If the results presented here where true, a pro West, pro NATO side would win "every" national election too.
History shows that not to be the case. More slashdot sockpuppet dreams.
"haven't just outsourced the whole of their IT management;"
That can depend on the security and police clearance. A lot more eyes are needed to track local issues on web 2.0 and social media at a town/city level.
Yes its chilling to understnd the total control over aspect of 'international' payment options that really link back their historical nation state origins.
Recall the wikileaks donations saga http://www.cnet.com/news/credi...
It would be interesting to see how it breaks down per decade, series, movie.
A lot of people many have big dvd classic collections and dont need/want to spend $15-40 again.
With tv and cable has a lot is in endless rerun - no need to buy that one movie you *might* have got with dvd.
4k will be telling. Enjoy your fancy new movies via super fast vdsl2 mate:)
A lot of people have been very heroic whistelblowers over many years and have faced a lot of court time. http://cryptome.org/2013-info/...
Re 'He didn't even release it all" - all the material is now in the hands of the press.
Some of the local press will remove all text ourside their local telcos ie for their own countries consumption. Other members of the press relase more per slide/documnet.
re 'wholesale by the NSA" - that limited hangout is always a risk with material like this.
Countries may be expected to make drastic hardware and software, staff changes brining in new junk equipment to replace older somewhat secure bespoke systems.
As for the "mountain" of data - the NSA faces the same issues 1980's Eastern Europe did with a flood of data from diverse informants and connections within their own databases.
You then need hundereds of thousands of new cleared staff to sort millions of new data points per hop of a nations population.
The good news is people/the wider press now know about the brands, the brands tame legal teams, the brands tech 'experts' and the generations of junk encryption they sold/gave away.
The good news is people/the wider press now know about the local telco hardware offering generations of support for 5++ other nations intelligence needs.
The good news is people/the wider press now know about bulk junk encryption been offerend as tested internation 'standards' over deacdes.
The good news is people/the wider press now know closed source encryption can be weak/junk.
The good news is people/the wider press now know open source encryption can be weak/junk.
A lot of the press, mathematics, programmers, cryptographers, telcos, lawyers and users to ponder.
How could so much crypto that is used by so many be so useless with so many smart teams working so hard? A lot of trap doors per generation of brand and product passed a lot of gov/telco//brand/open source testing.
Cash is already suspect for people. Trying to take it out of a bank and you get a chat down after electronic means flag you and your invited in to see a real person.
Driving with some cash makes you something unknown and you might face "civil forfeiture" depending on the area you where randomly stopped in. http://www.forbes.com/sites/in...
Enjoying a hotel or renting a car? Enjoy that friendly chat down as you make enquiries and pay your bill.
Now we see the same for online efforts unless your using one for 3 or 4 allowed US backed credit cards?
Cheap was always the way in for governments after beyond the 1950's. If any private or neutral gov was going to develop, market and sell complex cryptography they would find international standards and low prices blocking them. The option was to give up or sell out and go with weakened "international standards".
Free counters a diversity of unique or bespoke per seat, per user count crpto entrepreneurship over many countries.
No matter if it open source or closed source; as long as it can catch plain text, it is a good trapdoor.
Re "legal but subjectively undesirable business ventures"
Take it to a vote and then they can unleash the fully funded power for the domestic surveillance network of entrapment, police raids with military surplus, creating new informants, reports to fusion centers and enjoy great overtime funding.
That would then be "legal", fill the private prison system for longer, extra police funding and be great news for political class of prosecutors.
This method of "legal but subjectively undesirable business ventures" will result in many legally unsound convictions with very busy legal teams.
It really depends on what you can find in origins of US law about the tools of your legal trade/profession been blocked/confiscated. US color of law efforts without a warrant or access to court is not legally good and would be challenged by skilled US legal teams.
The great aspect to the US legal system is it was shaped to protect from extrajudicial punishment and protects free speech, assembly, press, privacy and much more. Generational color of law changes are difficult.
re "The US has something on us (or them personally), and keeps threatening to use it."
The UK enjoyed breaking most European powers codes in the 1920-30's and its political class became addicted to the insider knowledge cross referencing a world of diplomatic and military communications.
During WW2 ENIGMA offered the UK even more near the end of the war- almost realtime communications in plain text.
After WW2 the UK still had the code skills and bases around the world. The UK could also ensure many of the new post ww2 allies would standadize with weak TEMPEST ready encryption machines offering the US and UK almost realtime communications in plain text again.
Where the US won was in emerging digital storage, satellites and raw cpu power costing US tax payers billions over projects that the UK never had post ww2.
The US was able to leverage emerging digital database and networking over decades for land (shared US/UK sites) and finally political control.
It was a huge boondoggle to keep the skills in place for Russia and the USA.
The US needed to keep its best workers productive as the Shuttle spy satellite boondoggle was slowly ending.
Russia got to keep its best workers productive as the massive science cities/space funding was ending.
A lot of workers got to work with complex metals, fuel, life support systems, complex computer systems... for another few years.
Both countries also invited other wealthy nations in to 'share' in a huge sheltered workshop for years of fancy space funding.
Contractors, gov workers, federal and state political leaders all got the tax payer winnings out of that one last project.
The "diplomatic" charm that went with a modual, flag painted on the side and other national bragging rights seems to be lost on other nations too.
That cash could have gone to their own evolving space projects rather than renting a very expensive Skylab 2.0 experience.
It really depends on how you see the role of the GCHQ vs the NSA.
The NSA had the computers and total control over sealed parts of shared US/UK bases. The GCHQ had the global locations and very,very skilled staff but no real way into NSA global efforts even within the UK.
The Falklands, UK role in former Yugoslavia showed an even more clear lack of good UK crypto use or true UK global reach.
At any point in time the NSA could shut out or totally turn off the GCHQ product stream depending on US policy or political mood.
The UK likes to talk of its special relationship and joint facilities but knows a lot of other nations are now on the special US helper list (for NSA locations, "shared" sites) and other nations expect nothing back from the NSA unlike the UK.
The UK will always recall Diego Garcia in the 1970's and UK only efforts in Cyprus (and many other UK only regions) as been sticking points with the USA.
The result is a lack of sharing in both directions been used as a tool. NSA/GCHQ sites, Polaris, Super Antelope and Diego Garcia all showed the very real limits to US/UK relations in the past.
Now the UK is left with the result of the past budgets cuts from the 1960-80's and is totally dependant on the USA and NSA in many key ways. The US can offer all to the UK, some or none. The UK has its own sites for Ireland, and the Middle East but lacks its own NSA like total global reach.
The upper levels of the UK gov have also gotten a taste for the NSA product over decades. What this new news shows is a new hint at the decades old dance between the NSA, US gov and a UK addiction to total information awareness with limited funds.
So for years you had the useful sock puppets talking of the Anglosphere and that "special relationship" forged in past wars been about total trust and sharing. Reality is much more complex per US political decade, UK budget related cuts and is very much controlled by the USA.
The UK faces losing a world wide database of realtime calls, voice prints, faxes, emails, networking and banking intel via the US and having to fall back on UK only efforts. With only UK sites for Ireland, the Middle East and help from New Zealand, Australia, Canada it would be "dramatic" form the UK perspective after enjoying the global NSA efforts and long term storage.
It really depends. Optical is fixed or networked around. People tend to notice coax issues - no TV, slow/no networking.
Copper line is an area where warer and age can really degrade. backhaul would be looked after. Per home depends on the voice, legal data rate limits before a fault is fixed vs just slow.
The telcos are not happy to just move packets anymore. They want a payment if a movie or game or service needs speed and only then will their servers/hardware be upgraded and exisiting copper/optical be allowed to deliver.
Telco essential infrastructure is not rotting at a backhaul level. The servers and older hardware works, its just not been replaced until new contracts are in place.
Yes that would work. Every ISP becomes a true provider vs a classic copper telco network owner. You roll out optical into suburbia once per gerneation and then offer any service you want as just another layer.
Any plan you want from a vast array of different porviders. Some offering top speed, great service, HD media, games, just bacic net/alarm/voice/fax, good backhaul around to the world or just low cost with low cost on over subscibed networks.
The consumer would be in control making informed selections vs a legal cartel or gov gifted hardware monopoly.
No more water soaked copper, old coax, expensive one provider optical or other lock in plans per city. Just the freedom to select any plan: pay as you go or over a long contract.
Think of the app coders, artists, game devlopers, musicians in suburbia working in real time at home without having to factor in the need to upload over hours per project.
New emerging local US productivity would be amazing. Entrepreneurship would allow small firms to grow and then start hiring locally. New US digital brands delivering to the world on time, all the time. No having to move to or rent in a city with 'some' optical. Just getting on with projects and watching the payments flow in per sale:)
The main issue with that is backbones to node put into suburbia. The cpu power, ongoing costs and access to rooftops for well placed hardware can be difficult.
Can it be done for 100's of homes with free/hobby spectrum use ie no costly "licence"? Yes. Beyond that every connected home would need very well crafted networking software and be ready for speed drops as limited bandwidth gets shared as more people join.
Yes just building on your domestic vs "peacetime" and saying that under different projects an interest in US domestic telco traffic seems to show itself in any decade.
Just the digital age makes it more instant and wider for less cost.
Been less at peace sems to offer more expansion and dreamy retroactive legal cover.
Yes a vast domestic records database... recall Groundbreaker? The domestic side seems to have been an ongoing project. http://www.wired.com/2007/10/n...
Re "Once they are free to spy on you without respecting your rights as a citizen, you no longer have rights."
The U.S. Constitution is great like that, legal over all the color of law and extra domestic spying paragraphs.
Yes thats been found in open courts. http://www.freedomwatchusa.org...
Re "Ok so I was there to be antagonistic, but even five years ago the lower level guys knew what was going. "
Everybody knew since the 1980's with a few books and magazine 'hints' and the massive placement of non Soviet related domestic hardware.
You also had the mid 1970's Church Committee on the NSA and CIA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C... A lot of people recall the CIA aspect but few recall the more legally sealed NSA side.
So people entering the telco, crypto, math fields knew what was been placed, asked for and done just form open sources - the press, books and gov news.
It moves up the food chain over time. Small deep critters carry hot particles up to the larger more shallow big fish. Over years even basic ww2 chemical weapons dumps in the ocean have been found to spread in unexpected ways. All the ideas for waste dumps have been thought of.
Most solutions are about re use (France, Russia) or long term storage off site (USA). The main issue is the past need for nuclear weapons and the tech the USA used and did not want use. The US is left with a lot of hot waste to dump somewhere.
A lot of strange AC stories seem to make it and then get flooded with more AC comments trying to have a smart "debate" or change "views" on sets of gov or legal topics.
It might be one person or a few people but the tone and flow is usually the same with the style of links.
Re What did governments get from harassing MLK, OWS, anti-war protestors, or any of the other hundreds of millions of people that were abused by governments throughout history?
Thats the fun next step. With tech like this you get every licence plate, passengers face, drivers face 24/7, cell numbers called, cell phone details in any area depending on a few main roads in and out of a community, protest area or meeting.
Private/public CCTV network sharing fills in more gaps.
Then the State or Federal gov can wonder how long they can keep the data for.. months, years, tens of years? If there is a limit in place, get the private sector to share/collect/sort it.
In the past agencies would have to be photographing, walking local car parks-noting plates, sitting in on political meetings.
Now the data just collects itself with no real legal limits other than "parallel construction" efforts.
Re "Is there any evidence that anyone has been stupid enough to implement such hardware back doors in general purpose CPUs ?"
Think of more all the helper ports/chips/"cards" around the cpu and thier way back to stored data/keystorkes on an average consumer motherboard.
Wireless, networking are all part of a deeper complex hardware/software mix that an average OS may not be watching in real time.
Also recall different next gen wake for remote network even if turned off (vs unplugged with no power).
A lot of consumer products could have ways in. If not the NSA (Tailored Access Operations) just holds your next hardware upgrade shipment for a few hours and its all set.
The good thing is after Snowden more people are thinking, looking and asking real questions for the first time in a generation.
Re Somebody would have caught the unusual requests.
If a gov wants to sit between you and your site, the logs of your site would reflect whatever the gov wants. They have man in the middle, fake sites and efforts like TURBINE would show very little skilled, attentive admins. http://www.dailytech.com/Tax+a...
Slashdot Mirror
If the results presented here where true, a pro West, pro NATO side would win "every" national election too. History shows that not to be the case. More slashdot sockpuppet dreams.
"haven't just outsourced the whole of their IT management;"
That can depend on the security and police clearance. A lot more eyes are needed to track local issues on web 2.0 and social media at a town/city level.
Yes its chilling to understnd the total control over aspect of 'international' payment options that really link back their historical nation state origins.
Recall the wikileaks donations saga http://www.cnet.com/news/credi...
It would be interesting to see how it breaks down per decade, series, movie. :)
A lot of people many have big dvd classic collections and dont need/want to spend $15-40 again.
With tv and cable has a lot is in endless rerun - no need to buy that one movie you *might* have got with dvd.
4k will be telling. Enjoy your fancy new movies via super fast vdsl2 mate
A lot of people have been very heroic whistelblowers over many years and have faced a lot of court time.
http://cryptome.org/2013-info/...
Re 'He didn't even release it all" - all the material is now in the hands of the press.
Some of the local press will remove all text ourside their local telcos ie for their own countries consumption. Other members of the press relase more per slide/documnet.
re 'wholesale by the NSA" - that limited hangout is always a risk with material like this.
Countries may be expected to make drastic hardware and software, staff changes brining in new junk equipment to replace older somewhat secure bespoke systems.
As for the "mountain" of data - the NSA faces the same issues 1980's Eastern Europe did with a flood of data from diverse informants and connections within their own databases.
You then need hundereds of thousands of new cleared staff to sort millions of new data points per hop of a nations population.
The good news is people/the wider press now know about the brands, the brands tame legal teams, the brands tech 'experts' and the generations of junk encryption they sold/gave away.
The good news is people/the wider press now know about the local telco hardware offering generations of support for 5++ other nations intelligence needs.
The good news is people/the wider press now know about bulk junk encryption been offerend as tested internation 'standards' over deacdes.
The good news is people/the wider press now know closed source encryption can be weak/junk.
The good news is people/the wider press now know open source encryption can be weak/junk.
A lot of the press, mathematics, programmers, cryptographers, telcos, lawyers and users to ponder.
How could so much crypto that is used by so many be so useless with so many smart teams working so hard? A lot of trap doors per generation of brand and product passed a lot of gov/telco//brand/open source testing.
Cash is already suspect for people. Trying to take it out of a bank and you get a chat down after electronic means flag you and your invited in to see a real person.
Driving with some cash makes you something unknown and you might face "civil forfeiture" depending on the area you where randomly stopped in.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/in...
Enjoying a hotel or renting a car? Enjoy that friendly chat down as you make enquiries and pay your bill.
Now we see the same for online efforts unless your using one for 3 or 4 allowed US backed credit cards?
Must have been an interesting meeting: just drop in the free code like the rest of our wealthy, skilled competitors do.
Cheap was always the way in for governments after beyond the 1950's. If any private or neutral gov was going to develop, market and sell complex cryptography they would find international standards and low prices blocking them. The option was to give up or sell out and go with weakened "international standards".
Free counters a diversity of unique or bespoke per seat, per user count crpto entrepreneurship over many countries.
No matter if it open source or closed source; as long as it can catch plain text, it is a good trapdoor.
Re "legal but subjectively undesirable business ventures"
Take it to a vote and then they can unleash the fully funded power for the domestic surveillance network of entrapment, police raids with military surplus, creating new informants, reports to fusion centers and enjoy great overtime funding.
That would then be "legal", fill the private prison system for longer, extra police funding and be great news for political class of prosecutors.
This method of "legal but subjectively undesirable business ventures" will result in many legally unsound convictions with very busy legal teams.
It really depends on what you can find in origins of US law about the tools of your legal trade/profession been blocked/confiscated. US color of law efforts without a warrant or access to court is not legally good and would be challenged by skilled US legal teams.
The great aspect to the US legal system is it was shaped to protect from extrajudicial punishment and protects free speech, assembly, press, privacy and much more.
Generational color of law changes are difficult.
re "The US has something on us (or them personally), and keeps threatening to use it."
The UK enjoyed breaking most European powers codes in the 1920-30's and its political class became addicted to the insider knowledge cross referencing a world of diplomatic and military communications.
During WW2 ENIGMA offered the UK even more near the end of the war- almost realtime communications in plain text.
After WW2 the UK still had the code skills and bases around the world. The UK could also ensure many of the new post ww2 allies would standadize with weak TEMPEST ready encryption machines offering the US and UK almost realtime communications in plain text again.
Where the US won was in emerging digital storage, satellites and raw cpu power costing US tax payers billions over projects that the UK never had post ww2.
The US was able to leverage emerging digital database and networking over decades for land (shared US/UK sites) and finally political control.
It was a huge boondoggle to keep the skills in place for Russia and the USA.
The US needed to keep its best workers productive as the Shuttle spy satellite boondoggle was slowly ending.
Russia got to keep its best workers productive as the massive science cities/space funding was ending.
A lot of workers got to work with complex metals, fuel, life support systems, complex computer systems... for another few years.
Both countries also invited other wealthy nations in to 'share' in a huge sheltered workshop for years of fancy space funding.
Contractors, gov workers, federal and state political leaders all got the tax payer winnings out of that one last project.
The "diplomatic" charm that went with a modual, flag painted on the side and other national bragging rights seems to be lost on other nations too.
That cash could have gone to their own evolving space projects rather than renting a very expensive Skylab 2.0 experience.
It really depends on how you see the role of the GCHQ vs the NSA. ,very skilled staff but no real way into NSA global efforts even within the UK.
The NSA had the computers and total control over sealed parts of shared US/UK bases. The GCHQ had the global locations and very
The Falklands, UK role in former Yugoslavia showed an even more clear lack of good UK crypto use or true UK global reach.
At any point in time the NSA could shut out or totally turn off the GCHQ product stream depending on US policy or political mood.
The UK likes to talk of its special relationship and joint facilities but knows a lot of other nations are now on the special US helper list (for NSA locations, "shared" sites) and other nations expect nothing back from the NSA unlike the UK.
The UK will always recall Diego Garcia in the 1970's and UK only efforts in Cyprus (and many other UK only regions) as been sticking points with the USA.
The result is a lack of sharing in both directions been used as a tool. NSA/GCHQ sites, Polaris, Super Antelope and Diego Garcia all showed the very real limits to US/UK relations in the past.
Now the UK is left with the result of the past budgets cuts from the 1960-80's and is totally dependant on the USA and NSA in many key ways. The US can offer all to the UK, some or none. The UK has its own sites for Ireland, and the Middle East but lacks its own NSA like total global reach.
The upper levels of the UK gov have also gotten a taste for the NSA product over decades. What this new news shows is a new hint at the decades old dance between the NSA, US gov and a UK addiction to total information awareness with limited funds.
So for years you had the useful sock puppets talking of the Anglosphere and that "special relationship" forged in past wars been about total trust and sharing.
Reality is much more complex per US political decade, UK budget related cuts and is very much controlled by the USA.
The UK faces losing a world wide database of realtime calls, voice prints, faxes, emails, networking and banking intel via the US and having to fall back on UK only efforts.
With only UK sites for Ireland, the Middle East and help from New Zealand, Australia, Canada it would be "dramatic" form the UK perspective after enjoying the global NSA efforts and long term storage.
It really depends. Optical is fixed or networked around. People tend to notice coax issues - no TV, slow/no networking.
Copper line is an area where warer and age can really degrade. backhaul would be looked after. Per home depends on the voice, legal data rate limits before a fault is fixed vs just slow.
The telcos are not happy to just move packets anymore. They want a payment if a movie or game or service needs speed and only then will their servers/hardware be upgraded and exisiting copper/optical be allowed to deliver.
Telco essential infrastructure is not rotting at a backhaul level. The servers and older hardware works, its just not been replaced until new contracts are in place.
Yes that would work. Every ISP becomes a true provider vs a classic copper telco network owner. You roll out optical into suburbia once per gerneation and then offer any service you want as just another layer. :)
Any plan you want from a vast array of different porviders. Some offering top speed, great service, HD media, games, just bacic net/alarm/voice/fax, good backhaul around to the world or just low cost with low cost on over subscibed networks.
The consumer would be in control making informed selections vs a legal cartel or gov gifted hardware monopoly.
No more water soaked copper, old coax, expensive one provider optical or other lock in plans per city. Just the freedom to select any plan: pay as you go or over a long contract.
Think of the app coders, artists, game devlopers, musicians in suburbia working in real time at home without having to factor in the need to upload over hours per project.
New emerging local US productivity would be amazing. Entrepreneurship would allow small firms to grow and then start hiring locally. New US digital brands delivering to the world on time, all the time.
No having to move to or rent in a city with 'some' optical. Just getting on with projects and watching the payments flow in per sale
The main issue with that is backbones to node put into suburbia. The cpu power, ongoing costs and access to rooftops for well placed hardware can be difficult.
Can it be done for 100's of homes with free/hobby spectrum use ie no costly "licence"? Yes.
Beyond that every connected home would need very well crafted networking software and be ready for speed drops as limited bandwidth gets shared as more people join.
Yes just building on your domestic vs "peacetime" and saying that under different projects an interest in US domestic telco traffic seems to show itself in any decade.
Just the digital age makes it more instant and wider for less cost.
Been less at peace sems to offer more expansion and dreamy retroactive legal cover.
Yes a vast domestic records database... recall Groundbreaker? The domestic side seems to have been an ongoing project.
http://www.wired.com/2007/10/n...
Re "Once they are free to spy on you without respecting your rights as a citizen, you no longer have rights."
The U.S. Constitution is great like that, legal over all the color of law and extra domestic spying paragraphs.
Yes thats been found in open courts. http://www.freedomwatchusa.org...
Re "Ok so I was there to be antagonistic, but even five years ago the lower level guys knew what was going. "
Everybody knew since the 1980's with a few books and magazine 'hints' and the massive placement of non Soviet related domestic hardware.
You also had the mid 1970's Church Committee on the NSA and CIA http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/C... A lot of people recall the CIA aspect but few recall the more legally sealed NSA side.
So people entering the telco, crypto, math fields knew what was been placed, asked for and done just form open sources - the press, books and gov news.
It moves up the food chain over time. Small deep critters carry hot particles up to the larger more shallow big fish. Over years even basic ww2 chemical weapons dumps in the ocean have been found to spread in unexpected ways. All the ideas for waste dumps have been thought of.
Most solutions are about re use (France, Russia) or long term storage off site (USA). The main issue is the past need for nuclear weapons and the tech the USA used and did not want use. The US is left with a lot of hot waste to dump somewhere.
A lot of strange AC stories seem to make it and then get flooded with more AC comments trying to have a smart "debate" or change "views" on sets of gov or legal topics.
It might be one person or a few people but the tone and flow is usually the same with the style of links.
Re What did governments get from harassing MLK, OWS, anti-war protestors, or any of the other hundreds of millions of people that were abused by governments throughout history?
Thats the fun next step. With tech like this you get every licence plate, passengers face, drivers face 24/7, cell numbers called, cell phone details in any area depending on a few main roads in and out of a community, protest area or meeting.
Private/public CCTV network sharing fills in more gaps.
Then the State or Federal gov can wonder how long they can keep the data for.. months, years, tens of years? If there is a limit in place, get the private sector to share/collect/sort it.
In the past agencies would have to be photographing, walking local car parks-noting plates, sitting in on political meetings.
Now the data just collects itself with no real legal limits other than "parallel construction" efforts.
Re "Is there any evidence that anyone has been stupid enough to implement such hardware back doors in general purpose CPUs ?"
Think of more all the helper ports/chips/"cards" around the cpu and thier way back to stored data/keystorkes on an average consumer motherboard.
Wireless, networking are all part of a deeper complex hardware/software mix that an average OS may not be watching in real time.
Also recall different next gen wake for remote network even if turned off (vs unplugged with no power).
A lot of consumer products could have ways in. If not the NSA (Tailored Access Operations) just holds your next hardware upgrade shipment for a few hours and its all set.
The good thing is after Snowden more people are thinking, looking and asking real questions for the first time in a generation.
Re Somebody would have caught the unusual requests.
If a gov wants to sit between you and your site, the logs of your site would reflect whatever the gov wants.
They have man in the middle, fake sites and efforts like TURBINE would show very little skilled, attentive admins.
http://www.dailytech.com/Tax+a...