The Great Deception - Russia Just Hacks Us - The Truth - We Invented Hacking!

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One thing you have to love about the media, they will always be so preoccupied with their agenda they will have no time for historical analysis, research, and cross checking facts.  So we remain focused on how those dastardly Russians hacked us in the 2017 elections when we hacked them almost two decades ago.

Wikileaks has once again shown why they are the most loved and hated web site on Earth. Yesterday they dumped another batch of secret documents into the media charade and it showed how the Master developer and user of hacking programs of our world is none other than our very own CIA.

Fancy that, we set the standard for not simply hacking everyone, but for embedding our little packages in abut every computer in the world so it could report back to us.  Now the futuristic technology has been extended to iPhones and Smart TVs.

Did it ever occur to the media that Russian hacking might just be in retaliation for what we have already done to everyone else?  Was it not Wikileaks that spilled the beans on the USA monitoring the phones and emails of foreign leaders, friend and foe alike a few years back?

Here are two current articles about what Wikileaks leaked this time, and a third article on why our hands are not clean on hacking, we wrote the book and our own people were among the victims.

Technology

WikiLeaks publishes massive trove of CIA spying files in 'Vault 7' release

 Andrew Griffin,The Independent 

WikiLeaks has published a huge trove of what appear to be CIA spying secrets.

The files are the most comprehensive release of US spying files ever made public, according to Julian Assange. In all, there are 8,761 documents that account for "the entire hacking capacity of the CIA", Mr Assange claimed in a release, and the trove is just the first of a series of "Vault 7" leaks.

Already, the files include far more pages than the Snowden files that exposed the vast hacking power of the NSA and other agencies.

In publishing the documents, WikiLeaks had ensured that the CIA had "lost control of its arsenal", he claimed. That included a range of software and exploits that if real could allow unparalleled control of computers around the world.

It includes software that could allow people to take control of the most popular consumer electronics products used today, claimed WikiLeaks.

"'Year Zero' introduces the scope and direction of the CIA's global covert hacking program, its malware arsenal and dozens of "zero day" weaponized exploits against a wide range of U.S. and European company products, include Apple's iPhone, Google's Android and Microsoft's Windows and even Samsung TVs, which are turned into covert microphones," the organisation said in a release.

The public files don't include the cyber weapons themselves, according to a statement. The organisation will refrain from distributing "armed" software "until a consensus emerges on the technical and political nature of the CIA's program and how such 'weapons' should analyzed, disarmed and published", it said.

The files were made available by a source who intended for them to start a conversation about whether the CIA had gained too much power, according to the organisation.

"In a statement to WikiLeaks the source details policy questions that they say urgently need to be debated in public, including whether the CIA's hacking capabilities exceed its mandated powers and the problem of public oversight of the agency," a release read. "The source wishes to initiate a public debate about the security, creation, use, proliferation and democratic control of cyberweapons."

It also redacts the details of some of the names, locations and targets that are identified in the documents.

The organisation had teased the release in advance with strange messages about the release being "Year Zero", and references to "Vault 7". It had planned to release the files later on but that plan was thrown off when its press conference came under cyber attack, Mr Assange claimed.

Technology

WikiLeaks claims the CIA built special tools for hacking iPhones and other Apple products

 Kif Leswing,Business Insider

(AP) 
Documents published on Tuesday by WikiLeaks claim to be evidence that the "CIA lost control of the majority of its hacking arsenal." 

According to the WikiLeaks files, it appears that the CIA has teams specifically dedicated to breaking into Apple products, including iOS, the software that runs on iPhones and iPads, and even Apple's line of routers, AirPort. 

The WikiLeaks files suggest that the CIA may have access to undiscovered and unreported bugs, or exploits, in iOS, the iPhone operating system. 

"While our initial analysis indicates that many of the issues leaked today were already patched in the latest iOS, we will continue work to rapidly address any identified vulnerabilities," Apple said in a statement. 

Here's Apple's complete statement on the WikiLeaks files: 

"Apple is deeply committed to safeguarding our customers’ privacy and security.  The technology built into today’s iPhone represents the best data security available to consumers, and we’re constantly working to keep it that way. Our products and software are designed to quickly get security updates into the hands of our customers, with nearly 80 percent of users running the latest version of our operating system. While our initial analysis indicates that many of the issues leaked today were already patched in the latest iOS, we will continue work to rapidly address any identified vulnerabilities.  We always urge customers to download the latest iOS to make sure they have the most recent security updates.”

There is also evidence in the 7,818 web pages and attached files that the CIA has tools to gain unauthorized access to Android devices, smart TVs, and other computers. 

'Nothing interesting or new' about the published exploits

(A screenshot of purported exploits the CIA was aware of and documented.WikiLeaks)

 
Will Strafach, a security professional with extensive experience with iOS exploits and CEO of Sudo Security Group, cast doubt about the "leaked iOS stuff from CIA" on Twitter, saying that there appeared to be "nothing interesting or new."

"So far, there is zero cause for concern," Strafach told Business Insider. "They definitely have vulnerability research (looks very similar to my own company's internal wiki), but nothing which should be if any concern to a user on the latest iOS."

Apple regularly fixes the kind of bugs and potential exploits that the CIA purportedly developed and bought. For maximum security, you should update to the latest version of iOS on your iPhone or iPad in Settings > General > Software Update. 

In a statement accompanying the document release, Wikileaks claimed that there was a group inside the CIA specifically dedicated to hacking iPhones and iPads. Wikileaks wrote: 

Despite iPhone's minority share (14.5%) of the global smart phone market in 2016, a specialized unit in the CIA's Mobile Development Branch produces malware to infest, control and exfiltrate data from iPhones and other Apple products running iOS, such as iPads. CIA's arsenal includes numerous local and remote "zero days" developed by CIA or obtained from GCHQ, NSA, FBI or purchased from cyber arms contractors such as Baitshop. The disproportionate focus on iOS may be explained by the popularity of the iPhone among social, political, diplomatic and business elites.

The U.S. has a long history of hacking other democracies

By Mariya Y. Omelicheva, Ryan Beasley and Christian Crandall By Mariya Y. Omelicheva, Ryan Beasley and Christian Crandall

Monkey Cage

December 20, 2016

The former commander in chief of the Allied forces in Europe, Gen. Dwight David “Ike” Eisenhower poses for a photographer at NATO Paris headquarters in 1951. (AFP/Getty Images)

Why do democratic governments so often engage in violent covert actions?

The United States is roiled by controversy over Russia’s broad covert operation to undermine the legitimacy of the 2016 presidential election and Western democracy in general. But the U.S. government has interfered in other democracies’ decisions with violent clandestine operations that go back generations.

[A new poll shows an astonishing 52% of Republicans think Trump won the popular vote]

During the George W. Bush administration, the American public learned about post-9/11 covert actions that many found disturbing, including secret memos authorizing torture of terrorist suspects; a highly secretive program of “extraordinary renditions,” which involved the government-sponsored capture and transfer of detainees from U.S. jurisdiction to other states without due legal process for purposes of detention and interrogation; and “black sites,” or secret prisons operated by the CIA.

But as our research has found, those operations were a continuation of U.S. policy, not a break with it.
Here’s how we did our research — and what we found
We examined unclassified Central Intelligence Agency documents and historical academic research on U.S. interventions to identify 27 U.S. clandestine operations carried out between 1949 and 2000.

Most U.S. “secret wars” were against other democratic states.

[How Hannah Arendt’s classic work on totalitarianism illuminates today’s America]

Unclassified documents published by the U.S. national security archive at George Washington University show that the British government helped the United States overthrow Mohammad Mosaddegh, a democratically elected prime minister of Iran, and tried to block the release of information about its involvement in the coup.

But that’s just one example. In 1954, an anti-Communist “army” trained and armed by the CIA deposed democratically elected president Jacobo Arbenz Guzman in Guatemala — leading to years of violent civil war and rightist rule. Fifty-seven years later, Guatemalan President Alvaro Colom, on behalf of the state, asked Guzman’s family for forgiveness.

And in 1981, President Ronald Reagan authorized the funding for the CIA-led “secret wars” against the democratically elected Sandinista government in Nicaragua. These are but a few examples of the U.S. covert operations abroad.

Kissinger: Trump has opportunity to make history in U.S. foreign relations

During an interview aired Dec. 18, former secretary of state Henry Kissinger said of foreign leaders' relationship to President-elect Donald Trump, "It is a shocking experience to them that he came into office, at the same time, an extraordinary opportunity." Kissinger says of foreign leaders of Trump, "It is a shocking experience to them that he came into office, at the same time, an extraordinary opportunity." (Reuters)

We also examined the nationality of detainees in the “war on terror” between 2001 and 2006, when the United States was casting the broadest net to find and detain prisoners. The individuals detained by the U.S. military on the orders of the U.S. administration were placed at the Guantanamo Bay detention camp in Cuba or transferred to Abu Ghraib in Iraq. There is a public record of their detention.

In parallel to the U.S. military operations, the CIA seized several people in foreign territories suspected of hostile actions against the United States. Held incommunicado and without due process of law, these individuals were placed in the CIA’s secret prisons or sent to states known for forced disappearances and torture.

We compiled the list of individuals covertly detained by the CIA from reports by international human rights groups and independent news organizations providing investigative reporting on the CIA renditions program. Our analysis further confirmed that the United States was substantially more likely to use clandestine coercion against citizens of democratic states.

Why do democratic governments engage in frequent violent covert actions?

Policymakers worry whether their actions will be perceived as legitimate. Legitimacy comes in part from keeping policies consistent with citizens’ interests and expectations.

For instance, since wars and violence are inimical to citizens’ interest in self-preservation and freedom, policymakers are predisposed to value peace. Democratic governments will launch open violence only if they think they can persuade citizens that those actions are legitimate.

While working covertly to bring down democracies, the United States also worked to engineer public support for overt use of force, if necessary. For instance, in 1954, the Eisenhower administration spread fearmongering propaganda about the “communist leanings” of the Guatemalan president. The U.S. news media subsequently misrepresented the coup as a successful restoration of democracy in Guatemala, carried out by local freedom fighters.

The news media did not report what it did not know: that the CIA had masterminded and funded the revolt. Similarly, the British government used the BBC’s Persian service to spread anti-Mosaddegh attitudes before the 1954 Iranian coup.

When democratic governments can’t get their citizens to support coercive policies abroad, they — at times — can and do resort to covert force.

Mariya Y. Omelicheva is associate professor in the department of political science at the University of Kansas.

Christian Crandall is professor in the department of psychology at the University of Kansas.

Ryan Beasley is senior lecturer in the school of international relations at St. Andrews University.
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NSA advisory sparks concern of secret advance ushering in cryptoapocalypse

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Risk Assessment / Security & Hacktivism

Once elliptic curve crypto was viewed as a savior. Now its future looks doomed.

by Dan Goodin - Oct 22, 2015 6:15pm EDT

In August, National Security Agency officials advised US agencies and businesses to prepare for a not-too-distant time when the cryptography protecting virtually all sensitive government and business communications is rendered obsolete by quantum computing. The advisory recommended backing away from plans to deploy elliptic curve cryptography, a form of public key cryptography that the NSA spent the previous 20 years promoting as more secure than the older RSA cryptosystem.

NSA preps quantum-resistant algorithms to head off crypto-apocalypse

Quantum computing threatens crypto as we know it. The NSA is taking notice.

Almost immediately, the dramatic about-face generated questions and anxiety. Why would the NSA abruptly abandon a series of ECC specifications it had championed for so long? Why were officials issuing the advice now when a working quantum computer was 10 to 50 years away, and why would they back away from ECC before recommending a suite of quantum-resistant alternatives? The fact that the NSA was continuing to endorse use of RSA, which is also vulnerable to quantum computing, led some observers to speculate there was a secret motivation that had nothing to do with quantum computing.

On Tuesday, researchers Neal Koblitz and Alfred J. Menezes published a paper titled A Riddle Wrapped in an Enigma that compiles some of the competing theories behind the August advisory. The researchers stressed that that their paper isn't academic and at times relies on unsourced facts and opinions. And sure enough, some of the theories sound almost conspiratorial. Still, the paper does a good job of evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of the NSA's highly unexpected abandonment of ECC in a post quantum crypto (PQC) world.

"The PQC announcement suggests that NSA has no interest in this topic because it now views ECC as only a stopgap solution," the researchers wrote. "This caught many people by surprise, since it is widely believed that ECC will continue to be used extensively for at least another decade or two."
The researchers remain skeptical that quantum computing is the real reason for backing away from ECC. Documents leaked by former NSA subcontractor Edward Snowden have so far given no indication of any advances in the field that pose an imminent threat to any form of public key crypto. The budget for quantum-based research is modest by NSA standards, an indication that neither the US nor any other country is on the brink of a breakthrough, they said.

The theory that has generated the most attention among readers is that NSA researchers are now aware of breakthroughs that are unrelated to quantum computing that threaten ECC but not RSA. Matt Green, a Johns Hopkins University professor specializing in cryptography, notes the advance might involve classical cryptanalysis of what's known as the elliptic curve discrete logarithm problem (ECDLP). To date, the mathematical problem is believed to be so hard to solve that properly implemented ECC can't be broken without requiring millions or even billions of years. But there's no proof this assumption is correct. If NSA researchers stumbled on a new way to tackle the problem efficiently, it would torpedo the entire suite of crypto schemes banks, government subcontractors, and others have been using at the strong urging of the federal government.

"If the NSA's mathematicians began to make even modest, but sustained advances in the state of the art for solving the ECDLP, it would put the entire field at risk," Green wrote in a blog post. "Beginning with the smallest of the standard curves, P-256, which would now provided less than the required 128-bit security."

P-256 refers to a curve set in a 256-bit field. Because of the exponential number of operations required to solve ECDLP provides the equivalent of 128 bits of security, the minimum threshold mandates for encrypting classified material. A little-noticed provision in the NSA's August communication, Green noted, was the announcement that P-256 was being retired.

Nobody can crack important algorithms yet, but the world needs to prepare for that to happen.

While not everyone agrees with the theories, the paper makes a compelling argument that NSA researchers are aware of new information they have yet to disclose that's causing them to lose confidence in cryptography they were among the first to champion in the late 1990s and have continued to support ever since. More recently, ECC has been embraced as the alternative to the frailer RSA cryptosystem. The NSA's announcement is causing some researchers to question that assumption. Hanging in the balance is the security of just countless industrialized governments, banks, and websites everywhere.

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Truth or Consequences - China Hackers Threaten USA Power Grid

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This week we were informed that Chinese hackers could disable the United States Power Grid and paralyze the American economy.   The following extract came from The Inquisitr Online.

 

The Inquisitr‎   November 20, 2014

NSA Director Says Chinese Cyber Hackers Can Shut Down U.S. Power Grid

NSA Director Michael Rogers says that Chinese cyber hackers can shut down the power grid in the United States and essentially end life as we know it in America. According to the federal official, China and “one or two” other countries are capable of launching cyberattacks that terminate the ability of the power grid to function and shut down other “critical systems” nationwide.

The real possibility of massive and devastating power grid cyberattacks has long been discussed by both national security experts and the five million prepper families in the United States, but has not officially been confirmed by a “top cyber official” in the federal government until now. Former Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano said, not long after leaving office, that a cyberattack on the power grid was a matter of “when,” not “if.”

During a House Intelligence Committee hearing, NSA Director Michael Rogers said “adversaries” of the United States are currently engaging in “electronic reconnaissance” on a regular basis. Such activities are being conducted in order to ensure that China and other adversarial nations are “in a position to disrupt the industrial control systems” such as the power grid, which enable food and medication delivery and allow chemical facilities and water treatment plants to function.

The NSA director also said, “All of that leads me to believe it is only a matter of when, not if, we are going to see something dramatic. [In cyberspace] You can literally do almost anything you want, and there is not a price to pay for it.”

What is wrong with this picture?  On May 21, 2001, nearly four months BEFORE the tragic 9-11 terrorist attack on the World Trade Center at a News Conference at the National Press Center in Washington, D.C. a new company announced a cyber security system that could block any cyber attack on our power grid and any other critical digital operations in America.

Who was the first client of Invicta Networks,  the new company, the NSA.  So this week, 13 years later, NSA admits we have no defense for our power grid from a cyber attack.  Yet 13 years ago, they were testing a system that could protect our power grid.  What happened?

Special briefings were presented to the top cyber officials in the White House, Pentagon, and Intelligence agencies including the cyber czars like Richard A. Clarke for President Bush and President Obama.

In the time since 9-11 our government spent billions and billions of dollars on cyber security to protect the economy, banks, the power grid, classified government data bases and who knows what else.  Yet in the past year hackers have stolen over 500 million credit card, banking and phone records of our citizens.  Some protection.

The same ineffective computer security companies that dominated the Internet in 2001 dominate the Internet in 2014 except many have been acquired by giant defense contractors.  So the same companies that control the most powerful weapons systems in the world also dominate cyber security in the world.  Do you feel more secure as a result?  

Certainly the systems are not working if NSA says we are vulnerable.

Contrary to what NSA said, China is not the only threat.  There are Russian hackers, former Russian KGB and now Russian mob hackers, hackers from the Netherlands, the independent group Anonymous and of course employees and contractors for our very own intelligence agencies (remember Edward Snowden and NSA).

Congress should investigate why the White House national security advisors and USA intelligence agencies ignored solutions to our problems over the years and blocked companies like Invicta from protecting American assets.  Perhaps the true extent of our deception has not been discovered.

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Obamaville October 1 - When do the lies stop?

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Today the CDC became the newest government agency to lie to the public in a long list of institutional lying the past two years alone.  When they announced the first Ebola case in the United States they said there was no chance of anyone else being exposed.  Then 12 hours later they said the patient was refused Ebola treatment the first time he went to the hospital because they didn't test for Ebola even though he told them he came from Liberia.  He was given the great American cure all, antibodies, which have no effect on Ebola, then sent home.  For the next two days everyone he encountered in Dallas, Texas was exposed to Ebola.

What does it mean to citizens of the USA?  More important, who can you believe?  Did I mention there is no cure currently available?

Of course we are also facing a nationwide epidemic of the D68 virus in children and numerous cases have mutated from a very dangerous virus to paralyzing the victims and no cure is in sight for this either. 

Then there is the MERS coronavirus virus that has spread to the USA from the Middle East and again there is no cure.  If the victim has a strong immune system they may live.  Here in the land of addictive prescription drugs, dozens of required vaccinations, and the explosion of antibiotics prescribed, to both the humans for every little cause and in the food supply through massive doses in the animal feed, we have destroyed much of our immune system thanks to our government regulation.

The biggest lie of all is that we have a good health care system.  Right now the only thing healthy about American health care is the massive wealth being accumulated by the doctors, pharmaceutical corporations, health care providers, insurance companies, health equipment manufacturers, stock holders in health care companies, and banks financing the maze of activity designed to keep you sick, not make you healthy.

To this day our government does not allow medical practices that have been in use around the world for thousands of years that prevent people from getting sick.  Why are proven Chinese health practices such as herbal treatment and acupuncture not approved for health insurance and Medicare?

Did I mention the agency scandal of the week, this time the Secret Service, forced to admit the president has been in danger more than once and if the most recent fence jumping person who made it over the fence, across the lawn, and inside the White House to the private quarters of the first family had been carrying plastic explosives instead of a knife, there might not be a White House.  Thank God an off duty officer finally tackled the intruder.

This comes on the heels of two more disclosures of failures to protect the president, which was preceded by a prostitution ring that was serving the Secret Service agents some kind of security.  Today the Secret Service director was fired or resigned depending on whose lie you care to believe.

Not to prolong the discussion, but we are also still trying to find out what really happened in the IRS scandal that also cost a director her job.

Bringing up the rear in our cavalcade of institutional lies is the National Security Agency tale of woes thanks to whistle blower Edward Snowden.  Now these lies have echoed throughout the world and seriously damaged our credibility.

And that, my friends, is all the ink I will devote to the avalanche of lies we are being spoon fed.
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Obamaville March 18, 2014 - Obama who? What foreign policy?

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There are times when it seems the entire liberal social establishment in America has obliterated the memory of our sitting president from their minds, and thus from the news as well.

You see, when you control the media YOU decide what fodder to feed the foolish public and mums the word when it comes to the former darling of the liberal left.

 

 

One must admit that they have had quite a run of back luck or silly policy which ever you care to believe.

 

 

There is the case of promising to end the wars his first two years as president, made nearly six years ago by my math.  More people are being killed since we left Iraq than when we were there.  So much for bringing peace to the birthplace of civilization.

 

 

The only reason we will be out of Afghanistan by the end of this, his 6th year, is because President Hamid Karzai GCMG is throwing us out.  With the Taliban radicals patiently waiting across the border in Pakistan for us to leave, don't count on much peace there.

 

 

Then there was Libya, Egypt, Iran and Syria where revolts were won and lost and each time the people moved farther and farther away from good relations with America.  Did I mention Benghazi and the murder of our ambassador and other Americans?

 

 

Now, with the fracturing of the Ukraine and separation of Crimea American foreign policy is more fitted to cartoons, Saturday Night Live skits and MAD magazine than any serious strategic consideration.

 

Add to that the NSA scandals.  It's bad enough spying on your own people let alone spying on the leaders of your closest allies so no wonder the administration has a propensity to shoot itself in the foot.

 

 

Don't you find it rather ironic that our spy agencies can look down from satellites and read what kind of cigarette pack you have in your hand but they can't find an airplane, Flight 777, bigger than three football fields?

 

Now all those foreign failures alone are more than enough pain and consternation for most politicians but foreign policy failures are just the tip of the iceberg and Obama's Titanic billion dollar political machine long ago slammed into the iceberg.

 

 

When the truth of the past four years slaps the liberals across the side of the head they will also realize their last great hope, Hillary Clinton, is also on that same Titanic sinking swiftly to the ocean's floor because her fingerprints are right there along with the president in planning and carrying out the toxic foreign policy disasters.

 

 

It will take a lot more than an ex-president from Hope, Arkansas to salvage the colossal failures the Obama Dream brought us.  Speaking of ex-presidents, the public is yet to be told the truth about how the Clinton administration was responsible for gutting energy and financial regulations that enabled the greatest Wall Street scandals in our nation's history, scandals in which the perpetrators have yet to see a day behind bars at the expense of the government.

 

 

The biggest danger to the Democratic party in losing control of the Senate this year and the White House in two years is not that they will lose their liberal stronghold in Obama and Harry Reid, because most of the Obama agenda has not been enacted, even during the two years the Democrats controlled everything.

 

 

No, I suspect their biggest fear is the danger that could result in vigorous and long over due prosecution of those people and institutions who plotted with the Clinton administration to bend the rules and make a huge windfall profit while gutting the federal treasury and leaving the people on the brink of personal bankruptcy.

 

 

A Republican president and congress just might decide it is time the people know the truth about the energy price spikes, the home mortgage collapse, the Wall Street shenanigans, bailouts, payoffs and 401k retirement disasters brought about since the Clinton presidency.

 

 

The next Obamaville article will focus on more of the Obama legacy in terms of his domestic affairs record from the endless stream of broken promises to the few successes that mutated into disasters.

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