The All-Seeing Eye

[bobo fizmarkian]

I bet some of the NSA guys have some great collections of foxy ladies!

Of course, not just them..

Forbes:
http://tinyurl.com/l55q8p6

The All-Seeing Eye

Annuit Cœptis

The other day, my college age son quietly went around the house and
put electricians tape over the camera lenses on the displays of all
our home computers. I laughed when I discovered what he had done. .
.then paused: after all, it wouldn’t be that hard for someone to
remotely turn that camera on and secretly watch me and my family. I
left the tape on.

This is what it has come to. The revelations of recent days about
the NSA being able to spy on the phone calls of millions of everyday
Americans, without warrant, in search of a few possible terrorists
has made everyone just a little more paranoid – and a little less
trusting of the benign nature of our Federal government. The reality
is that we may not yet be paranoid enough.

I come from a spook family. I was born in Munich while my father was
running counter-intelligence missions for the Air Force OSI into
<snip>





--
Bobo - (What's the Jive? Bird's alive! What's the word? Thunderbird.)
jk

[Dreg Morpzag]

Kirby Grant wrote:

> I have a simpler solution. I disable the camera device driver. Since I never
> use the camera for any purpose there is really no reason for it to be
> enabled. And if I were to need it for some purpose that doesn't occur to me
> right now, it is easy to enable the driver.

It is easy FOR EVERYONE who has access to your computer to enable the
camera driver.

Sorry, you are wallowing in false security.

--

[Dreg Morpzag]

On 17.06.2013 00:03, Kirby Grant wrote:

>> It is easy FOR EVERYONE who has access to your computer to enable the
>> camera driver.
>>
>> Sorry, you are wallowing in false security.
>>
>> --
>

> No one has access to my system but me.

How come? Why do you believe that?

> Plus I have it booby trapped so that
> if someone did try to enable my camera they would find quite a surprise
> waiting for them.

Ok, but that might back-firing when you need your camera and you forget
to disable the surprise ;-)

--

[Robert Fitzgerald]

Since my name is not "Weiner" I always pull my cam when not in use.

Running a Linux distro off a CD or DVD is at least one way nobody will
write to the OS.




--
Bobby - I remember Bill (Evans)

[Robert Fitzgerald]

I mean, permanently write to the OS. Somebody might bust in and change
it in RAM/etc. But, reboot, clean again.. (I figure..)

The NSA had one of their contractors develop the SE-Linux stuff for
Linux. It's open source, free.. (Security Enhanced Linux..) Anybody can
use it..

There's also the idea of not loading programs into predictable areas of
memory. I think Windows also can do that..

However, I'm sure any complex system has errors in the code that will be
found over time, and probably agencies like the NSA spend huge sums on
finding them - and not talking about them. Using them.

Another way to protect is something like tripwire (etc. etc. etc. etc.)
on Linux. Maybe there are similar things for Windows.. (maybe not..)
It does a checksum of all the files on the system. Store the data on
something like a DVD, say.. Then do regular checks. If something is
changed, you know.. More sure than something like anti-virus.. Probably
best to run off a DVD/etc. too..

There's also the issue of simply driving a van up on the street, shining
a laser beam at a window, and getting the sound vibrations off it. Hear
everything going on inside..

Then, brain waves. Both EMF and on the ethereal plane. For that, simply
line a football helmet with aluminum foil, two layers. <joke - it
probably won't work on the ethereal..>

The British were getting radio emissions from computer monitors/etc. in
the London USSR embassy to know what was coming across the screens. The
US government came up - IIRC - with the "tempest" standard. I have a
couple of NEC multisync monitors that were modified by some company for
that, and have farraday cages around the guts. I think it just lines the
inside of the case, and the monitors aren't changed otherwise.. You can
see it through the grills. I think cost me $5 each. (I don't use them,
just collector items to me..) It seems to me the monitors say "tempest"
on them.. Top secret contractors/defense/etc. have to use them. I'm
sure any company that doesn't want their secrets revealed does the same
with various equipment.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempest_%28codename%29
Public research

In 1985, Wim van Eck published the first unclassified technical analysis
of the security risks of emanations from computer monitors. This paper
caused some consternation in the security community, which had previously
believed that such monitoring was a highly sophisticated attack available
only to governments; van Eck successfully eavesdropped on a real system,
at a range of hundreds of metres, using just $15 worth of equipment plus
a television set.

In consequence of this research such emanations are sometimes called "van
Eck radiation," and the eavesdropping technique van Eck phreaking,
although government researchers were already aware of the danger, as Bell
Labs noted this vulnerability to secure teleprinter communications during
World War II and was able to produce 75% of the plaintext being processed
in a secure facility from a distance of 80 feet.[9] Additionally the NSA
published Tempest Fundamentals, NSA-82-89, NACSIM 5000, National Security
Agency (Classified) on February 1, 1982. In addition, the van Eck
technique was successfully demonstrated to non-TEMPEST personnel in Korea
during the Korean War in the 1950s.[citation needed]

[Robert Fitzgerald]

On Mon, 17 Jun 2013 23:08:57 -0500, Robert Fitzgerald wrote:

<snip>

>
> The British were getting radio emissions from computer monitors/etc. in
> the London USSR embassy to know what was coming across the screens. The
> US government came up - IIRC - with the "tempest" standard. I have a
> couple of NEC multisync monitors that were modified by some company for
> that, and have farraday cages around the guts. I think it just lines
> the inside of the case, and the monitors aren't changed otherwise.. You
> can see it through the grills. I think cost me $5 each. (I don't use
> them, just collector items to me..) It seems to me the monitors say
> "tempest" on them.. Top secret contractors/defense/etc. have to use
> them. I'm sure any company that doesn't want their secrets revealed
> does the same with various equipment.
>

<snip>

I purchased these at a thrift store... I'd guestimate old 1990's
monitors..

I think one could probably do the same thing by maybe literally just
making a little wood cage around a monitor with alum foil on it.. (Of
course, don't block cooling..)

However, seems to me modern flat screen monitors don't emit as much
RF..(?) They probably have to also put shielding around all the
equipment..

I'm sure all companies that protect their secrets worry about RF
emissions from anything that matters.. Not just defense contractors..
who do it by law..

Probably, there are a bunch of websites/etc. that go into blocking
emissions from equipment.. ad-hoc ways..

Here's wikipedia on SE linux.. not about RF emissions of course..
openly available, open source.. (although trouble to use, seems to
me..) Development paid for by the NSA, some years back.. It seems to
me I read Microsoft objected, IIRC.

They probably have a bunch of stuff too that's not open source I
imagine..

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Security-Enhanced_Linux

Security-Enhanced Linux
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia This article needs additional
citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding
citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged
and removed. (June 2009) The SELinux administrator in Fedora 8

Security-Enhanced Linux (SELinux) is a Linux feature that provides
the mechanism for supporting access control security policies,
including United States Department of Defense-style mandatory access
controls, through the use of Linux Security Modules (LSM) in the Linux
kernel. It is not a Linux distribution, but rather a set of kernel
modifications and user-space tools that can be added to various Linux
distributions. Its architecture strives to separate enforcement of
security decisions from the security policy itself and streamlines the
volume of software charged with security policy enforcement.[1][2]
The key concepts underlying SELinux can be traced to several earlier
projects by the United States National Security Agency.

It has been integrated into the mainline Linux kernel since version
2.6, on 8 August 2003.
Contents

1 Overview
2 Users, policies and security contexts
<snip>

[Robert Fitzgerald]

On Mon, 17 Jun 2013 23:08:57 -0500, Robert Fitzgerald wrote:

<snip>
>

> There's also the issue of simply driving a van up on the street, shining
> a laser beam at a window, and getting the sound vibrations off it. Hear
> everything going on inside..
>

<snip>

This is something that places like the White House, and millions of
lesser-places are probably protected against.. Probably special
windows, heavy curtains, laser detectors, etc.. Companies with
secrets, maybe the Mexican Mafia, etc. etc. etc. probably know all
about this.. OTOH, it wouldn't surprise me if the Mexican Mafia gets
government help, on both sides of the border..

of course, they probably are watching carefully for strange leaves
that fall on the roof or whatever.. of high security places.. It's
probably a lot of work nowadays.

Some little kid who shines a laser cat toy at the white house probably
gets
swarmed quick, maybe.. Although I haven't read any stories like that.
Of course, people doing it to helicopters/etc.. and other aircraft.

Come to think of it, there are probably high resolution automated
telescopic cameras that are recording a lot of stuff regularly at
places like that.. Maybe from miles away..

They can put very high res camera systems on drones now, that take
pics of everything around in great detail. It'll only get cheaper and
cheaper. Although they didn't obviously use anything like that with
the Boston Marathon. Or didn't want to reveal it if they did..
Probably #1.. But, eventually it'll be ubiquitous. I'll call them
"supercams". There have been some stories on engineering schools or
whatever developing those..