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Countering threats from North Korea

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Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#121

Post by boomboomsubban »

xtian wrote: post #114
huntsman wrote: post #46

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think you’ll find TAG regularly gives assessment on attribution at least at the country level. Iran, China, Russia, Belarus and North Korea at least have been named in the last few years. (Disclaimer: I am head of TAG)

Here’s a question I expect you’ll never answer: is it within the capabilities of any groups within the West (state-sponsored or otherwise) to fabricate the information you’re using to make those assessments? And if so, how have you decisively eliminated this possibility? I ask because it’s broadly accepted that there are extremely powerful and wealthy entities in the West who benefit from an aggressive US foreign pol…

There are several sections of the Vault 7 leaks that showed the CIA had tools that could be used to fake the attribution of attacks. Some argue there's other uses for those tools besides faking the source of an exploit, but knowing they have the capability makes it impossible to eliminate as a possibility.

Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#122

Post by tptacek »

lizardactivist wrote: post #53

Been looking in that article to find how they concluded it's from North Korea, but I can't find it. Can anyone point it out for me?

They're unlikely to tell you, at least not the level of satisfaction a nerd message board demands, for some of the same reasons we don't know about all the anti-abuse mechanisms on HN; because attribution and obfuscation (like abuse/anti-abuse on HN) is an arms race/cat-and-mouse game.

Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#124

Post by illiac786 »

jorvi wrote: post #109
mot0rola wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am receiving increased SMS spam past week. Is connected to this exploit? Msgs are all different domains with unique ID appended.

Hearing Americans regularly complain about SMS and robocall spam still blows my European mind. I haven't received a single spam call or SMS in my life, ever. Back in the 90s and early 2000s the worst that could happen was, say, texting a commercial number to get a polyphone ringtone, and that actually being a subscription. But obviously that is something you have to initiate first, not something passive.

I live in Germany and I get a lot of spam calls and spam SMS. It's always in waves. Some days I stop answering calls if I don't recognise the number, because its one of these days where Interpol has informwd me already three times that my identity was stolen and I have to give them all my details to fix this ..... They're very patient at Interpol, I keep hanging up on them and they never give up.

Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#125

Post by bamboozled »

saagarjha wrote: post #116
bamboozled wrote: post #91

North Korea is a problem that would be easier to care of now, rather than later it seems.

Take care of how?

Probably doing similar things to what's been done with Russia, more sanctions, more sanctions against supporting nations etc.

They're soon to test a nuclear weapon and already play fun games testing missiles and having them land just off the coast of Japan. Not going to be fun once those things are nuclear missiles and en route to Tokyo.

Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#126

Post by Moru »

jorvi wrote: post #109
mot0rola wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am receiving increased SMS spam past week. Is connected to this exploit? Msgs are all different domains with unique ID appended.

Hearing Americans regularly complain about SMS and robocall spam still blows my European mind. I haven't received a single spam call or SMS in my life, ever. Back in the 90s and early 2000s the worst that could happen was, say, texting a commercial number to get a polyphone ringtone, and that actually being a subscription. But obviously that is something you have to initiate first, not something passive.

If you have your number up on the net somewhere, you will recieve calls. For example that domain registration you did 30 years ago that required a phone number... I got myself a smartphone for the reason I could easily block out of country phonecalls. I haven't had any recent spam calls though, was many years since the last one.

Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#127

Post by azinman2 »

saagarjha wrote: post #113
azinman2 wrote: post #82

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How do you know what country is actually behind any of this? I’d imagine that would be very difficult given nation states can host content anywhere in the world and will want to make it look like it’s coming from elsewhere.

I don’t work in this field, but my impression has been that groups tend to share techniques and code patterns that can help tie them back to where they came from.

But how do you know the origin?

Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#128

Post by tomatowurst »

Symbiote wrote: post #43
stefan_ wrote: post #41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Who is even routing with North Korea? Seeing how the normal populace there literally doesn't have access to the internet, what on earth is there to be gained?

Hong Kong and Russia: https://bgpview.io/asn/131279#peers-v4 http://cooks.org.kp/en/ is hosted on that network.

yeah well its to be expected. since they can't compete against the West conventionally, they focus on asymmetric warfare, which means giving zero crap about anything we value here in the West.

they are truly on survival mode, and given Russia's recent performance in Ukraine, its really eye opening to see just how much of a paper tiger their military is, relying again on asymmetric weapons of indiscriminate destruction of all things human.

Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#129

Post by kettleballroll »

bamboozled wrote: post #125
saagarjha wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Take care of how?

Probably doing similar things to what's been done with Russia, more sanctions, more sanctions against supporting nations etc. They're soon to test a nuclear weapon and already play fun games testing missiles and having them land just off the coast of Japan. Not going to be fun once those things are nuclear missiles and en route to Tokyo.

Don't we have these exact types of sanctions already in place i. NK for exactly the reasons you mention?

Re: Countering threats from North Korea

#130

Post by bamboozled »

kettleballroll wrote: post #129
bamboozled wrote: post #125

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Probably doing similar things to what's been done with Russia, more sanctions, more sanctions against supporting nations etc. They're soon to test a nuclear weapon and already play fun games testing missiles and having them land just off the coast of Japan. Not going to be fun once those things are nuclear missiles and en route to Tokyo.

Don't we have these exact types of sanctions already in place i. NK for exactly the reasons you mention?

Sure, they're not working well enough by the look of it...

The people are severely repressed, it's hard to imagine how much North Koreans suffer, look up Yeonmi Park's story.

What we seem to do is ignore these maniacs, until it's too late or it's absolutely critical, then they hold us hostage, like Putin.

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