Wednesday, June 01, 2011
Key bit of info
Listening to On Point on NPR. Always a good discussion of current events, with well-informed contributors and well-informed callers.
Today's subject is cyberwarfare. Covering lots of familiar territory (Stuxnet, hacking, EMP) but one item of info is brand new, snatched my attention forcibly:
Hackers routinely engage in extortion against banks and other businesses. It's happened thousands of times. Hackers will pick up all the bank's customer data, then charge the bank something like $100,000 to keep it silent. Generally it happens only once with each bank (which is the smart way to run any extortion) but some quasi-legal operations like online gambling are kept on the string for steady payments.
Three questions:
(1) Why hasn't this come to the attention of the law? I understand why there's no point in contacting the Feds; they've been Chinese property since 1989. (Think of the Wen Ho Lee case if this sounds unlikely.) But surely some city prosecutor would enjoy making his bones with a case like this. Or are all the cities blackmailed as well?
(2) Why hasn't this been reported in the press? Same reason? All the media are thoroughly blackmailed? Occasionally we do hear about some bank or business that has lost its customer info; was this the result of a refusal to pay the vig?
(3) Was the 2008 Grand Theft Of America By Shotgun Paulson simply a very large example of this? I've thought from the start it was blackmail, but didn't realize there was a pattern of many smaller extortions. This would explain why the big one was paid so smoothly and quietly to the Jewish Mafia; everyone in power was already part of the game.
= = = = =
Sidenote: One of the experts wasn't very good. A caller asked why so many industrial facilities are connected to the Net when the Net is such an obvious source of trouble. One expert explained that it's usually ordered by managers who want to have direct control of all plants from their headquarters. The caller then asked "Even if managers need to have info, couldn't you rig a one-way connection?" The other expert said "Some plants are connected that way, using a clever device known as a diode." Well, diodes have been around for a hundred years, and every electronic circuit includes a whole bunch of diodes, and any competent electronic technician can rig a communication line to work only one way. Nothing to do with diodes. So I suspect the expert may have been fooled by one of his sources. ¶ 4:54 PM
Today's subject is cyberwarfare. Covering lots of familiar territory (Stuxnet, hacking, EMP) but one item of info is brand new, snatched my attention forcibly:
Hackers routinely engage in extortion against banks and other businesses. It's happened thousands of times. Hackers will pick up all the bank's customer data, then charge the bank something like $100,000 to keep it silent. Generally it happens only once with each bank (which is the smart way to run any extortion) but some quasi-legal operations like online gambling are kept on the string for steady payments.
Three questions:
(1) Why hasn't this come to the attention of the law? I understand why there's no point in contacting the Feds; they've been Chinese property since 1989. (Think of the Wen Ho Lee case if this sounds unlikely.) But surely some city prosecutor would enjoy making his bones with a case like this. Or are all the cities blackmailed as well?
(2) Why hasn't this been reported in the press? Same reason? All the media are thoroughly blackmailed? Occasionally we do hear about some bank or business that has lost its customer info; was this the result of a refusal to pay the vig?
(3) Was the 2008 Grand Theft Of America By Shotgun Paulson simply a very large example of this? I've thought from the start it was blackmail, but didn't realize there was a pattern of many smaller extortions. This would explain why the big one was paid so smoothly and quietly to the Jewish Mafia; everyone in power was already part of the game.
= = = = =
Sidenote: One of the experts wasn't very good. A caller asked why so many industrial facilities are connected to the Net when the Net is such an obvious source of trouble. One expert explained that it's usually ordered by managers who want to have direct control of all plants from their headquarters. The caller then asked "Even if managers need to have info, couldn't you rig a one-way connection?" The other expert said "Some plants are connected that way, using a clever device known as a diode." Well, diodes have been around for a hundred years, and every electronic circuit includes a whole bunch of diodes, and any competent electronic technician can rig a communication line to work only one way. Nothing to do with diodes. So I suspect the expert may have been fooled by one of his sources. ¶ 4:54 PM
