Does Wiretapping Require Cell Company Cooperation?

decora writes "Recently the dictator of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, accidentally admitted to wiretapping journalist Irina Khalip. Khalip is the wife of Andrei Sannikov, one of the many opposition presidential candidates who was imprisoned after the election in 2010. I am wondering how Lukashenko did this? Can a government tap a modern cellphone system without the company knowing? Or would it require cooperation, like when AT&T and others helped the NSA perform warrantless wiretapping on Americans?"

Comments

Wasn't this the whole point of CALEA?

[Scareduck]

And isn't it the case now that stuff is embedded in all the major telecom hardware makers?

Re:Kinda

[atari2600a]

Keep in mind I'm talking out of my ass here.

GSM, SRSLY?

[Anonymous Coward]

GSM is not the most secure standard out there. Check the video from this presentation for a nice overview of exactly how fucked up GSM security is.
http://events.ccc.de/congress/2009/Fahrplan/events/3654.en.html

Re:Tapping land lines?

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

If you have a gluttonous lust for ghastly, utterly banal, PR-drivelspeak concerning wiretapping, anybody on Cisco's "Lawful Intercept Mediation Device Suppliers" list is excellent reading.

Re:Kinda

[Jafafa Hots]

Actually it turns out the easiest way is simply to tell the corporation you want the information.

That's all it took here in the US and we were ostensibly a dictator-free country with laws against it. So in a country with a dictator, it's a no-brainer.

Look at Cisco/China etc.,

Expecting ethical behavior from a corporation is like a duck expecting a piggyback ride across a lake from an alligator.

Re:Anti-terrorism Laws legal tapping.

[Shotgun]

Ever since the world ended up going hell bent on terrorism laws (New World Order), all wire-tapping is legal with or without a warrant and you do not require any special permissions anymore if you work in law enforcement and a telecoms company need not know either.

The erosion of liberties guaranteed to you in the US Constitution as a result of the War on Terrorism simply pales in comparison to what you've surrendered due to the War on Drugs and the War on Poverty.