NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
washingtonpost.com
NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
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Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#2It's hard not to come to the conclusion that these activities were essentially criminal. I don't see how the administration can fail to disavow them, investigate them fully, and hold their instigators accountable. It feels like Special Prosecutor time.
That aside, let me re-make a point I keep making:
Google had no knowledge of NSA's physical compromise of their data centers. But still, they pushed harder than anyone on the whole Internet for the adoption of modern TLS with forward-secrecy; they are the world's foremost deployers of ephemeral-keyed elliptic curve cryptography and of certificate pinning, both of which ensure not only the security of the traffic running over the network cables into their data centers, but also minimize the impact of a compromised long-term encryption key or the compromise of the CA system by a state actor.
Not only that, but Google launched a high-profile effort to encrypt the communications inside and between their data centers.
I hope a couple years hindsight will put the importance of Adam Langley's work (and that of the rest of his team; he's just the best-known member of that team) at Google into sharper relief.
Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#3"vice president for security engineering Eric Grosse announced that the company is racing to encrypt the links between its data centers. "
Isn't this useless?
They can serve Google NSL and the court can force the company to release the SSL keys for the encryptions - just like Lavabit. Google CEO/Board can not shutdown the company like Lavabit.
What can they do, get out of USA like how they got out of China?
Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#4If that graphic - that taunting smiley face, drawn when it was assumed that no one was watching - isn't enough to outrage the general public, I don't know what it will take. This is not super technical - it's easily explained and should be easily understood by the masses. And it should cause outrage.
Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#5Is that an official document with an actual smiley face?
What ever happened to the admins / programmers standing up for what is right, or do they just gobble down a paycheck and turn the other way?
Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#6"vice president for security engineering Eric Grosse announced that the company is racing to encrypt the links between its data centers. " Isn't this useless? They can serve Google NSL and the court can force the company to release the SSL keys for the encryptions - just like Lavabit. Google CEO/Board can not shutdown the company like Lavabit. What can they do, get out of USA like how they got out of China?
Lavabit is small. Who did their shutdown directly affect? Imagine Google going down for a full day, even homeless people will raise pitch forks and match down to DC to protest.
Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#7I hope that this finally convinces everyone that it doesn't matter whether Google is "Evil" or Yahoo is more evil or whatever. What matters is that large cloud systems are fundamentally incapable of protecting data.
Even the most goodhearted and the most talented teams can't reliably defend against a massively funded adversary.
Secrets are for keeping, not sharing.
Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#8From the article: "Two engineers with close ties to Google exploded in profanity when they saw the drawing."
That about sums up my reaction as well.
Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#9It's hard not to come to the conclusion that these activities were essentially criminal. I don't see how the administration can fail to disavow them, investigate them fully, and hold their instigators accountable. It feels like Special Prosecutor time. That aside, let me re-make a point I keep making: Google had no knowledge of NSA's physical compromise of their data centers. But still, they pushed harder than anyone…
Even with everything you say, Google was still defeated by the NSA. Will Google ever catch up in this arms race? "95% encrypted" == "100% compromised"
Re: NSA infiltrates links to Yahoo, Google data centers worldwide
#10It's hard not to come to the conclusion that these activities were essentially criminal. I don't see how the administration can fail to disavow them, investigate them fully, and hold their instigators accountable. It feels like Special Prosecutor time. That aside, let me re-make a point I keep making: Google had no knowledge of NSA's physical compromise of their data centers. But still, they pushed harder than anyone…
Even with everything you say, Google was still defeated by the NSA. Will Google ever catch up in this arms race? "95% encrypted" == "100% compromised"
Google appears to have been so on the ball with this stuff that the NSA literally had to send bag men to their cages in order to retain access.