Category: Terra Terra Terra!

Data privacy vs. national security

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

Apple to release iOS 9.3 after fixing iMessages encryption vulnerability

The hotly debated issue of national security versus data privacy has been making headlines all over the world due to the iPhone encryption case pitting the US Department of Justice against mammoth technology company Apple Inc.

A US District Court judge in California ordered Apple to help the FBI unlock the encrypted iPhone of one of the San Bernardino shooters who killed 14 people and seriously injured 22 in December 2015. Apple refused the court order saying it will not destabilize its products’ security features because that would leave customers vulnerable to hackers and other serious cyber threats.

Specifically, the FBI wanted Apple to write and turn over new code that would allow federal data analysts to break Apple’s encryption key. It is asking Apple to develop software that would weaken its own product – create a “backdoor” that would admit government hackers into the heart of its operating system.

Apple CEO Tim Cook’s open letter to customers denounced the FBI’s actions and court order saying, “The United States government has demanded that Apple take an unprecedented step, which threatens the security of our customers. We oppose this order, which has implications far beyond the legal case at hand.” 

He followed up with a similar email to all Apple employees thanking them for their support, reiterating that Apple has no sympathy for terrorists, and outlining how Apple has cooperated and will continue to cooperate with investigators and comply with information requests. But he urged prosecutors to withdraw their demand to turn over encryption secrets arguing it sets a dangerous precedent from both a technical and a personal privacy perspective.

Most technology experts and privacy advocates agree with Apple. They say that forcing US companies to weaken their encryption methods would invite attention from unscrupulous hackers, expose private data, threaten Internet security, and give a competitive advantage to technology companies in other countries.

Atlanta Defense Attorney Allen Yates commented, “Apple’s pushback against the government’s aggression in this case is understandable given the tech giant’s desire to protect its products, and more importantly, its customers and the ability to access their data. It is always a sensitive issue when the government invokes national security, but allowing the government unfettered access to United States Citizen’s encrypted data will create a very dangerous precedent and have unknown ramifications on the security of our most popular technologies.”

It’s a controversial topic. On the other side of the debate, the FBI and government supporters strongly disapprove of Apple’s refusal to cooperate. They say Apple must comply due to the highly sensitive nature of information that might reside on the phone. The FBI insists the code would only be used for this iPhone – one that had been in the possession of a known, deadly terrorist with allegiance to ISIS.

Like the Apple CEO, FBI Director James Comey also appealed to the public to gain support. He issued a passionate statement on the internet defending his request and saying that it is solely a question of justice for the victims and not intended to set a precedent of any kind. In his words, “We don’t want to break anyone’s encryption or set a master key loose on the land. I hope thoughtful people will take the time to understand that. Maybe the phone holds the clue to finding more terrorists. Maybe it doesn’t. But we can’t look the survivors in the eye, or ourselves in the mirror, if we don’t follow this lead.”

While the immediate legal issues surrounding the battle between Apple and the federal government became moot after the FBI hacked the iPhone itself and announced they were dropping the lawsuit, the entire debate between the right to privacy and national security will clearly continue.

The 289 classified pages of the 9/11 Commission.

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

9/11 Memorial and Museum (DSC04254)
Just going to link to a few stories you should read, like this:

In 1999, there were a handful of Arab flight students in SW Florida. In 2001 there were thousands. At a big AFB base in the Panhandle, a trainer told me, “It used to be Iranians. Now its all Saudis.”

Were they there by themselves? Hell no. Did the CIA know? Hell yes. I asked an old hand, in a highly irate tone of voice, how could the CIA not have known blah-di-blah blah. His answer was mild. Why, I’m sure that they did know. He said, “It would have been impossible for them not to.”

Venice and the surrounding region was teeming with spooks. The Sheriff in nearby Charlotte County—where Atta lived for a time, though you won’t find that in the 9/11 Commission Report—told me that, because of the 40-year history of covert activity that he had seen been run through Charlotte County, which he and everyone else in the Charlotte County Sheriff’s Department had been powerless to stop, he believed the CIA was responsible for 9/11.

Was one of the bigger shocks of my life. A Southern cracker Sheriff telling me he thought the CIA was responsible for 9/11. And hey. Maybe he’s right. But I couldn’t go there. I might believe that. But I never had proof.

This:

Here are some other snippets from www.historycommons.org...

“9/11 Commissioner John Lehman repeatedly meets with Bush administration officials and discusses links between the 9/11 hijackers and Saudi government officials.”

“Lehman is aware that the Commission’s investigators are working the topic and is interested to see what they will find. According to author Philip Shenon, “He thought it was clear early on that there was some sort of Saudi support network in San Diego that had made it possible for the hijackers to hide in plain sight in Southern California.” He is especially intrigued by money possibly passed from Princess Haifa, wife of the Saudi ambassador to the US, to associates of the hijackers, although Lehman thinks she would not have known the money’s real destination and had simply signed checks given her by radicals at the Saudi embassy in Washington. Lehman also doubts that the Saudi officials knew the details of the 9/11 plot, but thinks they knew the hijackers were “bad guys,” and “The bad guys knew who to go to to get help.”

“However, there is an absolute lack of interest on the administration’s part about the Saudi information. According to Shenon, “Lehman was struck by the determination of the Bush White House to try to hide any evidence of the relationship between the Saudis and al-Qaeda.” Lehman will say: “They were refusing to declassify anything having to do with Saudi Arabia. Anything having to do with the Saudis, for some reason, it had this very special sensitivity.”

And this:

Another terror attack

~ susie

What a crazy world we live in. Eye for an eye, etc.:

BRUSSELS — Apparently coordinated terrorist explosions rocked Brussels’ airport and a metro station Tuesday, leaving at least 26 dead and raising fears that attackers carried out retaliatory strikes after the arrest of a key suspect in last year’s Paris massacres.

The full casualty count remained unclear hours after the attacks, but various Belgian reports and officials said it reached at least 26.

“We are talking about scores of dead,” said Belgian Prime Minister Charles Michel without giving clearer estimates after blast strong enough to bring down the roof panels at the airport departure hall and leave the metro platform shrouded in smoke and littered with debris.

Belgian’s prosecutor’s office described at least one of the airport blasts as part of a suicide attack — the latest apparent terrorist bloodshed to hit Europe and another sign that militant networks remain able to strike despite widespread crackdowns and probes across the continent.

Some good news

~ susie ~ 3 Comments

Syria refugee crisis

Thank God! I am happy to hear this:

MUNICH — The United States, Russia and other powers have reached agreement on a “cessation of hostilities” in Syria’s civil war that allows for immediate humanitarian access to besieged areas, Secretary of State John F. Kerry announced here early Friday morning.

The end of hostilities, which Kerry avoided calling a cease-fire, is scheduled to go into effect “in one week’s time,” Kerry said. Humanitarian access to towns and cities in Syria where food and medical supplies have been blocked, sometimes for months, is to begin immediately.

“It was unanimous,” Kerry said. “Everybody today agreed on the urgency of humanitarian access. What we have here are words on paper. What we need to see in the next few days are actions on the ground.”

Agreement came after day-long consultations that lasted until early Friday here. Hours earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov huddled with his counterpart from Iran, Russia’s ally in backing the Syrian government of President Bashar al-Assad, and Secretary of State John F. Kerry sat down with allies backing the Syrian opposition, before all parties gathered for a joint meeting at which the deal was struck.

Lavrov called cessation of hostilities the “first step” toward a full cease-fire.

The effort has been considered a last chance to stop the carnage in Syria that has left hundreds of thousands dead and sent millions fleeing from the country. What was already a desperate situation in Syria has greatly worsened over the past few weeks, as massive Russian bombardment in and around the city of Aleppo has scattered opposition fighters and driven tens of thousands of civilians toward the barricaded Turkish border.

Feds find pipe bombs, weapons and ammo In ‘patriot’s’ home

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

A 24 year old Tampa man has been taken into custody on Monday after the execution of a search warrant on his residential home by law enforcement, MSN reports. The search warrant found pipe bombs, smoke grenades, and tear gas in his home, as well as materials to make weapons. They also found an AK-47 semi-automatic… Continue reading “Feds find pipe bombs, weapons and ammo In ‘patriot’s’ home” →

We have done such terrible things

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

And this is a reminder:

WASHINGTON — Three Guantánamo detainees were slated to leave the American prison in Cuba this week after about 14 years in captivity. But early Wednesday morning, only two were willing to board the plane.

The third — Mohammed Ali Abdullah Bwazir of Yemen — balked at the last minute, even though he has a history of hunger striking to protest his indefinite detention without trial. In recent days, Mr. Bwazir was “frightened” to leave the prison and go to a country where he has no family, his lawyer, John Chandler, said. The country has not been identified.

Mr. Chandler also said his client — who was born around 1980 and brought to Guantánamo in 2002 — was depressed. He compared his client to a character in the prison movie “The Shawshank Redemption” who has spent so much of his life behind bars that he cannot handle life on the outside after finally being paroled.

“Can you imagine being there for 14 years and going to a plane where you could finally leave, and saying ‘No, take me back to my cell?’ ” Mr. Chandler said. “This is one of the saddest days of my life.”

The FBI checked the wrong box and this woman ended up on watch list for years

~ susie ~ 1 Comment

This story was co-published with The Daily Beast. As the Senate debated a proposal earlier this month that would have barred gun sales to people on the government’s terrorism watch lists, Republicans decried the lists as unfair, unreliable and un-American. “There’s no due process or any way to get your name removed from it in a… Continue reading “The FBI checked the wrong box and this woman ended up on watch list for years” →