Tag US

Anyone keen in owning a non-fungible token (NFT) of a private & signed collection of Edward Snowden photos with the Canadian lawyer Robert Tibbo who helped him escape Hong Kong and the NSA back in 2013?

These photos will be auctioned at 1400 hr New York time TODAY, 28 October 2021. Check these out:

https://nationalpost.com/news/canada/canadian-lawyer-auctioning-nft-of-previously-unpublished-edward-snowden-photos

https://tibbonft.com/

https://zora.co/collections/zora/5918

https://mobile.twitter.com/tibbosnowdenNFT

Unpublished and Signed NFT photos of Edward Snowden up for auction today

The year 2019 has been setting the scene on the cyber-geopolitical scene for the 2020s. Here’s a nice sum up.

And on the personal front the best defense is to keep yourself informed – Watch out for fake news and facts-check everything you read especially anything that seems too perfectly outrageous.

(Above) photo credit: Jeff Nenarella/The Epoch Times

See also other related reports.

That Whistle Could Have You Behind Bars

For Whom the Bell Tolls was a 1940 novel by Ernest Hemingway about an American in the International Brigades who blows up a bridge during the Spanish Civil War with death the ultimate sacrifice.

But what about For Whom The Whistle Blows? That informs the current debate about Bradley Manning and Edward Snowden, two Americans who risked their lives by leaking documents on US foreign policy and covert cyber-snooping activities during the US war on terrorism. Are they prisoners – one in a US army stockade and the other in exile in Moscow – of conscience?

In contrast to the contemptuous labels and espionage charges the US government slapped on the two, one a US Army private first class and the other a former government intelligence contractor, both claimed their motive was to spark public debate and promote greater transparency in US government conduct. Whistle-blowers in general have all along been quite rightly championed and heralded by the authorities, media and the general public – at least by those whose oxen are not being gored from the revelations. Such are the dichotomies of modern history.

You can find the entire column here and there.

Check out the Guardian online interview with Edward Snowden here. Thousands of comments from readers and still counting.

The Art of Hiding and Being Undetectable

The world knows by now Edward Snowden, the former private contractor for the National Security Agency who leaked revelations of massive US clandestine electronic surveillance and eavesdropping programs, is still at large in Hong Kong.

You might wonder how Snowden managed to remain obscure, both in the physical and cyber spheres.

Hong Kong, a former British colony now a major global financial center and Special Administrative Region of China, is one of the most densely populated areas in the world with a population of over seven million spread over just 1,104 square kilometers.

But it is precisely for these reasons that Hong Kong may be the ideal place. One could be easily spotted or located or one could capitalize on the dense crowd and modern infrastructure to negotiate his way unnoticed in the physical, digital and cyber dimensions.

And Snowden sure knows how to do that.

So what would you do if you were Snowden or if you simply needed to hide and remain undetectable for a period of time?

Please read the full column here and there.

In Spies We Trust

The two-day private talks between the US and Chinese Presidents Barack Obama and Xi Jinping this weekend in Rancho Mirage, CA are expected to include, among other thorny issues, the dwindling trust between the two countries following the recent spate of cyber intrusions the US have repeatedly alleges to have originated from China.

In the first diplomatic efforts to defuse chronic tensions, the two have also agreed to launch regular, high-level talks next month on how to set standards of behavior for cyber security and commercial espionage. But don’t expect anything concrete from these meetings. The state of cyberspace diplomacy is heading only south.

Please read the full column here.

In the increasingly pugnacious cyber espionage war, the US is not only admittedly losing out to countries like China and Russia but the real headline news is, the US is still at a loss on how to protect itself against the massive intellectual property threats on its very turf.

The chairman of the House Intelligence Committee Rep. Mike Rogers told audience at the Intelligence and National Security Alliance (INSA) cyber conference, held on 26 September in Washington DC, that the US is “running out of time” – US government officials have stated that no country engages in cyber espionage as systematically, thoroughly and broadly as China and the theft of critical intellectual property is billing up to US$1 trillion.

The Rogers-Ruppersberger Bill designed to stem the tide is facing resistance at the Senate.

This Bill proposed to offer business liability insurance cover to the business community. In return, the victimized companies would have to share their threat information with the government, who will in turn share that experience with the business world.

(What? Are you kidding me?! Okay, I hear you at the back row).

Need I say more? Find out more about it here.

The Pentagon’s recent sworn: They won’t spy on journalists.

(Yeah right…. Yes, I hear you at the back.)

The US Defense Secretary Leon Panetta gave an order July 19 to clampdown on classified leaks from the Pentagon and “monitor all major, national level reporting”.

This raised immediate concerns amongst the press as journalists wondered: is the Pentagon planning to spy on their very act of reporting or simply to conduct wide-sweeping news scans for supposedly leaked information? The former, left to one’s imagination, could include wiretapping, surveillance and various forms of intrusive acts.

The Pentagon press secretary George Little reportedly replied in writing:

“The secretary and the chairman both believe strongly in freedom of the press and encourage good relations between the department and the press corps.” (Read this).

Meanwhile, a true story, I know a journalist who was spied upon by a Chinese intelligence agent.

The agent apparently tried to recruit the reporter by offering “huge rewards” if he cooperates and collects information about certain individuals under the pretense of combing background data for potential stories.

This journo friend declined outright but not long after, he suspected his phones were bugged and asked for help.

My advice?

Quite simply though cumbersome: buy and replace regularly several low-value, use-and-dispose SIM cards, several used cellular phones (the pre-smartphone days type like those good old Nokia, Ericsson, Motorola, etc) and used laptops.

In short, change your phone and cyber lifestyle – at least for the time being (Refer to my earlier commentary: Shhh… How to Beat the CIA and Protect Your Data).

I just picked up 2 interesting reports on surveillance matters.

It was reported that the FBI claimed its surveillance on those involved in the Occupy movement is within legal boundaries and did not cause “unnecessary intrusions into the lives of law-abiding people.”

This came after the American Civil Liberties Union used the Freedom of Information Act to secure FBI surveillance documents on the movement in a lawsuit and asked why the agency withheld two-thirds of its records and subsequently cited national security as a reason for the nondisclosure (Read this).

On the other side of the Atlantic Ocean, the civil rights group Liberty used the UK Data Protection Act to represent a disabled woman in a legal action against a commercial security firm and its undercover surveillance “usual practice” which, as part of their investigative works for insurance companies, send agents disguised as delivery men to spy on the sick and disabled in their homes (Read this).

These are just going to lead to endless debates. Watch this space, I might post a column on this topic.

The US works out a free ride for its spooks

I have always fancied having a smorgasbord of passports, each bearing a different name, country of citizenship and photo — just like the spies as we know them, or at least as we understand them from spy fiction and movies like James Bond and CIA agent Jason Bourne in the Bourne Trilogy movies.

However, airport security checks and immigration clearance must be a nightmare for real spies, undercover agents and intelligence officials these days as governments, increasingly wary of the growing sophistication of terrorists, have invented new technologies to try to detect them. Hence the increased tight security measures at airports over the world have created lots of inconvenience for the intelligence community. And the pseudo passports probably don’t even work, given the facial recognition checks on top of the fingerprint hassles that have become commonplace at immigration checkpoints across the globe.

The spymasters know and they care, and they set out to do something about it.

So in late July, the US Transportation Security Administration (TSA) – the agency within the US Department of Homeland Security that exercises authority over the security of the traveling public in America – reportedly put procedures in place to allow the employees of three US intelligence agencies to pass un-scrutinized through airport security checks with convenience… (Read the entire column here and there).

Spies multiply like coathangers in China and the US

How many intelligence — okay honestly, spy — agencies does a country really need?
Anywhere between eight and 17 and possibly more if you’re referring to China and the United States. The US, in fact, recently established its newest spy agency, which is specifically targeted at China, among others (Read the entire column here, here and there).

Electronic gadgets are often fun but there is rarely one as useful as this: a new type of flash memory stick that can self- destruct by remote control.

I was immediately speculating the immense possibilities. James Bond or Ethan Hunt, anyone?

But the real implication is even more profound, given a recent US court ruling that dealt a blow to the fight against corporate espionage in saying the download of proprietary data does not amount to a criminal offense after all (Read the entire column here and there).