guts and self-reliance over book smarts. Too bad, she writes in the Washington Post . "Would it be too much to ask that a...