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US obsession with security harming business

posted onJanuary 9, 2014
by l33tdawg

A deal between the United Arab Emirates (UAE) deal to buy two intelligence satellites from France worth $930 million is in trouble after the US NSA tried to put backdoors into the technology.

Two high-resolution Pleiades-type Falcon Eye military observation satellites contained two specific US-supplied components that provide a back door to the highly secure data transmitted to the ground station.

US BACKDOORED our satellites, claim UAE

posted onJanuary 6, 2014
by l33tdawg

A United Arab Emirates (UAE) deal to purchase two intelligence satellites from France worth almost 3.4 billion dirhams (US $930 million) is in jeopardy after the discovery of what was described as “security compromising components.”

A high-level UAE source said the two high-resolution Pleiades-type Falcon Eye military observation satellites contained two specific US-supplied components that provide a back door to the highly secure data transmitted to the ground station.

Microsoft Predicts US Government Will Erode IT Industry Security Efforts

posted onDecember 16, 2013
by l33tdawg

Microsoft believes that the government, but not necessarily the National Security Agency (NSA), may stymie the IT industry’s efforts to safeguard corporate and user data.

Top security executives at the company have put together their top predictions for 2014 for the Microsoft Security Blog. Paul Nicholas, senior director of Global Security Strategy for Microsoft’s Trustworthy Computing division says that government efforts to bolster cyber-security may end up doing more harm than good if all stakeholders fail to see eye-to-eye.

Officials Say U.S. May Never Know Extent of Snowden's Leaks

posted onDecember 16, 2013
by l33tdawg

American intelligence and law enforcement investigators have concluded that they may never know the entirety of what the former National Security Agency contractor Edward J. Snowden extracted from classified government computers before leaving the United States, according to senior government officials.

TPP leak: US babies following bathwater down the drain

posted onDecember 10, 2013
by l33tdawg

America is pushing too hard on too many fronts in the Trans Pacific Partnership treaty negotiations, making it unlikely the treaty will be finalised this year, according to a new round of leaked documents from the recent Salt Lake City meetings.

The latest leaks, posted at Wikileaks, reveal how deeply unpopular some of America's most treasured TPP positions are.

U.S. To Consider Cellphone Use On Planes

posted onNovember 22, 2013
by l33tdawg

The Federal Communications Commission will propose allowing passengers to use their cellphones on airplanes, setting up a debate that will pit the technically possible against the socially tolerable.

While phone use would still be restricted during takeoff and landing, the proposal would lift an FCC ban on airborne calls and cellular data use by passengers once a flight reached 10,000 feet.

NSA, UK hacked Yahoo! and Google data center interconnects - report

posted onOctober 31, 2013
by l33tdawg

British and US intelligence agencies managed to tap into the connections between data centers run by Yahoo! and Google, and in one month this year slurped 181,280,466 records, including metadata and the contents of communications, according to new documents from Edward Snowden.

A report dated January 9, 2013, from NSA’s acquisitions directorate, detailed the operation, dubbed MUSCULAR, in which operatives from the NSA and Britain's GCHQ tapped the fiber-optic transmission cables from the non-US data centers run by the two firms.

Parents of Gary McKinnon and Richard O'Dwyer back Lauri Love, who is accused of breaking into US military networks

posted onOctober 29, 2013
by l33tdawg

The mothers of Gary McKinnon and Richard O'Dwyer, who faced down US attempts to extradite their sons over hacking and copyright charges, have accused US authorities of targeting "young British geeks" after a vicar's son was charged with breaching US military networks from his home in rural Suffolk.

Lauri Love, 28, is facing 10 years in a US jail after being described by prosecutors as a "sophisticated and prolific computer hacker" who allegedly broke into US army and Nasa networks in an attempt to steal confidential data.