Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information • Hacker News Board

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#11

Post by iamshs » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 4:51 AM UTC

r0h1n wrote: post #8

iamshs wrote: post #3

Ah. How are they gonna transmit data? What a temporary solution to a permanent problem, using a technology that must have been cracked a century ago. Btw why would you go outside to discuss private matters? Wow. Now instead of playing into one agency's hand, play into all world's. Especially, now that everybody knows India discusses private matters in gardens. Horrific. India should totally adopt lavabit. Incompetent…

Yahoo! and Google ids are very widely used across the full spectrum of government and bureaucracy in India, in large parts because the official email offered by government body NIC is horribly unusable. Take a look at the email ids for officials, including cabinet ministers, in India's Ministry for Communications and IT: http://deity.gov.in/content/people-and-offices Aside from being a massive security risk it's also…

That is why something like lavabit is important for India.

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#12

Post by jonknee » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:01 AM UTC

iamshs wrote: post #9

ginko wrote: post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Ah. How are they gonna transmit data? If there only were some sort of non-electronic version of email.

Which means interception and time limits.

Send it with a person in a diplomatic bag. If it gets intercepted it will be an international incident and you'll know 100% of the time that you are compromised.

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#13

Post by r0h1n » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:02 AM UTC

iamshs wrote: post #11

r0h1n wrote: post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yahoo! and Google ids are very widely used across the full spectrum of government and bureaucracy in India, in large parts because the official email offered by government body NIC is horribly unusable. Take a look at the email ids for officials, including cabinet ministers, in India's Ministry for Communications and IT: http://deity.gov.in/content/people-and-offices Aside from being a massive security risk it's also…

That is why something like lavabit is important for India.

You keep mentioning Lavabit, even after they shut down?

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#14

Post by iamshs » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:09 AM UTC

r0h1n wrote: post #13

iamshs wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is why something like lavabit is important for India.

You keep mentioning Lavabit, even after they shut down?

So? The model/architecture behind lavabit is what should be replicated for all government communications. Don't provide it to citizens maybe, but do safeguard their own communication.

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#15

Post by Daniel_Newby » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:10 AM UTC

kamakazizuru wrote: post #6

Daniel_Newby wrote: post #2

Wow. Apu Fuck-knuckles is so incompetent that he deserves to be taken for a ride by every intel agency in the world. (Typewriter sounds are more easily surveilled and decoded into letters than a well-shielded computer. A given typewriter is trivially traceable to a particular office and even individual. Typing paper is somewhat easy to trace. Typewriters requires use of photocopiers, which are a centralized easily-su…

Wow - you're a racist bigot!

I am neither racist nor bigoted. What I am is opposed to spacefaring nuclear powers who are utterly incompetent at their jobs. They put all our lives in danger. If the Brits pulled this crap I would insult them with "Johnny Fuck-knuckles". (For example, "I am staggered that Johnny Fuck-knuckles would send agents to fling around office equipment at the Guardian's offices.")

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#16

Post by curiousDog » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:11 AM UTC

Daniel_Newby wrote: post #2

Wow. Apu Fuck-knuckles is so incompetent that he deserves to be taken for a ride by every intel agency in the world. (Typewriter sounds are more easily surveilled and decoded into letters than a well-shielded computer. A given typewriter is trivially traceable to a particular office and even individual. Typing paper is somewhat easy to trace. Typewriters requires use of photocopiers, which are a centralized easily-su…

How do you know they won't do a thorough sweep for bugs? How do you know their mode of transportation? If the Russians are doing it, there must be some merit to the solution. Granted it doesn't sound logical. Your worthless assumptions aside, you seem to have a lot of hate pent up there.

No need for name calling, Cletus. And it's sad to see this in someone with 12 yrs of professional experience as a "software and electrical" engineer.

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#17

Post by iamshs » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:11 AM UTC

jonknee wrote: post #12

iamshs wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Which means interception and time limits.

Send it with a person in a diplomatic bag. If it gets intercepted it will be an international incident and you'll know 100% of the time that you are compromised.

Fair enough. But it also imposes time limits for critical communication.

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#18

Post by jemeshsu » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:24 AM UTC

ginko wrote: post #7

iamshs wrote: post #3

Ah. How are they gonna transmit data? What a temporary solution to a permanent problem, using a technology that must have been cracked a century ago. Btw why would you go outside to discuss private matters? Wow. Now instead of playing into one agency's hand, play into all world's. Especially, now that everybody knows India discusses private matters in gardens. Horrific. India should totally adopt lavabit. Incompetent…

> Ah. How are they gonna transmit data? If there only were some sort of non-electronic version of email.

I supposed one can use carrier pigeons or trained ravens.

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#19

Post by redact207 » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:26 AM UTC

In a country that's stricken with extreme poverty, a caste system that births you into such a fate until death, where women can't walk the street at night without the fear of getting brutally raped or molested, a country that starves while massive stockpiles of food reserves perish due to kafkaesque bureaucracy and corruption; I hardly think that privacy breaches are India's top concern.

The political system is already ineffective and the use of typewriters to "secure" communications only proves that the priorities of the leaders are so misaligned to what the country needs to make any progress with it's problems.

India has great potential to develop into something more than it is, but until there's significant political reform then it's progress will always be slow and its people will continue to suffer.

Re: Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information

#20

Post by r0h1n » Sat, Sep 28, 2013, 5:27 AM UTC

iamshs wrote: post #14

r0h1n wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You keep mentioning Lavabit, even after they shut down?

So? The model/architecture behind lavabit is what should be replicated for all government communications. Don't provide it to citizens maybe, but do safeguard their own communication.

Fair enough. You meant "a service similar to Lavabit" and I was reading it as "Lavabit", especially because your first comment said "India should totally adopt Lavabit".