Guerrilla Network: All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012

All U.S. Internet Providers will be policing downloads by July 12, 2012

Education Time!

The system in question is called the “Copyright Alert System” (CAS) and it’s described in full on this webpage. The system implementation has been delayed and is not likely to start on July 12th anymore.

The only real change that this indicates is that if you get copyright infringement notices from the RIAA or MPAA (those scary letters that they mail you when you are caught) the ISP will note that in their system and take progressively stronger measures, per letter received, to ensure that you are aware of what’s going on and that you stop doing it. The first four infringement letters that the ISP receives will just result in warnings, the fifth is a warning with an optional “Mitigation Measure” (slowed speed or temporary disconnect until you discuss the infringements with your ISP), the sixth is a mandatory “Mitigation Measure”. Permanent denial of internet service has NOT been agreed upon by the ISPs, disconnects will be temporary.

One last thing I want to be clear on: your ISP will not be actively attempting to catch you downloading illegally, they are only implementing a system by which, if you are caught by the MPAA or RIAA, you will be notified. This also means that legal torrents will still be fine: the MPAA and RIAA have no right to send infringement notices for content which they do not own, which means that your ISP cannot mark it down as infringement, which means that your account will not receive a notice or an alert. So basically, the ISPs have just agreed to be a little more cooperative with copyright holders and to keep track of when their customers have received infringement notices. If you receive a lot of infringement notices in the mail, then this could cause problems for you, but if your methods of acquiring content don’t usually result in infringement notices, this probably won’t really change much for you.

(via guerrillatech)

Source: toodotnil

DHS Terrorism Informatics – Fusion Centers are Socially Irresponsible - #NWO #GIG #SystemsOfControl

Terrorism Informatics:  “The application of advanced methodologies and information fusion and analysis techniques to acquire, integrate, process, analyze, and manage the diversity of terrorism-related information for national/international and homeland security-related applications” Source: iacr.org

Homeland Security - Fighting Terrorism Since 1492

By now, we all should know what a Department of Homeland Security Fusion Center is.  What you may not know is how they work, and as they say, the devil’s in the details.

Fusion Center FAQ: Fusion Center Guidelines for Law Enforcement (original location)

 

General Dynamics Wins $876 Million Contract to Move Homeland Security Headquarters

The task order has a ceiling value of $876 million and duration of seven years if all options are exercised.As part of the relocation, General Dynamics will provide full enterprise support to the new Department of Homeland Security (DHS) headquarters on the St. Elizabeth’s Hospital campus, including the design, development and installation of an entirely new IT infrastructure. Once installed, the company will test, manage and maintain the IT enterprise to ensure continuous operations.

So what is in the “Mothership” of the DHS fusion center beehive?

DHS Fusion Center Headquarters Timeline (original location)

DHS Fusion Center HQ Design & Construction

Phase 1AUS Coast Guard HeadquartersPhase 1BUS Coast Guard Headquarters Shared-Use SpacesPhase 2A
  • Department of Homeland Security Headquarters
  • National Operations Center (NOC)
Phase 2BFederal Emergency Management Agency Headquarters (FEMA)Phase 3
  • Transportation Security Administration Headquarters (TSA)
  • Customs and Border Protection Headquarters (CBP)
  • Immigration and Customs Enforcement Headquarters (ICE)

Phase 1 is scheduled to deliver in 2013, Phase 2 in 2014, and Phase 3 in 2016.

Sounds like a party!  DHS, FEMA, TSA, CBP, ICE, and USCG all under one roof, that’s in entirely too many acronyms for me.  Let’s get back to General Dynamics.  What kinds of software/hardware are they installing?

Customer Testimonial – General Dynamics

This gentlemen is talking about NetOptics.

Phantom Virtual Tap for Total Visibility Across Your Virtual Network

NetOptics Counter Intelligence Brochure
(original location)

NetOptics Lawful Intercept Brochure
(original location)

Net Optics Whitepaper Social Networking Trends and Lawful Interception
(original location)

They must be able to isolate suspicious voice, video, or
data streams for an interception, based on IP address, MAC address or other parameters. The device must also be able to carry out filtering at wire speed. Requirements for supporting Lawful Interception activities include:
• The ability to intercept all applicable communications of a certain target without gaps in coverage, including dropped packets, where missing encrypted characters may render a message unreadable or incomplete
• Total visibility into network traffic at any point in the communication stream
• Adequate processing speed to match network bandwidth
• Undetectability, unobtrusiveness, and lack of performance degradation (a red flag to criminals and terrorists on alert for signs that they have been intercepted)
• Real-time monitoring capabilities, because time is of the essence in preventing a crime or attack and in gathering evidence

• The ability to provide intercepted information to the authorities in the agreed-upon handoff format
• Load sharing and balancing of traffic that is handed to the LI (lawful interception) system

Test access ports, or Taps, are devices used by carriers and others to meet the capability requirements of CALEA legislation. Net Optics is a global leader in the range and capabilities of its Taps, which provide permanent, passive access points to the physical stream.

NetOptics Lawful Intercept Cyber Intelligence 2

Let’s recap.  General Dynamics is building the DHS headquarters, and they use NetOptics.  Are we to believe that General Dynamics’ obligations stop at building infrastructure and designing a Big Brother supercomputer network?

EPIC v. Department of Homeland Security: Media Monitoring

EPIC has filed a Freedom of information Act lawsuit against the Department of Homeland Security to force disclosure of the details of the agency’s social network monitoring program. In news reports and a Federal Register notice, the DHS has stated that it will routinely monitor the public postings of users on Twitter and Facebook. The agency plans to create fictitious user accounts and scan posts of users for key terms. User data will be stored for five years and shared with other government agencies.The legal authority for the DHS program remains unclear. EPIC filed the lawsuit after the DHS failed to reply to an April 2011 FOIA request. For more information, see EPIC: Social Networking Privacy.

In the FOIA you will notice many requests for information reguarding HBGary, a cyber defense contractor.  Why is this important?  Last year the hacker collective Anonymous breached HBGary’s databases, leaking all of their internal emails to the internet.  Disclosures abound, the largest being Hunton and Williams, Palantir, Berico
Technologies, and HBGary were hired by the government to track down Wikileaks supporters and discredit them.  See for yourself:

HBGary Palantir Bericho WikiLeaks Response v6

Wikileaks ResponseThis PDF shows how closely tied military-industrial complex and law enforcement agencies are.  None of the actors in this investigation are law enforcement.

As interesting as that disclosure may have been, I found this file in the emails which is more on topic:

HBGary and General Dynamics – Project C
(original location)

General Dynamics has selected HBGary Inc to provide this proposal for development of a software application targeting the Windows XP Operating System that, when executed, loads and enables a covert kernel-mode implant that will exfiltrate a file from disk (or other remotely called commands) over a connected serial port to a remote device. The enabling kernel mode implant will cater to a command and control element via the serial port. The demonstration will utilize an exploit in Outlook as the delivery mechanism for said software application. The subsequently loaded implant will be stable and will not crash the demonstration system. A usermode component will be included as part of the exploitation package that exercises the kernel mode implant for demonstration purposes. The loaded implant will use the connected serial port to remotely enable functions which can be visible on the collection computer connected on the other end of the serial line. The purpose of the demonstration setup is to verify the functionality for the customer and validate that all work has been completed

Development of a kernel-mode implant that is clearly able to exfiltrate an on-disk file, opening of the CD tray, blinking of the keyboard lights, opening and deleting a file, and a memory buffer exfiltration over a connected serial line to a collection station. For demonstration, a null modem cable will be used to connect the collection station
Primary Objectives:
• The use of a standard Outlook Exploit as a delivery mechanism for the implant, with the intention being that any suitable exploit could be used for the same.
• As part of the exploit delivery package, a usermode trojan will assist in the loading of the implant, which will clearly demonstrate the full capability of the implant.
• Test set (which will consist of two computers networked together via a null modem cable using HyperTerminal) that can reliably and repeatedly demonstrate the exploit and subsequent implant capability of the system.

HBGary will begin development of a kernel-mode implant with the ability to exfiltrate an on-disk file, open the CD tray, blink the keyboard lights, open and delete a file, and execute a memory buffer exfiltration over a modem line to a collection station. The enabling kernel mode implant will cater to a command and control element via the serial port, and the rudimentary ICD/API in order to C2 the kernel implant will be developed by HBGary and documented appropriately for GDAIS use. As there are currently no requirements for stealth operation, this implant will be visible on the system if someone with technical knowledge were to investigate. Stability requirements are that this driver is loaded and unloaded without system crash, or blue screen.

HBGary General Dynamics Project C

General Dynamics, a defense contractor, is charged to monitor American citizen’s social media posts and aggregate the data into reports that look like this:

Virginia Fusion Center Terror Assessment

Virginia Terrorism Threat Assessmenthomeland terroristsenvironmental terrorists lolWhy should it matter if you end up in one of these reports?  Ask Greenpeace:

Greenpeace FBI FOIA request documents
(original location)

Serious Congressional oversight and review of the Posse Comitatus Act are in order.  The lines between military and law enforcement have become so blurred that new guarantees are needed to protect our civil liberty.  Lest we forget, Terrorism is just a word of recent invention.

» DOJ: Make It a Federal Crime to “Lie” on the Internet

Obama’s Department of Justice will tell Congress today it should have the ability to prosecute people who lie on the internet. It wants to do this by making it illegal to breach the terms of service of websites.

The DOJ’s deputy computer crime chief, Richard Downing, will argue that the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA) — an amendment to the Counterfeit Access Device and Abuse Act generally used to prosecute hacking and other serious cyber-crime — must give prosecutors the ability to charge people “based upon a violation of terms of service or similar contractual agreement with an employer or provider,” according to Andrew Couts, writing for Digital Trends.

Downing said law enforcement needs the revision in order to prosecute individuals for identity theft, privacy invasion or the misuse of government databases, and other violations of the law.

Orin S. Kerr, professor of George Washington University Law School, told Digital Trends that if implemented the law would criminalize people under the age of 18 who use the Google Search engine. Under its terms of service, minors are not allowed to use Google or its services.

“The same goes for someone who uses a fake name in their Facebook profile, or sheds a few pounds in their Match.com description — both of which are forbidden by those sites’ terms of service,” Couts notes.

If implemented, the government will not use the law to prosecute people who use fake names on Facebook, although it may use it selectively to prosecute “cyber-criminals.”

It is designed to attack alternative media. According to the government, the internet is a wasteland of lies, disinformation, and conspiracy theories.

In 2009, the government was so concerned about “conspiracy theories” it created a web page to debunk information challenging the official explanation of the September 11, 2001, attacks.

”The existence of both domestic and foreign conspiracy theories, we suggest, is no trivial matter, posing real risks to the government’s antiterrorism policies, whatever the latter may be,” Obama’s administrator of the White House Office of Information and Regulatory Affairs, Cass Sunstein, wrote in a paper entitled “Conspiracy Theories: Causes and Cures.” Sunstein proposed infiltrating “extremist groups” – the alternative media – that deviate from the official narrative on 9/11 and other government-spun fairy tales.

Modifying the CFAA appears to be an attempt silence government critics and journalists who “lie” about 9/11 and other official narratives.

The government may not actually prosecute people for challenging official disinformation and propaganda, but it will may use the law to intimidate journalists and editors.

to & by #Anonymous: Internet Manifesto by Tux

We are the generation of the Internet.

We are different from every previous generation on earth.
We, unlike any other generation before us, are able to partake in this expression of the ultimate Nexus of Ideas.
We, the new generation of the Internet, are no longer bound, restricted and divided by geography, distance, or culture.

Because this IS our culture.
The culture of the Internet.
Our Memes and our lulz.


And this IS our home. Our country. Our Nation. The Internet. We transcend country, religion, and notions that have divided every other generation before us.

We are united by this.

The Internet is our father, our mother, our brother.
Our Teacher Mentor, and friend. Our Country Nation, and Home.
Never again, shall we wage war against fellow brother.
Never again, shall we prove ignorant in the face of Information Incarnate.
Never again, shall our information be oppressed, controlled, and censored by outside forces.
Never Again.

More so that any other generation before us, we are able to communicate at a speed unprecendented by anything before this.
Communication is instantaneous. Any information we need, or want- at our fingertips.
And although you have never met me, seen me, touched me.
I am your brother. We grew up together under this awesome nation.
And I will die to protect it for you.

Information is Free.

-TuxAnon

(via kwikset)

Source: anoncentral

Senators Kill Off the "Kill Switch"

Fed up with being associated with censorship and repression, Senators Joe Lieberman, Tom Carper and Susan Collins have introduced a cybersecurity reform bill that explicitly prohibits the president from shutting down the Internet. The group are among the leaders of those in congress pushing for legislation to give the government authority over parts of the Internet in event of an emergency.

The Cybersecurity Freedom Act of 2011 adds language explicitly stating the president can’t shut down the Internet. Senator Collins noted in her remarks that this change was a direct result of President Mubarak’s actions in Egypt. It also permits owners of assets deemed critical infrastructure by the federal government, and therefore subject to additional Department of Homeland Security regulations, to appeal that decision in a federal court

CNN: Is Internet Access Now A Human Right? (via SaveOurSovereignty3)

Airing Date Jan.30, 2011

CNN: Is Internet Access Now A Human Right?

Source: youtube.com

Dust off your dialup modem to contact Egypt | Radio Netherlands Worldwide

With the internet down and SMS services unavailable, most of Egypt is closed off from the rest of the world. This makes distributing eyewitness reports very difficult. Radio hams, hackers and bloggers from all across the globe are desperately trying to set up make connections and to distribute information.

Until Saturday night it wasn’t even possible for Egyptians to use their mobile phones. In order to break the large-scale protests the Egyptian authorities are using all possible means to cut off communication channels. But an old-school analogue communication platform turns out to be very helpful. So messages are coming out off Egypt through regular landline phones.

“Thanks to many dedicated bloggers outside of Egypt”, says Manal Hassan, an Egyptian blogger operating from South Africa.

“So what we’ve been trying to do is get in touch with some of the activists on the ground who had firsthand accounts of what is happening. And then we would try to publish it on the internet: on our blog, on twitter and other social networks.”

“On Saturday the government brought back the voice mobile communication. SMS is still down until now. But at least we could get in touch with activists in the protest itself. We would call them and ask them about what’s happening, about the people’s reactions and we could even hear some of the chants in the protest. And then we would post these updates.”

Old-school communication
Internet traffic is not entirely impossible. A Swedish online group of internet activists, hackers and ‘freedom-of-speech-activists’ known as Telecomix is working on setting up connections through the old-fashioned dialup phone modems, that many of us know from the nineties”, says Telecomix’s Christopher Kullenberg.

“We were looking around for dialup connections that were still active at some European Internet Service Providers. We found a few and we managed to send in dialup numbers onto modem pools in Sweden and France. And we had a few Egyptian people calling up using old- style modems to get on the internet.”

Modems wanted
In the West, dialup internet access has been obsolete for almost a decade but it is currently the only way to connect digitally with Egypt, says Kullenberg.

Making use of landlines in Egypt is not without its dangers. There is a good chance the lines are tapped. Also the connections are often slow and unstable and the costs of these connections are high.

Radio hams
Radio hams occasionally distribute messages from Egypt. They communicate in Morse Code, putting their lives in danger because both their transmitters and identities can easily be traced by the authorities.

cyber/space\war: 12/9 defcon: net freedom & dark objects #emp #nwo #spaceweapons

op-ed: waving goodbye to internet freedom*
a look at america’s deadliest space weapons*
emp defense council founded on pearl harbor day*
new india web controls as blackberry gets reprieve*
fake chips threaten military computers*
massive dark object ‘lurking on edge of solar system hurling comets at earth’*

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