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US Mounted 231 Offensive Cyber-operations In 2011, Runs Worldwide Botnet
An anonymous reader sends this news from the Washington Post:
"U.S. intelligence services carried out 231 offensive cyber-operations in 2011, the leading edge of a clandestine campaign that embraces the Internet as a theater of spying, sabotage and war, according to top-secret documents [from Edward Snowden]. Additionally, under an extensive effort code-named GENIE, U.S. computer specialists break into foreign networks so that they can be put under surreptitious U.S. control. Budget documents say the $652 million project has placed 'covert implants,' sophisticated malware transmitted from far away, in computers, routers and firewalls on tens of thousands of machines every year, with plans to expand those numbers into the millions. ... The implants that [an NSA group called Tailored Access Operations (TAO)] creates are intended to persist through software and equipment upgrades, to copy stored data, 'harvest' communications and tunnel into other connected networks. This year TAO is working on implants that “can identify select voice conversations of interest within a target network and exfiltrate select cuts,” or excerpts, according to one budget document. In some cases, a single compromised device opens the door to hundreds or thousands of others."
Yeah. And to think that they can't secure their own networks, hence that Snowden got this out.
Sometimes I wonder if the NSA planted some or all of this stuff to impress the hell out of the world and strike fear into the hearts of the Opposition. I mean, this is straight out of a Sci-Fi plot: Homer Simpsonvich brings one infected iPod into his FSB headquarters, and soon the whole goddamned place is full of programs that are listening in on anything in sight, autonomously making cuts to exfiltrate back to Ft. Meade, copying anything that looks interesting, and surviving whatever the Opponents do to the host machines.
Securing a network is always harder than attacking a network and you can never fully understand a person's intentions when you grant them access. I'm sure a small part of what they publish is a psyop of some kind but for the most part, yes, sci-fi is reality. We are not the only ones doing it and we may not even be the best.
When you start to consider everyone who is "operating" on the Internet, things get really scary, really quick. The new cold war will be one of constant paranoia of an attack that can influence a piece of critical infrastructure. There have been small rumored instances but until the Hiroshima of the online world happens, it will be a constant game of shadows and you never, ever, fully know or understand an operator's capabilities.
Sci-fi, indeed.
"Network penetration is network engineering, in reverse."
Personally, I take comfort in knowing that this will only be used against foreigner's computers, since I am a US citizen. Just like how we were assured the collection of phone data only applied to foreigners. Damn it, why does my CPU usage keep spiking?