Explain to Shane

The GPS is essential to modern navigation, communication, and critical infrastructure. However, the United States faces serious threats to GPS technology, many of which are rarely discussed publicly. In addition to the looming threat from Russian and Chinese weaponry, increasing orbital debris and severe space weather have the potential to damage or destroy American satellites, causing a complete collapse of our navigational systems. A sustained disruption could significantly impair navigation, timing, and communications systems nationwide.
America has more satellites than any other country, and our economy depends heavily on space-based positioning, navigation, and timing services. Former members of the National Security Council and outside advisers have called GPS “a single point of failure for America.”
To discuss this matter, Shane is joined by two experts in GPS policy. Dana A. Goward is president of the Resilient Navigation and Timing Foundation and a former member of the National Space-Based Positioning, Navigation, and Timing Advisory Board, which advises the government on GPS policy. He took this role after retiring from service in the Coast Guard and as the United States maritime navigation authority. Also joining Shane is Coast Guard Rear Admiral Jeff Hathaway (ret.), a longtime navigator and board member of the foundation.

Innovations in drone technology have expanded their usefulness and made drones increasingly present in everyday life. Despite this progress, key limitations such as short battery life and limited payload capacity have hindered their full potential in critical infrastructure. That reality is beginning to shift. Recent breakthroughs in long-endurance flight are pushing drones beyond these limits and into entirely new possibilities. As these advances reshape what drones can do, we must ask: What new possibilities do these breakthroughs unlock? And what might these possibilities mean for our everyday lives?
In this episode, Shane is joined by Brian Hinman, the founder and CEO of SiFly, and John Donovan, the CEO of Qudit Investments and a board member at Palo Alto Networks and Lockheed Martin. As leaders of these innovations in drone technology, they draw on their extensive experience in aviation, defense, and technology to help us explore how this next phase of drone development could change the way we think about infrastructure, emergency response, and the future of aviation itself.

With the advent of the digital age, individuals rely on countless personal devices, each one expanding their exposure to cybercrime. Missing one or two software updates may seem harmless, but this common negligence leaves us vulnerable to cyberattacks. With the number of individuals falling prey to cybercrime increasing on a yearly basis, we must ask: Why have established cybersecurity measures failed to halt or slow down the activity of cybercriminals? And what can we do to better protect ourselves and others?
In this episode, Shane interviews Greg Oslan, chairman and CEO of the National Cybersecurity Center, on how we can do just that. Oslan has previously served as a managing partner at One Strategy Group consulting, CEO of Arturo, and a strategic adviser for the US Department of Homeland Security. His wide-ranging experience with this matter helps us make sense of how we can become safer online.

As the increased use of artificial intelligence necessitates connectivity, it will continue to become inextricably linked to the digital network landscape. When people talk about artificial intelligence, they usually focus on algorithms, chips, or data centers. But there’s a less visible piece that determines whether any of it works in the real world: digital networks. AI doesn’t live in one place. It moves. It learns. It responds in real time. And all of that depends on the networks that carry data among devices, clouds, and people. In many ways, telecommunications and cable operators are the digital networks that make up the transportation system of the AI economy—the highways, railroads, and air traffic control that make intelligence usable at scale for businesses and consumers.
In this episode, Shane interviews Roger Entner, one of the most respected analysts in telecommunications and digital infrastructure. Roger is the founder of Recon Analytics. He advises companies on strategy and public policy in telecommunications, technology, AI, and media. Previously, he served as senior vice president and head of telecom research at the Nielsen Company. He’s spent decades studying how networks evolve, how policy shapes investment, and why connectivity is central to innovation. Compute may create intelligence, but networks deliver it, from mobile and broadband to the next wave of AI-driven services. His decades of experience in the telecommunications industry give him the depth of expertise to discuss the future of artificial intelligence in this space.

One of the most important cybersecurity laws in the country quietly expired last October with no sign of reauthorization on the horizon. Instead, the conflation between the 2015 Cybersecurity Information Sharing Act and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency has led to a political standstill that will only have negative impacts on American cybersecurity. What implications will not reauthorizing CISA 2015 have on national security? And how much risk are we taking on by letting protections for information sharing between the private sector and the government lapse?
In this episode, Shane Tews is joined by Caitlin Clarke, Cristin Flynn Goodwin, and James Andrew Lewis. In this conversation, they unpack how confusion between the 2015 information-sharing law and the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) makes Americans vulnerable to foreign cyberattacks, how rescinded liability and FOIA protections are already slowing down cyber defense, and why speed matters more than ever as AI accelerates malicious actors.