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Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

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Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#141

Post by teh_infallible »

Mvhsz wrote: post #61
sailfast wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It is, but people are terrible about it anyway. At a minimum, it is a field day for social engineering attacks because you can learn to speak in the languages / abstractions of that specific organization which automatically leads to trust-building.

can confirm that defense people are terrible about spilling a lot of details in public, but I don’t think I’ve ever heard an actual classified piece of info spoken in public

I once sat at a bar next to a drunk guy who told me he was a Boeing engineer. He proceeded to describe to me how jet engines work, one limitation of common designs, and a way to work around it. I didn’t understand any of it. I got the impression he was very interested in his work and didn’t have people he could discuss this stuff with.

He then told me about a limitation with the SR-71 Blackbird (Apparently the panels of the body expand at high speed, so they have to be designed in a way where they have gaps and are leaky on the ground, until they reach sufficient speed.)

He said solving this problem would be a big deal. Then he wrote the word, “Aurora” on a napkin and immediately crumpled it.

Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#142

Post by rasz »

>Moran moved on from the spy world. Moran heads communications at the Environmental Investigation Agency.

"EIA is a 501(c)(3) independent, international, non-profit advocacy organization based in Washington, D.C.". 30 year old environmental non profit, totally not the perfect front organization for spy operations, right up there with jet chartering business (Aero Contractors, Pegasus Technologies, Tepper Aviation, etc).

Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#143

Post by Scoundreller »

enraged_camel wrote: post #63
opportune wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Also true for the Caltrain, coffee shops, and nicer restaurants between SF and SJ. And SFO, SJC, and SEA airports; I think I hear some salesman loudly talking about a deal almost every time I fly out of those places on weekdays.

Yep. One of the first things I learned early in my careers is, when you're having lunch at a venue with your coworkers, if the subject turns to client work, do not ever mention the client's name out loud. You never know who might be sitting nearby.

So how about that fruit company’s new phone?

Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#144

Post by Scoundreller »

klodolph wrote: post #41
electricslpnsld wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in my Portland days I got the DL on some of Nike’s soon to be announced Jordan’s when an obviously high ranking Nike designer popped open his MacBook and proceeded to have a design review at a local coffee shop! Maybe not the most actionable information but kind of fun to see.

This is—no joke—one of the main reasons why tech companies feed their employees on campus.

Probably helps with the IRS audits: oh, it’s not an employee benefit, it’s an employer benefit!

Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#145

Post by hawaiian »

charwalker wrote: post #103
oska wrote: post #87

> invited her to a pub called the Fuggle & Firkin Fuggle is a classic English aroma hop, released in 1875 by Mr Richard Fuggle. [1] Firkin is an English brewery cask unit, specifically one fourth of a barrel or half a kilderkin. [2] There used to be a chain of Firkin pubs in the UK, all of which featured Firkin in the name, e.g. Fettler and Firkin, Goose and Firkin, etc. [3] [1] https://www.britishhops.org.uk/varieti…

fox and Firkin in my hometown closed but the brewery there now rocks sours.

California in a lesser known town? I know of a Firkin & Fox.

Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#146

Post by chewz »

mysterydip wrote: post #5

This is well known but often ignored for convenience. Go to any restaurant in the DC area around lunchtime and you'd be amazed at what you can learn from the table next to you.

This has been done in Poland by Marek Falenta - private businessman. He did bribed waiters and wired popular restaurants in Warsaw to get material on businessman and politicians. It made a lot of noise - nothing top secret but enough of what politicians really say in private stuff to impact elections.

[1] https://kafkadesk.org/2019/06/13/polands-most-wanted-man-thr...

[2] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-06-10/polish-bu...

Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#148

Post by zby »

unethical_ban wrote: post #31
zby wrote: post #15

Warning: I tried to read it - but after half of it I found no content.

Did you have a technical issue with npr.org or are you stating your opinion that the article wasn't interesting?

It was an opinion. I am now sorry for being snarky - but my opinion did not change - whole article about the surprising iformation that spies meet at restaurants.

Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#149

Post by electricslpnsld »

sizzle wrote: post #137
electricslpnsld wrote: post #37

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Back in my Portland days I got the DL on some of Nike’s soon to be announced Jordan’s when an obviously high ranking Nike designer popped open his MacBook and proceeded to have a design review at a local coffee shop! Maybe not the most actionable information but kind of fun to see.

Awesome, did you work at Nike or Intel?

I worked for New Relic, although, no joke, probably 90% of the people on my block worked at Intel or Nike!

Re: Eat, Drink and Be Wary: Ex-CIA Officer Reveals How Eateries Are Key to Spycraft

#150

Post by bernawil »

latch wrote: post #134
joezydeco wrote: post #129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's even wackier is that in commodities trading, insider information was allowed. The loophole was a key plot point in the movie "Trading Places" and when the 2010 financial overhaul rules were passed, this section was nicknamed "The Eddie Murphy Rule". https://www.npr.org/sections/money/2013/07/09/200401407/epis...

Only wacky if you think insider trading is a bad thing. There's a pretty vocal minority of economist who thinks it does more harm than good. One of the most objective summaries I've seen is from the Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta (1). Subjectively: intentional or not, insider trading laws drastically protect and enhances wallstreet's information asymmetry advantage. (1) https://www.frbatlanta.org/-/media/documents/r…

"insider trading" is one of funniest many exceptions to the rules of capitalism. Like someone said "The financial system works! you support companies you think will do good for profit! it's great, it will regulate itself! Only, you can only bet with bad information and we'll make great expense into regulating you are not using good info!.
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