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Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

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Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#181

Post by solardev »

MichaelZuo wrote: post #167
hn_version_0023 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always giggle a little when really smart people forget thugs exist and do what they’re told. If that includes breaking the knees of M people to get what they’re after, then M pairs of knees are gonna get destroyed. This isn’t hard to understand, but it’s easy to forget our civilization hangs by a thread more often than any of us care to admit.

Any organization that is really really serious about security will obviously keep at least N-M +1 folks, along with their family, in other countries. Which is a much much higher bar to clear for any would be rubber hose attackers.

Your secrets aren't really safe unless Xi and Putin each have part of your key personally memorized.

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#182

Post by baz00 »

wdb wrote: post #180
baz00 wrote: post #143

Earlier quoted context omitted.

AWS support is pretty fucking terrible generally. We’re a very high rolling enterprise customer and it’s pretty obvious that some of their shit is being managed by two guys in a shed somewhere who don’t talk to each other.

Using AWS Greengrass?

Never even heard of that one!

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#183

Post by yieldcrv »

elif wrote: post #19
michaelt wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect when a trove of documents is big enough, newspaper readers lose interest before you run out of documents. I mean, even on this tech forum hardly anyone knows who Cavium are, let alone your average Washington Post reader.

Maybe the moral of the story is that future snowdens should leak to selected law firms instead of selected journalists? If there's one organization designed to comb through large documents for details and understand the impacts to potential parties, it is law organizations. Put 2-3 in time competition to make cases out of the documents and it will be a scramble race for justice.

All the big leaks should be done this way

The Ashley Madison leaks should have been one name a week and making it a big spectacle till this very day!

Same for the Snowden leaks

you can also get bigger bidders for the data by drumming up interest and suspense

hackers really suck at marketing, so far.

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#184

Post by Fnoord »

iballing wrote: post #97
squarefoot wrote: post #60

When I buy something electronic, my approach is "everything that is closed and goes online will be used to spy on people". It may seem a stretch, but governments can't exercise power over something they cannot control, and truly private communications would take away some of that control. To me there are no conspiracy theories or other strange reasons for being able to decrypt any seemingly private information except…

“100% open and auditable from the operating system to the cpu” is the main goal of the Betrusted project: https://betrusted.io/

Which seems to be an iteration of the Precursor (Mobile, Open Hardware, RISC-V System-on-Chip (SoC) Development Kit) by Bunnie Huang and Sean Cobs

> Part of the purpose of Precursor is to validate the system-on-chip (SoC) design we hope eventually to produce as a custom ASIC for use in future such products. This SoC, which we call "Betrusted-SoC," is meant to be the central pillar of security for devices like Precursor. The version of Betrusted-SoC used in Precursor is based on a Xilinx FPGA and has the following features [...] [1]

As for the person who replied to you requesting LTE: won't happen, there's no completely FOSS stack for LTE. Always there is closed source firmware due to regulations. Oh, that wonderful world of transceivers. If you want FOSS, go wired. Tho it seems Precursor found a way to utilize Wi-Fi with a FOSS stack?

[1] https://www.crowdsupply.com/sutajio-kosagi/precursor

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#185

Post by mbakke »

squarefoot wrote: post #60

When I buy something electronic, my approach is "everything that is closed and goes online will be used to spy on people". It may seem a stretch, but governments can't exercise power over something they cannot control, and truly private communications would take away some of that control. To me there are no conspiracy theories or other strange reasons for being able to decrypt any seemingly private information except…

I generally hold a similar opinion. However I have two data points that suggests back-doors are not available by default (for my government at least), but that they are aggressively bugging (or auditing, lol) devices:

* When I ordered the first generation Raspberry Pi, they were stuck in the toll a long time, and when they arrived all the warranty seals were broken. Consequently I never really used them.

* When I ordered the first generation Google Pixel, before it was generally available in my country, it was stuck in domestic mail for almost a week. The person who imported them sold and sent two phones the same day: the other one arrived after just two days and travelled a lot further. I used it regardless as I already considered phones a lost cause... (and could not with good conscience sell a possibly compromised device).

At this point I don't trust anything sent by mail.

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#186

Post by solardev »

__alexs wrote: post #174
hn_version_0023 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I always giggle a little when really smart people forget thugs exist and do what they’re told. If that includes breaking the knees of M people to get what they’re after, then M pairs of knees are gonna get destroyed. This isn’t hard to understand, but it’s easy to forget our civilization hangs by a thread more often than any of us care to admit.

I think you can probably get away with only breaking one pair of knees and sending a video of it to the other people.

Youtube would delist that before they could all see it though.

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#187

Post by RationPhantoms »

sschueller wrote: post #124
RationPhantoms wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're not under the threat cone of nation state surveillance (like trying to exfiltrate the radar-asborbing paint formula on the F35) then I wouldn't be too concerned. "That's not the point! It's about privacy!" Sure. I'll choose it ignore the fact that our civilization is somehow still functioning in a post-nuclear world.

A Mann is being executed in Saudia Arabia for tweeting a negative tweet about the government to his tiny following. Not exactly someone who thinks they are a target of a nation state. [1] https://www.hrw.org/news/2023/08/29/saudi-arabia-man-sentenc...

Not sure if this a joke but SA is the exact country I would expect to utilize spyware against its citizens.

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#188

Post by NorwegianDude »

tristor wrote: post #138
tristor wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Huawei stuff is proven to be compromised, just not by NSA, instead by China.

[flagged]

That's not proof, that's just an accusation. Huawei even offered up source access to customers as a way to prove that they didn't do that.

Not saying they don't do such things, but the evidence is lacking.

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#189

Post by phito »

AndrewKemendo wrote: post #155
squarefoot wrote: post #60

When I buy something electronic, my approach is "everything that is closed and goes online will be used to spy on people". It may seem a stretch, but governments can't exercise power over something they cannot control, and truly private communications would take away some of that control. To me there are no conspiracy theories or other strange reasons for being able to decrypt any seemingly private information except…

This is the right approach IMO. Just assume you’re being persistently surveilled - if you use a computer or electronics then the likelihood approaches 100% over your lifetime.

I try to have this approach, but I find it so exhausting tbh. It makes me want to just not use technology.

Re: Snowden leak: Cavium networking hardware may contain NSA backdoor

#190

Post by RationPhantoms »

slackfan wrote: post #113
RationPhantoms wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you're not under the threat cone of nation state surveillance (like trying to exfiltrate the radar-asborbing paint formula on the F35) then I wouldn't be too concerned. "That's not the point! It's about privacy!" Sure. I'll choose it ignore the fact that our civilization is somehow still functioning in a post-nuclear world.

Sure. See you in the gulag, comerade

Oh please, the United States is so incredibly armed, my death will likely come at the hands of some misplaced right-wing militarized fascist group performing mass murders under the guise of "Freedom" and "A return to the constitutional purity of the US".
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