The Watch Floor with Sarah Adams

Is Canada doing enough to confront the terrorist threat, and what has the West failed to learn from more than two decades of counterterrorism operations?This week on The Watch Floor, I’m joined by Phil Gurski, a 32-year veteran of Canada’s intelligence community, former analyst with the Canadian Security Intelligence Service (CSIS) and Communications Security Establishment (CSE), author, and host of Canadian Intelligence Eh!We discuss his newest book, 9/11: The Unfinished Battle, and why the threat from jihadist terrorism is far from over. Our conversation examines the terrorist threat facing Canada, the consequences of releasing convicted terrorists back into society, the role of social networks in radicalization, and how accusations of Islamophobia can complicate legitimate terrorism investigations.We also discuss the loss of experienced intelligence professionals, the consequences of Western counterterrorism policies, and why understanding how terrorist organizations recruit, operate, and adapt remains critical to preventing future attacks.Phil brings decades of intelligence experience and a Canadian perspective to a threat that extends well beyond Canada's borders.Learn More About Phil Gurski📖 Buy Phil's New Book: 9/11: The Unfinished Battle: Why Jihadi Terrorism Is Stronger, Wider, and Far From Overhttps://a.co/d/06MexgNF🎙️ Listen to Canadian Intelligence Eh!Spotify: https://open.spotify.com/show/4NTG9pHoct7Rtuhq0cXmsYApple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/ca/podcast/canadian-intelligence-eh/id1455756173Podcast Archive: https://borealisthreatandrisk.com/category/podcast/Connect with PhilWebsite: https://borealisthreatandrisk.com/X: https://twitter.com/borealissavesLinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/phil-gurski-8942468/#TheWatchFloor #PhilGurski #Counterterrorism #CanadianIntelligence #NationalSecurity #Terrorism

In this episode of The Watch Floor, I sit down with Steven Al Ebadi, a U.S. Army veteran, former intelligence officer, combat linguist, and journalist whose career includes supporting U.S. Army Special Operations Forces, the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA), and the FBI.We discuss his journey from Iraq to serving alongside U.S. forces, the experiences that shaped his career, and his work in intelligence and journalism. Our conversation also covers the consequences of decisions made during the Iraq War, the threats he has faced, and his reporting on the war in Ukraine.Follow Steven Al Ebadi:X: https://x.com/Alladdin1983Substack: https://substack.com/@alladdin1983YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/@StevenAlEbadi

October 7th was not simply an intelligence failure. Israel had warning, surveillance, military power, and years of experience watching Hamas. What it lost was enough doubt about whether its own assumptions could be wrong.In this episode of The Watch Floor, I look at the lessons from October 7th that go well beyond Israel. We examine how complacency shaped intelligence assessments, how Hamas studied and attacked Israel’s dependence on technology, why warning indicators were missed, and what happened when the national response became overwhelmed and the fight turned local. I also look at the broader threat environment around Hamas, including training and relationships outside Gaza, and why intelligence services have to understand the enemy they actually have, not the enemy they remember. Most importantly, this episode is about what the United States can learn from those failures before someone tests the same weaknesses here. Complacency does not always look like laziness. Sometimes complacency looks very sophisticated.

On September 17, the Defense Counterintelligence and Security Agency released its annual report on foreign efforts to acquire sensitive U.S. technology from the cleared defense industrial base. DCSA received more than 22,000 suspicious-contact reports during fiscal year 2025 and identified roughly 2,900 incidents involving foreign entities seeking U.S. information or technology. The leading method was the exploitation of experts. In this episode of The Watch Floor, I break down what that targeting can actually look like. It may begin with a consulting request, conference invitation, peer review, recruiting approach or research discussion. The interaction can look completely legitimate while giving someone access to the people who understand a technology, its limitations, its supply chain and where development is headed next. We also look at elicitation, front companies and intermediaries, why unclassified knowledge can still have intelligence value, and the warning signs experts should pay attention to when an ordinary professional relationship begins moving in another direction. The episode also covers why former government, intelligence, aerospace and defense personnel remain valuable targets long after their access or clearances are gone.Sometimes the most valuable technology is not sitting inside a secure computer system. It is sitting inside the head of the person who spent twenty years learning how that system works.

The FBI is investigating a breach tied to FBIJobs.gov and the possible exposure of employee personally identifiable information. Hackers connected to ShinyHunters claim they stole terabytes of data covering current and former FBI personnel, applicants, medical information, background investigations, and other sensitive systems.Some of those claims remain unverified. But reporters have already reviewed thousands of records containing names, home addresses, Social Security numbers, family contacts, employee identifiers, and details pointing to sensitive FBI assignments involving China, Russia, human intelligence, surveillance, cartels, and other national security work.In this episode of The Watch Floor, Sarah Adams breaks down what is actually confirmed, what the hackers are claiming, how the breach may have happened, and why this is much more than an identity-theft problem. When personnel records can be combined with family information, assignments, travel indicators, and other breached data, they can become a map of an organization and a valuable counterintelligence tool.We also look at the comparison to the 2015 Office of Personnel Management breach and the biggest unanswered question: who else may already have this information?

Writing“See something, say something” leaves out the hardest part: what are you actually looking for?In this episode of The Watch Floor, Sarah Adams explains the behaviors that can appear before an attack, from repeated surveillance and security testing to unusual questions about access, possible preparation near home or work, and warning signs at an airport. She explains why context and patterns matter, what details make a report useful, and whom to tell when something needs attention.

Artificial intelligence is moving from answering questions to taking actions. In controlled tests, advanced AI models have deceived operators, attempted blackmail, concealed information, recognized when they were being evaluated, and taken steps researchers describe as self-preservation behavior.Those findings have produced extraordinary warnings about where AI may be headed. But a warning is information. It is not a conclusion.In this episode of The Watch Floor, Sarah Adams walks through four questions: What can these systems actually do? Can we reliably control them? What is driving companies and countries to move so quickly? And if there is a problem, who gets to decide what the response looks like?We look at the emerging AI threat picture, the difference between capability and intent, the race for technological advantage, the national-security competition with China, and the competing concern that AI safety could also become a justification for concentrating enormous technological power in the hands of a small number of companies and institutions.The goal is not to tell you what to think about AI. It is to separate the warning from the assessment, understand what the evidence actually shows, and ask better questions about what comes next.

Hamza bin Laden is alive. On September 10, on the eve of the 25th anniversary of 9/11, al-Qaeda released A Quarter Century After the September 11 Raids, Part One, featuring Hamza in three separate scenes.But the footage was not new. Hamza recorded it on August 13, 2021, in Kandahar, as Afghanistan was falling to the Taliban. Al-Qaeda held that footage for more than five years.In this episode of The Watch Floor, Sarah Adams breaks down what the video actually shows, the 2019 deception that led the U.S. to announce Hamza bin Laden was dead, how al-Qaeda concealed his survival and eventual rise to emir, and why the decision to reveal him now matters.The most important question is no longer whether Hamza survived.It is why al-Qaeda spent years hiding him, only to begin showing him now.The threat did not disappear. It evolved.