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Have a Privacy-Invasion Wishlist? Peruse NSA's Top Secret Catalog
An anonymous reader writes with a link to Der Spiegel, which describes a Top-Secret spy-agency catalog which reveals that the NSA "has been secretly back dooring equipment from US companies including Dell, Cisco, Juniper, IBM, Western Digital, Seagate, Maxtor and more, risking enormous damage to US tech sector." Der Spiegel also has a wider ranging article about the agency's Tailored Access Operations unit.
The NSA has been "secretly back-dooring" the American people for years.
The NSA will achieve the opposite for the USA, not more security but less, with the rest of the world now keen to do their own thing, the NSA are a loose cannon on a rolling ship.
Huawei and Samsung are US companies? Because if you read the article these things are not limited to US companies despite the implication of the summary.
If you actually go to the referenced article and read it you will see that these are exploits, not backdoors, and they apply to equipment from non-US manufacturers as well as from US manufacturers, for example Samsung and Huawei.
Good job slashdot. NOT. A nice raspberry for Der Spiegel too.
I was working for a software company specializing in network security back in the post 2001 period. I recall that we had more than a few discussions with the unskilled egomaniac in charge of the marketing of that firm that many competitors were using their Canadian branch office addresses 'front and centre' in their marketing to the European market.
Why? Because one doesn't always want to be perceived as an American.
The myth of Americans with Canadian flag stickers on their passports is not completely false.
Well, he was horrified at the notion. In fact, if you want to see how existential angst can be suddenly manifest in someone's behaviour in an unexpected setting, try this. I expect that we'll see more of the same in the next year. Ultimately, countries will roll their own code, and have their own Silicon Valleys because of the national security issue. A few years ago I remember seeing an ad from I believe a Swedish firm selling routers and switches that were 'designed and built' in Europe with each unit only delivered to a physical address in Europe. Does anyone else remember this outfit?
---- The above post was generated by the Turing Institute. Maybe.
I'm surprised you couldn't come up with at least some possibilities on your own, K. S. Kyosuke. I always thought that you were a smart cookie.
One obvious one is that the disk's firmware is updated to detect and modify critical Windows executables, DLLs or drivers with some additional code to send out information to remote servers once a network connection is detected, or perhaps to introduce flaws that can be exploited easily. The same could be done for Linux kernel binaries or modules, too, of course.
Another pretty obvious one is that the disk's firmware alters log files to remove any traces of intrusions, making it appear as though no intrusion has occurred.
I'm sure there are many, many other ways that I haven't thought of.
Looks like this is a loud and clear call for more intensive open source BIOS development.
Don't think for a second that these back-doors that companies put in at the behest of the NSA aren't also being used to the benefit of those companies.
So, if the NSA were shuttered tomorrow, what makes you think those back-doors are going to go away? How much is it worth to those tech companies to know exactly what their customers are doing? How much is it worth to their institutional shareholders?
See, the ugliest part of this is that it's a two-headed monster. Fight one head and the other one will come around and bite you. Both government and corporations have come to believe that they are beyond our reach, above reproach and entitled to everything you have.
You are welcome on my lawn.
Unfortunately I don't have the skill set and there doesn't seem to be any other way to support them.
If you have a machine that supports it, Coreboot could be a very interesting solution.
Learning HOW to think is more important than learning WHAT to think.
Didn't say the summary was wrong. What it said was perfectly correct, but leaving out the fact that the article didn't just talk about US companies made it misleading.
So all those shows we have mocked, like 24, csi, etc, because their tech "hacks the firewall" in 15 seconds were actually accurate? Crap. That changes some things..
What are we going to do tonight Brain?
I'm not sure if the NSA seeking to exploit technology is particularly damaging to US firms. The NSA is seeking to exploit all technologies, not just American-based ones.
I think the part that does damage American firms, was the end of the second article. It read that the NSA has been redirecting the shipping of some computers to their address, installing software or hardware, repacking the device, and shipping it to the purchaser.
Well, if you put it that way... it certainly sounds easier to just let the government keep fucking me up the ass.
By now I'm used to it. And your way sounds like work. Yuck.
naive. if US is doing this, then Chinese and Russians are doing it too.
The rest of the world does not go around shouting how they are the land of the free and that they are the world police that will bring said freedom to others. (By force other any other means.)
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
It can do any number of things, but they have to be pre-arranged, as the disk cannot access main memory. It can, for example, inject code into the boot-loader or compromise known executables. The firmware compromise is not really necessary, but it can help disguising things. For example, with a firmware compromise you can do things like boot-code compromise only if the power went up less than a minute ago or if there was a reset shortly before. Then anybody reading the bootloader to verify it will not see the compromise. A BIOS-attack would be doing something similar, but without the possibility to hide so easily. (If these things become widespread, I will start to verify my BIOS regularly with an SPI adapter. No way to hide from that.
Full disk encryption with boot from a non-writable medium (kernel and initrd on CD in a non-burner drive, for example) will neutralize a compromised disk firmware pretty effectively or alternatively protect the boot-loader against manipulation. Of course "they" could then try to compromise the CD drive...
Still, the NSA is not magic. They do not even have the best hackers, just those with the biggest egos ans smallest morals. These tend to be rather mediocre. No, the problem is that PC security sucks badly and that you can break into almost any standard installation if you throw enough money at the problem. My guess would be that even a restrictive firewall configuration on a Linux firewall keeps them out reliably. Of course, if you use Windows, they can just get past that with the update mechanism and with active help from Microsoft...
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
TFA does not give a link to this so-called catalog. Does anyone here have the link?
SELinux is not under suspicion. Putting backdoors in it would be glaringly obvious to anybody halfway competent doing an analysis, as it is just an access control layer and hence rather simple. Being hard to find is a critical characteristic of any professionally placed backdoor, and hence a backdoor in SELinux is very unlikely. You are barking up the wrong tree.
Most ACs are not even worth the keystrokes to insult them. Be generically insulted by this and ignored otherwise.
It is not the Spiegel that wrote the slashdot summary, it is the Spiegel that wrote the article that includes the non-American companies, and the American Slashdot that only included American companies. So how about rethinking your comment?
You sure this isn't an Apple feature called "power nap", the system wakes up and downloads updates, checks for new email etc, then goes back to sleep.
http://spamdecoy.net - free throwaway anonymous email - avoid spam!
fortunately I just turn off the wifi when I put the machine to sleep. it still does it, but at least I know it isn't sending anything to anyone.
And you are 'turning off' the wifi exactly how? Disconnecting the antenna, or trusting the software switch? (as opposed to a hardware switch interrupting the power or antenna, wouldn't that be a nice feature...)
"loose cannon"? Bullshit.
Don't you think for one damn minute that the NSA is "off the ranch" with their programs. They were implemented at the behest of our beloved and benevolent leaders.
The "justice" branch (haha) just declared everything is just fine after all. The executive branch and legislative branch has already said time and time again that the NSA is doing useful and important work.
What really chaps my ass, is not that the government tells people these programs are for the so-called "war on terror" or that certainly, the government would never use it against non-terrorist, but the that nearly every poll indicates that most 'mericans fucking believe them!
I know they have done their best over the last 40 years to indoctrinate kids starting in kindergartener, but it is sad that so many folks just close their eyes and refuse to ask hard questions.
Think about it...forcing children to pledge allegiance to a government... It is fucking crazy. We are brainwashed never to question our masters, and it is working. Fuck, look at the shit your facebook friends post! That is a representation of America.
Disclosure, I feel I have the right to bitch. I did my 4 years in the services and about half that was in the shitty hotspots of the world keeping and eye on brown people.
Much of the US-branded kit is fabbed and manufactured in China, yes. Occasionally ipods (iphones?) ship with MS Windows viruses because of this. However, that was sloppiness rather than malice.
The reason I'd be interested in a Loongson Lemote box is that it does have a remarkably open design at almost all levels. You could create your own version of the processor on an FPGA if you so desired. The same isn't true of intel, AMD, NVidia, Freescale, TI, Samsung (or any ARM SoC vendors) etc. I think several generations of Sparc are equally open too, you'd have to check opencores. The layer above the hardware - the BIOS - is also open in Lemote (Loongson) devices. And of course you can run your own (open) OS on top of that. I don't know of any more open device. It's the best way to go if you're Richard Stallman, certainly (it's what he's used and recommended for half a decade). For anyone else, YMMV.
If I was the NSA and I wanted to make sure there was a way to get into a Loongsn device - I'd aim at the AMD chipset that it uses. If you control the flow of all data, you effectively control everything.
Nothing's 100% trustworthy. I like strength through depth though.
I appreciate that this doesn't answer your question particularly well, but it just some closely related thoughts.
Also FatPhil on SoylentNews, id 863
Get a clue, its not just the US/NSA that does this. They are just the ones that are getting beat up in the press.
Yep, it's too bad the NSA doesn't actually protect national security, and is instead just ensuring all the other state sponsored enemy spies can get at more info than a contractor like Snowed did.
Imagine what it would be like if the government wasn't allowed any secrets or wiretaps. Our public policy would be the same policy we actually furthered around the world -- We wouldn't have to worry about diplomats making secret arms deals behind our backs; If such things were actually required to save lives then we'd understand the circumstance. The only reason we can't trust their actions is because secrets mask their motives, even when they are on the up and up.
We have amazing spy satellites launched via the biggest rockets in the world already. They would simply have more funds to split with NASA and be more benefit to actual security, science, disasters relief, while ensuring no force can make a move against us without us knowing instantly. They could even map submarines from space with ground/water penetrating radar. Better space collaboration would ensure decommissioned tech helps the space exploration initiative. No spies can threaten a government without secrets.
If the NSA were actually protecting the national security of America then they could be tasked with finding all the backdoors in the hardware and software. No one could put backdoors in for fear the NSA would find out, publish it, and ruin their business. Today they stay silent and let the public purchase systems the NSA likely knows have been compromised by enemy spies -- This saves the NSA time: They can just use the existing backdoor instead of put their own in. If the NSA weren't allowed secrets, they'd be eliminating exploits instead of leveraging them and our hardware, firmware, and OS's would be more secure. Eventually other governments would have to start up their own programs of outing intentional exploits just to ensure their people they weren't compromising public security. In addition to the Space Race, we'd have a Privacy Race, where competition would be in building the most secure systems. Public and private sector security experts could be assisted with new tools to show where flaws lie. Security would be a selling point and methods of provable security would be devised (I have done so myself on small scales). Computers and programs have finite state, so provable security is not impossible: Instead of spying the data centers and supercomputers could be tasked with hardening all the hardware and software. People would buy the USA security endorsed systems with pride. We'd have less identity fraud -- one of the most prevalent crimes. Conspiracies could be silenced through truth not ignorance. If we outlawed government secrets and required scientific evidence that their programs were helpful not harmful then we could trust our governments more than any citizens ever could before.
Sadly, we're too primitive and politically oppressed to apply the simple Scientific Method to governance. None can have assured trust or security from prying eyes because we allow the government to have secrets. That the priority of secrets is valued above security by the spies is obvious and evidenced by the way they compromise security and do not inform the world that we are buying insecure products. They risk spies accessing more than Snowden ever dreamed due to the priority they place on secrecy over security in their digital spying programs. These secret programs aren't getting beat up nearly as bad as they should be in the p