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Snowden Used the Linux Distro Designed For Internet Anonymity
Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes: "When Edward Snowden first emailed Glenn Greenwald, he insisted on using email encryption software called PGP for all communications. Now Klint Finley reports that Snowden also used The Amnesic Incognito Live System (Tails) to keep his communications out of the NSA's prying eyes. Tails is a kind of computer-in-a-box using a version of the Linux operating system optimized for anonymity that you install on a DVD or USB drive, boot your computer from and you're pretty close to anonymous on the internet. 'Snowden, Greenwald and their collaborator, documentary film maker Laura Poitras, used it because, by design, Tails doesn't store any data locally,' writes Finley. 'This makes it virtually immune to malicious software, and prevents someone from performing effective forensics on the computer after the fact. That protects both the journalists, and often more importantly, their sources.'
The developers of Tails are, appropriately, anonymous. They're protecting their identities, in part, to help protect the code from government interference. 'The NSA has been pressuring free software projects and developers in various ways,' the group says. But since we don't know who wrote Tails, how do we know it isn't some government plot designed to snare activists or criminals? A couple of ways, actually. One of the Snowden leaks show the NSA complaining about Tails in a Power Point Slide; if it's bad for the NSA, it's safe to say it's good for privacy. And all of the Tails code is open source, so it can be inspected by anyone worried about foul play. 'With Tails,' say the distro developers, 'we provide a tongue and a pen protected by state-of-the-art cryptography to guarantee basic human rights and allow journalists worldwide to work and communicate freely and without fear of reprisal.'"
The developers of Tails are, appropriately, anonymous. They're protecting their identities, in part, to help protect the code from government interference. 'The NSA has been pressuring free software projects and developers in various ways,' the group says. But since we don't know who wrote Tails, how do we know it isn't some government plot designed to snare activists or criminals? A couple of ways, actually. One of the Snowden leaks show the NSA complaining about Tails in a Power Point Slide; if it's bad for the NSA, it's safe to say it's good for privacy. And all of the Tails code is open source, so it can be inspected by anyone worried about foul play. 'With Tails,' say the distro developers, 'we provide a tongue and a pen protected by state-of-the-art cryptography to guarantee basic human rights and allow journalists worldwide to work and communicate freely and without fear of reprisal.'"
What's that? Have any unknown in your life? Just insert the NSA?
Don't have the source code? The NSA must be behind it.
Don't know who spread a worm? Must be the NSA.
Don't know who authored BitCoin? NSA.
Don't know who packaged up TAILS? NSA.
The NSA sent his heavenly son to die for our sins.
May want to keep an eye out in the development community of the OS for a sudden influx of programmers "just wanting to help out." Or existing members suddenly driving new sports cars and acting strange.
SJW's don't eliminate discrimination. They just expropriate it for themselves.
https://tails.boum.org/downloa...
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
The CIA etc notes that its employees 'serve in silence,' surely this team has advanced the cause of freedom and liberty more than them, in silence.
Tails bakes in a routing table that makes all traffic go over Tor. It also has built-in I2P support. So, while ISPs can look at your traffic, it becomes quite a tough nut to crack to figure out what you're actually doing. Attacks are possible, but require exponentially more sophistication and resources than just tracking an IP.
Go on YouTube and listen Jacob Appelbaum's (a Tor developer) videos. Something about NSA agents peering into his girlfriend's window at night and various other intimidation tactics..and that's just him..
Tails doesn't store any data locally,' writes Finley. 'This makes it virtually immune to malicious software, and prevents someone from performing effective forensics on the computer after the fact. That protects both the journalists, and often more importantly, their sources.'
Traffic sniffing does not require files on the target and this is the biggest source of data for agencies like the NSA. It may protect you from key loggers being installed (unless they were inserted ahead of time).
I'm pretty sure that part of Snowden's leaked information showed that exploits are occurring at the hardware level as well as software. Entry points like LOM modules were explicitly called out in the leaked presentations.
I'd agree that forensics becomes extremely difficult, if not impossible (memory analysis can still occur). I don't agree that the systems are immune to malicious software at least in a general sense. Immunity would require a lot of control for the hardware running the OS, and monitoring to make sure things have not been tampered with. Relying on a repository build of an OS imaged is still a target for potential a MITM attack feeding a user a kitted image.
It's all good in my opinion, I'm just being picky about the terminology chosen. Immunity implies absolute safety, and very little in the world is absolute.
-The wise argue that there are few absolutes, the fool argues that there are no probabilities.
Incognito Linux did not impress me. You can be more anonymous using Backtrack.
ah no.
Backtrack is for cracking not staying anonamous.
Tails routes all of your traffic through TOR and keeps you anonymous as long as you don't share anything reveling.
---Saying gnome 3 is better than windows 8 not so much a compliment as it is damning with light praise.
how do we know it isn't some government plot designed to snare activists or criminals? A couple of ways, actually. One of the Snowden leaks show the NSA complaining about Tails in a Power Point Slide
And that, ladies and gentleman, is how you play the Really Long Game.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Well, personally my first thought after reading the summary was "but how do you trust the BIOS?" A few years ago I'd have immediately said that's conspiracy theory and dismissed it (along with the other items you listed). But after a year of exposure to the Snowden and RSA revelations and everything else, it pains me to say these NSA questions aren't so far fetched any more.
Sure they may not be probable but they could be possible. No matter how rational you think you are, it really messes with one's mind. Subtle paranoia, if you will.
That sounds like something the NSA would post.
NSA 'compaining' about tails? Oh, no, please don't throw me in that briar patch!
http://americanfolklore.net/fo...
Snowden would have had a much harder time had he been using legal Microsoft products.
"The average reporter we talk to is 27 years old......They literally know nothing." - Ben Rhodes
The Amnesic Operating System.
Shouldn't it be amnesiac?
Nope - an amnesiac is a noun that refers to a person suffering from amnesia; "amnesic" is an adjective that means "exhibits properties of amnesia," which can apply to more than just the human psyche.
An enigma, wrapped in a riddle, shrouded in bacon and cheese
Unless you compile from vetted source code on an un-compromised system using an un-compromised compiler, etc., you can't be certain the binary they provide is the same as what compiling the source code would provide.
"I believe in Karma. That means I can do bad things to people all day long and I assume they deserve it." : Dogbert
Considering the fact that the NSA is super-secretive and the ongoing joke is it's an acronym for "No Such Organization," short of another Edward Snowden I don't think you can be given the kind of evidence you want. Remember, before Snowden those "paranoid" people like Tor Developers were relegated by folks like you into the land of nutjobs, conspiracy theorists and tinfoil-hat haberdashers. Now look..
No, no, and no. If you were using tails, you wouldn't have been vulnerable to this attack because it enables NoScript by default. Tails' use of security best practices helps protect against zero-day exploits like the FBI's javascript malicious payload.
There's plenty of ways to defeat stylometric analysis, notably, running things through a translation engine several times through a few languages.
Maybe Trucrypt isn't available for linux distros but i am sure there are plenty of alternatives that do a similar full system os encryption.
I can think of one alternative on Linux, it's called Truecrypt with an "e".
Escher was the first MC and Giger invented the HR department.
No, he doesn't. He's referring to the real puppeteers: NSO.
[End Of Line]
Are you able to verify all of the distribution yourself? Are you able to vet the contributors? Are they able to vet each other? Is Tor really safe?
It all comes down to a matter of degree but in the end... Trust No One
I've been seeding the 0.23 version since it came out. Here's the magnet link:
magnet:?xt=urn:btih:B7EE06A2568630EED830CFFBF45B6BFD5DE796D4&dn=tails-i386-0.23&tr=http%3a%2f%2ftorrent.gresille.org%2fannounce
Hail Eris, full of mischief...
E pluribus sanguinem
Really? There haven't been enough scandals yet?
- pressure to backdoor linux - http://www.itworld.com/open-source/383628/linus-father-confirms-nsa-attempt-backdoor-linux
- NSA/GCHQ have power points about trying to attack TOR exit nodes including with DOS attacks
- they hack sys admins
- they are suspected of introducing bugs into code bases (anonymous commit to the linux kernel which had a = instead of == allowing remote code exploit)
- they are known to have inserted hardware backdoors into US chips - most probably Intel and Via.
- they used NIST to cripple encryption and random number generation standards. (They fixed the s-boxes in DES, but they reduced the key length from 64 bits to 54 bits. They lobbied to reduce the number of passes in current crypto systems. The Dual_EC_DRBG is the backdoored random number standard they forced though.)
- They paid $10 million to RSA to set the default to this bad random number generation standard.
- They use porn browsing habits and other information they collect to discredit people they don't like - this includes Americans.
- They launch DoS attack against people they don't like. This includes people in anonymous and file shares using pirate bay. Anyone happening to use the same public IRC servers suffer too.
- They launch "false flag" operations - meaning they do something evil, blame someone else, and use that as an excuse to do the thing they originally wanted to do but couldn't (the equivalent of shooting your own troops, blaming the enemy, and launching a "counter attack").
- Joe Nachio former CEO of Qwest, was invited to Fort Meade and asked to do something blatantly illegal to which he said no. As a result, he lost the government contracts he expected to get, and the government arrested him for insider trading. He served 6 years in prison after being denied the right to defend himself because the programs in question were classified. (And you wonder why other telcos go along with the NSA's "requests")
- Lavabit (secure email provider) was strong armed into closing after they received an NSL to spy on Snowden's email. The form of the NSL required that ALL lavabit customers would be spied on.
These are just off the top of my head! How many demonstrations of evil do you need from those bastards? They are completely out of control.
A manic maniac?
Just physically unplug the hard drive before booting off a live CD? I have to admit, though, that my first reaction was also "Anonymously produced live CD promises to protect your secrets? Sounds legit."
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
Sir! I think we've just identified the Babelfish Bandit!
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
Who are controlled in turn by an even more mysterious organisation: ROUS.
But I doubt they exist.
Rampant carbon sequestration destroyed the Dinosaurs' tropical paradise. I'm here to help repair the damage.
It was not his choice to get stuck there, the US govt pretty much made sure. You know, even getting the Swiss to force down the plane of a president and search it, because he might be on board... really, your comment is unintentionally ironic: the invasion already happened -- that is, your external enemies ain't shit compared to the internal ones you bred yourself -- and it's YOU who is bending over and cheering.