It is a black day for Belgium, Europe and the whole world. A suicide attacks at Brussels airport and metro station killed at least 34 people and left hundreds wounded. As terrorists continue to strike across the globe, the terror threat starts to be one of the most significant problem of our civilization.
According to the Global Terrorism Index report published by the Institute for Economics and Peace last year, the terror threat around the world increased by 80% in 2014 reaching the highest levels ever recorded. With attacks in France, Nigeria, Turkey and today in Belgium we can say that 2015 and 2016 are no better.
Click one the map to open the larger version in a new window
The map above shows the impact of terrorism on particular countries (with the interactive version here). The darker the color the most severe impact. The report says that the most dangerous countries are Iraq, Afghanistan, Nigeria, Pakistan and Syria but many other countries like the US, UK, Belgium and France have high or very high risk of terrorism. Even more terrifying is the graph below.
In the last 15 years over 140.000 were killed in terrorist attacks around the world (with over 32.000 in 2014). The report states that the organizations responsible for a majority of these murders (51%) are Boko Haram, which operates in Nigeria and Central Africa, and ISIS, which operates in Iraq and Syria. If we consider the fact that Boko Haram has sworn allegiance to ISIS and began operating as an extension of ISIS in Africa, in essence ISIS is responsible for most of the deaths due to terrorism in the world.
Today’s events show that the terrorism threat is not going to decrease anytime soon. Our thoughts and prayers are with the families of the victims. We live in dangerous times.
The full Global Terrorism Index report is available here.
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Waze is one of the best free navigation and traffic apps out there. Although it has been acquired by Google nearly 3 years ago, it regularly adds new features making sure that the community continues to bring valuable traffic data to Google Maps team.
Last week the company introduced a new feature called “Planned Drives” for iOS users. It allows users to enter dates and times for upcoming appointments to have the app automatically plan out their route and offer reminders for when to leave. The new feature “takes into account expected traffic conditions based on smart algorithms, aggregated traffic history and predictive analysis” we can read on Waze blog.
In order to use this new functionality, you have to go to a new “Waze Planned Drives icon” in the bottom left of the “ETA” panel. The app gives you an option to link it with your smartphone and Facebook calendars so that the app could create timed drives for preprogrammed events.
Are you an Android user? Don’t worry the Android version should be out soon.
Cool feature. Good job Waze team!
