[VIDEO] How Government Lost the Crypto Wars (At Least for Now)
Posted: March 2, 2018 Filed under: Crime & Corruption, Science & Technology, Self Defense, Terrorism | Tags: Bulk Data Collection, Data, Encryption, FBI, Sayed Farood, software, Whatsapp Leave a comment
Forty-two years after unbreakable encryption was first conceived, these tools are more widespread than ever before. One milestone came in 2016, when the world’s largest messaging service—WhatsApp—announced it would offer default end-to-end encryption on all communications. In other words, the messages can be read only by the senders and recipients; even the platform provider can’t access them.
Law enforcement and intelligence agencies are still reckoning with this new reality. For decades, they demanded that tech companies hand over private data on their users, sometimes without obtaining warrants. So companies like Apple changed their policies so individual users were the only ones holding the keys to their data.
This new era of consumer privacy led to a standoff in 2016, when the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) demanded access to an encrypted iPhone belonging to Sayed Farook, a deceased terrorist from San Bernardino, California. Farook and his wife, Tashfeen Malik, had killed 14 people at a holiday office party in December 2015.
The FBI wanted Apple to write software that would weaken the iPhone’s built-in security. Apple refused, saying that such flawed software would jeopardize the security of its customers, who number in the hundreds of millions. Once a back door was created, the company claimed, the FBI could use it on similar phones—and it could be leaked to hackers or foreign enemies. “It is in our view the software equivalent of cancer,” Apple CEO Tim Cook told ABC News. Read the rest of this entry »
The Wikileaks CIA Stash May Prove Interesting, But Not Necessarily for the Hacks
Posted: March 8, 2017 Filed under: Crime & Corruption, Law & Justice, Science & Technology, War Room | Tags: Android (operating system), Angela Merkel, Barack Obama, Central Intelligence Agency, Donald Trump, Edward Snowden, Hillary Clinton, National Security Agency, RUSSIA, United States, Whatsapp, White House, WikiLeaks Leave a comment
The software tools revealed by the leak are sinister, unsurprising—and potentially politically explosive.
Jamie Condliffe writes: Wikileaks has released a huge number of files that it claims to be the “largest ever publication of confidential documents” from the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. It includes details of a number of hacking tools, though at first blush they don’t appear to be as incendiary as their potential political ramifications.
“To be sure, such hacks are sinister. But if we learned anything from Snowden’s disclosure of National Security Agency surveillance programs in 2013, it’s that government agencies feel it necessary to hack any technology the public chooses to use.”
The controversial organization published the first tranche of what it says will become a vast collection called Vault 7 on the morning of March 7. The first wave, called Year Zero, contains 8,761 documents and files from between 2013 and 2016.
At this point in time it’s impossible to have scoured the entire database. But Wikileaks claims that it contains descriptions of tools from the CIA’s hacking program. They are said to include malware that can turn Samsung TVs into covert listening posts, tools to remotely control vehicles, and a number of means to render encrypted messaging apps like WhatsApp and Signal redundant.
[Read the full story here, at MIT Technology Review]
None of these approaches are particularly earth-shattering. Samsung had already admitted that its smart TVs could effectively spy on you. Security consultants showed that they could remotely control a Jeep Cherokee two years ago.
“None of these approaches are particularly earth-shattering. Samsung had already admitted that its smart TVs could effectively spy on you.”
And as Edward Snowden points out, the files don’t reveal a problem with encrypted messaging services themselves, though they do reveal that the CIA has a number of targeted exploits that allow them to gain partial remote access to iOS and Android. Read the rest of this entry »
Two-Thirds of the World’s Internet Users Live Under Government Censorship
Posted: November 14, 2016 Filed under: Censorship, Global, Mediasphere | Tags: American Civil Liberties Union, Ann Kirkpatrick, Facebook, Freedom on the Net 2016, Global surveillance disclosures (2013–present), Internet, Internet service provider, Peoples' Democratic Party (Turkey), Selahattin Demirtaş, Turkey, Twitter, Whatsapp, YouTube 1 Comment
Web freedom declined across the globe for the sixth consecutive year, according to a new report.
Amar Toor reports: Two-thirds of the world’s internet users live under regimes of government censorship, according to a report released today. The report from Freedom House, a pro-democracy think tank, finds that internet freedom across the globe declined for a sixth consecutive year in 2016, as governments cracked down on social media services and messaging apps.
“Although the blocking of these tools affects everyone, it has an especially harmful impact on human rights defenders, journalists, and marginalized communities who often depend on these apps to bypass government surveillance.”
— Sanja Kelly, director and co-author of the Freedom on the Net 2016 report
The findings are based on an analysis of web freedom in 65 countries, covering 88 percent of the world’s online population. Freedom House ranked China as the worst abuser of internet freedom for the second consecutive year, followed by Syria and Iran. (The report does not include North Korea.) Online freedom in the US increased slightly over the year due to the USA Freedom Act, which limits the bulk collection of metadata carried out by the National Security Agency (NSA) and other intelligence agencies.
“Telegram faced restrictions in four countries including China, where the government blocked the encrypted messaging service due to its rising popularity among human rights lawyers.”
This year saw a notable crackdown on secure messaging apps such as WhatsApp and Telegram. WhatsApp was blocked or restricted in 12 countries over the course of the year — more than any other messaging app — including in Bahrain, Bangladesh, and Ethiopia, where authorities blocked it in response to civilian protests. Telegram faced restrictions in four countries including China, where the government blocked the encrypted messaging service due to its rising popularity among human rights lawyers.
Read the rest of this entry »
[VIDEO] WOZICON: Apple Co-founder Starts Silicon Valley Comic Con
Posted: February 22, 2016 Filed under: Art & Culture, Comics, Mediasphere, Science & Technology | Tags: Apple Inc, CNBC, Comicon, iPhone, Jan Koum, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Sundar Pichai, Whatsapp Leave a comment
Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak had a front-row seat as the personal computer began to reshape society, so it made perfect sense to him to bring a convention meshing technology with pop culture to Silicon Valley.
Why Texting Is Dying Out
Posted: January 14, 2014 Filed under: Art & Culture, Mediasphere, Science & Technology | Tags: Deloitte, Facebook Messenger, iMessage, Instant messaging, Short Message Service, Snapchat, Text messaging, Whatsapp 2 Comments
This guy probably isn’t sending a text message. (ANDREW BURTON/Getty Images)
Alex Brown writes: For the first time in two decades, the number of text messages sent has declined—at least in the U.K.
A Deloitte study shows that SMS (standard messaging service) messages declined by 7 billion last year, to 145 billion. Meanwhile, messages sent by instant-messaging apps have spiked dramatically. Roughly 50 billion IMs were sent in 2012, which grew to exceed 150 billion last year. IMs are expected to total nearly 300 billion this year.
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