Snowden distributed encrypted copies of NSA docs around the world

http://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2013/06/snowden-distributed-encoded-copies-of-nsa-docs-around-the-world/

by titlex • 13 years ago

251 157 13 years ago

rosser• 13 years ago

I'm just going to leave this here:

“When I was in Hong Kong, I spoke to my partner in [Rio de Janeiro] via Skype and told him I would send an electronic encrypted copy of the documents,” Greenwald noted. “I did not end up doing it. Two days later his laptop was stolen from our house and nothing else was taken. Nothing like that has happened before. I am not saying it’s connected to this, but obviously the possibility exists.”

e3pi6• 13 years ago

ASK HN: How Does Edward's Dead Man Switch(EDMS) Function?

How?

So, there are these remote backups/sites out there, encrypted. Say, every week ES has somebody Bob post a keyword somewhere, a forum, pastebin, etc. The owner(s) Alice, Doreen, Glen, etc... of these backup sites manually or 'auto-crontab' for this keyword, or coded sequence of keywords, if so, fine, steady as Edward goes.

If not, .... ES released his hand(See hyperventilated Dyson's DMS in Terminator II film) sprung trigger. NOT good:

This interrupts the auto-cron periodic keyphrase(word) update and the toothpaste tubes are vigorously flattened, and you can't get the toothpaste back in.

(How? ie, How does EDMS trigger release become known to remote system trigger manager Bob or crontab daemon?)

Neighbor Bob check's local lampposts for Ed's new white tape once a week?

Can Bob be automated?

jlgreco11• 13 years ago

This is needlessly complex. Just find people that you trust to hold onto the key, and a few other people to hold onto the file. People who's priorities are aligned properly and are use to being leaned on (journalists and/or activists). When they read in the New York Times that Edward Snowden is dead, some or all of them publish.

If you are worried about one of those people colluding with another to get the secret sauce too early, then split the secret. Give it to 50 people and require any 10 of them to release their material. Or whatever, you can tune it how you like depending on how many people you trust and how much you trust them. Automation is unnecessary.

chacham15• 13 years ago

I agree this is wayyy complicated. All you do is send the encrypted data to whomever you want and then have some servers check an email every day to see if it got an email from snowden indicating the date. If its there repeat tomorrow else email key to journalists/publish on the internet.

antocv• 13 years ago

Its too complicated.

I believe any organization worth its salt that has NSA/CIA as enemy would have thought of something better and easier for a fail-safe device, an insurance on their lives if you will. Wikileaks has an insurance of this form.

Post encrypted file to everyone. Probably there is several VMs checking in or even scraping most news sites for "Assange dead", and if that happens, pastebin the keys. And even this is complicated.

If I would need a dead-man switch, Id include people I trust to release the keys, or parts of the keys in case I need to trust several people to be in agreement at the same time.

A technological solution in case I cant trust anyone, then I would run several php scripts on those free hosting sites, or get a plan with heroku or redhats openshift, all of which check for updates from my sock puppet accounts on facebook, g+ and email, weekly or so. Say every other update on at least one of the public services must contain a secret codeword in hidden form like first letter of each sentence or rot3 of those. If no updates are found for three weeks on all the sites, or if the codeword is not there two times, pastebin the keys all over the internets.

vinhboy• 13 years ago

If I am paying so much money for our awesome military industrial complex, I would AT LEAST expect them to know how to stage the house to make it look like a robbery. Or copy the hard drive and then bug the machine & router to intercept all future communications.

If the government really did break in and just stole his laptop, this is like the least cool spy thriller ever.

fnordfnordfnord6• 13 years ago

The polite, gentlemanly global surveillance state. They only take what they need. They don't make a mess. How nice.

"We would be happy to replace the laptop too, but we didn't think you'd want to use the new one."

jlgreco11• 13 years ago

If I am paying so much money for our awesome military industrial complex, I would AT LEAST expect them to know how to stage the house to make it look like a robbery.

On the other hand, if this wasn't done by a government then it really is what a robbery looks like!

_pmf_• 13 years ago

If I am paying so much money for our awesome military industrial complex, I would AT LEAST expect them to know how to stage the house to make it look like a robbery. Or copy the hard drive and then bug the machine & router to intercept all future communications.

You forget the fact that the majority of operative work abroad is done by minimum wage hired thugs who don't give a single fuck about the intricacies of the execution of the task at hand; they probably even like the fact that they can help make the US look like a bunch of morons.

codex2• 13 years ago

"Rio de Janeiro has been rated “Critical” for crime by the State Department for the past 25 years. Crimes statistics for 2012 reflect continued critically high and rising levels of crimes in both the state and city of Rio de Janeiro in the categories of robbery, rape, fraud, and residential thefts." [1]

"The high level of residential burglary has made most residents opt to reside in apartments where the “porteiro” (doorman) ensures 24/7 access control for the building. Having effective access control is critical."

[1] https://www.osac.gov/Pages/ContentReportDetails.aspx?cid=139...

throwaway100013• 13 years ago

But thieves don't just take a laptop once in

jasonkolb• 13 years ago

Greenwald wasn't in Rio, his colleague was.

thomasjoulin• 13 years ago

So, NSA supposedly has access via PRISM to direct access to Microsoft servers, and yet they supposedly have to go steal a laptop to get access to sent files ?

cheald4• 13 years ago

Perhaps they didn't want access so much as they wanted to remove possession of the files from Greenwald's partner?

The NSA presumably already knows what's in the archive.

Goopplesoft• 13 years ago

No the key of that phrase was:

I did not end up doing it.

It's implying had he sent it the laptop wouldn't have been stolen.

samstave3• 13 years ago

The machine could have been shutdown before they had the opportunity to slurp the file.

Dylan16807• 13 years ago

Yes. Are you trying to imply that that is odd? "Sent files" as a general case don't live on Microsoft servers.

o0-0o• 13 years ago

Wait, what? This dudes gay?

GI8A• 13 years ago

Reminds me of the time the house I was renting with a bunch of other international students was broken into and obviously searched, but nothing was taken, not even cash.

contingencies4• 13 years ago

Headline should be CIA burgles house in Brazil?

Kylekramer• 13 years ago

That would be a terrible headline based on that quote. Speculative, sensationalized headlines are undesirable even if they push an agenda you support.

Makes it very easy to dismiss.

contingencies4• 13 years ago

Speculative, sensationalized headlines are undesirable

Oh, I agree completely! Unfortunately, copywriters for almost every popular newspaper in the world do this by rote.

I added a question mark. :)

quackerhacker5• 13 years ago

Your title suggestion is too much of an assumption and accusation.

While the disclosure of Prism has confirmed what many tech minded people I know have always assumed, it does not stand to reason that other countries do not monitor chatter and would not act on intel that is valuable.

Basically, what I'm saying is to keep our minds open while reading these articles...an example of why would be if you remember Huawei Routers not being allowed in certain US infrastructure [0], or Clinton lobbying China to remove it's firewall [1].

Open minds can then start speculating past motivations in old articles.

[0] http://www.dailytech.com/Huaweis+CEO+and+Former+PLA+Officer+...

[1] http://www.salon.com/2010/01/22/hillary_clinton_internet_fre...

contingencies4• 13 years ago

Sure! Nobody knows what happened. What amuses me is that you instigate for open minds whilst referencing nationalism.

cookiecaper• 13 years ago

What do you people think intelligence agencies do? I'm surprised how far some people are taking the feigned ignorance/outrage. The NSA is reading the traffic from the biggest web communities in the world? Major shocker there. And now we're trying to make a scandal of an intelligence agency discreetly taking an object that may contain data that compromises national security? Things like that are why clandestine services exist in the first place: making sure we have a way into major communication channels when necessary, and making sure sensitive information is kept from prying eyes. These are basic functions for meaningful intelligence. Do we think the CIA just sits around in Langley all day?

I don't get it, is all.

sami36• 13 years ago

I'm starting to think the freakout we've seen in the media up to now is for much more than the Prism disclosure. This guy is the real thing, he's got serious insurance to bargain for his life & he's taken all precautions to safeguard it. No wonder they're scared shitless.

drivebyacct22• 13 years ago

The "freakout" in the "media" outside of the HN/reddit/internet bubble is mostly obsessed with "Where in the World is Carmen, I mean Edward, Snowden?" and not so much in the whole PRISM, constant universal wiretapping scandal.

alan_cx• 13 years ago

Exactly.

Focus on the man, and not the issue. That is the "freak out".

k-mcgrady• 13 years ago

I'm in two minds about this. Focussing on this issue is obviously important but I think the general public gets bored of it after a few days. They are much more interested in the human story. Keeping them hooked on that with the obvious regular explanation of who Snowden is and why he's in the news might get people to want to look into the actual story more. And if there is a big 'break' in the story (Snowden captured, makes it to Ecuador, etc.) people will be hooked and then the story of the spying will hold their attention. People (and I include myself) are much more interested in a story about other humans than a computer hacking/spying story that doesn't really involve many specific people directly.

dredmorbius• 13 years ago

Because that lets them play the distraction game (and shoot the messenger at the same time).

Tichy• 13 years ago

Want to bet on Snowden's bright future? I don't :-(

leeoniya• 13 years ago

wasn't this kind of assumed? to go this far and not cover all bases would be incredibly stupid and he doesn't strike me as such.

bcRIPster• 13 years ago

Agreed and I think the move to travel through China and Russia had to have been part of his plans at the start as this just drags all of the International parties into the fray whether they want to keep it quiet or not. It also then behooves everyone to keep him safe so they don't get escalate the finger pointing game on who might have had him killed.

I'd personally like to see less focus on the guy and more on the message though.

Avalaxy• 13 years ago

Interesting view. Hadn't thought about it like that :) For now China seems to be pretty happy about Snowden.

quackerhacker5• 13 years ago

This is definitely the only reason I think he is still alive. The NSA has probably done forensic analysis on the workstation that he utilized to transfer the intel...and as Snowden has noted, he does not want to be careless with the information or it's distribution in contrast to Manning.

To make it simple, I think he released to the public the appetizer, and has withheld any main course or desert (sorry for the analogies...lunch time).

jpdoctor2• 13 years ago

I hope Glenn has also thought about what should happen if he has a sudden car accident.

quackerhacker5• 13 years ago

Just for the uninformed that may not know what your referencing.

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/06/21/email-sent-by-mic...

kamjam• 13 years ago

Woah. The scene of that accident looks straight out of a movie scene, looks too unreal to be a normal car accident!

tlrobinson2• 13 years ago

Thanks to LA's high concentration of paparazzi there's video of (allegedly) him blowing through a red light moments before the crash: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gNhqKRugk8Q as well as video of the burning wreck minutes later: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3LSY3wVuASg (possibly disturbing video)

Also, interview with an eyewitness: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fweyFCFKcp0

nthitz• 13 years ago

Related: a presentation by DARPA about car cyberattacks http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=3D6jx...

TillE2• 13 years ago

As he's mentioned several times, Glenn Greenwald is not the only one with access to all the material Snowden has released. There are several other people at the Guardian and perhaps elsewhere, so targeting him in that way makes little sense.

Instead, they've wisely chosen the strategy of trying to discredit him.

jpdoctor2• 13 years ago

so targeting him in that way makes little sense.

The fact that others have the same info means that it makes a lot of sense.

Not a lot of people have the backbone to carry on after someone has been made an example. And those that do, well, they can also be made examples.

baddox• 13 years ago

It seems pretty clear that this isn't an insurance policy for his personal well-being, but rather an insurance policy for the data eventually being published.

GoodIntentions• 13 years ago

+1 insightful. The people doing this aren't worried about personal sacrifice, or they wouldn't be doing it. I think perhaps what they are worried about is their efforts being in vain.

pvnick2• 13 years ago

I wonder to what degree Wikileaks held Snowden's hand through all of this? For those who remember, Assange's organization distributed a large encrypted archive through bittorrent around the diplomatic cable leaks, presumably with a dead-man's switch [1] set up to reveal the key. I'm sure that Snowden had some procedures in place before departing to Hong Kong, but I also recall Assange saying they were trying to reach out to Snowden a week or two ago, and perhaps (hopefully!) they were able to give him some insurance tips, including potential pitfalls that Snowden may not have thought of.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dead_man's_switch

mpyne5• 13 years ago

If it's at all true that Assange had foreknowledge of Snowden's attempt to re-penetrate NSA via B-A-H, that would be very bad news for Wikileaks IMHO.

pvnick2• 13 years ago

Not saying it goes back that far, but referring to more recent times. Like over the past couple weeks. I don't think anybody in the world other than Snowden himself knew of his plans to penetrate BAH. But even if they did, who cares? As long as they didn't help him, I do not believe that knowledge of an impending crime is in-and-of itself a crime (someone please correct me if I'm wrong). What are they gonna do? Trump up some sexual assault charges?

spiek• 13 years ago

A wikileaks activist flew out to Hong Kong to advise him.

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/06/24/world/offering-snowden-aid...

pmorici• 13 years ago

So all anyone that wants access to the whole of what he has recovered needs to do is kill him and then it will all be released? That doesn't seem like a good position to put ones self in.

TillE2• 13 years ago

Snowden isn't carrying military secrets or anything. Details about internet/phone surveillance are of relatively little consequence to foreign governments, who certainly have a good idea of what's going on already.

smegel• 13 years ago

And just like Wikileaks the trickle of information will gradually dry up and we never hear anything again. The thing I hate most about these leakers is that they have huge stores of documents but only release a tiny fraction.

kintamanimatt3• 13 years ago

That makes sense. As Snowden said in one of the interviews, the reason he doesn't want to release everything is so that other countries don't have a blueprint from which to develop their own PRISM.

mpyne5• 13 years ago

Is Snowden still focused on PRISM alone? The blueprint to that is already out, it's called FISA and FISA Amendments perhaps sprinkled with a bit of Ruby on Rails and web services magic.

wyck• 13 years ago

Wikileaks made their "insurance" available to everyone via torrent... in other words they have safety in numbers. Snowden having distributed to file to "many different " people is vague and if the # is small could put them in real danger.

jlgreco11• 13 years ago

On the other hand, he's been to both Hong Kong and China now. Government officials from either country may be among those people with the encrypted data. Whether or not they release the encrypted data when/if the key is publicized doesn't really matter.

Publicly distributing the encrypted data does seem to be better to me, but making it ambiguous as to whether or not foreign governments have it seems like it could be a decent second best.

babesh• 13 years ago

He's no ordinary system administrator. This whole thing seems very well thought through.

corford3• 13 years ago

Well, obviously. How many sys admins do you know that used to work for the CIA and contract for the NSA? :)

mratzloff• 13 years ago

If you were going to put your life in jeopardy and go on the run, you would probably think it through very carefully as well.

thufry3• 13 years ago

This is the kind of thing which may help keep him physically safe, but massively hurts him both in the court of public opinion (which matters a lot, if his actions are to have any positive effect for the public), and should he stand trial in the United States (although, one could argue that if it gets to that he's lost either way). It puts the people arguing for a pardon for him in a much tougher position.

corford3• 13 years ago

Why? The data is encrypted so unless he divulges the key, it's useless to whomever has it.

Also, we don't know what the data contains. So even if he does give out the key and the media start publishing, who's to say what comes out wont be in the public interest?

I think it's a bit early to say this strategy has massively hurt him.

thufry3• 13 years ago

It doesn't matter what the data is at this point, since it's encrypted, but what it says, to a disinterested observer, is that Snowden is the sort of person who would gladly wield the threat of disseminating classified US information as a way of protecting his own skin. This directly contradicts the falling-on-my-sword, leaving-my-girlfriend-and-highly-paid job martyr/hero positioning he's been going for.

Snowden is coming to light as a complex character, not some altruistic idealist who expects a pardon and a ticker-tape parade. Phrases that come to mind are "David vs. Goliath," "Catch me if you Can," and "John Le Carre." I love it because it's a more interesting story this way.

darkarmani• 13 years ago

but massively hurts him both in the court of public opinion

How? Oh, look he isn't an idiot and he knew the CIA would try to assassinate him to silence him.

rdouble• 13 years ago

I wish Greenwald would share these documents that are so shocking and revealing. I would like to see what all this fuss has really been about.

ryanhuff• 13 years ago

If it was known (assumed) that Snowden sent Greenwald files, don't you think every intelligence group in the world with an interest in obtaining US classified information would be very motivated to obtain that chip?

gesman• 13 years ago

This is double-edged sword! While USA/NSA does not want Snowden dead to keep secrets for as long as possible - suddenly half of the world might become more interested in exactly that to happen rather sooner than later.

thomasjames• 13 years ago

I wonder how he was able to amass thousands of documents within two months of being in his current position while still screening them for information beyond the scope of what he was trying to leak. The possibility that there is confidential information about foreign operations outside of the internet surveillance makes me lose a great deal of respect for him. I also don't trust someone who wasn't even able to manage a GED to read through thousands of intelligence documents... just putting that out there. I feel like many have been too quick to give this guy a free pass.

Snowden distributed encrypted copies of NSA docs around the world

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