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The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

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Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#31

Post by widforss »

moogly wrote: post #7

It's pretty disheartening to know that the Swedish press won't touch this with a 10-foot pole; they're busy digging/drumming up the "good ole" Russian Scare from the 60s/70s right now amidst the sabre-rattling coming, frankly, largely from the West.

Well, it is not exactly news is it? It has been known since Snowden that the FRA is working closely with the NSA.

And it is really hard for journalists to write something constructive about the FRA because of the secrecy [1].

[1]: https://sverigesradio.se/sida/artikel.aspx?programid=2519&ar...

EDIT: The link covers an incident where one of FRA's planes were shot down in 1952. Everything were successfully covered up for more than 50 years, and a lot of the reports are still unavailable. The FRA _really_ likes to not talk about themselves, more so than many other intelligence agencies.

The FRA claims that the now 65 year old reports could still pose a threat to current operations.

Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#32

Post by durandal1 »

moogly wrote: post #30
jacobush wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Unfortunately any "team" gets embarrasing supporters. However, both sides (pro/anti) should by now agree on the need to HAVE a military of substantial size. One side, to credibly stay out of NATO. The other, to credibly expect an application be granted.

Switzerland spends half as much as Sweden on its annual military spending as percentage of GDP (also less in absolute terms), and they can credibly stay out of NATO, so why couldn't Sweden? Geographics? I don't buy it. Also, if Sweden wanted to join tomorrow morning, they would have the application granted after lunch the same day. NATO has been salivating at the thought for decades now, and considering Sweden's mili…

> Switzerland spends half as much as Sweden on its annual military spending as percentage of GDP (also less in absolute terms), and they can credibly stay out of NATO, so why couldn't Sweden? Geographics? I don't buy it.

I think you should go look at that map again and think about the strategic value of Sweden vs Switzerland.

Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#33

Post by toyg »

croon wrote: post #3

Interesting read for a variety of reasons. As a countryman of Sweden, I think it's sad that we've been playing lapdog throughout history. Germany during WW2, and now the US. The article refers to much less publicized occurances, but there's also lesser stories (but important signaling) like the piratebay court cases farce. Is Russia up next as our masters, when they want to secure their fiber pipeline? It's in cases…

The EU discourse is complicated, but in short: US interests and EU finances do not currently allow Europeans to develop a voice independent of NATO; and without a shared defense policy independent of US, there is little space for a shared foreign policy that can push back on this sort of topics. Ironically, what could change this state of things is the antagonistic US/UK isolationism currently on the rise.

Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#34

Post by lostlogin »

moogly wrote: post #7

It's pretty disheartening to know that the Swedish press won't touch this with a 10-foot pole; they're busy digging/drumming up the "good ole" Russian Scare from the 60s/70s right now amidst the sabre-rattling coming, frankly, largely from the West.

The west hasnt invaded anyone or shot down any airliners though has it?

Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#35

Post by lostlogin »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #28
Karlozkiller wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have? I must've missed the announcement stating this about what Snowden told the world. Care to expand on it?

Pretty much everybody in Silicon Valley knows how wrong Snowden was about PRISM. Unlike The Guardian, The New York Times interviewed actual engineers and got the story correct from the very beginning. Here is a competent explanation of how Snowden didn't understand that DITU is an FBI department and not a bulk collection system on internet companies' networks: https://medium.com/@alecmuffett/how-to-talk-about-prism-a…

What? That doesn't say PRISM doesn't exist it says it does and suggests how it might be used ("I imagine"). It says the info is collected.

Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#36

Post by vkou »

lern_too_spel wrote: post #28
Karlozkiller wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

They have? I must've missed the announcement stating this about what Snowden told the world. Care to expand on it?

Pretty much everybody in Silicon Valley knows how wrong Snowden was about PRISM. Unlike The Guardian, The New York Times interviewed actual engineers and got the story correct from the very beginning. Here is a competent explanation of how Snowden didn't understand that DITU is an FBI department and not a bulk collection system on internet companies' networks: https://medium.com/@alecmuffett/how-to-talk-about-prism-a…

I don't understand why you're being downvoted, considering this one fact:

PRISM was ran on a budget of $200,000/year.

This may be enough money to put together and maintain a sad-looking web portal that lets you make requests for user data against Google, Apple, and Yahoo's legal compliance departments.

This is by no means enough to do bulk data collection for billions of users. (That was the domain of the other hundred-odd programs that the NSA runs.)

Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#38

Post by jessaustin »

vkou wrote: post #36
lern_too_spel wrote: post #28

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Pretty much everybody in Silicon Valley knows how wrong Snowden was about PRISM. Unlike The Guardian, The New York Times interviewed actual engineers and got the story correct from the very beginning. Here is a competent explanation of how Snowden didn't understand that DITU is an FBI department and not a bulk collection system on internet companies' networks: https://medium.com/@alecmuffett/how-to-talk-about-prism-a…

I don't understand why you're being downvoted, considering this one fact: PRISM was ran on a budget of $200,000/year. This may be enough money to put together and maintain a sad-looking web portal that lets you make requests for user data against Google, Apple, and Yahoo's legal compliance departments. This is by no means enough to do bulk data collection for billions of users. (That was the domain of the other hundr…

It's called the "black budget", and it's $50B/yr. Plenty of room there for PRISM.

[EDIT:] Any "documentation" for that $200k "fact"? It smells strongly of an orifice, from which it perhaps was extracted?

Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#39

Post by vkou »

jessaustin wrote: post #38
vkou wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't understand why you're being downvoted, considering this one fact: PRISM was ran on a budget of $200,000/year. This may be enough money to put together and maintain a sad-looking web portal that lets you make requests for user data against Google, Apple, and Yahoo's legal compliance departments. This is by no means enough to do bulk data collection for billions of users. (That was the domain of the other hundr…

It's called the "black budget", and it's $50B/yr. Plenty of room there for PRISM. [EDIT:] Any "documentation" for that $200k "fact"? It smells strongly of an orifice, from which it perhaps was extracted?

Or, perhaps, we could apply Occam's razor, and assume that they don't have a single program (With no documentation besides 15 power-point slides) that mass-slurps all user information from 12 major IT companies...

And instead, attribute that 50 billion budget to the other hundred-odd projects, all of which are targeted (This one attacks Google, this one attacks Apple, this one hosts >50% of TOR relays in the United States...)

Edit: The PRISM slides themselves. [1] Ah - I was wrong by 2 orders of magnitude - it's 20M/year. Still chump change, compared to how much a broad surveillance project for all these companies would cost.

Look at slide #7. It describes what PRISM does. Interfacing with APGOFAMS is a tiny portion of it. Given how government works, it's unsurprising that the vast majority of that $20 million/year is poured into the bottomless pit of middle managers who live in the upper part of the chart.

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/interactive/2013/nov/01/pr...

Re: The Swedish Kings of Cyberwar

#40

Post by jacobush »

sebcat wrote: post #29
jacobush wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes. Unfortunately any "team" gets embarrasing supporters. However, both sides (pro/anti) should by now agree on the need to HAVE a military of substantial size. One side, to credibly stay out of NATO. The other, to credibly expect an application be granted.

> However, both sides (pro/anti) should by now agree on the need to HAVE an military of substantial size. What seems to be happening is that priority is given to projects that benefit certain companies, rather than increasing military capabilities. Investments are made in platforms such as Gripen[1], A26[2], Visby[3], PRIO (licensed SAP system) rather than giving priority to training and maintaining personnel. The me…

This is what is happening. I still hope (maybe in vain) that the rest will ramp up too and that will build political clout for the army and the civil defence that will need to be rebuilt. But it's not surprising that the first initiatives would be money heavy corporate spending. After all, the last couple of decades, "government doing military duties" has increasingly translated to "selling fortifications cheaply and spend time with industry lobbyists". The toys are nice but we need boots on the ground. And civil defence. Do I repeat myself?
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