Because Only Terrorists Use 802.11

skinnyd writes "Consultants working for the Department of Homeland Security have announced that the Feds view open WiFi as a means of abetting terrorists, and say that they will compel the open wireless operators will have to close off their nets. 'Homeland Security is putting people in place who will be in a position to say, "If you're going to get broken into ... we're going to start regulating."'

Comments

Great...Big Brother, anyone?

[jonny-mt]

Nice, nice. Good to know that freely-available 802.11b will now be a thing of the past thanks to John Ashcroft and the Eye in the Sky. Of course, I can completely see the logic...only terrorists use wireless Internet, so only terrorist use the Internet, right?

For God's sake, man, give us back our freedoms!!

Re:Great...Big Brother, anyone?

[outlier]

That's not what the article says. It points out that wireless insecurities, particularly on corporate networks, pose a security threat -- no surprise there.

Because of all the hoopla about homeland security, people are pointing out that *any* insecurity that allows people to access networks in unauthorized ways can be a vector for Bad People who want to do Bad Things.

The same could be said about critical security problems in networked computers that may be exploited to attack critical networks. I'm sure that federal cybersecurity czar Richard Clarke would say that any insecurity that enables unauthorized network access *may* be a national security threat.

It doesn't say that you can't have a home or office wifi network. It doesn't even say that freely available wifi is a tool of the terrorists. It says, that systems should be secured, and that responsibility lies at many levels (manufacturers, corporate users, etc).

This isn't to say that the government doesn't engage in FUD or that civil rights aren't under attack. But it makes mare sense to fight the real threats to individual liberties.

Re:Great...Big Brother, anyone?

[Anonymous Coward]

Wireless networks with their poor range, scaling issues, background noise problems, limited range and transmit power, and lack of connection to the internet are not, by any stretch of the imagination, a threat to cable companies. Do you really 802.11b would scale to an entire city?

Please, try to ground yourself in reality a bit before posting this reactionary drivel.

The office of homeland security is merely trying to justify its existence and the amount of tax money being put into the beaurocratic incenerator. Now doesn't this seem a little more reasonable than a big corporate/government conspiracy?

The fact that you were modded up is truly pathetic.

And this is limited to Wi-fi how?

[idiotnot]

It would seem that anyone who could get internet access could potentially affect networks. Should they regulate AOL distributing CD's with a thousand free hours? I mean, the terrorists could easily use a stolen credit card (oh, I'm sure they'd have qualms about doing that...)to get initial access....

Okay, so they wouldn't be moving as fast as they would going through a corporate network.

But if a LAN Admin is stupid enough to leave his access points open (with access to the outside world), then the company gets what it deserves for hiring an MSCE to do its network design.

Yes, I run an open AP at home (and there's nothing really interesting to look at, I assure you), but I'm not to the point where I think it's a good idea to put one on the network at work. It's been discussed before, and it'd just be more difficult than it's worth.

Wi-Fi is certainly the highest priority

[chupar]

"We know that (an attack) could bring down the network of this country very quickly. Once you're on the network, it doesn't matter where you got in," said Daniel Devasirvatham, who headed the Homeland Security task force for the Wireless Communications Association International trade association.

Right... So, open Wi-Fi, with that dangerous 50-foot useable radius is a top priority for national security. Why not just set up a National Firewall instead :)?

Please Read "Is This the America I Love?"

[goingware]

The original of "Is This the America I Love?" is at http://www.goingware.com/notes/america.html

But I wanted it to be read more widely than was happening with it on my own little homepage so I posted a copy at Kuro5hin. An advantage of the K5 version is that it enabled followup discussion.

Here's the intro:

I just feel the need to write right now. Something has gone terribly wrong with the country I was raised to love. The good things that America stands for are being trampled into the dirt by those charged with the burden of protecting them.

I was raised to be a patriotic American. I grew up a military brat - my father was a proud officer of the United States Navy, who served in the Vietnam War. When I was young, I was always told that my father was fighting to preserve the freedoms that were guaranteed us by the United States Constitution.

In the first grade, I attended a school run by the U.S. Navy in Gaeta, Italy, where my father was stationed aboard the U.S.S. Springfield. Each day when we started school we sang patriotic songs and said the Pledge of Allegiance. We were told that America stood for freedom and democracy and justice.

I loved America for what it stood for.

Thank you for your attention.

It's not too hard to see where this is all going..

[Dr_Marvin_Monroe]

Our department of "Homeland Security" is creating the situation where all users of the net must be tracable....for the purpose of spying on them and controlling our ability to peacefully associate on the net. Our right to assemble for the purpose of communication is gauranteed in the bill of rights, but is under assult.

As with the "Great Firewall of China" articles that I've been seeing here lately, governments are fearfull of any tool that would allow people to communicate freely. Annonymous communication over the net allows disent to grow without the heavy hand of big brother picking out the "ringleaders."

I notice in this article that there is no discussion at all about why this is necessary for security. I don't believe at all that one guy with a laptop on an open AP could "bring the net down"...

We must force our government to explain WHY this and all of the other USA Patriot act bullshit is necessary....making Bush, Poindexter, Ashcroft and the others explain their position to everyone is the act of a real patriot.....don't believe the hype.....

You're WRONG. This has GREAT benefits for society

[Anonymous Coward]

"All they want to do is mandate minimum security levels for Wi-Fi network operators so as to prevent intrusions."

You just don't get it.

Envision this scenario.

In the not too distant future, maybe 10 years from now, a company creates a wifi "web" technology. IT works like the internet. Except without WIRES. It works just like the internet. Someone connects to another local computer, or several of them, and they pass the data along from computer to computer till their reach their destination... JUST LIKE NOW, but without wires.

Except that with idiots creating laws like this, we will never have that internet utopia. It would be illegal to allow just ANY computer to connect to your "network" because the government doesn't want you to be able to allow people to connect to you if you don't know who they are.

Have you ever heard of FREEDOM OF ASSOCIATION? I consider this a freedom of association. I have the right to allow strangers into my house. I also have the right to allow strangers to go through my filing cabinets. And damnit, I HAVE THE RIGHT TO ALLOW STRANGERS TO LOG ONTO THE NET through my pc!

The fact that terrorists could use this as a tool to help them out is NOT a good enough reason to crush this sort of technology. This sort of technology has WIDE reaching uses far GREATER than the risk involved could EVER be.

Imagine if this sort of legislation was enacted on the INTERNET back in the 1990's. That it was deemed dial up conenctions were too dangerous to allow to connect to the net, because it is too easy for someone to purchase a dial up account and connect from a large number of locations, and move about secretly.

We would HAVE NO INTERNET TODAY.

And we will have no WIFI INTERNET 2 tomorrow if such BACKWARD thinking people as yourself are allowed to create assinine laws like this.

There's a difference between intentionally limiting rights and establishing minimum standards of conduct. I suppose you guys never heard of speed limits on highways."

Your analogy is poor. High speed kills thousands upon thousands of people a year, and the benefit from it is very small. The risk to benefit ratio is very high.

The benefit from this EXTREMELY great. And the risk is REALLY SMALL. And shitting it down would do little to NOTHING to prevent the terrists from speaking secretly. So the risk to benefit ratio for this is really LOW.

LOW RISK, HIGH BENEFIT.

They MUST NOT do this. It would be ABSURD and make us fall even farther behind countries like Singapore where EVERYONE has a high speed net connection whereas most Americans are still on dialup. When they have WIFI internet that is FREE, with FREE BANDWIDTH, and we don't, it will hurt our economy, and JUST PLAIN SUCK.

sanity run amuck

[kraksmoka]

this WiFi announcement makes as much sense as the personal injury suits won by crooks years back (i'm certain overturned on appeal), who sued homeowners when they hurt themselves in attempted breakins.

yes, people today in the US fell less secure in some ways, say, when traveling on airlines. this is understandable due to the trauma of 9-11 and the threat of worse, such as the SAM attack in Kenya last week. bad things do happen in the world, they are unavoidable, and my mother would agree, better paranoid than alive.

however, it is this /.er's opinion that the right wing extremists of our beloved (not) presidential administration is overly eager to use the situation to extend the police powers of the state.

every little chink in personal liberty, every new crime invented, every new link to terrorism where it does not exist, ALL of THEM, are affronts to not only the liberty of the land of the free, but to the free world at large.

take Jose Padilla. an enemy combatant now, why? last time i looked (i took a history degree in a prior life) a Citizen of the United States had certain rights, even if he used them in a way detrimental to society. this is a "free" country, treason is an option, still punishable by death, none the less an option. that isn't to say it's my choice, but he made his willingly. why is he all of the sudden, this native born son (or bastard, don't know yet really, do we?) having something taken by Ashcroft (remember, he did lose an election to a corpse before his elevation to Grand Inquisitor), that a proper court of Law would only strip of him (this is being decided now) in the most dire of circumstances.

wi-fi security is just another nick in the neck of lady liberty. unfortunately, if you add the nicks up, there's a gaping hole at the moment, and not enough people to stand up to GOP sticks and stones making these nicks. may the god i don't believe exists help us all, without faith based government initiatives.

Re:This is not about security

[Anonymous Coward]

Exactly. You don't see the Feds threatening action over (cough, cough) insecure OS's. Quite the opposite, calling for the NSA to halt development of their hardened Linux distro. The one consistent element? Business friendly.

Devil's advocate

[Have Blue]

Ignoring the arguments about whether it's "terrorism", this does touch on a very important issue. Does making your computer deliberately insecure count as negligence if it is used to commit a crime? Are you liable if you accidentally leave your car unlocked and it is used to commit a crime? What if you did so deliberately? What if you put a sign in the window saying "Anyone is free to use this car so long as you return it"? Where do you draw the line between generosity and irresponsibility?

Who are the real "evildoers?"

[DeComposer]

I think there are a number of different things going on here.

First of all, we're talking about an administration that is breathtakingly clueless about technology. Because they don't understand how a thing works means that the thing will be used to wreak havoc, right? That sounds chillingly similar to our cold war "capability equals intent" policy.

I also think it's a pretty solid bet that the infotainment industry is fueling those fears to protect their investment in broadband and their ability to sell it.

I also tend to think that people like Dick Cheney and George Bush view technology (espcially technology that provides or enhances intellectual freedom) of any kind as an inherent threat to his vision of what America should be. After all, "There ought to be limits to freedom."

Civil Disobedience

[Loki_1929]

I just opened my Wireless router wide open. Anyone with an 802.11b network card should have no problem immediately getting an IP address from my router and should have completely open and unrestricted access to the internet from anywhere within about 800ft of my house. I encourage every single one of the 250,000 daily slashdot readers who has a wireless access point or a wireless router to do the same thing. Secure your computers, open your wireless.

To hell with the Dept of Homeland insecurity and their ridiculous ranting. They can take their Gibsonesque FUD elsewhere.

Very proud to have done my small part

[goingware]

I used analog earlier this evening to check my server logs to see how people were finding Is This the America I Love?. I've had the page up for over a year, but since the election I have felt a renewed sense of urgency to get people to read it.

One of the referring pages I found listed in my log is I've held it in too long: I am no longer Proud to be an American. wherein the poster says:

America just makes me sick now. The worst part is nobody seems to see the Injustice of it all. Are you all Blind? Have you not seen the greatly exaggerated and proposterous veil that has been strewn upon America?

Something is indeed wrong. I've sensed it, and to this day haven't been able to find the words to describe what it was, but I have to say something. Why? Because I have a fucking voice, and I will fucking spread it, because that's what America USED to be all about. Now? Now it's nothing, not even a shadow of it's former self. I'd literally rather live in Canada right now, because despite what people thing of Canada, it's pretty cool.

and so on.

Look at the bottom of the guy's post where he gives a link with the text "This is what inspired me to finally say something".

I've worried about the potential for backlash by saying what I did in such a public way, and further to be making such an effort to get people to read it.

But if I was able to get even one person to speak out as this fellow said I did, well that makes it all worthwhile.

There's lots of people who posted to the K5 discussion who don't agree with what I said, but that doesn't bother me so much. I'm very pleased to have opened up so much debate. People are talking about these issues that might not have otherwise.

People need to talk about this stuff, or we will end up in a great deal more trouble than we are already in.

And there were some fairly intelligent points raised at K5 that seem to poke holes in my argument. That's OK too, because I have answers to their objections, and will be able to make some small revisions to my original piece that should ultimately make it stronger and more convincing. So in the end those who found fault with my essay have done me a favor.

Finally, in the little while between posting the above and being just about to post this, my copy of the essay has received 102 page views referred from this slashdot discussion.

I'm very glad of that - prior to posting at K5, the essay was getting about 300 page views a month. So far this month (just a few days into the month) my copy has got 594 page views, and I imagine the K5 post got many times that.

Are you all so blind?

[Anonymous Coward]

The real reason behind canning open access wireless is this: If people can connect freely thanks to altruistic techs, they won't pay $49.99 a month to some random lobbying corporation.

Re:Ludicris

[blincoln]

These people need to take action and clean up before the govt gets more motivated to regulate them.

Should it be illegal for businesses to have poor security for their buildings?
Breaking and entering (in the physical and electronic world) is already a crime. Only a police state regulates the actions of potential victims of crimes to "protect" them.

What a coincidence.

[woboz]

It is recently announced that a group of companys' are joining together to provide nationwide wireless access, for a fee of course. Then the next day the government comes out trying to make it illegal to provide free internet access.
What a big suprise.
Netzero you better start sending money to DC or your going to be next.

The politicians do not understand

[panurge]

...what is going on. Forget Bush, who seems just to be a mental underperformer (many countries have done well when their Royal Families collectively lacked the IQ of a seaslug in a jar of alcohol), I suspect the real problem is that the people in power are many years behind an understanding of where technology has actually been going. While technologists have been following Moore's Law, the politicians and the bureaucracy have been following a linear path of increased understanding, dropping behind the curve more and more each year. (And FBI agents are lawyers, basically the most reactionary profession of the lot.)
Now suddenly they are being asked to do something other than obtain campaign donations and talk crap on TV. And they have not the slightest idea what to do. When a politican or a civil servant doesn't know what to do, what is the reaction? Find something that people are doing, and stop it. It is so much easier to ban something than to think of a positive action.

The posters who are making jokes about banning telephones and coats are not actually that far off the mark. In the Soviet Union, that dangerous instrument the typewriter required a licence, and all official typewriters had their fingerprint taken by the KGB so that any typed document could be traced to the original machine. As for photocopiers, each one had its KGB operative to control access. We now seem to be heading for a government policy of achieving basically the same thing electronically. In the long term, it is likely to be about as successful.

The big problem is, who is going to educate the politicians? Or do we need to find a way to replace them with younger, better educated ones who might actually have a clue about the modern world?

Re:Very very sad

[Sacarino]

What's worse is they're going to push and push and take away rights under the guise of 'public safety' or some shit and it will come to a head.

America in the past has risen up to say 'fsck you' to overwhelming repression and hopefully it will again.

The most insightful quote I ever heard was Sean Connery in Red October.... "A little revolution now and then is a good thing."

America needs a revolution, and needs one soon. I have no desire for my children live with the burden of pencil-pushers dictating their lives.

Sure, for now..

[Lysol]

You are absolutely correct. However, politicians may steal as much as they can, but it's the people that still elect them. Only when the masses wake up will things change. And unfortunately, throughout history, this has rarely happened until after the point of no return.

What you list above is an admirable way to protect the 'homeland' but it still misses the main problem. Check out Usama's letter on what his reasoning is. We were founded on the premise of religious tolerance. However, there are elements linked to the government through the current administration that are now just as bad as Usama himself. Extremist conservtives drunk with intolerance of any religion other than Christianity and set on enforcing their view of morality on the rest of the world - just like Usama. Only difference is that they have the worlds largest military and corporations to back it up.

When and if we correct this problem, will there be no or little reason to monitor our borders and ports - except maybe to keep others away from prosperity (which sounds odd if you think about it). But for now, I fear you're correct and we are already starting to see ridiculous examples of democracy gone awry.

It is even more sad..

[nurb432]

That I've been trying desperately for years to tell people this was happening time. But no one listened, I was just a 'nut'.. Then 9/11 happened and I said it again, but I was 'anti patriotic', so again, no one listened.

Even in school in the 80's people that valued freedom, our constitution, and wanted to protect both were labeled 'radical' and programmed to think it was wrong.. In reality we were no different then our founding fathers, and should have been labeled 'federalists' instead..

Now here we are, almost at the gates of oblivion.. Who among us will be the first person to stand up and say NO.

Correction...

[rjung2k]

We are obviously willing to give up our freedoms b/c of that bearded fuck w/limp and a cammo jacket...

Funny, I don't see any bearded person handing down these pronouncements from the Department of Homeland Security.

Yes, Osama was the bearded fuck who guided jet planes into the WTC and started this mess, but be honest -- the erosion of Americans' civil liberties and rights in the 15 months since have been guided by the Supreme Court-appointed poser sitting in the White House right now, and his team of right-wing extremist croneys. They're simply using the bearded fuck as an excuse for their actions.

You're right, though, that too many people are giving President Ripper free rein on this mess. Vote him out of office in '04!

Freedoms

[WindBourne]

Our freedoms are disappearing at a frightening rate. The Bush admin has done a number of song and dance routines about Anthrax. The security that has been implemented since 9/11 is a joke. It is still easy to attack the aircrafts, airports, trains, or cars. It is still easy to get anything into this country. In all fairness, that is and always will be the case in all countries that have large infrastructure and borders. But now Bushes cronies blame 802.11 for causing problems while still pushing MS everywhere. At the same time, the fight OSS of anytype even though it has been proven over and over that OSS is better in anything dealing with server space. Finally, they threw a group to study 802.11 by its competitors and they come out blaming all sorts of problems on it and ask for regulations. That meeting is almost certainly the same as Cheny's meeting with Enron on how to deal with USA's Oil issues. WakeUp USA, IKE warned us and we did not listen.

Re:public != insecure.

[ncc74656]

cable company kiosks - Do you mean those kiosks which stand in the middle of the street? They usually are very crippled in their interface. you can't even run ping. I dunno. Maybe you might be able to exploit them.

If they're running IE (or a browser built on the IE engine), all you need is some useful binaries squirreled away on a webserver to do whatever you want with their computer. Security settings are almost always such that you can run untrusted EXEs. At Comdex, I ran PuTTY off of my home webserver so I could check my mail. There's no reason I couldn't have stashed some malware ahead of time and run that.

(Mozilla, OTOH, won't let you do that. It'll prompt you to save the file someplace. If "Run...", "Command Prompt", and IE are removed from the Start menu and Windows-R is trapped (it's a keyboard shortcut for Start|Run...), good luck getting your downloaded file to run...assuming that you can find a directory that'll let you save your file. (One college lab had "Run..." and "Command Prompt" removed from its machines, but opening IE and giving c:\winnt\system32\cmd.exe as the URL gave me a command prompt.))

They might be midgets

[TygerFish]

Possibly justified hysteria aside, the subject of this thread is a prime example of a thing which provides two equally valid answers to a social question: is the umbrella of 'homeland security'--the name alone is nauseating--being used by the forces of vacuous greed in Washington to provide favors to large, commercial internet businesses, or is the simpler and better assumption that the Wonks in washington just dumb and prone to suggestion?

Before everyone with an I.Q. over ninety buys a plane ticket to Canada, we should consider what we're really dealing with in the U.S. government nowadays. It is easy for a Slashdot-quality mind to spot the sheer, arid uselessness of a ban on free 802.11 and this has got to make you wonder.

On the one hand, WE know that terrorists are far more concerned with keeping secrets than ordinary users are. WE fully understand that terrorists, spies and clever lunatics put real work into hiding their intentions and there are too many ways onto the internet to filter all of them--that is, at least, using any method we know of.

It's easy to imagine, a mind like John Ashcroft's simply bypassing this; you can almost see that sloping brow furrow horribly as it bypasses the obvious fact that terrorists have no need to reach for free radio Ethernet.

On the other hand, it is just as easy to conceive of the current administration's love for corporate power making it despise grass-roots initiatives to provide free internet fill-in-the-blank and ducking fast behind the poor, beleaguered flag at the first murmur of dissent.

Both answers are perfectly imaginable: It is easy to imagine genuine nastiness on the part of any government as piggy-eyed as the one we have right now. At the same time, the absence of a clue on the administration's part is just as credible an explanation.

To paraphrase the name of musical group, 'they might be midgets.'

let me see if I got this straight:

[WhiteDragon]

If I use security measures (such as encrypting all my traffic) I have something to hide, and must be a terrorist. If I don't, I am allowing others to use my network, so I must be a terrorist.

Re:Fine, run your open network...

[MikeFM]

A yard or radio waves are different than an object. They are something that is just there. Grabbing them and claiming it doesn't mean you or anyone made them. A car, food, your cat, etc are objects. The first two you can own and as always the cat owns you.

Most people are shortsighted greedy morons who wouldn't know the difference between their arse and their brain. Y'know the people who read tabloid newspapers and think all thats tuff is real. Land is an unlimited resource. At least as far as humans are likely to be concerned. There is more land on this one planet than is actually usable by the number of people the planet can sustain. Then there are lots of other planets we have the power to go to if we wanted to bother. Also we could easily create more 'land' by building large underwater or floating cities. Land is not an object so it is owned by the public.

Just because something belongs to the public doesn't mean you can't use it. It just means you can't deny others the use of it when your not using it. Y'know like a King that would punish peasents for killing a deer in his forest despite the fact he wasn't using the deer or the forest.

You and I are certainly not responsible for what our ancestors did but that doesn't mean we're not responsible for whatever actions we take that support what our ancestors did. Of course we have to have a place to live but you don't hafta put brick walls around your yard and curse the damn kids for their frisbees that float inside the fence. ;)

Try not paying your taxes and see how public your land is. Your purchase price is little more than a rent deposit. Of course the only reason you have to pay for land is because people don't realize that if they felt like it they could just take what they needed from all that empty land not being used. A large enough group can take anything. No surprise about that. Forty big bikers with semiautomatic weapons can camp in my living room any damn time they want. :)

What are you not yet using your yard for that it'd be damaged by a child running across your grass?

Sure kids can play in their yard, a public park, etc. It doesn't mean I'm gonna get pissed off if they walk across my yard. I guess it's a reasonable use thing. If they aren't hurting me or damaging anything I'm using then I don't care if they use it.

You must have grown up somewhere nice. Where I grew up everyone played in the street. It was the only space big enough for most games and close enough to home that our parents didn't have to worry about gang fights, drug pushers, etc.

Anyway I think the original point was that it'd be silly to blame someone for not fencing their yard against criminal/terrorist activity. In the same way it's silly to blame someone for not fencing off their wireless network against criminal/terrorist activity. You shouldn't have to fence off either if it pleases you to leave them open.

Smaller Government?

[oldstrat]

Was anyone besides myself foolish enough to print this thing out before scrolling through it?

I just killed a small wooded lot.
Just a thought, next time George and the boys offer up something this important, they really should think about making it a PDF and or gzip it.