Displaying items by tag: NSA

Larry Ellison could be very out of touch with reality if some of his recent comments on TV. Since losing a long court battle where he tried to grab millions (well really hundreds of Millions) from Google over approximately 7 lines of very simple and basic code he is back complaining about Google again. This time he spoke out on CBS this Morning with a few comments about how bad Google is for using Java as a development platform. This is despite the fact that the judge presiding over the case stated that the code in question could have been recreated with little effort. Ellison just cannot get over the fact that this lawsuit did not go in his favor and he could not honor his friend Steve Jobs by ruining Android and Google in the process.

The US Government is trying very hard to shatter any illusions that we might have about the right to privacy on the internet. They are currently in the process of going after a few of the smaller privacy oriented email services with the intent of getting user information out of them; very specific user information. Right now the current focus is on the company Lavabit who has the unfortunate distinction of having been used by Edward Snowden on multiple occasions to send email to the press and others. This distinction has gotten them into some hot water and now they are actually closing their doors in order to not comply with a government request to hand over the contents of Snowden’s email (and possibly others). This incident has sent a shiver through the small yet strong market for private email and web services.

Every now and then someone makes statements that are so extreme that we really have to wonder what they were thinking and if they really believe the things they are saying. The latest statement of this type comes from former NSA head General (retired) Michael Hayden. Hayden recently spoke to the Bipartisan Policy Center about future cyber security threats. It seems that Hayden wants to put cyberactivists, groups that call for government transparency, hackers and, from the sound of it, anyone that disagrees with being spied on into the same category as al-Qaida.

The news is all abuzz with the compromise of the Tor (Originally The Onion Router) Network. This network has been used by a wide variety of people who are looking for a degree of anonymity. It relies on the use of different entry and exit point to prevent someone from identifying your exact IP Address or MAC address. In-between these point there are different hops that further confuse the trail. In basic terms your system is masked by the exit point which is selected randomly by the system. Now in addition the anonymity services for individual users there are also servers that host websites and even anonymous email services. Some have called this the “dark net” or “deep web” although that is not actually the case (the dark net is something else entirely). Many of these sites are legitimate sites that need to protect their readers from less than understanding authorities, but there are a larger number that are not above board at all including many sites that host child pornography.

There is a rumor going around (from “sources wishing to remain anonymous”) that claims that US Law Enforcement and the NSA have been asking internet companies for user passwords. The article originally posted by cNet has made the rounds this morning across a few sites; all of them pointing back at the single cNet source. Now on top of everything else that is going on many people are ready to jump on board with this and further denounce the NSA, the FBI, DHS, IRS, and anyone else in the US government with initials. But outside of the claims from a single blogger at cNet are there any other indications that this is a common practice?

Yesterday there was a vote on one of the more important pieces of legislation to go through Congress this year. Despite its importance there was very little media coverage outside the internet and the few sites that are still determined to fight for people’s right to privacy. The bill was named HR 2397 and was introduced by Representative Justin Amash (R MI) and was intended to deny funding to the NSA for any program that allows for broad (warrantless) spying on US Citizens.

Microsoft is taking great exception to the reports of their cooperation with the NSA. It seems they do not feel the reports that they have given encryption keys, created backdoors or unrestricted access to their servers is fair. Instead they are releasing some information in the hopes that they can prove they did not do anything wrong. Sadly, as is always the case, what they leave out of their statements is as important as what is in them and there is some fairly eye opening information in their actual statement.

Over the last couple of weeks the new has been flooded with articles about the US Government’s surveillance program called PRISM. It is possibly one of the largest invasions of privacy that has been leaked to the general public. What makes this program all the more concerning is that the NSA appears to have cooperation from each of the companies involved. This apparent breach of consumer trust has caused quite a stir and almost all of the companies that were shown in the leaked power point about PRISM have released statements claiming they only cooperate within the limits of the law. This raises an interesting question though; if a broad request is approved by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court wouldn’t a company be within the law to grant access?

After the massive leak about the NSA’s PRISM project many people are understandably upset and members of congress have been pulled into closed door meetings to be briefed on the details of what the program is doing. At the same time the companies named in the leaked slides are rushing to perform damage control and protect their businesses from losing customers. So far most of these have come as flat-out denials of any complicity or knowledge of project PRISM. Sadly, even if they were involved most National Security Letters or data requests also come with a gag order preventing them from giving any details or even acknowledging the event. This makes the claims from Microsoft, Google and others seem a tad hollow in the face of what is going on.

After the public release of the NSA’s PRISM program we are hearing that they have an open account with at least one cell service provider. The provider that we know about so far is Verizon and the NSA has quite the hold on them. It seems that Verizon must hand over the metadata for all calls made inside the US as well as calls that are to destinations outside the US. This type of wholesale spying is being granted under section 215 of the Patriot Act. These requests have to be processed by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court with DoJ oversight to prevent abuse. At least that is how the system is supposed to work.