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Germany, Seeking Independence From US, Pushes Cyber Security Research (reuters.com)
Germany announced a new agency earlier this week to fund research on cyber security and to end its reliance on digital technologies from the United States, China and other countries. From a report: Interior Minister Horst Seehofer told reporters that Germany needed new tools to become a top player in cyber security and shore up European security and independence. "It is our joint goal for Germany to take a leading role in cyber security on an international level," Seehofer told a news conference with Defence Minister Ursula von der Leyen. "We have to acknowledge we're lagging behind, and when one is lagging, one needs completely new approaches."
Germany outlawed the ownership of "hacking tools" (202c StGB, "Acts preparatory to data espionage and phishing") , and all of a sudden, Internet security research in Germany is lagging.
Why the Subjunctive? Checkpoint Firewall for instance is widely deployed in Germany and is made in Israel.
It's Seehofer. Germany's version of a deep-south republican senator.
To be honest, we're happy he can talk in a way that conveys what he means. When I think of the infamous "Transrapid" speech of his predecessor... Even as a German native speaker you were left wondering what the fuck he was talking about.
We used to have a Bill of Rights. Now, with the rights gone, all we have left is the bill.
will be spent on GDPR compliance. The remaining budget will be spent on foreign consultants, because using "hacking tools" is a crime in Germany, so no one knows how to use them.
Signature deleted by lameness filter.
... after Obama wiretapped the German leader's 'phone.
--- "We've always been at war with Eastasia."
Given the raise of insular behaviour among the big countries recently, and considering that the same trends have been reacted to already in the HPC area, with the idea of an European HPC chips, the independence in all things economically and militarily necessary is increasingly prudent. If the big countries are gunning for a conflict among themselves, EU area might not want to be left in an increasingly impossible situation as the trading stops and missiles start flying.
There is still a long way to an emergency socialization of the strategic companies and technologies, and the mass employment to build, say, a Europe wide quantum information network.
Germany doesn't have the intellectual base in computing? It's like you've been raised on American "news" channels, son.
It's always fun to see an American bragging about "American innovation". Have you ever looked at research papers from the large American universities? You may notice that overwhelmingly, the authors are foreign guest researchers. Do you know just how much of America's technology sector is carried by first generation immigrants, both naturalized citizens and H1B visa holders?
The reality is that your country's tech sector and "innovation" is the work of foreigners, and among them Germany is well represented, and when it comes to "intellectual base in computing", no country is farther behind for its socioeconomic size and population than America.
Your popular culture and educational institutes is literally shitting out nothing but ignorant twats. You USED to be a smart people, but now you're dumbed down by TV, gossip and eating, and foreigners have to carry you.
It is not OR/OR it is AND/AND.
The US has hacked Germany (and other allies) before. It is like fucking your best mates wife. There are things you should not do, even if it is legal. And if you do, you must not be upset if suddenly he does not trust you anymore and does not want to be your best mate anymore.
So why SHOULD Germany trust the USofA? The USofA does not trust its allies (and I am not even asking that they should.), so what is good for the goose is good for the other black pot.
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
Face it, the US cyber intelligence community (an oxymoron) is in total disarray. Its weapons have been exposed and re-weaponized for organized crime, it can't keep a cybersecurity "czar" in office, and it has a half-dozen competing agencies snooping and sniffing and still are unable to be of much use when an actual disaster happens.
Were I a German policy maker, I'd say: cut the meager tether and spend the money to protect myself and EU interests. I'm not sure the US is going to do that much longer, and in many areas, has already stopped cold.
And I'm sincerely hoping that the missiles don't fly.
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.