NASA has released assembly footage of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope successfully integrating the mission’s telescope and two instruments onto its instrument carrier. The work, carried out inside the largest clean room at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, marked the completion of the Roman payload. Roman is NASA’s next flagship space observatory, designed to operate alongside the Hubble and James Webb Space Telescopes. Using wide-field observations, it will study exoplanets, chart the structure of the Milky Way, and probe the nature of dark matter. Engineers say the mission remains on track for an early launch, with scientific observations expected to begin before the end of 2026. View the footage here.
Could you survive a war where no one knows who you really are?
Deep in the jungles along the Nicaragua–Honduras border, the Cold War turned feral. Guerrilla camps shifted overnight, loyalties fractured, and a single misstep could get you killed before sunrise. Into that chaos stepped “Major Alex,” a hard-edged Honduran army officer tasked with keeping rebel commanders in line. Only he wasn’t Honduran military at all. He was Ric Prado, operating deep undercover for the CIA.
Prado was embedded with the Contra forces at a moment when discipline was collapsing, and violence threatened to spin out of control. Rogue commanders looted towns, committed atrocities, and drew unwanted attention to a covert US-backed war. Reining them in meant confronting armed men who trusted no one, while maintaining a cover that had to hold under extreme pressure.
Life in the camps offered little protection. Firefights erupted without warning. Training missions turned into ambushes. At one point, Prado received a whispered warning that his own allies planned to kill him in his sleep. Survival depended on reading the room, projecting authority, and knowing exactly when to escalate or stand down.
Join Ric Prado in this week’s podcast selection, 'Hidden Hand', on a mission to embed behind enemy lines, enforce order in chaos, and stay alive long enough to make it back out.
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Test your team's skills and strategy, compete to climb the leaderboards, and recharge with food and drink in your own private space hosted by a dedicated staff member.
Book your next team social.
Take on immersive games and challenges at SPYGAMES! Test your team's skills and strategy, compete to climb the leaderboards, and recharge with food and drink in your own private space hosted by a dedicated staff member.
What changed to push US cancer survival past a major milestone?
The five-year cancer survival rate in the United States has reached 70 percent, according to a new report released Tuesday by the American Cancer Society. The figure reflects outcomes for patients diagnosed between 2015 and 2021 and marks a sharp rise from 49 percent in the mid 1970s and 63 percent in the mid 1990s.
The report points to several factors behind the gains. Earlier and more widespread screening has helped doctors catch cancers sooner, while decades of declining smoking rates have reduced risk for several major cancer types. Treatment has also changed. Targeted therapies and immunotherapies now play a larger role, improving outcomes across a wide range of diagnoses.
Survival rates are highest for thyroid and prostate cancer, at around 98 percent. They are followed by testicular cancer, melanoma, and breast cancer, all with five-year survival rates above 90 percent. Other cancers have also seen meaningful progress. Survival for myeloma has nearly doubled since the 1990s, while liver cancer survival has increased several-fold, though it remains low overall. Lung, liver, esophageal, and pancreatic cancers continue to rank among those with the lowest survival rates.
Articles
Secretive Front Companies
What if the company selling you security was secretly spying on you instead?
For decades, intelligence agencies have quietly operated behind corporate logos, office addresses, and glossy sales brochures. One of the most audacious examples was Crypto AG, a Swiss firm trusted by governments worldwide to protect their secrets. Instead, its encryption machines were quietly designed to do the opposite, allowing foreign intelligence services to read supposedly secure messages from allies, rivals, and even religious institutions.
From a Boston “consultancy” that existed mostly on paper, to an encrypted messaging app built to lure global criminal networks, spies have repeatedly used front companies to blend into plain sight. Some posed as tech startups. Others as aviation firms, car customizers, or meat exporters. In each case, the business wasn’t the mission. It was the cover.
These companies helped track drug traffickers, monitor hostile governments, expose double agents, and move operatives across borders. Sometimes the fronts collapsed publicly. Other times, they disappeared quietly, having done their job. Discover more examples of secret front companies in this SPYSCAPE article.
Give your party guests an unforgettable experience designed to engage, entertain, and inspire. Our dedicated staff will be on hand to help, and you'll even get your own private space to celebrate.
Host your birthday at SPYSCAPE or SPYGAMES.
Give your party guests an unforgettable experience designed to engage, entertain, and inspire. Our dedicated staff will be on hand to help, and you'll even get your own private space to celebrate.
How did an open experiment become the internet’s default reference?
Wikipedia turned 25 on Thursday. What began as a side project has grown into one of the most visited information platforms in the world, with more than 65 million articles published across over 300 languages and maintained by roughly 250,000 volunteer editors.
In 2000, founder Jimmy Wales launched Nupedia, an online encyclopedia written by experts and reviewed through a formal editorial process. Progress proved slow, with fewer than two dozen entries published in its first year. Alongside editor-in-chief Larry Sanger, Wales shifted to a new model built on wiki software, allowing anyone to contribute and revise entries collaboratively.
The change accelerated growth. Wikipedia published roughly 18,000 articles in its first year, and by 2002, nearly 200 people were editing the site each day. Since 2003, the platform has been operated by the nonprofit Wikimedia Foundation. It now adds hundreds of new articles daily and receives nearly 15 billion page views each month. Automated traffic has increased with bots accounting for a growing share of site activity as Wikipedia content is accessed and reused by AI systems.
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