Our daily morning swim around the world

🇷🇺🇨🇳🇺🇸 Russia and China are competing against the US military for control of the Arctic region, the WSJ reports. The Arctic has become an increasingly contested territory over the past few decades due to a loss of sea ice, which has resulted in more ship traffic traveling through the Arctic Ocean. In recent months, Russia’s military has further increased the frequency of its Arctic patrols with help from satellite and electronic intelligence supplied by the Chinese government, per the Journal. Both countries have also upped the number of joint naval exercises in the Arctic over the past year.

🏢 A French extreme climber died in a suspected fall while scaling a skyscraper in Hong Kong. Remi Lucidi (social media handle: “Remi Enigma”), 30, had a history of posting images and videos online showing him at the top of various bridges and high-rise buildings around the world. Hong Kong police say their initial investigation appears to confirm Lucidi died while attempting to scale a 68-story residential building.

🇨🇳 China is accused of secretly installing malware in key US military infrastructure systems in America and around the world. The first public hints of China’s alleged malware campaign emerged in late May, when Microsoft said it detected mysterious computer code in telecommunications systems in Guam (home to a large US Air Force base). But in reality, Chinese hackers had been conducting their global malware campaign for at least a year by that point, with an overall goal of allowing Beijing to cut off power, water, and communications to US military bases in the event of future conflict, per a new NYT article citing over a dozen US officials and industry experts.