These are admittedly confusing times to be on the left. For example, it’s disorienting to discover that you agree with Maine’s Republican Governor Paul LePage about anything, but it’s hard to disagree with his take on Chumpcare:
Maine Gov. Paul LePage said Tuesday that he is “very, very discouraged and disappointed” with the House Republican plan to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act.
“Right now, I am very, very discouraged and disappointed with what the House Republicans are introducing,” LePage, a Republican, said on the “George Hale and Ric Tyler Show” on WVOM Maine radio. “Basically it’s not much better than—in fact, I don’t know, they haven’t scored it yet, so we don’t know what the cost is. But based on what I see and I’m reading and what has happened here in Maine over the last 15 years, I don’t think it’s an improvement.”
Or consider this. Since WikiLeaks has just released a trove of documents from the CIA’s Center for Cyber Intelligence, who do you our president will side with? Will he side with the folks who worked with his buddy Roger Stone to destroy Hillary Clinton’s campaign?
Trust me, it will soon the Podesta's time in the barrel. #CrookedHillary
— Roger Stone (@RogerJStoneJr) August 21, 2016
Here's the screengrab of Roger Stone admitting the Trump campaign colluded with Asange and Wikileaks (I know, real stunner) pic.twitter.com/TcBrMrSTig
— Kriston Capps (@kristoncapps) March 5, 2017
Or will Trump side with the folks who are pretty clearly convinced that he was in collusion with the Russians and have been treating him as a counterintelligence case?
Will people on the left be outraged that Republican Rep. Jason Chaffetz of Utah said that they can just give up their Android phones if they need extra coin to afford health insurance, or will they save their energy to criticize the CIA for making sure that Android phones are insecure?
And what about those televisions? I mean, I have a Samsung Smart TV in my bedroom that I hope DCI Mike Pompeo enjoys:
Some of the details of the C.I.A. programs might have come from the plot of a spy novel for the cyberage, revealing numerous highly classified — and in some cases, exotic — hacking programs. One, code-named Weeping Angel, uses Samsung “smart” televisions as covert listening devices. According to the WikiLeaks news release, even when it appears to be turned off, the television “operates as a bug, recording conversations in the room and sending them over the internet to a covert C.I.A. server.”
It should be interesting to see how Trump behaves. And if he didn’t see this WikiLeak assault on his intelligence services coming, maybe he should ask Roger Stone why he got no head’s up this time.
Or, maybe Stone’s involved in this leak, too, and this is how Trump tries to get the Intelligence Community to back off their push to have him ousted for Russian collusion.
It’s a bit of a problem that that possibility actually seems rational in this insane environment.
Viva LePage! Viva the CIA!
At the risk of seeming thick, can I admit that I’m confused about the exact nature of these CIA leaks? Does the leak concern the CIA’s methods, information obtained that way, both?
So far, the focus is on capabilities. But that’s just people giving you the bullet points.
I’m confused about what I’m supposed to be confused about.
Sign of the times, my friend.
Sign of the times.
I think the only reaction is to adopt one’s best semblance of Both Sides Do It Broderism and then make a substantial financial contribution to the Green Party.
So Wikileaks is saying, “Damn, some source of ours stuck us with the source code for all of the hacking tools that the CIA uses. What do we do now? How do we disarm this thing before we get nuked by someone or another?”
Well, that’s the way that journalists who do not understand the software realities of what is at stake would write it.
In fact, some of these tools have leaked out into criminal cyberattacks or national-government cyberattacks on all sorts of targets.
I’m on the side of citizens who expect to be left alone by their government even while they protest its actions. Neither of your Hobson’s choice.
What is interesting about this is the multiple choices for why Trump goes down. Was it failure to find out about the overreach into the internet of things? Was it not caring about security of defense hacking tools? Was it just lack of attention?
What worries me is Congress’s response to try to put the secret things back into the intelligence community box and up the punishment for letting them out. What it is likely to do is ensure that the hacking tools get more widely used by those outside any government. And that, which you remember had to do with legislating a backdoor method of access, means that the internet experience will get as enjoyable as the air travel experience — minus the cavity search, but if Congress can think of how to allow that they will. Just so long as you say you’ll use it only on terrorists and criminals, er “bad dudes”.
Yes, I hope it brings Trump and his Breitbartians down.
But I also hope it brings down the people who have no respect for the US Constitution in doing their jobs at the CIA, NSA and other intelligence agencies.
And seeing Roger Stone in an oranged jumpsuit and “in custody” would be a slight consolation prize for never seeing Karl Rove so attired.
The only side to be on in this is massive accountability for all involved.
And for a responsible way of unlearning all of the learning in the actual source code of the hacking tools.
Are we ready to admit that intentionally putting backdoors in software is a bad idea. Reliable and secure software is the best solution for the world even if it makes the lives of national spooks a little harder.
Much of it can be purchased at DefCon or that’s where contacts to purchase can be made.
Snowden
Buying “Zero Days” is probably cheaper than employing an army to search for zero days.
Well hey the Russian version of these tools is how they blackmailed Trump into being their guy right?
Or US invented tools in Russian operative hands. Or hacker for hire using tools from one job to complete another.
Any of these could be true.
That I like.
Its the usual tools anyone interested in data or net security feared or were familiar with (in use or concept). All devices, all operating systems are compromised. To dodge the exploit takes time and effort, things that many don’t want to bother with.
Nice to see that the Samsung Smart voice command listed. I warned about those last year. Now what about the Amazon and Google voice activated voice activated concierge devices. Sitting there on the counter listening to your conversations.
R
>>what about the Amazon and Google voice activated voice activated concierge devices. Sitting there on the counter listening to your conversations.
i got one as a Christmas present and it’s still in its box. I do NOT need Amazon listening to everything I say.
I argued with my brother about this.
“the circuit is only activated by saying its name”
Yeah, right. That why Hayden, Clapper, etc.. all put tape over their laptop’s camera lens and people like Warren Buffett or other Very Wealthy carry flip phones. When you are dealing with National Security or hundreds of millions of dollars; you want to bolt as many doors and windows as possible.
Snowden demonstrated removing the microphone and camera lens from smart phones for a reason.
R
Even if you don’t it doesn’t matter. Since everyone around you is compromised they’re hearing you too.
I am with the Spooks
The latest Wikileaks dump may end up being less shocking than it seems at first glance. Questions of authenticity are still to be determined. I’m more prone to defer to those sufficiently knowledgeable on those matters, and we really won’t know much for a bit. So for now, wait and see. As the Mashable article notes, the FBI has had these capabilities for a while, so the CIA having them is less than a big deal than it might appear. And it’s unlikely that we’re being spied on every time we get on our mobile phones. I don’t have one of the Samsung smart TVs, so that is not a worry to me, but sounds like I probably have little need for paranoia even if I did have one. The only thing that is noteworthy to me is that if the dump is authentic, folks at the CIA have bad tastes when it comes to meme collecting. All the same, interesting times we live in.
there are more than two sides.
neither Trump nor the CIA has ever been on my side, and even if the CIA is against Trump right now that doesn’t put them on my side.
The question you ask, are you rooting for the CIA or for Trump? is exactly what I was thinking about today. It’s a great question.
This latest Wikileaks escapade reminds me of when the DNC computer got hacked. Well it should, Wikileaks dumped that too. Wikileaks is working with/for Russian intelligence. So with the DNC, I was against the Russians doing it, but as long as they did it, I was glad the information got out. Same here. If it helps Trump I don’t like it, but I’m not sorry the information’s out there.
I think I could say, I’d be content to have Russia and the CIA, as we now know them, break each other’s bones to smithereens, as long as Trump also gets destroyed in the process. But if you’re talking about Trump, Bannon, and all their little pals, go CIA! They’re supposed to protect American security, and they’re actually doing it, by God.
Is that confusing? It isn’t to me.
Sorry esquimaux, that wasn’t meant to be a comment to your comment, it was meant to be a comment to Booman. I suppose you don’t agree with me.