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NYT Quietly Pulls Article Blaming Encryption In Paris Attacks
HughPickens.com writes: Inside Sources reports that the NY Times has quietly pulled a story from its website alleging the attackers used encrypted technology. The original piece, which has since been removed, can be found on the Internet Archive. It stated, "The attackers are believed to have communicated using encryption technology, according to European officials who had been briefed on the investigation but were not authorized to speak publicly. It was not clear whether the encryption was part of widely used communications tools, like WhatsApp, which the authorities have a hard time monitoring, or something more elaborate. Intelligence officials have been pressing for more leeway to counter the growing use of encryption."
A link to the NY Times article now redirects readers to a separate, general article on the attacks, which does not contain the word "encrypt." The Times later posted a second article citing an anonymous "European counterterrorism official" who was quoted saying authorities' "working assumption is that these guys were very security aware," but clarified officials "offered no evidence."
A link to the NY Times article now redirects readers to a separate, general article on the attacks, which does not contain the word "encrypt." The Times later posted a second article citing an anonymous "European counterterrorism official" who was quoted saying authorities' "working assumption is that these guys were very security aware," but clarified officials "offered no evidence."
This is like watching a Hollywood spy movie where they're astounded at how the elite criminals are using Unix!
It's an open question to me whether it's the media that is dumb, the alleged government spokespeople, or somebody is just faking it to bullshit the generally dumb public who doesn't know any better.
Here's a hint how to defeat these terrorists. Go about your daily life as if nothing happened, and don't let the government do anything different.
Then they'll lose and you won't lose either.
do your fucking job. spying on suspects
not hoovering everything from everyone and thinking a search query will give you magic intelligence. intelligence work is *work*
the encryption is not important. your gumshoe work is. get out of your fucking cubicle you lardass and find these dirtbags
and if you can't do that maybe your useless security theatre job should be axed
intellectual property law is philosophically incoherent. it is your moral duty to ignore it or sabotage it
The most shocking thing to me is that our (the US) security agencies seemed to be completely unaware that anything was being planned. No reports of chatter. No outwardly visible concern. Even the President was briefed that ISIS was "contained" and "under control," and he reported as much on national television days before the attack.
This begs the question of where our intelligence agencies are focusing their efforts. Are they really scouring the world for terrorist activity, or are they too busy spying on their own citizens?
We live in dark and scary times when my government knows everyone I call or email, and when, and records all of that communication, but they can't catch wind of a major terrorist attack in its planning stages.
"The attackers are believed to have transported themselves and their weapons using modern automobile technology, including (but not exclusively) internal combustion engines, air-pressurized tires and asphalted roads. They may even have used advanced public transportation technologies".
Speechless.
Are our so-called leaders *that fucking incompetent*?
This sort of 'reporting' is a farce, of which they really ought to be ashamed. Aside from the dubious wisdom of parroting 'unnamed intelligence sources who definitely wouldn't have any reason to be spinning the media after a dramatic and gruesome attack on their watch'; there's a pretty aching gap in even basic critical thinking if you treat 'the working assumption is that the guys were pretty security aware' as some sort of insight.
FFS, any pot dealer who has stayed out of prison for a couple of years would count as 'pretty security aware' in the vacuous "well, we didn't realize that they were up to something until they had already executed it" sense of the term. Of course some degree of care was used in orchestrating a coordinated attack involving a number of people, some of who had had run-ins with the law before. Why would you expect otherwise?
Plus, historical examples suggest that terrorists aren't complete morons about security: Al Qaeda and the Taliban both had a healthy distrust of cellphones, even before we learned what 'dirtboxing' was; and the guys who pulled the Mumbai attacks in 2008 used Blackberries specifically because BBM is way more resistant than SMS. I realize that somebody had a burning need to fill column inches; but what pitiful dreck.
In the USA, "treason" is defined in the Constitution, and has a very narrow meaning. Do keep that in mind when tossing the word about.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
Paris Attacks Renew Call for Access to Encrypted Messages
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/...
And the NYT has a new and extensive story that absolutely "mentions" crypto.
We don't need "backdoors". What we need is a clear acknowledgment that what increasingly exists essentially amounts to a virtual fortress impenetrable by the legal mechanisms of free society, that many of those systems are developed and employed by US companies, and that US adversaries use those systems against the US and our allies, and for a discussion to start from that point.
The US has a clear and compelling interest in strong encryption, and especially in protecting US encryption systems used by our government, our citizens, and people around the world from defeat. But the assumption that the only alternatives are either universal strong encryption, or wholesale and deliberate weakening of encryption systems and/or "backdoors", is a false dichotomy.
The most shocking thing to me is that our (the US) security agencies seemed to be completely unaware that anything was being planned. No reports of chatter. No outwardly visible concern. Even the President was briefed that ISIS was "contained" and "under control," and he reported as much on national television days before the attack.
....
And you believe Obama because????
You don't know what Obama was briefed. He's been openly trying to downplay ISIS for several years - because their existence imperils his "be nice to everyone and everyone will be nice to you" approach to international relations in a way that would make Neville "Peace for our time" Chamberlain proud.
Nowadays encryption becoming the norm. Most sites use https when dealing with private data, and if you are looking for something more secure, there are plenty of easily accessible end-to-end encryption tools. It's pissing off government agencies BTW.
There are people who use strong encryption for their cat pictures. For terrorist to communicate without encryption is almost like wanting to be discovered and should be seen as very suspect.
Also "encrypted technology" is so wide that it is like saying that they used "vehicle technology" for movement. Watching a DVD is using encryption technology, even though it is just a totally broken DRM.
the Paris attackers had used some kind of encrypted communication
Which requires the incredibly rare high-tech skill of installing a readily available app on your smartphone.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
Brennan also said the United States had strategic warning about the terrorist attack in Paris, but did not provide details, other than to say it was not a surprise.
The same subordinate status that makes it OK for the ruling class to violate citizens' privacy means it's not a big deal if they are blown up. Sheep are herded, sheep are slaughtered.
How do you fit the fact that all of the identified attackers so far are european nationals into your narrative?
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
I've been watching the media coverage (and listening - NPR) on this whole encryption mudslinging by law enforcement. The media is eating it up, and while they are careful to say that the jury is out on whether or not the terrorists in Paris used encrypted communications, they are quick to say that law enforcement and intelligence agencies had no inkling that this attack was on the horizon. I will leave aside the notion that Occum's Razor can be used to evaluate the two scenarios - one where the agencies and law enforcement were simply incompetent and are now blaming this evil encryption for being caught flatfooted, vs. their premise that the terrorists MUST be using encryption now...
What is lost on all of them (agencies, law enforcement) is THAT THEY DID THIS TO THEMSELVES either way. Law enforcement and intelligence agencies have been "hoovering up" all available communications data and metadata. They demanded and got kangaroo courts (FISA - I'm looking at you) where secret search warrants are being executed. There is no regulation by the citizenry, only by government "you can trust us" types who don't understand that when the stories about this stuff break, consumers begin to demand secure communications. Every time the government executed these warrants on the communications and computer industries, they gave them both an incentive to ditch the whole cooperation thing, and finally those companies started encrypting things in a way that they did not have the ability to "listen in" because lets face it, that is a pain in the neck and takes them away from their core mission.
Now they are crying about encryption, without understanding that the ship already sailed... And they are the ones that kicked it out of the harbor.
Brawndo: It's what plants crave!
You don't know what Obama was briefed. He's been openly trying to downplay ISIS for several years - because their existence imperils his "be nice to everyone and everyone will be nice to you" approach to international relations in a way that would make Neville "Peace for our time" Chamberlain proud.
That image too is for public consumption. American foreign policy has nothing to do with "be nice to everyone and everyone will be nice to you".
"What the American public doesn't know is what makes them the American public." -Ray Zalinsky (Tommy Boy)
ISIS would have access to their streets whether or not refugees were accepted; what, you think an ISIS terrorist is going to take his chances going across the Mediterranean in a swamped, sinking refugee boat? They've got the money, documents, and connections needed to take a plane and rent an apartment like any normal person. He'll be wearing a nice suit, carrying quality luggage, and probably show a student visa or EU passport or something.
The main problem with the refugees is that if, rather than integrating and educating them, they dump them into refugee ghettos and don't provide them with decent opportunities then in 30 years there will be a whole new crop of "home grown" converts to whatever extremist cult is popular at that time.
The only long-term solutions to extremism are integration, education and wealth. Period.
Log in or piss off.
Exactly. In March 2011, a month after the Japanese Fukushima tsunami, there was a NYTimes article critical of Japan's leadership during the disaster. However, after re-reading it 8 hours post-original online publication, I noticed that it had become watered down and so I inquired to the NYTimes public editor about the discrepancy. I received the following response a month later from the Office of the Public Editor:
"To answer your question, yes, stories can be edited if they are part of the continuous news cycle. Mr. Brisbane [NYT public editor at the time] asked assistant managing editor Jim Roberts to address this in one of his first letters columns: http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10... ... Hopefully Roberts’ response gives you some more info on how The Times processes material as part of the continuous news cycle. It seems that this article was constantly being updated with new information due to the changing nature of events right after the tsunami."
I tried to find the article just now, originally entitled "Flaws in Japan's Leadership Deepen Sense of Crisis," (March 16, 2011) only to find that even the title had been altered to the less damning "Dearth of Candor from Japan's Leadership," and the even weaker "In Tokyo, a Dearth of Candor" for the print edition. I always suspected that someone in the JST time zone made a last minute call in those critical hours between online print and hard copy, lots of "new information" right there.
"Hey there, we're all going to meet up in London in two weeks. Be sure to bring a sweater because it'll be cold. We're stopping at Bill's place first, then going out to eat. Maybe we'll catch a concert. How's that sound?"
Come to Paris in three days. Bring AK-47 and ammo. Akmed will provide suicide vests to attack the restaurants and concert hall. Allah Akbar!
Seriously, nobody with a brain is going to use actual encryption, that's a red flag. They'll come up with a code first, something that sounds normal. I can just see the CIA now: "Oh no, these two people say they're going to the movies! Code Red! Code Red!"
Everything you know is wrong, Just forget the words and sing along.
This article https://theintercept.com/2015/11/15/exploiting-emotions-about-paris-to-blame-snowden-distract-from-actual-culprits-who-empowered-isis/ is a pretty good discussion of what's in play. Kudos to the NYT for pulling the article. Shame they published it in the first place.
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And when the police are 10 minutes away, there will be a body count identical to Paris or worse.
This attack killed 129 people [1], but let's get some perspective. France has a traffic-related death rate of 4.9 per 100,000 per year [2], and Paris has a population of 2.24 million [3]. A naive estimate suggests that roughly 110 people die a traffic-related death in Paris every year. That's comparable to the death toll resulting from this attack.
ISIS could commit an attack like this in Paris every single year and it wouldn't be significantly worse than the death caused by motorists. Let's keep some perspective, please. While this attack was despicable, it doesn't represent anything like an existential threat. Giving ISIS "incredibly easy access to their streets" is not significantly more dangerous than allowing people to drive cars. "Bordering on treason" may sound like a level-headed analysis of the situation to some, but I question how accurate it is.
Chuuch. Preach. Tabernacle.
Yes, look at the attackers. None of them came with the recent wave of refugees (the one Syrian passport found has since been identified as a fake). So closing the borders now accomplishes - pretty much nothing.
We need to figure out why there are people living in our countries that hate those same countries so much they are willing to die just for the joy of expressing their hatred.
We didn't and we let it foster, that is our first fault.
Our second fault was not facing the problem, believing too much in a peaceful co-existence and multi-cultural society to not see that some parts of the same want to fucking kill us.
Assorted stuff I do sometimes: Lemuria.org
How is this shocking?
The team leader gets his general, not specific, verbal instructions from some guy in a tent in the middle of some desert wasteland. He goes back to Europe and recuits a half dozen guys.
They all manage to plan it secretly, don't tell anybody, and nobody gets busted doing something stupid, like getting pulled over with AK-47s and Semtex in the back seat.
How the fuck do you stop that with electronic surveillance?
The only thing that would seem to even put a dent in that kind of operation is going full-on totalitarianism, ie, sending in the jackboots to every house with "Mohammed" on the nameplate and turning the place upside down, hemming them into their own neighborhoods and not letting them out without checkpoints and searches.
I think everyone sees the drawbacks to such an approach. Even the people who manage to pull it off halfway decent STILL have problems and have all the other problems that go alone with such a system. The Israelis aren't 100% effective, even the goddamn Chinese can't seem to squeeze the Uighurs tight enough to shut that problem down and their playbook has rules like "if anyone objects, shoot them in the head and ship everyone they know to a gulag".
About the only country that makes it work is North Korea, and that just might be because we don't know what doesn't work there.
If ISIS actually had 1000, or even 100, hardcore fighters who could be integrated into the refugee streams without the cat being let out of the bag somewhere along the way, then Europe is fucked no matter what.
Log in or piss off.
Well, of course! The Statist types always complain about encryption and anonymity (and personal weapons, BTW) making their jobs more difficult. They are sincere, and what they say is true. It is just that at normal times we can rationally resist their urging, while at the times of crisis our collective rationality weakens and we allow major freedom-infringements to happen...
Rolling them back is hard, because the things like having to present an ID or even submit to a pat-down are not too tedious and the burden never reaches a crisis level of its own, despite occasional trouble-making by some prominent figures.
In Soviet Washington the swamp drains you.
You mean Muslims like Timothy McVeigh, or the IRA?