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Violent Attacks in Afghanistan; Security Concerns Involving a Fitness App and U.S. Troops; The Transfer of an Ancient Statue in Egypt
Aired January 30, 2018 - 04:00 ET
THIS IS A RUSH TRANSCRIPT. THIS COPY MAY NOT BE IN ITS FINAL FORM AND MAY BE UPDATED.
CARL AZUZ, CNN 10 ANCHOR: CNN 10 is explaining stories taking place around the world. And I`m tour guide, Carl Azuz. Great to have you aboard.
The war-torn nation of Afghanistan is where we start. Despite an effort by a U.S.-led coalition to topple the nation`s former rulers, a terrorist
group known as the Taliban, they continue to pose a major challenge for the Afghan government. And the ISIS terrorist group, which also operates in
Afghanistan, is making conditions even more complicated and deadly.
This month, more than 150 people have been killed in the Middle Eastern country, the majority of them in attacks over the last nine days. An
assault on a military base in the capital of Kabul left 11 dead yesterday. An ambulance filled with explosives killed more than 100 people over the
weekend. Attacks on a charity group named Save the Children and on people staying at a hotel in Kabul are among those that killed dozens more.
The Taliban said it was behind two of these assaults while ISIS claimed the rest. And reporters there say residents are increasingly afraid that the
Afghan government can`t protect them. The country is holding a national day of prayer on Tuesday.
The U.S. has had troops in Afghanistan since it went to war there in 2001. There are at least 11,000 American servicemen and women there now, possibly
more.
Regardless of where they`re stationed around the world, a fitness tracking application could be posting their movements publicly for anyone to see.
And that could be a serious security problem. It starts innocently enough. A few U.S. troops used an app to track their morning run, how far they go,
how long it takes.
They`re supposed to be train on how to turn on the privacy settings on their smartphone or watch, but they don`t. And suddenly, their route which
might include sensitive information about their base for instance is public. The U.S. Central Command says it`s changing its privacy policies
after this happened.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
SAMUEL BURKE, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Personnel movements on remote military bases revealed by an exercise app. You might have heard of Strava. It`s a
social network for athletes and it actually published a map that shows what everybody who`s using their app who hasn`t set their information to be
private is doing, where they`re going. And one person realized that this could actually show many people what military members are doing around or
even on their bases.
If you take a look at this map, we already knew where the military bases where, if you look at Google Maps. But this tells you something much more
intimate. Exactly where people are going inside those bases and maybe even where they`re going to run around those bases, possibly proving people with
very important information.
Now, nobody here is alleging that somebody has actually been harmed as a result of publishing this data. But take a look what the spokesperson for
the Department of Defense told CNN, quote: DOD takes matters like these very seriously and is reviewing the situation to determine if any
additional training or guidance is required and if any additional policy must be developed to ensure the continued safety of Department of Defense
personnel at home and abroad.
Strava says they have tens of millions of users and they track cellphones, GPS devices, and other fitness tracking apps. But that you can actually
figure out what one single person is doing here or who they are. Quote: Our global heat map represents an aggregated and anonymized view of over a
billion activities uploaded to our platform. It excludes activities that had been marked as private and user defined privacy zones.
But what this all shows is that even members of military bases in remote places aren`t always cognizant of the privacy settings, especially when so
many apps are set to automatically share information that may be seemingly harmless, but when put together in a large group and publish online for the
world to see could pose major operational security risks.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AZUZ: A controversial study has come to light that involved animal testing of car exhaust. It was carried out in 2014 at a research lab in New
Mexico. It was paid for by three German carmakers, BMW, Daimler and Volkswagen.
And what the study tried to do was prove that newer diesel engines were cleaner that old ones.
But it was how the study was done that`s getting so much attention. As first reported in "The New York Times", diesel fumes from a Volkswagen were
pushed in airtight containers where monkeys breathe in the fumes. This was done for hours at a time.
The three carmakers involved confirmed that researchers they hired did the study. But Volkswagen says it was not finished or published, and the
research lab says the study won`t be published in the future because it was tainted.
For years, Volkswagen had been cheating on its diesel emissions tests. It was making its car exhaust seemed cleaner in the tests than it actually was
from its cars on the road. VW admitted to this in 2015. The company says it believes the methods used in the study on monkeys were wrong and that it
would have been better not to do it at all.
Daimler says it`s doing an investigation and the German government says the tests can`t be justified in any way.
In Germany, using apes as lab animals is mostly illegal. But it is allowed more extensively in the U.S. Tests that involved breathing car pollutants
were also reportedly carried out on humans and those were done at a facility in Germany.
(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)
AZUZ (voice-over): Ten-second trivia.
Of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World, the only one that`s still standing is located in what country?
Iraq, Egypt, Greece, or Turkey?
Only one of the Seven Wonders that remains is the Great Pyramid of Giza and that`s located in Egypt.
(END VIDEO CLIP)
AZUZ: Just one of the priceless archeological relics of the ancient country, Egyptian engineers recently moved another example, a statue about
1,300 feet from a storage area to a museum in the Egyptian capital of Cairo. Doing that cost more than three quarters of a million dollars.
Why? Because the statue weighs 80 tons, half the estimated weight of a blue whale and it`s more than 3,000 years old.
It`s hoped to help bring tourists back to Egypt, a nation that has struggled with numerous terrorist attacks in recent years.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
REPORTER: An 83-ton statue of Ramses II, considered one of ancient Egypt`s greatest rulers, has been moved to a new home.
Escorted by a marching band, a mounted military guard, and much funfair, the 3,200-year-old granite statue was transported 400 meters in a specially
built cage to the Grand Egyptian Museum. Ramses II also known as Ramses The Great ruled ancient Egypt from 1279 to 1213 B.C.
He is known for conquering large areas of Nubia, in what is now Sudan and Syria, and for building on a colossal scale. This is the fourth and
thought to be final moved the statue has made in its long history.
It was moved once in the 13th century B.C. and not again until 1954 when Egypt`s president ordered that it be brought to Cairo. It stood outside
Cairo`s main train station until 2006, when the government moved it to a temporary location in Giza, fearing that auto emissions were damaging the
granite.
Its new home is Egypt`s massive Grand Egyptian Museum, a 650,000 square foot facility that is still under construction. The museum is intended to
reignite the country`s tourism sector damaged by years of violent instability.
Ramses now stand as the ancient to the museum, waiting to welcome tourist through its doors.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
AZUZ: During basketball season, you hear a lot of stories about buzzer- beaters and half court shots. And here`s another one. It`s not from half court though. It`s from the free throw line at the other side of the
court. A freshman hurls it and sinks it. It`s almost sad that this was worth only three points, but that`s all that was needed for Evanston
Township High School in Illinois to win the game with a final of 45-44.
How could a buzzer-beater better beat a buzzer than with a heave hove free throw for three though that span the court of court to court, a game-
winning, claim-winning, fame-winning shot for the super fresh freshman who sank the shot.
I`m Carl Azuz. Join us again tomorrow for coverage of the U.S. president`s State of the Union Address and the opposing party`s response. That`s
Wednesday on CNN 10.
END
