Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

CIA malware and hacking tools

wikileaks.org

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

441–450 of 1001 posts

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#441

Post by jessedhillon »

alasdair_ wrote: post #339
res0nat0r wrote: post #246

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unfortunately for this we aren't going to get some 1080p video of someone in a mask sneaking into the DNC server room, just the fact that the 17 agencies all agree based on what they've seen believe that to be the case. Unfortunately everyone these days think everything is a conspiracy or has to have HD recordings of something they think happened as public evidence or it is false, but that's not how the world really…

>" just the fact that the 17 agencies all agree based on what they've seen believe that to be the case." This simply isn't true. The whole "17 agencies" thing is a talking point that first came up in one of Hillary Clinton's debates and gets repeated without challenge. The "17 agencies" didn't all independently make their own assesments about what happened and decided it was the Russians. Instead, James Clapper (at t…

I don't believe it was perjury -- a statement made with the intention to deceive.

NSA makes a distinction between data and metadata, as we know. If you assume that distinction, then the question is -- "does the NSA collect actual communications content on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans" -- something which, to our knowledge, is not the case.

Can it? Potentially yes. But we haven't seen anything that suggests that it actually does.

At best, his response contains an assumption which is arguably normal for an NSA director to make, and which may have be conveniently advantageous to hold. But I'm sure, even if you ask him today, he will say that metadata does not constitute intelligence collection.

To prove perjury you need to demonstrate mens rea (guilty intent) and I think it's plausible that he did not intend to mislead the investigation. It was a hard question to answer, because he could not answer in a way that would reveal the existence of the program to collect metadata either.

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#442

Post by drvdevd »

I just have to say... glossing over the details quite a bit, not reading the article. Mostly I've just read peoples' thoughts on here and Twitter.

But my initial gut feeling/reaction about this news is that it's distinctly un-interesting as compared with, say, Shadow Brokers or Snowden.

Just my initial reaction...

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#443

Post by monochromatic »

dmix wrote: post #204
imron wrote: post #66

The CIA's Remote Devices Branch's UMBRAGE group collects and maintains a substantial library of attack techniques 'stolen' from malware produced in other states including the Russian Federation. With UMBRAGE and related projects the CIA cannot only increase its total number of attack types but also misdirect attribution by leaving behind the "fingerprints" of the groups that the attack techniques were stolen from. Th…

There also still hasn't been any public evidence that Wikileaks got their Podesta email data from Russians yet. So far we only know the DNC leaks were very likely Russian. That means until today only about ~50% of the 'election hacks' have been attributed to Russia with public evidence. Now this leak calls into question some of the evidence about the DNC hack [1]. This evidence being the malware was Russian. But ther…

What public evidence is there that the DNC leaks were related to Russia?

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#444

Post by droithomme »

openasocket wrote: post #364
sparkling wrote: post #248

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There is no hard evidence where the DNC/Podesta leaks came from. However, Julian Assange has repeatedly said that the source is not the russian goverment or a affiliated state party [1] and in a other interview has hinted that the source may be Seth Rich [2], a former DNC staff member that was murdered in Washington DC. [1] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uyCOy25GdjQ [2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Kp7FkLBRpKg

> However, Julian Assange has repeatedly said that the source is not the russian goverment or a affiliated state party How would he know? Isn't wikileaks set up so that people can submit data anonymously? Is he claiming that they got the data through different channels? Why would an insider purposefully leak the data in a way that de-anonymized him to Assange and possibly others, instead of using the established chan…

> How would he know?

Not all leaks are submitted through the web forms. Craig Murray has stated that he received some of the leaks in person from a DNC insider during a face to face meeting in Washington, and he couriered those leaks to wikileaks himself.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2016/dec/14/craig-murray...

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#445

Post by mason240 »

sschueller wrote: post #2

I hope Europe and Germany especially finally wake up and start kicking out these pests. The US/CIA is conducting crimes against humanity on foreign soil. Like the drone war. The US may not be part of the international court but Germany is.

European governments have agreements with the CIA to spy on their own citizens (which is in illegal for them do), in exchange for their spy agencies spying on American citizens.

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#446

Post by monochromatic »

NoGravitas wrote: post #425
homakov wrote: post #415

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Bypass encryption means they broke the protocol. They could say "also malware can read your private messages and anything else on your phone". But no, bypassing encryption sounds a lot better. Fake news.

I don't read it that way. To me, if they meant they broke the protocol, they would say "broke the encryption" or "defeated the encryption". "Bypass" implies to me that they get the information without interacting with the encryption.

I agree with you on the semantics. They didn't break the encryption, but they certainly did get around it / bypass it.

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#447

Post by sanswork »

angry-hacker wrote: post #416
untog wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Julian Assange a reliable actor in this? He has every motive to deny that Russia are the source of the leaks.

Why wouldn't he suddenly be? Because he exposed the corruption of the party you supported? It doesn't work that way really. Either he is reliable, or not reliable to begin with. I have every reason believe he is, and he has demonstrated that people turn a blind eye on things if it fits their narrative of the world and politics.

You can trust the leak without trusting the leaker. I believe everything wikileaks has leaked has been legit. I also believe they frequently make extremely misleading statements(like the Seth Rich stuff) to push their own goals and I wouldn't doubt for a second that they would lie to push forward their own goals/or mask them.

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#448

Post by ubernostrum »

angry-hacker wrote: post #416
untog wrote: post #302

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Is Julian Assange a reliable actor in this? He has every motive to deny that Russia are the source of the leaks.

Why wouldn't he suddenly be? Because he exposed the corruption of the party you supported? It doesn't work that way really. Either he is reliable, or not reliable to begin with. I have every reason believe he is, and he has demonstrated that people turn a blind eye on things if it fits their narrative of the world and politics.

Why wouldn't he suddenly be? Because he exposed the corruption of the party you supported?

He was never neutral or objective on the subject of Hillary Clinton. And isn't it convenient that despite our knowing of multiple politicians whose private email got hacked, hers is the only one he felt was worthy of publishing...

So, yeah, not exactly a "sudden" lack of objectivity on his part. Also it's been demonstrated his followers will turn a blind eye to things that don't fit their narrative.

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#449

Post by monochromatic »

homakov wrote: post #410
nightpool wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why would you be surprised by the fact that if your phone is compromised, even the best encryption software in the world isn't going to help?

Another victim of sensationalism.

The conclusions are correct. Talking about them isn't sensationalist just because you think they're foreseeable.

Re: CIA malware and hacking tools

#450

Post by 1001101 »

huffmsa wrote: post #320
afandian wrote: post #227

I am completely bemused that on the one hand the CIA is quite happy to literally murder, rape and and torture left right and centre, overthrow foreign governments, interfere with elections etc ... but is careful about adhering to the finer points US Constitution.

That's why the CIA doesn't operate inside of the United States. It is beholden to the laws of the United States and tasked with protecting and upholding the Constitution. But there are no stipulations against doing bad things in non-US lands.

> That's why the CIA doesn't operate inside of the United States.

False [1] [2] [3] [4] [5] [6]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_ARTICHOKE [2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusade_for_Freedom [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_MKUltra [4] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Mockingbird [5] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Project_SHAMROCK [6] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HTLINGUAL

Post reply on HN