Chinese hackers breached the U.S. Treasury Department earlier this month, stealing documents from its workstations.  |
- Chinese hackers breached the U.S. Treasury Department earlier this month, stealing documents from its workstations.
- The United States on Monday announced nearly $6 billion in additional military and direct budgetary support for Ukraine amidst the ongoing Russia–Ukraine conflict.
- President-elect Donald Trump has endorsed embattled House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), potentially hedging off a divisive fight later this week.
- Russia is dissatisfied with key aspects of a Ukraine cease-fire plan reportedly under consideration by Trump and his incoming administration.
- To start great conversations, consider these 50 deep questions. Column after the news.
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The Treasury Department in Washington on March 25, 2024. (Madalina Vasiliu/The Epoch Times) |
Chinese hackers breached the U.S. Treasury Department earlier this month, stealing documents from its workstations, according to a letter the agency sent to lawmakers on Monday. The Treasury Department described the breach as a "major incident." Chinese state-sponsored hackers compromised a third-party software service provider, Beyond Trust, on Dec. 8, accessing certain unclassified documents, according to the letter by Aditi Hardikar, an assistant Treasury secretary. The letter stated that the hackers gained "access to a key used by the vendor to secure a cloud-based service used to remotely provide technical support for Treasury Departmental Offices (DO) end users. With access to the stolen key, the threat actor was able to override the service's security, remotely access certain Treasury DO user workstations, and access certain unclassified documents maintained by those users." The department did not specify how many workstations had been compromised or what kind of documents the hackers may have obtained. However, in the letter, it said that the Beyond Trust service has been taken offline and "at this time there is no evidence indicating the threat actor has continued access to Treasury information." The Treasury is working with the FBI and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency to investigate the scope of the hack. (More) More Politics |
A majority of Americans expect positive change in 2025 in a number of key areas—including employment prospects, inflation at reasonable levels, and the United States becoming more powerful—although optimism was tempered by expectations for overall economic difficulty, much international discord, and domestic political conflict. The findings come from a Gallup poll released on Dec. 30 that found that Americans' predictions for 2025 are generally far more optimistic than their expectations were for 2023, the last time a similar survey was conducted. The 2025 poll reflects a nuanced mixture of hope and concern regarding views about the nation's trajectory across key sectors such as the economy, global influence, and domestic stability. Clear partisan divides emerged in the findings, with broad majorities of Republicans foreseeing positive outcomes for the United States on all measures except political cooperation. Notably, the percentage point shifts in each party's predictions compared to 2023 revealed a striking trend: the relatively slight growth in Democratic pessimism about a year in which President-elect Donald Trump assumes office was outweighed by an explosion in Republican optimism, accompanied by a significant rise in optimism among independents. Together, these shifts led to a broader uplift in public confidence as 2025 approaches, according to Gallup. Among the most optimistic predictions, 54 percent of Americans believe employment opportunities will increase in 2025, reflecting faith in job growth and a strengthening labor market. Similarly, 52 percent anticipate inflation will rise at a "reasonable" rate, signaling hope that prices will further stabilize after several years of volatility. The stock market is expected to be a particularly bright spot in the coming year, with 66 percent expecting 2025 to be bullish for equities. (More) More U.S. News |
- A more cautious and conservative Federal Reserve will likely influence Wall Street's playbook for the new year.
- The United States' trade deficit widened last month to more than $100 billion, with import growth outstripping the uptick in exports, according to data released by the government.
- Health and wellness company Hain Celestial Group must face allegations that the corporation's baby food products contained high levels of arsenic, which posed a health risk to babies, a district court in New York has ruled.
- People scammed out of their money by Ponzi scheme mastermind Bernie Madoff are set to receive a final payout of $131.4 million from a recovery fund run by the Justice Department, which said that the last compensation tranche brings the total recoveries to over $4.3 billion, or nearly 94 percent of the victims' fraud losses.
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Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov in Moscow on Nov. 14, 2024. (Alexander Zemlianichenko/AFP via Getty Images) |
Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has expressed Moscow's dissatisfaction with key aspects of a Ukraine cease-fire plan reportedly under consideration by U.S. President-elect Donald Trump and his incoming administration. "We are certainly not satisfied with the proposals made by representatives of the president-elect's team to postpone Ukraine's membership in NATO for 20 years and to deploy a peacekeeping contingent of UK and European forces in Ukraine," Lavrov said in a Dec. 29 interview with Russian state news agency TASS. During his election campaign, Trump pledged to swiftly resolve the ongoing conflict between Russia and Ukraine upon taking office for a second, nonconsecutive term. Until now, the president-elect, who will return to the White House on Jan. 20, 2025, has provided few details on how he plans to do so. Sen. JD Vance, now vice president-elect, in September floated the notion of freezing the conflict by creating a heavily fortified "demilitarized zone" along the current frontline. Vance further suggested that Russia might be granted a "guarantee of neutrality" from Ukraine, meaning the latter would abandon its hope of joining the NATO alliance. (More) More World News: |
- The United Arab Emirates has negotiated a prisoner exchange that led to the release of hundreds of Ukrainian and Russian soldiers.
- Syria's de facto leader, Ahmad al-Sharaa, has said it could take up to four years to hold elections in the country, following the ousting of President Bashar al-Assad this month.
- While Mikheil Kavelashvili has been sworn in as president of Georgia, outgoing President Salome Zourabichvili has branded her successor illegitimate and is demanding new elections.
- A South Korean court on Tuesday approved an arrest warrant for President Yoon Suk Yeol, who has been impeached and suspended from power over his decision to impose martial law on Dec. 3, investigating authorities said.
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🎤 American Thought Leaders: Dr. Stanley Goldfarb on how DEI and gender ideology in medicine are harming patients. (Watch) 🔀Crossroads: The Pentagon warns that the CCP is planning a cognitive war against the US. (Watch) 🍿 Documentary: "Against All Odds" tells the story of a rugby player who was left paralyzed after a car accident but became an inspiration to thousands. (Watch free on Gan Jing World) ✍️ Opinion: Beijing Keeps Losing Friends by Milton Ezrati (More) 🍵 Health: Hunchback posture hurts more than just appearances. It can lead to muscle soreness and exert pressure on internal organs. Fortunately, specific exercises can help prevent and correct this issue, improving appearance, enhancing cardiovascular and respiratory health, and supporting digestive function. 🎵Music: Edvard Grieg: Peer Gynt Suite No. 1 (Listen) 📷 A Year in Photos: Our photography editors picked the photographs that defined the past year. |
Deep relationships are built upon deep conversations. (Biba Kayewich) |
Conversation—true, deep, meaningful conversation—is one of the greatest gifts we can experience in our human interactions, and yet such conversations are not all that common. |
- Increasingly, they are shoved to the margins of life by our addiction to technology, our overfilled schedules, and our growing cultural anxiety and isolation.
- Fewer and fewer people understand the art of conversation, an art so intimately tied to our very humanity. For what is more profoundly human than thinking together with others about important matters?
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As Aristotle says, humans are both rational and social animals. When you combine those two aspects of our nature, the natural result is conversation. |
- Plenty of people yearn for that deeper human connection fostered through true conversation, but often we are too shy or uncertain about how to get things started.
- One of the biggest hurdles to deep conversation is knowing how to begin. Once the ball of a good conversation is rolling, it often propels itself for hours through its own momentum.
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To aid you in your conversational endeavors, then, we have 50 conversation-starting questions to help get you and your loved ones thinking about interesting, exciting, and meaningful things, while deepening your knowledge and love of each other. We feature questions in the categories of knowing yourself and others; literature, film, and famous people; the big questions; and just for fun.
Click here to discover the 50 questions and the full story by our colleague Walker Larson.
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