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French Prosecutor Opens Echelon Probe
gillbates writes: "A French prosecutor is conducting an investigation into the workings of the Echelon system. The article is here, and it details how France is concerned that Echelon is being used for invading its citizens' privacy. France lost a contract with Saudi Arabia due to Echelon, and knows it. How much else will they learn? My question is: What's going to happen to U.S./European relations when they find out the truth about Echelon?" SWroclawski [Updated 6 July 2000 by timothy: sorry 'bout the spelling, Serge! :) ]
points out this link to BBC Coverage, noting "France's laws on privacy are very strict and in a world where one's rights of privacy are being challenged all the time, it's good to see one country taking a stand."
France is just twanked because Echelon caught them on a little deal with Brazil not too long ago. (read it here)
If you are included in the ECHELON network, like the UK and Ireland, then everything is just peachy...else, you cry foul. What of the countries that are in the "network" that are spying on their own companies? Is this suddenly OK?--
Wooden armaments to battle your imaginary foes!
If France was actually taking the path of righteousness here, I'd applaud them. However, they are primarily upset because it's not their system. Most of their civil service is wildy inefficient - often by design, since it allows them to hire more civil servants - but their own spies are top notch. And they don't have laws against bribery to gain foreign contracts, such as the US has for its companies. Its not the privacy concerns that bother the French here, its getting caught.
French foreign policy since WWII has mostly been based on repeated iterations of the question "Will it piss off the English-speakers?" I'll admit that this approach is probably as valid as anything else, and they have certainly been consistent and fair in its application, but basing relations with the rest of the world on a grudge over holding a losing ticket in the dominant culture sweepstakes is not terribly praiseworthy. Sorry.
-reemul
You're just jealous 'cuz the voices talk to *me*
There was an item in the UK newspapaper "The Independent" last Sunday which dealt with habitual US usage of Echelon and the American intelligence services to give unfair trade advantages to American companies in competition with European countries.
Are they scared American companies can't succeed on their own merits, or something?
Pax,
White Rabbit +++ Divide by Cucumber Error ++
free experimental electronic music netlabel at www.viablehybrid.com
:wq
I believe France has recently 'lightened up' on the use of encryption, just as us Brits are clamping down and (trying to) regulate it.
However, I understand that the French were placing bribes to back up their contracts so in this case I'd say 'score one for Echelon'!! If more general use of Echelon were proved, i.e passing commercial secrets where no wrongdoing is taking place, then I think they would have a legitimate case.
Donte Alistair Anderson Roberts - hi son!
Karma: Chameleon
Paper by Kenneth Neil Cukier, Communications Week International on Frenchelon.
Also mentioned in this issue of Cryptome.
Another important question is, what's going to happen when Americans find out what is going on? Less than a year ago, on 60 Minutes, a woman stated that she had heard Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina on a telephone wire tap in an Echelon center (I believe it was in Britain). Any such intrusion is not only in breach of Echelon's internal policy as stated by the NSA (no spying on US citizens) but a severe breach of the Senator's civil rights.
If I recall correctly, the basic point of that story was that American intelligence is using Echelon stations in Britain (and the foreign agents running them) to get around the rule that bans surveillance on U.S. citizens.
After this current round of accusations, the story has been all over the mainstream media outlets.
The answer to the question above is nothing. On the whole, Americans just don't give a damn. In fact, they seem to like the idea of their intelligence looking after them, despite the inherent risks and problems it creates.
I have talked with all my friends, some of them extremely well-informed and intelligent people, and I could barely get an ounce of concern out of them.
The prosecutor's move is quite demagogic, he only wants people to think "Hey, look at me, I'm not afraid to fight Echelon !". But his action is bullshit, he already knows he can't do anything : Do you think he can go to Washington DC and invetigate in the Pentagon, or to London to invetigate the MI5 ?
come on guy, this is the story of a prosecutor who is looking for fame !
By hthe way, I think the French govt and the French secret service don't support him, they are rather embarrassed by his action. Legal action is not the way things are done in the secret service world.
In the end, if them kicking up a fuss can result in ALL nations co-existing and co-habiting the same planet WITHOUT waging full-scale wars over who's turn it is to take the trash out, then I don't give a damn who complains or why, only that they did.
Sure, I'm a dreamer to think that nations can ever move out of the social stone age. But it's not from a lack of ability. It's a lack of want. If there were votes to be had, by creating sane nations, then they'd do so. And if this continuing scandal persuades voters that sanity is worth the effort, that could happen. Maybe.
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
BTW, do any Brits think it is a gross breach of sovereignty to have foreign bases in the UK? I mean, how would Americans feel if foreigners set up a military base here? Maybe there are foreign bases in the US and it's just a NATO thing...
Nick
-- "It's a sad day for American capitalism when a man can't fly a midget on a kite over Central Park" - Jim Moran
Before we all get on the "France is standing up to government intrusion" bandwagon, let's remember that France is well-known for "borrowing" travelling executives' laptops at customs, long enough to copy the entire hard drive. And they have, at least once, completely trashed the hotel rooms of major aerospace executives during the Paris airshow to gather information.
France has been in the forefront of government-sponsored economic espionage for some time, so this whole "Echelon is bad" is fairly hypocritical.
For further information, check out Secure Computing's April 1998 issue (the first hit I got from google, I'm sure there's plenty more out there): http://www .westcoast.com/securecomputing/1998_04/cover/cover .html#French.
david.
or it will be if the allegations of espionage are verified. Thanks to US willingness to invoke WTO regulations and charge penalties for Europe's just support of carribean banana farmers, the game is hotting up. United, even only economically, Europe now has plenty of stick to make the Boss of the World take note. As well, and this is unfortunate, there's an almost bigoted suspicion of America's intentions inside Europe, and plenty of people/lawyers/officials willing to "take up arms" against the US. If these allegations prove true it will only verify what a lot of Europeans have belived a long time: that you can't trust Uncle Sam.
--
The UK government's Regulation of Investigatory powers (see notes on it here) has got it exactly right. It going to insist that every UK ISP fits hooks to their infrastructure to allow them to tap e-mails and web traffic, at the ISPs expense. Not only that, but they are enshrining it in law, and talking about it publicly !
....)
Now that's open government for you....... It dosen't solve the problem of your diminishing privacy, but, being British, they are nice enough and fair enough to tell you about it first.
(.....Sh*t - where is the HTML irony tag when you need it
Stephen Hawking has written another book. It's about time as well.
If Big Bro is watching me then I hope he's getting a cheap thrill. They are going to get a whole load of noise before they find any signal in my life. If I'm using such easily intercepted stuff as email for anything critical or secret (like, for example, details of a bid for a contract or anything like that) then of course its going to be GNUPGed with the highest key length my version can generate. In the absence of back doors in the algorithm (which is why I prefer open source - better coders than I have already looked at it in detail and if there were holes I'd have read about it on BUGTRAQ) then the data I'm protecting is not invulnerable but by the time anyone has managed to crack it I'd hope it would be obsolete. Somebody wants to wiretap me? Good luck hearing anything to make it worth your while. Of course, unless you're the government and able to make the laws fit whatever you want to do if you get caught you're in a world of hurt. I can live with that. Government agencies already have so many resources for finding out about people that the addition of things such as Echelon doesnt really make that much difference although it may improve their accuracy.
Dont know about you but I'd rather if folks were going to be looking over my shoulder they got it right rather than confusing me with somebody that has the same name that happens to be a serial goat-rapist believed to be hiding out somewhere in Montana. In all seriousness, with minimal info to start from any governmental agency can find out all they need about you. Provided there are controls in place to ensure the info is accurate and open to challenge it doesnt really matter how they get it, because they COULD find it out anyway, Echelon or not. Unfortunately with recent reports of the use of "secret evidence" by government agencies in the US it seems those controls are not in place... The problem is not Echelon or any other info-collecting tool, its what is done with the info afterwards. Do you trust 'em? I sure dont.
# human firmware exploit
# Word will insert into your optic buffer
# without bounds checking
I had a
Anyone who believes that the French are not engaged in espionage against the United States and that information does not make it to state-owned or quasi-governmental entities like Airbus, is naive. My sense is that they don't like the scale, style and effectiveness of the eavesdropping.
All countries engage in espionage. Due largely to resources, some are more effective than others. It is also meet to remember that nation-states do not have friends, but national interests. I'm not saying that I like the Echelon program, just that we are not alone in the pursuit.
"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers."
"Computers are useless. They can only give you answers."
-- Pablo Picasso
I'd like to see all of the patriotic American nationalists that we have in this country, flying their red white and blue on their pick-up trucks and snapping at any two-bit 'hippy' that dares suggest America isn't the greatest nation in the world, react to having every bit of communication recorded and played back to them, from their email and letters to their phone calls.
And - damn it, I'm going to pimp this book again. DATABASE NATION by Simson Garfinkel. This book should be read by every geek, grocery clerk, grandmother, businessman and government official. While it is not the most in-depth book, it is the best brush with which to paint a general over-view of the demise of privacy to those who are otherwise completely oblivious to it.
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seumas.com
This bill allows the Australian Security Intelligence Organisation (ASIO) to enter, modify, delete or copy data as well as disabling any cryptography one may be running, in order to make it easier for them to get future data. Despite the Attorney General, Daryl William's reassurances that the legislation was "designed to ensure an appropriate balance between individual privacy and the public interest in effective law enforcement and national security;" and that an access warrant is required in these cases, I am fearful of the abuses that are bound to follow. Under this act, ASIO will be allowed to cover up the fact that they hacked into the system and will not be subject to the Crimes Act that forbids computer hacking in Australia surely raising the possibility of framing dissenters and now under the auspices of business, perhaps conduct industrial espionage.
Have these recent laws been instituted in order to legitimise hacking by the Australian Government and pave the way for the legal usage of Echelon by the Australian government? Is there some greater conspiracy I am failing to foresee? I hope not, otherwise my future civil liberties online are already under great jeopardy.
-- "I can't tell the future, I just work there." -- The Doctor
Yes, they have. In fact, they've gone quite a long way, much further than was needed to pacify French businesses. As a result, they've changed from being one of the most oppressive countries in Europe with regards to encyption, to one of the most liberal. See http://www.info-sec.com/cr ypto/99/crypto_020699a_j.shtml.
"The invisible and the non-existent look very much alike." -- Delos B. McKown
Two words: Absolutely Nothing.
Why? First of all, the British were willing co-conspirators in all of this. There's a scapegoat inside the European community waiting for us.
Secondly, every other European nation that counts has just as barbaric national security measusers as Echelon. They may not actually be Echelon, but they're concerned about the almighty National Security as much as we are too. They understand why we need Echelon.
Thirdly, France is a muckracker. Nobody else in the community cares, and France can't do anything on its own without the support of the community.