10 things you need to know today: February 5, 2015

(Image credit: (AP Photo/Raad Adayleh))

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1. Jordan says it will intensify its war against ISIS
2. Anthem data breach could affect 80 million people
3. Kerry promises Ukraine aid as France and Germany pitch a new peace plan
4. Death toll in Taiwan plane crash climbs to 31
5. Silk Road founder Ross Ulbricht convicted
6. Deadly fire on wrecked New York train linked to dislodged third rail
7. Boko Haram raid leaves 100 dead in Cameroon
8. FCC proposes tough net neutrality rules
9. Snoop Dogg's son signs to play football at UCLA
10. Brian Williams recants claim his helicopter was shot down in Iraq

published 5 February 2015

1. Jordan says it will intensify its war against ISIS

King Abdullah of Jordan declared Wednesday that his country would wage "relentless" war against the Islamic State, the Islamist extremist group that burned alive a captured Jordanian fighter pilot. "We are waging this war to protect our faith, our values, and human principles," the king said on his return to Amman from a trip to the U.S. Leaders from other Middle East nations also expressed outrage. Saudi Arabia called the killing a "heinous crime" and called for intensified fighting against terrorists.

The health insurance giant Anthem announced Wednesday that hackers had broken into a database containing the personal information of as many as 80 million customers and employees. The information in the breached database included names, birthdays, social security numbers, email addresses, and income data, but no credit card numbers or other financial information. Anthem said it would individually notify people affected by the "very sophisticated attack."

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Secretary of State John Kerry arrived in Ukraine on Thursday and announced the U.S. would send $16.4 million to help Ukrainians affected by escalating fighting with pro-Russian separatists. Washington also reportedly is considering sending weapons to Ukraine now that peace talks with rebels have collapsed. French President Francois Hollande and German Chancellor Angela Merkel also are traveling Thursday to pitch a new peace plan to Ukraine and Russia, which NATO says is arming and financing the rebels.

Taiwanese rescuers used a crane to lift the fuselage of a TransAsia Airways plane from a Taipei river on Wednesday after pulling 15 survivors from the wreckage. The death toll from the crash of the turboprop plane climbed to 31. Eleven of the 58 people on board remained missing. The plane banked sharply shortly after takeoff and went down, as the crew called "Mayday" over the radio. Local media speculated that the pilot turned to avoid hitting a densely populated residential area.

A Manhattan jury on Wednesday swiftly convicted Ross Ulbricht of operating the black-market website called Silk Road, helping drug dealers and other criminals reach customers. Prosecutors said Ulbricht ran a $1.2 billion empire under the pseudonym Dread Pirate Roberts. Drugs made up the majority of Silk Road's sales over the three years it operated, government lawyers said. Ulbricht said he merely ran the site for a few months. Ulbricht, 30, faces up to life in prison. Sentencing is in May.

The deadly fire on a New York commuter train that hit an SUV erupted because the crash tore up 400 feet of the electrified third rail that powered the train, investigators said Wednesday. Gasoline from the wrecked Jeep Cherokee fed the blaze. "The entire interior of the first rail car was burned out," said Robert L. Sumwalt of the National Transportation Safety Board. Six people were killed and more than a dozen were injured in the wreck, which occurred in Valhalla in Westchester County.

Boko Haram militants killed more than 100 people in a cross-border raid into Cameroon, leaders in the town of Fotokol said Wednesday. The victims, many with their throats slit, were killed in mosques and houses. The Islamist group has kidnapped or killed thousands of people in neighboring Nigeria, and is the target of a multi-nation offensive. Cameroonian soldiers, backed by forces from Chad, eventually drove away the attackers, killing some of them.

Federal Communications Commission Chairman Tom Wheeler on Wednesday proposed regulating internet service providers like utility companies — a big win for net neutrality advocates. The proposal, which the FCC could vote on this month, would create "bright-line rules" to "ban paid prioritization, and the blocking and throttling of lawful content and services," Wheeler wrote in an op-ed for Wired. Last year, President Obama called on the FCC to "implement the strongest possible rules to protect net neutrality."

Wide receiver Cordell Broadus, son of rapper Snoop Dogg, announced Wednesday that he had signed to play for the UCLA Bruins. The younger Broadus is ranked No. 130 among ESPN's top U.S. high school players. The 6-foot-3 Broadus had narrowed his choices to UCLA, Arizona State, and USC, which his father has supported for years. "UCLA presented the best platform for him when his football career is over," said father Calvin Broadus, a.k.a. Snoop Dogg.

NBC News anchor Brian Williams on Wednesday admitted that he had falsely claimed his helicopter was shot down in Iraq in 2003. Williams apologized on the air after Stars & Stripes looked into complaints from soldiers who were there. Williams was actually on another helicopter flying up to an hour behind the one that was hit with a rocket-propelled grenade. He reported the incident accurately at the time, but told the false story last Friday. He apologized, saying "the fog of memory" caused him to "conflate" the events.

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Harold Maass is a contributing editor at The Week. He has been writing for The Week since the 2001 debut of the U.S. print edition and served as editor of TheWeek.com when it launched in 2008. Harold started his career as a newspaper reporter in South Florida and Haiti. He has previously worked for a variety of news outlets, including The Miami Herald, ABC News and Fox News, and for several years wrote a daily roundup of financial news for The Week and Yahoo Finance.