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Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

abc.net.au

51–60 of 361 posts

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

from what I understand they developed the app themselves... marketed and pushed the app to certain "dark markets" and let them use the apps and devices as if they were secure. they were in fact real time monitoring every transaction. amazing really. and pretty funny if you asked me :-P

Not funny. Pretty much worse fucking case scenario. Imagine Signal, Telegram, or any other app that touts themselves as a secure app is really just the creation of the FBI, NSA, CIA, and NRO. Remember, yesterday’s conspiracy theory is today’s reality.

I'd say it's just a good argument for using a popular app (like one you mentioned) because it is likely to be subject to the critical eyes of security researchers.

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#52
post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not funny. Pretty much worse fucking case scenario. Imagine Signal, Telegram, or any other app that touts themselves as a secure app is really just the creation of the FBI, NSA, CIA, and NRO. Remember, yesterday’s conspiracy theory is today’s reality.

Food for thought: Telegram estimated costs for 2021 based on 675 million monthly active users (MAU) are $220 Million. Yet, the app is somehow free to use. Where does the money to cover the costs come from?

$220M is not pocket money, but Durov's net worth is apparently $17.2B, so he could afford it for a few more years

https://www.forbes.com/profile/pavel-durov/

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#53
post #15
post #11

So the big question is if would have been better to strike fast, silently gain more intel och strike in some kind of statistical analysis maner to not blow their cover á la Alan Turing and the enigma

It’s been running for three years. I suspect something changed recently (perhaps some imminent threat) that meant they needed to act now.

One of the warrants they were using to legally collect the information ran out today.

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#55
post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Representing criminals is fine, but aiding them in committing future crimes isn’t. If you do that, you’re just part of a criminal conspiracy, and being a lawyer doesn’t give you an exception from moral culpability.

Doing their taxes okay, but representing them in court with the goal to free them is the purpose of the justice system...

I think the GP meant 'aiding them in commiting future crimes' in the literal sense (e.g. helping launder money, abusing attorney privilege etc.) rather than implying that by defending them in court the lawyer would then be culpable.

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#56
post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I suspect that people don't fall into such neat categories. You could pose a similar question re: lawyers whose bread and butter is protecting and representing people associated with organised crime (the kind of individuals represented by Maury from The Wire or Neil Mink from The Sopranos). Are they lawyers who developed a slippery version of ethics & morality, or people with loose ethical standards who entered law?…

What? Representing criminals is not unethical or 'immoral'. Period. Protecting criminals legally is not unethical unless you are knowingly doing something illegal yourself. I imagine that most layers are just doing their job and getting paid for it. Bringing morality into that equation makes no sense in a legal system that has little to nothing to do with morality.

[deleted]

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#57
There are more details in a recently unsealed search warrant against a GMail user: https://storage.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.casd.70...

An informant (confidential human source, or "CHS") helped the FBI and AFP (Australian Federal Police) develop and distribute Anom to criminal gangs (transnational criminal organizations, or "TCOs"):

> The CHS offered this next generation device, named “Anom,” to the FBI to use in ongoing and new investigations. The CHS also agreed to offer to distribute Anom devices to some of the CHS’s existing network of distributors of encrypted communications devices, all of whom have direct links to TCOs.

Anom was specifically designed from the ground up with an encryption backdoor:

> Before the device could be put to use, however, the FBI, AFP, and the CHS built a master key into the existing encryption system which surreptitiously attaches to each message and enables law enforcement to decrypt and store the message as it is transmitted. A user of Anom is unaware of this capability. By design, as part of the Trojan Shield investigation, for devices located outside of the United States, an encrypted “BCC” of the message is routed to an “iBot” server located outside of the United States, where it is decrypted from the CHS’s encryption code and then immediately re-encrypted with FBI encryption code. The newly encrypted message then passes to a second FBI-owned iBot server, where it is decrypted and its content available for viewing in the first instance.

Naturally, the FBI can't spy on domestic communications without a warrant, so they got the AFP to do it for them:

> FBI geo-fenced the U.S., meaning that any outgoing messages from a device with a U.S. MCC would not have any communications on the FBI iBot server. But if any devices landed in the United States, the AFP agreed to monitor these devices for any threats to life based on their normal policies and procedures.

Closing Sky Global and Encrochat drove criminals to Anom:

> Since March 12, 2021, as a direct result of the Sky Global charges, there are now close to 9000 active Anom users. The criminals who use hardened encrypted devices are constantly searching for the next secure device, and the distributors of these devices have enabled criminals’ impenetrable communications on these devices for years.

Finally, the FBI quite directly admits their goal is to shake confidence in encrypted messaging:

> A goal of the Trojan Shield investigation is to shake the confidence in this entire industry because the FBI is willing and able to enter this space and monitor messages.

There's also a number of sample conversations in the warrant application showing criminals openly talking about moving drugs and other illegal activities with absolutely no code. Definitely worth a read.

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#58
post #11

So the big question is if would have been better to strike fast, silently gain more intel och strike in some kind of statistical analysis maner to not blow their cover á la Alan Turing and the enigma

Random nitpick, but I think it's à la. Do correct me if I'm wrong though.

[deleted]

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#59

As to how the FBI got access to the messages, Vice says[1] after Vincent Ramos of Phantom Secure was arrested in 2018, a confidential human source offered Anom, which the source was developing, to the FBI (probably in exchange for immunity or a reduced sentence, in my opinion). The source then seeded Anom phones to his existing distributors as a replacement for Phantom Secure phones, and from their they made their wa…

So Vice says that an external source came to offer the app, while the Australian Police "said the plan to use an encrypted app was hatched overseas over a few beers with FBI agents in 2018, before police figured out how to decrypt all messages."

I wonder how this all ties together. As someone mentioned here, there surely be some movie about it.

Re: Australian Federal Police and FBI nab underworld figures using encrypted app

#60

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The tweet says: "... remember that Dipshit McSonInLaw used these exact "technologies" to communicate with the Saudis and stuff. ... ". But, I don't see how he the tweeter could be sure or know that Trumps used this app?

Eric Garland is a massive blowhard/self-promoter (and I say this despite sharing his dislike of Trump). Even when his claims are accurate he's so obnoxious and annoying that I can't be bothered to evaluate his other claims. I save a lot of time and mental agitation by ignoring e-personalities and assuming that if something is important I'll hear about it from a quality source before very long.

> I save a lot of time and mental agitation by ignoring e-personalities and assuming that if something is important I'll hear about it from a quality source before very long.

We’ve had 4 years of media personas announcing Trump’s imminent incarceration. Call me when something sticks.

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