nuclear-news

NSA’s surreptitious infiltration of 1000s of computers

Global Nuclear Insecurity http://majiasblog.blogspot.jp/2014/01/global-nuclear-insecurity.html 20 Jan 14

A story reported in The New York Times stopped me cold:

N.S.A. Devises Radio Pathway Into Computershttp://www.nytimes.com/2014/01/15/us/nsa-effort-pries-open-computers-not-connected-to-internet.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20140115&_r=0

WASHINGTON — The National Security Agency has implanted software in nearly 100,000 computers around the world that allows the United States to conduct surveillance on those machines and can also create a digital highway for launching cyberattacks. While most of the software is inserted by gaining access to computer networks, the N.S.A. has increasingly made use of a secret technology that enables it to enter and alter data in computers even if they are not connected to the Internet, according to N.S.A. documents, computer experts and American officials.

The technology, which the agency has used since at least 2008, relies on a covert channel of radio waves that can be transmitted from tiny circuit boards and USB cards inserted surreptitiously into the computers. In some cases, they are sent to a briefcase-size relay station that intelligence agencies can set up miles away from the target.

Majia here: Holy Cow! Computers now can be hacked by radio waves that are miles from the target!I’m sure the technology must not be new since its being reported in the mainstream press.

What it does explain is why cybersecurity is now such a pressing issue. Remember when Richard Clark was warning about cyber-security threats? See here.

Think about it. Anyone with this technology could hack NUCLEAR PLANTS and CHEMICAL PLANTS and cause them to explode entirely remotely.

Both the Chinese and the Americans have the technology so no doubt Russia and Israel also have it.

We think we are so smart with our toys but all we’ve done is feed our most base and anti-social instincts.

January 24, 2014 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | Reference, secrets,lies and civil liberties, USA