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| [america.aljazeera.com] |
Update: 26OCT2023
Once again, I'm republishing this newly updated blogpost as new information has been revealed regarding the abuse of NSA's surveillance capabilities; the two biggest perps appear to be Harris and Celebrite, both of which tout their spyware as promoting "public safety" by intruding on private phone conversations.
Thus, a Police State makes sense to them, but, maybe not to you.
You may find the three highlighted articles both informative -- and shocking.
Having been exposed as perpetrators of potentially [probably ?] illegal hacking of phone conversations, Celebrite [an Israeli company] has reportedly found a way to "hack" iPhones using iOS 11. Aside from selling their techniques to US Law Enforcement agencies, keep in mind that this is an Israeli country, which means Israeli Intelligence can monitor your phones [and the phones of our Intelligence and Military officials] as well.
Here's a quote from the article:
"For years, cops and other government authorities all over the world have been using phone hacking technology provided by Cellebrite to unlock phones and obtain the data within. And the company has been keen on keeping the use of its technology “hush hush.”
"As part of the deal with government agencies, Cellebrite asks users to keep its tech — and the fact that they used it — secret, TechCrunch has learned.
"This request concerns legal experts who argue that powerful technology like the one Cellebrite builds and sells, and how it gets used by law enforcement agencies, ought to be public and scrutinized.
"In a leaked training video for law enforcement customers that was obtained by TechCrunch, a senior Cellebrite employee tells customers that “ultimately, you’ve extracted the data, it’s the data that solves the crime, how you got in, let’s try to keep that as hush hush as possible.”
Notably, while I was investigating Intelligence vulnerabilities at the Pentagon in 1990 (three years after Jonathon Pollard's conviction for spying for the KGB and Israel], I learned that LTG Sidney T Weinstein [then US Army Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence] had granted an Israeli company a contract to "secure US Military Intelligence data and communications"!
Thus, Israeli Intelligence then had access to ALL Military Intelligence data.
The original blogpost is below.
Click here for related story [Bloomberg]
We republish this blogpost in the wake of the 06 January fiasco in which
FBI agents/provocateurs posed as demonstrators and "rioters", and spied
on the demonstrators, monitoring their cell phone traffic. There was a time
when such activity was illegal, but, as we've noticed of late, legality is of
no concern to our federal law enforcement or judicial system. Worse, the
NSA tools have now been made available to the Capitol Hill Police [CHP]
which is apparently to become a National Police Force with no oversight and
will report directly to the Speaker: Nancy Pelosi (not a paragon of virtue)]
[25 July 2022]
The original post follows:
We've commented earlier about NSA sharing their high tech capabilities with local police agencies, which was the basis for much of Mr Snowden's leaks of NSA Top Secret briefing slides.
As you may recall, NSA's mission was to spy on foreign powers, both enemy and friendly, to assure US national security. However, after 9/11 [well, in reality, long before], NSA began spying on US citizenry; they started with Congress and political candidates, and moved from there down to Joe the Plumber -- for no other reason than that they could.
With all their whiz-bang hardware and software, they still can't break most encrypted communications since the protective technology is much stronger than NSA's hacking capabilities.
NSA, via DHS, has now assumed a training and support mission to local police forces monitor the local population; of late, DHS has "showered more than $35 Billion on states and localities for 'terrorism prevention'." Sadly, Congress has now passed a bill to legitimize police access to the private communications of citizens.
In the story linked to this blog, we learn that police are now using NSA equipment at the local level to not only track citizen telecommunications, but to disrupt, re-route, and block telecommunications -- particularly cell phones.
As you may recall, NSA's mission was to spy on foreign powers, both enemy and friendly, to assure US national security. However, after 9/11 [well, in reality, long before], NSA began spying on US citizenry; they started with Congress and political candidates, and moved from there down to Joe the Plumber -- for no other reason than that they could.
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| NSA [aka: Puzzle Palace] |
Of late, the NSA is an agency without portfolio.
With all their whiz-bang hardware and software, they still can't break most encrypted communications since the protective technology is much stronger than NSA's hacking capabilities.
Think in terms of encryption between two communicators in which the call is transmitted over a broad bandwidth, changing frequencies hundreds of times a minute, with the encryption changing modes every few seconds.
It takes time to even locate a transmission, much less to lock on to it; and then there's the key word search -- but if it's encrypted, NSA won't hear it.
[Recently, rumors of a Chinese deciphering app have floated -- without confirmation]
NSA focuses on clear, open text communications which they can gather in huge volume, store in massive vaults, and then sort -- very efficiently by computers. That helps analysts, but leaves the barrier of access to the really good intelligence.
So, NSA turns inward, to collect all the metadata on American citizens which DHS has now declared as "potential terrorists". The definition of "terrorist" has now been adjusted to cover anyone who is critical of the government -- especially the President.
[Recently, rumors of a Chinese deciphering app have floated -- without confirmation]
NSA focuses on clear, open text communications which they can gather in huge volume, store in massive vaults, and then sort -- very efficiently by computers. That helps analysts, but leaves the barrier of access to the really good intelligence.
So, NSA turns inward, to collect all the metadata on American citizens which DHS has now declared as "potential terrorists". The definition of "terrorist" has now been adjusted to cover anyone who is critical of the government -- especially the President.
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| Local Cops/CHP Now Have NSA Tools |
NSA, via DHS, has now assumed a training and support mission to local police forces monitor the local population; of late, DHS has "showered more than $35 Billion on states and localities for 'terrorism prevention'." Sadly, Congress has now passed a bill to legitimize police access to the private communications of citizens.
In the story linked to this blog, we learn that police are now using NSA equipment at the local level to not only track citizen telecommunications, but to disrupt, re-route, and block telecommunications -- particularly cell phones.
[Our own personal communications have been disrupted in this manner, and photos from our computer have mysteriously appeared in texts to us from anonymous sources. Interestingly, photos from computers of former colleagues have also appeared -- with warnings that Mr Clapper regards us as a threat]
Since targets are usually unaware they are being monitored, and the equipment is essentially unregistered and used by street level cops, there is no judicial link to such surveillance in which court orders are required.
The Harris Corporation, a Defense contractor, is authorized by the Federal Communications Commission [FCC] to sell a mobile/cell phone tracking system the size of a suitcase called the StingRay - an IMSI-catcher [International Mobile Subscriber Identity]. The function of the StingRay is to send signals which mimic cell towers, thereby accessing all the identifying data from cell phones up to a mile away.
In reality, the police use the StingRay to monitor and disrupt cell phones of private citizens -- and protestors at rallies, or just to monitor their personal friends, family, neighbors and adversaries.
Chicago spent $150,000 on StingRay equipment; Harris has also peddled its equipment to San Francisco, Takoma, and Miami, but they will not disclose the purpose for which their equipment is being used.
Local law enforcement and the federal government have blocked judicial enforcement simply by refusing to turn over records demanded by the courts. In one case, when the court demanded police documents, the US Marshalls Service seized the records to ensure the court could not access them.
The term "above the law" has taken on a completely new meaning!
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| Harris StingRay II |
Its capabilities include:
1) Extracting data from cellphone internal storage [e.g., all phone numbers, logs, voicemails, etc.]
2) Writing Metadata to internal storage [e.g., boosting power to extend the transmission range to assist monitoring of the call; making it easy to track.
3) Tracking and Locating the cell phone or compatible cellular device even when the device is turned off.
4) Denial of Service [DOS], or blocking of all transmissions while the StingRay conducts its surveillance.
5) Interception of Communications Content by simulating a cell site which forces a connection with the target device [cell phone] to
a) conduct "GSM Target Key Extraction" to obtain the target device encryption key
b) download the target device's IMSI and other identifying data;
c) simulates the target device to connect to the legitimate service provider;
d) forwards signals between the target device and the legitimate cell site -- while decrypting
and recording the communications content
Police say they purchase these systems to "detect mobile phone detonated bombs like those used in Middle East IEDs".
2) Writing Metadata to internal storage [e.g., boosting power to extend the transmission range to assist monitoring of the call; making it easy to track.
3) Tracking and Locating the cell phone or compatible cellular device even when the device is turned off.
4) Denial of Service [DOS], or blocking of all transmissions while the StingRay conducts its surveillance.
5) Interception of Communications Content by simulating a cell site which forces a connection with the target device [cell phone] to
a) conduct "GSM Target Key Extraction" to obtain the target device encryption key
b) download the target device's IMSI and other identifying data;
c) simulates the target device to connect to the legitimate service provider;
d) forwards signals between the target device and the legitimate cell site -- while decrypting
and recording the communications content
Police say they purchase these systems to "detect mobile phone detonated bombs like those used in Middle East IEDs".
Chicago spent $150,000 on StingRay equipment; Harris has also peddled its equipment to San Francisco, Takoma, and Miami, but they will not disclose the purpose for which their equipment is being used.
Local law enforcement and the federal government have blocked judicial enforcement simply by refusing to turn over records demanded by the courts. In one case, when the court demanded police documents, the US Marshalls Service seized the records to ensure the court could not access them.
The term "above the law" has taken on a completely new meaning!
