Slashdot Mirror
Why Did The FBI Retire Carnivore?
We posted earlier this week that the FBI has officially dropped Carnivore, its "privacy respecting" eavesdropping program. Now reader Throtex writes "Professor Orin Kerr at the George Washington University Law School, a member of the Volokh Conspiracy discusses why Carnivore came to be in the first place and why it really was terminated (about two years ago). Essentially, the media (as usual) got a bit carried away with a non-story: Carnivore was designed to protect your rights from being invaded while sniffing only suspect data. Carnivore was dropped because, as of two years ago, the available tools met the necessary privacy standards, as Prof. Kerr noted in his article about the PATRIOT Act published at the time."
I would be more concerned about things like ECHELON anyway.
Speaking of ECHELON, maybe the reason people get so carried away with conspiracy theories is that our government is so bloody set against telling its own people what it does. AFAIK, even though a couple of European countries on the ECHELON project have admitted their membership, the U.S. government continues to deny such a thing even exists.
If this were a truly free country, we wouldn't have a government that's so hellbent on keeping things a secret. You can talk about the practical reasons behind keeping things secret to protect our interests and the people involved in the operations, but that doesn't change the fact that it makes the country non-free in the actual sense, and it gives people a very good reason to be jittery about snooping projects.
When the government is known to clam up and hide things, how can you ever be sure it's telling you the truth about its projects and that they really do what they're saying they do?
Alito: A vote for Alito is a punch in the eye to put that bitch back in her place!
Because existing intercept systems were in place long before this crud known as carnivore surfaced. Why go to the ISP's when you can sit back and 'dictate' to the telco's that they 'WILL' run a cable from all their major exchanges, straight on in to the 'spy' agencies.
;-)
Either that, or their license to do whatever is revoked on 'technical' grounds.
The old boys club in action
Because of tcpdump?
Seriously, if the FBI had the resources and access to the right people, why couldn't they build Carnivore out of open-source material and not resort to "commercially available" products?
Put another way: With modern hardware being dirt cheap and OSS getting better and better, what would it take to build a system that comes close (or even surpasses) what Carnivore had to offer?
who said they have retired anything ?, you might think its been retired hence its public knowledge, of course the truth is they havent retired anything
the US gov is like a crack smoker when it comes to surveillance info, a few hits and they cant put the pipe down
They say they've retired Carnivore.
Why tell us? And how do we know they actually did?
Weaselmancer
rediculous.
My guess is that
1) too much bad publicity
2) Existing tech can do what they want now
3) the U.S.A.P.A.T.R.I.O.T. act let's them do more anyway.
....the next version came out. A new Linux kernel comes out, and you upgrade, right? I guess Carnivore 98(TM) is going off support.
They bought an off-the-self equivalent.
Talk about spyware.
I doubt the FBI doesn't scan emails during an investigation anymore.
I blame PETA.
Not that I have anything to hide in the first place... no, really...!
Don't hurt me.
Many Bothans died to bring you this sig.
Maybe they figured out that the terrorists used encryption.
;)
But your tinfoil-hat-army probably thinks they have backdoors for them
No, no, NO!!
I read it on SLASHDOT!! The Gubmint wants to read my e-mail! It's part of their Total Information Awareness plot to put me in JAIL! They want to label me a TERRORIST and send me to GITMO!!
Don't tell me it's not true! It's on the INTERNET for crying out loud!
"Ask not what your country can do for you." --John F. Kennedy
Maybe because Hugh Jackman destroyed it with a fish so they had to make it a vegan instead ?
Trolling using another account since 2005.
How do we know it even existed in the first place? How do we know that there's no audio-based Carnivore? They could have the microphones trained on us RIGHT NOW!!
The solution is obvious - you must barricade yourself in your own house, destroy the phones and televisions, and sit quietly on the couch so the thermal pickups dont register your presence. It's the only way you'll have privacy!
Hokey statistics and ancient misconceptions are no match for a good thought in your head, kid!
When I stop using a system it is usually because I have something better.
The government has actually contracted with the makers of such programs as: ........
-Gator
-CoolWebSearch
-ISTbar
-and Internet Optimizer
Hmmm, a good question that opens up a lot of possibilities. If I remember right, Carnivore was ostensibly installed to snoop for terrorism leads in internet communication. Telling the world it was there may have acted to discourage terrorists from using an easy to access tool like the internet for their purposes, thus keeping the technology out of most of their operations. If that's the case, why say it's gone? Either they're trying to give the impression that they now have tools just as good or better than Carnivore, maintaining the same level of snooping, or perhaps they'll just eventually get in trouble if they don't tell us when they discontinue stuff like this. I'd imagine they need to make such announcements with possible Freedom of Information Act revelations in years to come in mind.
Yup...
You're rejoicing that the FBI retired Carnivore. What Carnivore allowed was the collection of information, then the decryption and analysis of that data with a court order. They retired it because USA PATRIOT allows them to just collect it the good old fashioned way...no encryption, no court order. Whomever, whenever they want. The difference is that now they can look for suspicious activity via eavesdropping instead of first having a suspicion and confirming it via eavesdropping. You are celebrating that the FBI has thrown away their lock picks and not realizing that Congress has removed all your doors.
Public use of any portable music system is a virtually guaranteed indicator of sociopathic tendencies. -- Zoso
And even the headline blurb points it out. Carnivore was not just a sniffing tool, it had to be able to extract massive amounts of data and then filter it to protect the privacy of people's communications. Tcpdump is not even a ballpark comparison.
"Carnivore was dropped because, as of two years ago, the available tools met the necessary privacy standards, as Prof. Kerr noted in his article about the PATRIOT Act published at the time."
Does this mean that instead of using a more privacy friendly tool (i never though i'll use this expression on carnivore) is NOT needed any more because of the patriot act? That's just plain scary. It's like saying "oh, instead of catching one guilty guy with good surveillance method, we just blanket-search 10'000 and we'll find our criminal that way". I hope i'm not correct with this interpetation.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
As someone currenly job hunting in the DC/Baltimore area, I am amazed by the number of programming jobs that require security clearances. If you have a security clearace and took a couple java classes in college, government contractors will shower you with job offers. The requisite for getting a job on these projects, therefor, is not being a talented programmer, it is having a clearance that says you aren't a spy.
The result, I'm convinced, is that they hire a lot of sub-standard programmers, who create poorly designed products at great expense. And if the product doesn't work, well, thats another $100 million of taxpayer money down the drain.
These outfits need to either figure out a way to use better programmers who don't have security clearances, or figure out how to get good programmers cleared without a 2 year delay. Until that happens, a lot of substandard coders will contiue to write failed applications on the taxpayer dollar.
SpyDock: Scientific Python in a Docker container
hyped a story, claimed the FBI was after you, claims victory when the FBI shuts it down (TWO YEARS BEFORE THE HYPE)... and then comes around and says "shucks there tweren't nothing to worry about after all, isn't that interesting."
I'll call in the answer to that.
Let me find a phonebooth first, in which the men in the black helicopters can't see me.
ich bin der musikant
mit taschenrechner in der hand
kraftwerk
That's Professor Orin V. Kerr AKA Professor KerniVOre.
If they suspect anyone they can simply kidnap them, take them to afghanistan, torture the infomation out of them, then lock them up indefinatly without trial, no need for any of this 'evidence' or 'investigation' crap.
What if Tetris was invented by Nazis?
To get more money for the new and improved system
It's the battle of the minds, and everyone's unarmed.
You're clearly not paranoid enough to post on slashdot.
The implication here is that Carnivore was only being used because they had to respect your rights. Post-PATRIOT act, they don't have to bother with that, and are now just happily reading *everything*. Of COURSE the government wants to know how many questions you asked that guy selling Star Wars Action Figures on ebay. It's important in the fight against terrorism.
If you don't encrypt your email and web traffic, you have no "reasonable expectation" of privacy. Apparently, "addressing information" - that is, packet headers - are not a part of confidential communications, and as such, it does not represent an invasion of privacy to read them.
While I understand his argument that PATRIOT merely made pre-existing wiretap laws apply to the internet, this fact alone doesn't make the existing laws right. For example, just knowing who called who when, even without revealing the details of content, does significantly invade one's privacy. In these times when someone can be detained simply because they "may have knowledge of a criminal act", divulging the websites a person visits is still too dangerous. Someone concerned about the rise of radical Islam could easily be detained as a "potential terrorist" simply because they did some independent research on Islam using the internet. Even scanning addressing information alone is too much power for a government in which the mere declaration that one is an "enemy combatant" can be used to arbitrarily deny one's civil liberties.
The society for a thought-free internet welcomes you.
A few years ago I attended a talk by an FBI agent who justified Carnivore by saying that computer abuse was the fastest-growing crime area in the world. His definition of computer abuse included
unauthorized reading of personal email (or slashdot) on your company's computer, which is actually a Federal felony. What probably happened is that the people inside FBI pushing Carnivore with such flimsy justification lost the funding for their program. FBI is very concerned with its funding and public appearance. Fighting crime and terrorism is secondary.
They retired it because it ran on NT4.0 ....
*narf!*
I think the key to the problem is in that we say things like "our government is set against telling its own people what it does"(Sic) instead of "our governement is set against telling the people it represents what it does". It is our government, we are not it's people. And no, we are not free. We are extremely well off, but are not capital "F" free.
That's just the 1/5th libertarian in me talking. The other 1/5th wants my government enforcers to protect the status quo and give tax breaks to those that are more successful, and the other 3/5ths wants the man to stop trying to bring me down and just past the douchie to the left hand side.
postmodernsideshow.com
Please tell me that the owners of this site are not only hosting the site as a place for conspiracy theory... It disturbes me that one of the first article on the site references The Onion. -M@
...saying "We're not going to use it anymore so you can stop worrying about it. *wink, wink*"?
Just remember the different between "you're" (you are) and "your" (you own something).
I hear they just put the Aquinas router online. Better get some ambrosia.
We retired Carnivore so we could bring in Omnivore. Never would we use the Patriot Act for frivolously putting airplane-taggers in prison, or anything else that could be considered stupid and a waste of government funds/money or abusive to the general population.
We just came out with Omnivore, essentially Carnivore II. It's made-up of a massive Xbox cluster (that's what we get when we contract it to Microsoft) and has every major exchange hooked into it. It's also the reason people seem to be fascinated with Area 51. Please note that all those old Russion MIGs and freaky green, glowing lights were just cover (the green lights were Das Blinkinlights while we were experimenting with BeOS).
Please note that Carnivore II is currently intercepting the nude photos that your GF is sending you and FBI agents are probably posting them up in the office right now. Also, it is more than capable of intercepting every e-mail with the word terrorist, seeing as how the Bush Administration would rather that you use the words "Men Of Extreme Evil" so as not to let them win by even acknowleging their presence on Earth. So if you even use the word "terror," we will come after you in your sleep and put you in GITO forever, then you will need to put up with endlessly being forced to dance in front of the other "Men Of Extreme Evil." Thank you for your understanding in this matter. We apologize for any confusion. Remember, Uncle Sam is just trying to decide what's best for YOU!
Silence is golden... and duct tape is silver.
he FBI performed only eight Internet wiretaps in fiscal 2003 and five in fiscal 2002; none used the software initially called Carnivore and later renamed the DCS-1000, according to FBI documents submitted to Senate and House oversight committees. The FBI, which once said Carnivore was "far better" than commercial products, said previously it had used the technology about 25 times between 1998 and 2000.
Carnivor was not a system designed to watch Internet traffic 24/7/365 and flag stuff that looked like potential usefull data on random people. It was used to monitor people who were already under investigation.
I don't hear many people cry foul over a regular telephone wiretap, which is done for the same reasons under the same circumstances - they wiretap telephones of people who are already under investigation (I realize that Eschelon is different, but Eschelon is not a telephone wiretap on a suspect's phone. Its a wiretap on all communications, or so some people claim).
And the Patriot Act does require a court order to do most things. Its just that its not the courts that we think about. Its a secret court. There have been articles on the very subject.
I don't believe that the FBI simply randomly picks people to monitor and do searches of houses at random, etc. There is some "oversight", although to most of us, that "oversight" is secret (yes, that can lead to abuse).
- it tightens government control of research in general
- it shifts focus away from 'obscure' languages and promotes isolationism and (ironically) thereby supports cultural imperialism
- likewise, it diverts effort away from tools that might be useful in translation
- it diverts from work that could in principle radically improve text compression ratios (which is mathematically more important for secrecy than improved crypto algorithms, though this is rarely pointed out)
- it helps refocus academia on providing short term benefits to military, intelligence and industrial applications and away from its own programme of building abstract and enabling knowledge.
(At the risk of antagonising the community here I should also point out that Carnivore and its successors probably share with slashdot a huge problem that is widely perceived as a feature: that it actively reinforces its user community's notions of relevance. Surfacy, automated filtering is of course even more likely than human moderation to classify material by its rhetorical style than its actual content. In politics, indeed in support of any culture or subculture, this is perhaps a wonderful thing; in intelligence, a two edged sword of the worst kind - one that may explain how a number of things manage to slip under the radar.) But I can only leave you to judge.Because he's a professor?
Because it sounds credible (which it does?)
Because he says "I was in government at the time the story broke?"
Should I believe everything Theodore Postol says? He's a professor, too.
This story is nothing but a set of assertions. There's not so much as a single citation to back any of this up.
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
The whole thing eventually comes down to security through obscurity - a somewhat dangerous philosophy.
The British followed such a philosophy for years, not even admitting that MI5 and MI6 existed. Eventually, they realised that this offered zero additional protection. Those who were a threat already knew they existed and had probably infiltrated both, so the only ones being kept in the dark were the voters/taxpayers. They abandoned the cloak of secrecy and even published the name of the head of MI6. The world didn't explode, civilization didn't collapse, and people carried on pretty much as normal.
In the case of Echelon, stating whether or not it exists wouldn't seriously hurt US national security. Those with secrets to hide are likely to already use a wide range of evasion and encryption techniques. Knowing that Echelon is out there, without knowing the details of how it works, wouldn't provide any information they wouldn't already be assuming to be true.
What it does do is make it possible to correct any flaws in the system, as it currently exists. it wouldn't require anyone to say what those flaws were, or how the system works, but it would allow them to bill for fixing things.
Carnivore, by all accounts, was superceded by commercial tools. Why? Did the FBI sack all of its software engineers, the day after the product went into service? Probably not. The official figures suggest that the product saw a steady decline in usefulness, which suggests that there was little or no maintenance or development. This likely started when the project was classified, as the available data suggests it had reached terminal decline by the time it was admitted to.
There was absolutely nothing preventing the FBI from keeping Carnivore up-to-date. If they started ahead of everyone else, they should have remained ahead of everyone else. In fact, if they had programmers so good that they COULD start ahead of those who'd been working on the problem for some time, they should have INCREASED the gap between themselves and commercial vendors.
They didn't. Well, you can hardly hire a contractor to fix an unacknowledged bug in a system you won't admit exists. The more secret you make these things, the harder it gets to get the bug reports from the users to the programmers.
The problem with GOTS software (or hardware) is that there is an unstated assumption that problems will fix themselves if you bury them deep enough. That is why Carnivore became outdated, not some magical advancement by the commercial sector.
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)
Just remember the different(sic) between "different" and "difference".
If you're going to criticise someone's post for spelling, you need to do a better job making sure yours is up to snuff.
That's funny, because that's how I read it. I kinda believe it though since they admit to using comercial spyware instead. which is probably alot more rapant then something the goverment made. (Unless its GenMod)
They ran Canivore on Bush and Cheney and found a long list of crimes that would have required them to arrest these guys. They found GWB's long hidden cocaine arrest. They found DC had gone AWOL on his draft callup.
troll? looks like someone hasn't been reading the news. This is actually happening
Most net traffic is P2P these days.
So they can safely watch most of it pretty easily...
and for minimal cash be able to say they watch the majority of web traffic.
If that's effective or not... that's another story.
But the FBI is just a government organization. It's goal is to keep the public calm and stay within budget. That's it's only goal.
We don't need no stinking warrants!
Now the FBI will just put a camera in your computer room!
Carnivore was designed to protect your rights from being invaded while sniffing only suspect data
There was a government conspiracy to protect my rights???
It's going to take days for me to get back to normal.Is my tin foil hat on right??? What's happening??
You mean.. everything they say isn't true? Really?! You mean.. they are never going to find WMD in Iraq? You mean they really didn't have a Nuclear program? That's a gastly thing to say! You HAVE to believe everything they tell you! It's not American to believe otherwise!
We have been lied to so much by our own government, I don't see how anyone can put an ounce of credibility in anything that comes out of their mouth anymore, even from this professor so-in-so.
We've seen this before and we'll see it again.
I for one will be keeping my eye out for herbivore.
I have written a few studies about Carnivore, and frankly, I would be more concerned about efforts like Tempest, which attempt to pick up the radiation from computer screens. I'm not going to get into a big argument over the possibilities of it working or not, but efforts like that, seem to me, to be more of a threat on privacy than Carnivore.
The clamor of Carnivore was more like a big joke: The FBI was only getting information your ISP already had. If you were truly concerned and informed about privacy, then you have realized long ago that sending email through an ISP exposes that information to someone else.
And while I'm a pretty big fan of privacy, let's get one thing straight: The FBI frankly doesn't have the time, resources, or desire, to search through every US Citizen's email okay?
How would you go about proving that you're *not* using something? Any "citation" would just be the assertion of someone else, necessarily failing your test.
-Looking for a job as a materials chemist or multivariat
Which is exactly the point.
Sometimes people need practical demonstrations of that.
I think where you and i disagree is not about the "shades of gray" issue. Where we disagree is about inerlocking shades of intent. If, by way of example, a complete loss of privacy (strip searches upon exiting the home, "your papers, please!" at every corner, etc. for one week would eliminate a very serious threat (and I don't think bin Laden actually qualifies for something this intrusive, but for a theoretical, let's use him), and then everything would be back to a relatively free society, many might be OK with that. However, what actually happens is a ratchet effect - increased scrutiny is also useful for other things, and so it tends not to go away. Look at the cameras going up everywhere, or the increasing scrutiny of financial transactions.
I don't believe it is alarmist to say that we are moving towards being the most heavily surveiled society in history - the former East Germany (DDR), I think, holds that title now, but if things don't change, the US will take the lead in my lifetime.
And producing chafe along the road to that, I believe, is patriotic to the country I want to live in - if I can't vote to not become a panopticon, I can at least do my part to increase the cost of becoming one.
I forget what 8 was for.
This spin, that somehow "proves" that Carnivore is no more, comes from Kerr, the guy whose "Patriot" Act marketing is linked from this story's summary. It dates from the time the Act was being "debated" in Congress,; called "Internet Surveillance Law After the USA Patriot Act: The Big Brother That Isn't". We all know now that it is, and that Carnivore is part of it. So this is all just a sign of both the big budgets the FBI has for lifecycle spin control these days, and how important it is that we believe that this harmless program doesn't exist. Obviously, it does exist, and it's bad. The coverups of course make it much worse.
--
make install -not war
[tinfoilhat] I never got all this Osama talk. Who says Al-Qaeda even exists? The same government that has produced no hard evidence of the existance of this 'massive' terrorist organisation? The same government that failed to produce a wreckage of the plane that crashed into the Pentagon? Oh wait, the photos they released didn't even lend/hint to a plane crash, let alone a wreckage.
Yeah, secrets are good. Because we all know how dangerous it is for the public to know Al-Qaeda does exist, and a plane *did* hit the Pentagon.[/tinfoilhat]
"The Volokh Conspiracy" Doesn't appear to be accepting incoming connections anymore. For something labeled as a conspiracy that's certainly interesting. Course its probably just a slashdotting, but it's not letting me in w/ a Slashdot referral or otherwise.
If you can't see the value in jet powered ants you should turn in your nerd card. - Dunbal (464142)
VeriSign's NetDiscovery service provides telecom network operators, cable operators, and Internet service providers with a streamlined service to help meet requirements for assisting government agencies with lawful interception and subpoena requests for subscriber records. Net Discovery is the premier turnkey service for provisioning, access, delivery, and collection of call information from operators to law enforcement agencies (LEAs).
Verisign does this for telephony by using (or abusing) their control of Signalling System 7., the routing network for telephony. When a wiretap request comes in, they change the SS7 routing data to route calls to/from the phone of interest to their call monitoring center, from which the call is then routed outward again. To the telephone network, this looks like call forwarding. This approach requires no additional hardware at the wireline carrier; it's done through the existing SS7 infrastructure. (Incidentally, this should increase latency, depending on how far you are from Northern Virginia. But they may have remote monitoring centers by now to cut that down.)
Verisign also offers wiretapping services for mobile phones, and cable-based VoIP.
Efforts are underway to integrate NetDiscovery capability into future Cisco routers.
Verisign takes the carrier or ISP completely out of the loop. "Authorized Government agencies" can submit their wiretapping request to Verisign, where they are "reviewed by a paralegal" and then implemented. There's no need for the carrier or ISP to even be aware of the wiretap.
So that's why there's no need for Carnivore any more.
Verisign - your full service wiretapping solution provider.
I remember my youth where I thought my president was the evilest thing that ever lived. Us old fogeys laugh at the kids who think Bush even breaks the halfway point on the evil scale.
I'm guessing you're about 19, because you sure as hell didn't live through Reagan.
Hollow words will burn and hollow men will burn.
What's to prevent a troublesome guy like Micheal Moore from being locked and the key thrown away BECAUSE the Govt. has REASONABLE cause to assume to he was endangering the security of the State?
Your basic assumption is YOU are safe BECAUSE you are not doing anything illegal. DEAD WRONG.
Soviet Union was built on the assumption that the State is superior to the individuals. How long did it survive and how was the living standard of its people?
The more power you give to your Govt., the more you lose. You end up losing your freedom to think, to do, and to talk. You assume the Govt. will take good care of its people in a brotherly way if you sign away your powers...what's to present you from ending up in a Gulag because you spoke against some of its policies.
The constitution of the USA was built on the basic assumption that the rights and freedom of an individual CANNOT be taken away by Govt.
Freedom is NOT a Gift that can be snatched away when the Govt. feels like it. Freedom is OUR birthright if we want to live as Humans.
Stop talking about giving away your rights to Govt. in exchange for tax-benefits...
"Doing what i can, with what i have." ~ Burt Gummer
They have something better. (Sattelites in the case of the SR-71).
"Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, it doesn't go away." - Philip K. Dick
Because high protein(meat), low carb diets are just so hard to maintain.
You, my friend, have the spirit we all need. Thanks for the battlecry -- justice of the peaceable. I like that.
Let the terrorists arrive by the busload and I'll give them the hellfire Mohamad warned them of.
dude, you rock!
Why are you posting at -1? It's impossible you can be a troll when you have these comments, and all your post history is -1 as though none can see what you are saying! All your posts aren't trollish in your posting history! Hope a moderator appraises your thoughts that they may be a non-secret to everybody.
I'm having real trouble seeing the logic of your argument. You seem to be saying that the government didn't want to admit Carnivore existed, which made it impossible for them to get it fixed/updated. How'd it get built in the first place, then? Answer: It got built by cleared contractors who knew not to reveal the name or details to anyone not appropriately cleared. Similar contractors -- probably the same ones -- would be (and probably were) used to maintain it.
I'm going to play devil's advocate for a moment here.
The premise is that a government's purpose should be to further the well-being of the people it represents. Correct? Now comes the cincher: How can we be sure that the government's openness is good for that?
I base my argument on Scott Adams' theory that we're all idiots. Politics is a very convoluted field and to be able to recognize what must, should and can be done requires significant time and effort. Would the average citizen do it? (From my personal perspective, the election of GWB settles this issue.) The principle is the same as it was in Athenian times: In order to work, governmental openness and the power of the people both require that the people have a grasp of the situation and the feasible choices of action. To use a very bad metaphor, give the people pulling your cart too much power over choosing the route or the pulling methods and you end up with a great big wreck.
Of course, secretiveness weakens the people's trust in their government, which goes against the government's goal. Educate the pullers to be proficient on the things you give them power over, and things go fine. If they don't like the destination, they might stop pulling altogether. What the government should be doing is not necessarily any indication of what it is doing. It goes without saying that there's no perfect solution, and the more I think about this matter the more it starts to resemble tap-dancing on quicksand.
Kizor
>those people killed by Ossama kealed over at those
>terrorists demands and I not have have shown such.
I know you are speaking of the people that sat-through the airplane Hijackings. It's the various other countries that don't have the option to sit through a air-heist is what makes your thoughts seem impractical. You have some brazen balls, though; and I and the Soviet Overlords don't thankyou for that.
You only have to do a Google search for "Death to USA" or some such to supercede Carnivore.
or are you just dense?
the poster was suggesting that the secretive way that the gubbernment spys on people before they do anything to merit being treated like criminals ["foes"] leads to resentment which manifests itself in a rebellious attitude.
you must've had a rather unusual childhood, to not understand such a simple concept. most people deal with this during adolescence.
Why Did The FBI Retire Carnivore? Because at the time, the FBI didn't think support would be dropped on its backbone OS, Windows NT 4.
What you mean is you *can't* come up with a reasoned response because GP is absolutely correct. You need to get past this incredibly naiive "if you've done nothing wrong you've nothing to worry about", not least because it is demonstrably untrue. Pointing out that power gets abused is not some wild claim - *we have the evidence*. Only an idiot can be wilfully blind to this.
My experience with the government and observation of technology trends in war machines over the last 15 years I'm only 30y/o ... has been when one technology goes away, its need does not ... so you simply just dont see the new stuff until its already in service for like 5 years.
Mostly the trend is in the avionics industry. A prime example of this is the stealth technology that would up on the door steps of a couple of major wars in the last 10-15 years - the F117-A/B. There was a release of a couple of planes from active service at that time, that seem strange, but served as a key to what would become a very public display of technology in 1991. BTW, the F117 at that point had already served 5 years in active service.
Another example is the SR-71 Blackbird sky plane that NASA uses, after its retirement from the Air Force a couple years back. It was built in 1963 or around then. Do you HONESTLY think that the US would drop production of this plane that flies in excess of Mach 3!! just because? No. I imagine that Lockheed Martin has another plane coming out of their Skunkworks that runs about 4-5 in Mach and does sub-space flight, with ALL the goodies ... replacing conventional technology of the modern day like the SR-71. ie. the Aurora guesses.
Either way, Echelon simply didn't get retired. That's what they WANT you to think. The government simply has something already in place that media (and us - general public) don't know about. Anyways .. not like I WANT to know what's reading my email. Probably would scare the shit out of me.
I presume that you believe there are threats out there (i.e. Osama), and if so, I presume that you want such threats stamped-out (i.e. Saddam)
I must be dense, I don't understand your logic. Could you please explain further how you get from the one case to the other? I thought everyone now agreed, neocon cabal included (albeit grudgingly), that Saddam had nothing to do with 9/11 and nothing to do with Al-Qaeda; that indeed, the deeply religious Bin Laden and the secular Saddam were, in fact, enemies? And that Bin Laden is actually *glad* that Saddam was toppled? Or are you perhaps saying that if the intelligence agencies had greater powers, they wouldn't have made the colossal error of believing Saddam was a threat when he really wasn't?*
* Except, of course, that this isn't what actually happened. The intel. agencies were quite clear in their appraisals of the "threat" from Saddam (ie that he was not at all), but this was not what the neocons wanted to hear, so they set up their own "intelligence" unit that gave them the answers they *did* want to hear. And started a war based on lies
The last couple years of his administration, Clinton realized that terrorism, especially the threat from Bin Laden, was going to be the main problem for the US in the future. Meanwhile, at the time, Republicans claimed Clinton was just trying to "distract" from the Lewinsky scandal and that he was "paying too much attention" to Bin Laden.
There were several programs he put into place that Bush discontinued when he came into office. For example, Clinton stationed ships close to Afghanistan so that a missile strike could nail OBL within minutes. (the training camp strike in 1998 missed OBL by about 15 minutes, IIRC) Bush removed the ships. There was also a training program to have a Pakistani team go into Afghanistan to get OBL. Bush discontinued the program.
Clinton didn't do *enough* to combat terrorism but at least he realized it was a problem. Bush didn't do *anything*. Hell, he did worse than nothing because he dismantled existing efforts.
They scrapped it because the functionality they needed is essentially built into Windows XP (ever wondered why DoJ settled with Microsoft so fast?) and other vendors products.
If you're going to tell people to RTFA, you should read the full article yourself. Orin's point is that the FBI is retiring Carnivore because it's no longer necessary from a technical point of view.
In the late '90s, the FBI was relying upon commercially available packet sniffers (dubbed Omnivore by the Bureau) for electronic surveillance. They found the products available at the time insufficient for the job -- the official explanation is they didn't allow fine enough filtration to protect privacy, but if you wish to read more nefarious reasons into it, it doesn't make much difference -- so the Bureau created their own system called Carnivore. But that was over half a decade ago, and the publically available programs have finally caught up to FBI specs.
The truth is, you can probably download a packet sniffer off Sourceforge that's more powerful than the dread Carnivore. And that's probably what the FBI's doing now.
Les Miserables Volume 1 now up with my reading of
oh your right, we should leave saddam and every other bad guy in power.
I assume you're using sarcasm and in fact believe that the US *should* be in the business of removing bad guys from power? In which case, who would you suggest should be next on the list? What would you say are the bad guy qualities that make a nation ripe for regime change? A regime that imprisons, tortures and kills people without any kind of legal process, perhaps? That represses dissenters and discriminates against groups of its own people on the basis of ethnicity, gender or political alignment? Military dictators that seize power and steadfastly refuse to permit any moves towards democracy? Maybe nations that invade and occupy the territory of others? Or governments that sponsor terrorist activities?
I'm working on my list - maybe we can compare notes a little later?
The govn't doesnt let something like Carnivore die. Its just obsolete. The new system is most likey more powerful, intrusive, and much less obvious.
It is better to be the hammer than the anvil.
How are you doing with your list? So far I have:
Saudi Arabia
Pakistan
Israel
There's likely lots more candidates, but this a good start on the worst offenders, dontchya think?
"Those with secrets to hide are likely to already use a wide range of evasion and encryption techniques."
It is my opinion that those nations or organizations with secrets to hide other than highly developed nations would use a wide range of low tech solutions to counter high tech evasion and encryption. Even highly developed nations have resorted to low tech espionage and evasion techinques when applicable.
Its less about technique and more about application of technique and timing that keeps your enemy guessing and good strategy is a mix of all applicable techinques at random times. What I really love is the Orwellian doublethink that was just perpetrated on all of Slashdotdom. You all have been snookered I am sure.
"Carnivore" may have been unplugged but does that really mean that Carnivorous activity has ceased. Don't be fooled and sleep well knowing your evil government is working day and night for your right to bitch and moan!
Put the mouse and keyboard away, turn off the monitor and go kiss a girl!
Its the Way of Slashdot (TM)
I can't recall an interesting truth I've ever posted on here that didn't get modded -1 Troll
The line near the end where Brian Cox is standing in front of the budgetary commitee probably describes exactly what happened but I can't find it anywhere!
Don't believe anything the FBI says. Really, do you think they'd retire something like this without a much more capable and invasive replacement?
For the record - 99.9% officers from the inteligence community take a very hard line stance with "illicit porn" and the desginate OCA's usually sign OCA release paperwork to share the the information with law enforcement of the appropriate jurisdiction. You just hear the "federal agents raided..." part on the news - when in a large number of cases it was a tip from the CIA/NSA/FSS/SVR etc.
Maybe attacking hitler was a bad thing to.
If you recall no one attacked Hitler. He was the aggressor. Hitler was activly trying to take over Europe and racially 'purify' it. There's a hell of a difference between that and Saddam.
Fighting Hitler was something called "defense".
What a mistake it was going to WWII
The US didn't go into WWII even after Hitler invaded Poland. It took the Japanese bombing of Pearl Harbor to get us involved. And seeing as the Japanese were allied with the Nazis, and we were allied with those they were fighting, we got involved in the European theatre as well.
Saddam's tanks posed a treat to the US?!? [rolls eyes]
You may have a little understanding of history, but the emphasis is on "little". Saddam didn't invade "the Middle East". His forces may have been within Iranian territory at times during the Iran-Iraq war (but it should be noted that he was a friend of the West at the time; indeed he had backing and assistance from the US, both during the war and during the now infamous chemical attack at Halabja). That leaves Kuwait as the only "sovereign territory" that Saddam "invaded". It should be noted that Saddam had tacit approval from the US in what was, to the Iraqis, a border dispute; he was genuinely surprised when the Bush snr reneged and launched the first gulf war.
Maybe I'm just paranoid and pissed off about stuff.
And what the hell - I left the country anyway. Not that I think that Australia is a lot better, at least it's not so in your face. And as an expat, I at least have plausible deniability
AC = Almost Competent
You have to be shitting me. Do you really believe the US Government would spend money because it was getting TOO MUCH information?
The truth is, you can probably download a packet sniffer off Sourceforge that's more powerful than the dread Carnivore. And that's probably what the FBI's doing now.
No, the FBI now demands what they want from ISP's who collect and sort all the information for marketing purposes. Thanks to the Patriot ACT they no longer need court orders. It's now easier than ever to get wiretaps and snoop on US Citizens. There ARE more than ever and it's getting worse.
If my Government wants to respect my privacy, they can stop their own and other's snooping. What happened to the principle of an inviolable post? My communications, snail, phone, email and others should be private, damn it. I resent my government spending my money to tap into it and I resent the collection of such information by fools who think it's worth money. Such efforts, like ticket sorting are a waste of everyone's time and money. When it's collected, it's done at your cost and you only pay it only when there's no reasonable alternative to the service you need and the cost can be pushed onto you. That, or you're dealing with the wrong people.
Friends don't help friends install M$ junk.
Allegedly, the name "Carnivore" came because it was based upon a commercial filter called "Omnivore", but Carnivore filtered more effectively to only get the "meat", meaning relevant information. Given the fears that the FBI has products that arbitrarily sniff email looking for people to investigate, I propse the following filter packages:
Atkins: contains the relevant material found by Carnivore, but also chooses select material not relavant to the investigation that may be of interest.
Vegetarian: skips all of the material relevant to the investigation and returns everything else
Vegan: returns only material expressly irrelevant for investigation, especially emails including lot's of l33t text and rants about porn and warez sites.
And, yes, I did work on one of them.
Also, it is extremely expensive.
"Avoid employing unlucky people - throw half of the pile of CVs in the bin without reading them." -- David Brent