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FBI Agent Talks Crime, Macs

Posted by pudge on from the put-down-that-one-button-mouse-and-back-away-slowly dept.

hype7 writes "There's an article at SecurityFocus describing a visit an FBI agent to Washington University. His visit was ostensibly about computer security and the general public's complete lack of any idea on computer security whatsoever: 'I have spent a considerable amount in the computer underground and have seen many ways in which clever individuals trick unsuspecting users. I don't think most people have a clue just how bad things are.' His talk ranged from some of the pranks he's seen played on unsuspecting users, to Eastern European extortion of big banks." WeakGeek added, "FBI security guys are using Macs because, 'those machines can do just about anything: run software for Mac, Unix, or Windows, using either a GUI or the command line. And they're secure out of the box.' Another good quote: 'If you're a bad guy and you want to frustrate law enforcement, use a Mac.'"

5 of 654 comments (clear)

  1. Apple's in the news now... by danielrm26 · · Score: 5, Interesting

    "If you're a bad guy and you want to frustrate law enforcement, use a Mac."

    Hmm. Not *precisely* the kind of publicity the Mac folks were probably looking for, but with their marketshare almost any publicity is good publicity. I just think it's cool that all the FBI Infosec guys are on OS X. Makes me feel good about my migration to the platform as well (as soon as Apple posts the much-awaited G5 price adjustment).

    I don't quite understand how people are good at mining data off of *nix but not off of a Mac though -- that part didn't make too much sense. I find it hard to believe that the people they were referring to were on OS9, and if they were on OSX then the boxes basically *are* *nix machines...

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    1. Re:Apple's in the news now... by Surazal · · Score: 5, Interesting

      I have minimal experience with the new MacOS X, but what little I know is enough to convince me that MacOS X is "different" enough to confuse even experienced Unix users. The directory structure is vastly different in a number of ways, and the GUI isn't X. It's really what Unix would have looked like if we lived in an alternate universe and the naming conventions were wildly different.

      Old tried and tested tools also aren't available. Have a shared libary incompatibility problem? Forget using "ldd" to figure out how to resolve the situation. It just doesn't exist (unless something changed since the original MacOS X release, which is right around when I ran into this troubleshooting problem). From what I eventually learned, a proprietary utility from Apple was required that had equivalent functionality to ldd.

      I suppose this was the "securuty" the FBI agent was talking about. If you don't know how to use the system, then you won't be able to figure out how to break into it.

      But security through obscurity is a temporary solution at best. Someone, someday, *will* invest the time to figure out the environment. Obscurity will provide no protection whatsoever against individuals or groups who know the system.

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  2. Perhaps other agencies as well.... by BWJones · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I am not really surprised that the FBI security guys use OS X boxes. Years ago I remember another government agency with a three letter acronym that used NeXT boxes it seemed almost exclusively from the situation rooms right down to the secretaries (at least in Langley).

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  3. The benefits of relative obscurity by siliconbunny · · Score: 5, Interesting
    As a lawyer, I work with computer forensic people (mostly ex cops) in getting electronic material to use in lawsuits.

    It's always been my experience that the guys are hot on Windows, pretty good on *nix, but very very few know anything about Macs -- my guess because of their law enforcement background, where they used and were trained on PCs.

    A predominant amount of their work seems to be recreating or capturing MS Outlook mailboxes (looking for the smoking guns). They aren't as cluey on Eudora (presumably because most corporate enterprises don't use it).

    Small market share means that the majority of people focus on the system(s) that form the majority of OS/apps used -- a trait which appears to extend to law enforcement and makers of forensic programs. But the really good professionals are always interested in asking "so just how does this work on a mac" and discussing the similarities/differences...

  4. Re:Apple dot edu by Selecter · · Score: 5, Interesting
    Funny, my ex-wife stopped by tonight becuase she had gotten a brand new Emachine A64 based laptop and wanted me to check it out. I hooked it up to my router and procured a IP and went to windows update.

    Damn thing took 13 Critical Updates/Service Packs before it was done. (WinXP) Then she proceeded to check her email, which she had not checked for 4 days becuase she was on the road. Her email in box had 126 copies of MyDoom.A in it.

    She had only had the computer for less than 3 hours since purchase, not even finished setting the fucking thing up, and she had to update the OS 13 times and had 126 viruses in her email. And this without any doing on her part.

    Thats pretty fucking sad. I'm glad I got my G5. Everything a bit more relaxed. :)