The intelligence angle in Google's new Grace Hopper transatlantic cable

Google will lay a new undersea communications cable between the United States and Britain and Spain. The cable will support increased data flows across the Atlantic. But "Grace Hopper," as the cable is named, will also attract some interesting intelligence activity.

The first point to note is that the British end of the cable will come ashore in Bude, Cornwall, on England's southwest coast. While many U.S. cables land at Bude, that location is also home to a joint base of the U.S. National Security Agency and its British equivalent, Government Communications Headquarters. GCHQ-Bude conducts a range of signals intelligence activities, but its particular focuses are the monitoring of undersea cable traffic, supporting NATO sea control, and interception of data and communications running across numerous satellites. But its position on the picturesque coast gives GCHQ-Bude a particular opportunity to assess data moving across undersea networks quickly.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/the-intelligence-angle-in-googles-new-grace-hopper-transatlantic-cable

#us #uk #google #GCHQ #intelligence

Groundbreaking new material 'could allow artificial intelligence to merge with the human brain'

Scientists have discovered a ground-breaking bio-synthetic material that they claim can be used to merge artificial intelligence with the human brain.

The breakthrough, presented today at the American Chemical Society Fall 2020 virtual expo, is a major step towards integrating electronics with the body to create part human, part robotic "cyborg" beings.

Connecting electronics to human tissue has been a major challenge due to traditional materials like gold, silicon and steel causing scarring when implanted.

👀 👉🏼 https://www.independent.co.uk/life-style/gadgets-and-tech/news/artificial-intelligence-brain-computer-cyborg-elon-musk-neuralink-a9673261.html

#artificial #intelligence #brain #computer #cyborg
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CIA’s In-Q-Tel Among Backers of German Satellite-Thruster Startup

Morpheus Space’s small and simple electric thrusters could upend the satellite industry.

The Central Intelligence Agency’s venture capital firm is among a half-dozen investors in Morpheus Space, a German startup whose novel electric thrusters enable tiny satellites to maneuver and big ones to reduce complexity.

The Dresden-based company said it plans to use the capital to hire employees, increase production and expand its business to the United States. While the company won’t say how much money it raised, it listed In-Q-Tel along with other investors VSquared Ventures, Lavrock Ventures, Airbus Ventures, Pallas Ventures and TechStars. The startup’s leaders hope the money will allow it to enter the defense, civil, and commercial space markets.

https://www.defenseone.com/business/2020/08/cias-q-tel-among-backers-german-satellite-thruster-startup/167984/

#MorpheousSpace #CIA #German #satellite #firm #intelligence

Private Intel Firm Buys Location Data to Track People to their 'Doorstep'

The data comes from hundreds of ordinary apps installed on peoples’ phones around the world.

A threat intelligence firm called HYAS, a private company that tries to prevent or investigates hacks against its clients, is buying location data harvested from ordinary apps installed on peoples' phones around the world, and using it to unmask hackers. The company is a business, not a law enforcement agency, and claims to be able to track people to their "doorstep."

The news highlights the complex supply chain and sale of location data, traveling from apps whose users are in some cases unaware that the software is selling their location, through to data brokers, and finally to end clients who use the data itself. The news also shows that while some location firms repeatedly reassure the public that their data is focused on the high level, aggregated, pseudonymous tracking of groups of people, some companies do buy and use location data from a largely unregulated market explicitly for the purpose of identifying specific individuals.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qj454d/private-intelligence-location-data-xmode-hyas

#intelligence #firm #HYAS #data #location #privacy

European Police Malware Could Harvest GPS, Messages, Passwords, More

A document obtained by Motherboard provides more detail on the malware law enforcement deployed against Encrochat devices.

The malware that French law enforcement deployed en masse onto Encrochat devices, a large encrypted phone network using Android phones, had the capability to harvest "all data stored within the device," and was expected to include chat messages, geolocation data, usernames, passwords, and more, according to a document obtained by Motherboard.

The document adds more specifics around the law enforcement hack and subsequent takedown of Encrochat earlier this year. Organized crime groups across Europe and the rest of the world heavily used the network before its seizure, in many cases to facilitate large scale drug trafficking. The operation is one of, if not the, largest law enforcement mass hacking operation to date, with investigators obtaining more than a hundred million encrypted messages.

https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/k7qjkn/encrochat-hack-gps-messages-passwords-data

#Europe #police #malware #surveillance #intelligence

How the U.S. Military Buys Location Data from Ordinary Apps

A Muslim prayer app with over 98 million downloads is one of the apps connected to a wide-ranging supply chain that sends ordinary people's personal data to brokers, contractors, and the military.

The U.S. military is buying the granular movement data of people around the world, harvested from innocuous-seeming apps, Motherboard has learned. The most popular app among a group Motherboard analyzed connected to this sort of data sale is a Muslim prayer and Quran app that has more than 98 million downloads worldwide. Others include a Muslim dating app, a popular Craigslist app, an app for following storms, and a "level" app that can be used to help, for example, install shelves in a bedroom.

Through public records, interviews with developers, and technical analysis, Motherboard uncovered two separate, parallel data streams that the U.S. military uses, or has used, to obtain location data. One relies on a company called Babel Street, which creates a product called Locate X. U.S. Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), a branch of the military tasked with counterterrorism, counterinsurgency, and special reconnaissance, bought access to Locate X to assist on overseas special forces operations. The other stream is through a company called X-Mode, which obtains location data directly from apps, then sells that data to contractors, and by extension, the military.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/jgqm5x/us-military-location-data-xmode-locate-x


#US #military #intelligence #privacy #location #why

Investigating Chinese Intelligence Firm Zhenhua Data

CCP is collecting massive amounts of data from social media including Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, TikTok, VK, Instagram etc. They also monitor a wide range of media outlets, news websites, news aggregators such as Reddit, etc.

Stories of Chinese Intelligence Firms leveraging Big Data Analysis, Social Media Platforms, LinkedIn, Mobile Devices, SIGINT, etc are all over the internet. However the recent stories about the Zhenhua Data Leak in the Indian Express caught our attention and we decided to leverage our ShadowMap platform to get some more insight on the Zhenhua Data operation.

After spending several days deep into this rabbit hole of vague corporations, a wide range of collection systems, some really interesting correlation use-cases – we’ve been able to put together a fairly comprehensive image of the Zhenhua Data operation.

While on the surface Zhenhua Data seems to be “just another” firm capturing, processing and selling publicly available information, the story changes rapidly once you look beyond the surface.

Zhenhua Data & Affiliates

According to the Zhenhua Data website (which has been taken offline, but is still accessible via ShadowMap) – “Zhenhua Data focuses on integrating overseas data and information to provide services for domestic institutions”. In-addition to Shenzhen Zhenhua Data Information Technology Co., Ltd. (china-revival.com) that has already received wide-spread coverage, we also found the involvement of Weiju (aggso.com) & SocialDataMax (socialdatamax.com).

Weiju, started out as a “location-based, instant messaging application that enables users to chat with nearby strangers.”, however the last update on its website (in 2015) mentions “Public opinion monitoring and early warning”, “Communication analysis statistics”, etc.

There are also several mentions of the underlying platforms being developed by “Beijing Juwei Hezhi Information Technology Co., Ltd.”, which has a very limited public presence but is listed online as “Juwei Hezhi is a company that analyzes social media big data”.

https://outline.com/MpwBFt

original article : https://shadowmap.com/security-research/investigating-chinese-intelligence-firm-zhenhua-data/

#Asia #China #intelligence

Five-Eyes intelligence services to help Europe circumvent encryption

Strongly secured chats annoy secret services and prosecutors worldwide. On this sensitive issue, the EU states are now to coordinate with the powerful Anglo-Saxon secret service alliance.

In future, the EU states are to work closely with the Anglo-Saxon secret service alliance of the "Five Eyes" to circumvent secure encryption in digital communications. This can be seen from documents sent to the member states by the German EU Council Presidency and available to the Süddeutsche Zeitung. As "Five Eyes", the secret services of the USA, Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Canada are cooperating with each other.

A report by the Austrian radio station ORF had already pointed out two weeks ago the similarity of the wording in the draft EU paper with a statement by the secret service alliance "Five Eyes" as well as India and Japan on October 11, which also demanded "lawful access to encrypted communication". Another paper from the EU Council of Ministers now substantiates this suspicion: The document called "Recommendations for the future handling of the encryption issue" is dated November 16 and has been submitted to the SZ.

The document is addressed to the EU member states and is a kind of handout. Point six states that governments should engage in a close dialogue on the topic with the initiators of the paper "End-to-End-Encryption and Public Safety". This is the declaration of the Five Eyes countries, as well as India and Japan, in which they call on companies such as Facebook to allow states access to encrypted content.

👀 👉🏼 Translated with DeepL
https://www.sueddeutsche.de/digital/geheimdienste-verschluesselung-crypto-wars-messenger-1.5131084

#fiveeyes #intelligence #eu #encryption #messenger #cryptowars #thinkabout
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Threema boss: Master key for secret services "not possible at all

The head of the messenger service Threema has sharply criticized demands for access to private chat messages for state security authorities. "These demands for a master key testify to the inexperience of the authorities," Martin Blatter told Welt am Sonntag. Technically, he said, it was not even possible. "We don't have a master key that we could deposit. The encryption is done by the users and not by us.

"Criminals almost always already known to the authorities"

In mid-November, alleged plans by EU countries to ban the secure encryption of messages on channels such as WhatsApp caused a great stir. The German EU Council Presidency had drafted a resolution on the subject. However, the paper was vaguely formulated and did not go into detail about how security authorities should be able to decrypt encrypted messages. Nevertheless, civil rights activists and data protectionists strongly criticized the initiative.

Blatter also emphasized that in the case of terrorist attacks, the perpetrators were almost always already known to the authorities and on file. "This means that politicians have not managed to protect citizens". In the newspaper interview, he also spoke of U.S. secret services having forced manufacturers of routers to install back doors, which in the end were also used by China.

👀 👉🏼 Translated with DeepL
https://telegra.ph/Threema-Chef-Generalschl%C3%BCssel-f%C3%BCr-Geheimdienste-gar-nicht-m%C3%B6glich-11-29

via www.heise.de

#fiveeyes #intelligence #eu #encryption #messenger #threema #cryptowars #thinkabout
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Revealed: China suspected of spying on Americans via Caribbean phone networks

Security expert claims Chinese surveillance may have affected tens of thousands of Americans

China appears to have used mobile phone networks in the Caribbean to surveil US mobile phone subscribers as part of its espionage campaign against Americans, according to a mobile network security expert who has analysed sensitive signals data.

The findings paint an alarming picture of how China has allegedly exploited decades-old vulnerabilities in the global telecommunications network to route “active” surveillance attacks through telecoms operators.

The alleged attacks appear to be enabling China to target, track, and intercept phone communications of US phone subscribers, according to research and analysis by Gary Miller, a Washington state-based former mobile network security executive.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/dec/15/revealed-china-suspected-of-spying-on-americans-via-caribbean-phone-networks

#China #US #mobile #phone #networks #intelligence #spy #surveillance