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Belgian Home Affairs Minister: Terrorists Communicate Via PlayStation 4 (qz.com)
bricko writes with story at Quartz reporting the words of Belgium's home affairs minister Jan Jambon, who says that ISIL operators communicate using their PlayStation 4s; "which allows terrorists to communicate with each other and is difficult for the authorities to monitor. 'PlayStation 4 is even more difficult to keep track of than WhatsApp,' he said. The gaming console also was implicated in ISIL's plans back in June, when an Austrian teen was arrested for downloading bomb plans to his PS4." This seems a strange place to concentrate investigators' energies; terrrorists could be communicating in the chat session on the side of many social media games, too, or by any number of other means; Jambon would do well to read through some of the movie plotlines that Bruce Schneier has gathered.
We should ban all communication devices that terrorists might use, including pigeons
same can be said for cops shooting people, or colleges "not acting" in relation to race. or (insert other buzz worthy topics of the day)
have you seen my sig? there are many others like it but none that are the same
Either this information is false, or the Belgian minister is an idiot. If we can track them on a single platform, it would be dumb to let them know, because they will move somewhere else. It would also be dumb to tell them that it is hard for authorities to monitor if that was actually true. So I assume this is all false information disseminated as a deception.
Ban all telephones, because if we don't, terrorists might kill us.
Jews did WTC and Paris.
9/11 was an inside job (mossad)
catpcha: robbery
They're too stupid to play video games. Too stupid to play video games.
Which is why I'm glad Clinton has worked so hard to protect video games.
The minister gave no source for this conclusion or any information, really -- or at least Quartz didn't report any). As it is, he's speaking out his pie-hole.
With all the spying on its citizens, the governments are still clueless!
Actually, game-chat would probably be a good (for them) way to hide certain types of planning. I'm not saying it's true, but for a modern shooter or perhaps FPS, they could simply substitute "game" targets for real-life ones, and otherwise the conversation might sound much you would hear in some games.
OK, so sneak your infiltrator into the enemy Science Centre. There will be about 3 guards in positions X, Y, and Z. Group B will take them out, then you delivery the package by 14:00. Meanwhile group C enter the mass relay by 13:50, and take out all present. Group A will attempt to take out enemy power infrastructure and cause confusion at 13:30.
Maybe some of it would sound like weird BS, but would *you* suspect that some of the weird guys in CoD were actually plotting nefarious things in real life? Some of the shit that trolls said might be a good cover too, as most sane people either mute them or just ignore it. As a mid-level gamer I'm not sure I could tell the difference between a real-life nutball and the online nutball variety.
Terrorists have attacked again. Drop your freedoms and bend over.
Don't waste your vote! Vote for whoever you want, unless you live in a swing state it won't matter anyways
You're far more likely to die by slipping in your bathtub.
That's because your bathtub is designed by terrorists
“He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
Belgium simply doesn't have enough manpower to monitor all potential jihadists. It has the largest number of muslim citizens to go fight in Syria per capita out there. I imagine you could automate most of the monitoring of chats etc online, but when you need to monitor group audio sessions with dozens of participants in a pool of maybe millions of gamers. How do you manage something like that ?
Why would any sane terrorist use any sort of service run by someone else? That just makes them vulnerable. Any sort of PC, install Linux and set up their own private XMPP server, instant fully-encrypted communications without leaving any logs or other traces on anyone else's systems where the authorities could get access to them. And with the authorities' current focus on social media it adds the additional layer of security of not being where anyone's looking for them to be. Geesh, I think government officials have been reading too many best-seller spy novels and listening to too few tech geeks.
Communicating plans to commit evil deeds isnt the problem, its actually carrying them out that is the problem. In fact the more people these extremists communicate with about there plans the more likely someone will be able to talk them out of it.
But i guess the politicians will bring in more extreme laws in an effort to make people free of extremists....
N/T
by TheSpoom (715771) Uncaring Linux user here. I have nothing to add to this but please continue. *munches popcorn*
Is there an actual embargo on the video games? During the 1990s there was some concern with Iraq getting hold of a bunch of PS2s (I think they were) and clustering them together to make a supercomputer. I imagine the fears were unfounded but I seem to recall they'd actually ordered a whole ton of them and had them shipped to their country.
"So long and thanks for all the fish."
She should have spent more time protecting her email server... Oh wait, then she wouldn't have a convenient excuse for when the Feds caught her commuting treason.
If Snowden and Bradley Manning (no way I'm calling him a she) are traitors, then Hitlery is certainly one, and by far the worst traitor of the three.
among the last 9 stories only 1 is about terrorism. try new glasses maybe?
Slashdot, fix the reply notifications... You won't get away with it...
You seem to have forgotten that the Internet spans the entire world. And that many /. readers are not from the USA.
while I agree that the news coverage on the subject is often a bit excessive in some regards I strongly disagree with your apparent position that the 127 people who died in France yesterday and the hundreds of others who die every month elsewhere in the world don't matter because they are not American.
and FYI I am an American, I just have a broader world view than you have demonstrated.
If you have point to point communication, traffic analysis can easily detect the participants of a network. If you have a central server with lots of uninvolved people, you either need to get the information from the server or rely on timing analysis. The timing is useless with asynchronous communication and can be obfuscated by introducing delays.
You're an inhuman little douchepot. You don't give a damn about terrorisim unless it involves the death of Americans? #frenchlivesdon'tmatter #britishlivesdon'tmatter #onlyamericanlivesmatter #i'mafuckingxenophobewhocaresfornooneoutsidemycozylittleworld #jewishlivesdon'tmatter #ragheadlivesdon'tmatter #onlydouchebagslikemematter
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
Within hours after the attacks in Paris, Belgium raided multiple sites, and arrested a number of suspected accomplices.
They have the ability to monitor, what they lack is the balls to act on their intelligence. Better to wait until an attack goes down, then arrest the conspirators, than to use the intelligence proactively.
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
That's dumb. If I don't listen the first time, I won't hear you the second time. Around about the third time, I'm thinking about putting a primer on the old reliable muzzle loader, and blasting away at the broken record. *
* You younger puppies ** probably don't remember vinyl records, which would sometimes crack, then send the needle into a repetitive loop in one groove.
** I love sadpuppies and rabidpuppies
"Windows is like the faint smell of piss in a subway: it's there, and there's nothing you can do about it." - Charlie Br
That's a bit ignorant. In many parts of the world terrorism is responsible for thousands of deaths every year. The best way to find your country in a similar situation is to ignore what is going on around you.
Also, slipping in your bathtub is preventable. Finding oneself in the middle of a terrorist attack is not. Deaths by terrorist tend to be painful and slow, which is a far worse fate than dying by slipping in your bathtub.
Why is such crap even given airplay?
As a European, thank you.
can we get 1 article not about terrorism? Something like 30 Americans have died from terrorism in the past 5 years. You're far more likely to die by slipping in your bathtub. The news coverage on terrorism is INSANELY blown out of proportion. I'd be fine not seeing another one for the rest of this decade.
At least this article has a technical angle, albeit a strange one. Throughout history entities have sought to keep their communications secret. At times obscurity was the order of the day, at other times cryptography was the method of choice, and sometimes a combination of the two are used.
Now that it's pointed out I'm not all that surprised that this kind of Internet-based medium would be used; it's specialized enough to be easily overlooked and given the nature of what's said on gaming systems during gameplay that there might not be much desire on the part of the operator of the proprietary system to monitor or even log communications. Of course, a downside, playing devil's advocate, is that if the operator of the system is logging, even if only to be able to address abuse after the fact, they might be able to comb through communications and uncover the participants, their IP addresses and possibly a degree of geolocation, plus any discussed plots including those that might not have been carried-out.
One of the things that kind of bothers me is that in this era of so much spying, including the very likely state of warrantless surveillance, that we've had high profile examples where that questionable system has failed. We had a fake expert on terrorism that lied about his credentials for many years. We've had cases of American domestic terrorism and mass-shootings that were publicized in advance by the shooters that were not uncovered or stopped. We've had cases of international terrorism in Western nations that were not uncovered. Clearly this spying is not only questionable in its legitimacy, but it's not even effective. Proponents can't claim that all of this spying on us, all of this expense and the chilling effects of known surveillance aren't even making us safer, so it's a net-negative.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
You prefer 3D printing and uber?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
You should be up-voted for being highly insightful. Sorry, I have no mod points to help.
They've already revved up the "this is because snowden told them how to avoid being watched by us" rhetoric.
and I'm sure France's next version of the patriot act is days away from being enacted. they just happened to have the legislation ready to go.
Sleep your way to a whiter smile...date a dentist!
Considering God, Jahwe and Allah are all names for the same deity, yes, the two are indeed equivalent.
it's in my head
This makes complete sense. It's kind of a steganography, putting their data in where it can't be separated out easily or flagged because it blends in with the rest of it.
>Anyhoo, France already sent their aircraft carrier east. Now there will be even more resolve to roll ISIS up.
You mean more Western bombs falling in the Middle East? How else can we a actively fund their recruiting efforts?
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SHALL WE PLAY A GAME?
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My God, it's Full of Source!
OUTSIDE_IP=$(dig +short my.ip @outsideip.net)
Yeah, because outlawing encryption and total surveillance of communication already did such a wonderful job we have to up the ante now.
How, I'd ask?
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
Have we found a way to tack yet another shooting on games. I'm impressed, I thought you couldn't steer this one towards the bad, evil games of murder, but leave it to our politicians to find a way.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
From the 80s though. Got into management and politics after awhile.
"For the love of god, can we get 1 article not about terrorism?"
The terrorism _was_ for the love of god.
4) Could there be bitcoin on other planets, and is it being used to fund a replacement for systemd? If so what are the implications for you, the hard-working CIO?
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
And as a Canadian I apologize for the point of view of the parent Anonymous Coward, which is too USA-centric.
I don't think "NOT PLAYING" is a valid option here. This is not two nuclear superpowers fighting each other, this is nuclear-capable countries fighting individual terrorists cells all over the place, hidden in the population.
IMHO the mass surveillance is just to line someone's pockets. It doesn't work, nobody is listening before or after the facts. They might find how they communicated but unless Facebook or Google kept track of it, the government sure as hell didn't or can't find it.
So it is basically a method of siphoning tax money towards companies and developers and since nobody cares or is listening it doesn't matter to our 'rights' whether or not they do it.
Custom electronics and digital signage for your business: www.evcircuits.com
It had to be later than the 90's because the PS2 didn't come out until 2000. That said I think the USAF did cluster a bunch of PS2's together for some reason, although now I can't find a reference to that. In 2010 the USAF did make a PS3 cluster for analyzing satellite imagery.
Indeed. The French have perfected a method for reducing - or even totally avoiding - this risk.
According to the Australians, the Brits aren't far behind.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
tl;dr
People die, therefore doctors are useless. Crimes happen, therefore police are useless. People post illogical fallacious crap on the internet, therefore whoever taught you logic is useless.
Confucius say, "Find worm in apple - bad. Find half a worm - worse."
The actual stated concern was that they would somehow be able to use the gpu as guided missile components.
This Belgian minister is unfortunately not a stupid idiot. He just has a different goal than we do: this isn't about catching terrorists but about trying to drum up support for increased government surveillance.
Then luckily it's all in Belgium. A country where government and regulation seem optional, to the point that the country essentially did without a government for almost 2 years at one point in time.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
We need to take any and all actions reasonable to ensure that those in power remain rightfully fearful of the governed masses.
Or you know, you could begin by not giving that much power to the government.
There's this small thing called "direct democracy" (= where it is the actual people who have the final say on everything. Not some representatives, but the general population). You should try it sometimes.
Oh, and please no dummy complaints that "it only works in very small territories". Come on. It's 2015. We're in the Internet Age.
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]
"Something like 30 Americans have died from terrorism in the past 5 years. You're far more likely to die by slipping in your bathtub. The news coverage on terrorism is INSANELY blown out of proportion. I'd be fine not seeing another one for the rest of this decade."
So how do you breathe under all that sand?
Any open society can be penetrated by terrorists. Making western countries work like the terrorists' own hellholes is not a solution. You have to blast the terrorists at home and take away their funding sources for international operations. In this case that would mean carpeting ISIS territory with fuel-air bombs and sacking Saudi Arabia. It's the only way to be sure.
More like, homeopathic doctors are useless, so we should stop paying homeopathic doctors and use a different approach so that less people die. Like, police that do not leave the major artery roads are useless at helping reduce crime in neighborhoods, better re-evaluate how the police operate to help reduce crime.
Do not look into laser with remaining eye.
* You younger puppies ** probably don't remember vinyl records, which would sometimes scratch, then fail to move the needle from one groove.
Who doesn't remember vinyl?
And whats the odds of being forced into an style of life you don't wish for yourself in the next 10 years or so?
First, he didn't say it was useless, but to address your logic argument: if doctors just collected medical knowledge, but never helped helped anyone, then I'd consider them useless. If police logged all crime in a big data center but did nothing to stop it, then I'd consider them useless. Same for mass surveillance. If you collect terabytes of crap in a big data warehouse, but can only find information that would stop attacks in retrospect, that's useless.
I don't know how useful mass surveillance is, but from what limited information about it I'm allowed to see, we are a lot better at collecting it and storing it than we are on acting on it. Instead of focusing on how many terabytes of data we can vacuum up on our citizens, we should instead focus on the effectiveness of how that data can be used to save lives.
Yep, it did... Japan surrendered.
However, we aren't fighting against a government, or even a fixed piece of land, this time. This war is with hidden combatants, not physically localized in any one area. As much as ISIS (or ISIL, or whatever the hell they are calling themselves) wants to believe, suggest, or force upon the world that they do indeed have a piece of land somewhere under full Islamic State laws (the closes would be Iran, maybe?) they really don't. And it's hard to bomb something to kingdom come that does not exist.
Keeping them out of other countries, and allowing them to only blow themselves and their own relatives up, is what the world really does need to do. They'll peter out at some point in the future. Just keep them the hell out of our countries (ie: Europe, Asia, and the west). Let their own deal with them locally in the Middle East. Those countries are either already going down that path, or are so aligned with the western way of life that they won't put up with the threat against their new, modern lifestyle for long. For that to work, though, we have to keep them contained there, and not allow them to infiltrate our societies.
And that's the really, really hard part... How do you pick out the bad guys from the benign groups? No one has yet figured that out...
Sounds like some police just want an excuse to buy some Playstation 4's just prior to Star Wars battlefront coming out...
"Sorry sarge, we're too busy today 'monitoring' Playstation 4 to do any other work, I'm afraid we'll probably be at it pretty constantly for the immediate future..."
You seem to have forgotten that the Internet spans the entire world. And that many /. readers are not from the USA.
while I agree that the news coverage on the subject is often a bit excessive in some regards I strongly disagree with your apparent position that the 127 people who died in France yesterday and the hundreds of others who die every month elsewhere in the world don't matter because they are not American.
and FYI I am an American, I just have a broader world view than you have demonstrated.
I concur with your views and position on war deaths.
Leslie Satenstein Montreal Quebec Canada
Direct democracy doesnâ(TM)t work at any scale.
The pure direct democracy Switzerland begs to differ.
The United States founding fathers were correct in that the biggest threat to any populace is its own government.
...if this government has power.
If the government's only role is to organise things, and the final say for any decision is taken with democratic vote (ie.: nearly every single law gets voted by the general population before acceptance), the government can't pass any stupid or oppressive law.
(Unless the majority of the population is dumb enough to approve it. That can happen occasionnally. But in a country where the general population is happy - thanks to good welfare and good economy - and educated, it tends to be rare)
When any segment of society looses fundamental rights, no ones rights are safe.
So put all the segments of society in charge, and be done with it.
Or do you prefer to still concentrate all the decision power in a few elect ?
And then have the general population running constantly armed with deadly force in order to be ready to kill any rogue elect (and risking killing each other in the process. a lot)
"Sufficiently advanced satire is indistinguishable from reality." - [Tips: 1DrYakQDKCQ6y52z6QbnkxHXAocMZJE61o ]