Sunday, September 30, 2018

The Internet Changes Composition

I ran across a map that shows how the Internet is changing.   I had similar data in my first book on The Chinese Information War.  The US and most of Europe are puny compared to India and China.  So, if you are trying to market or manage influence campaigns, it is hard not to consider the people that are on the Internet.  Russia is almost non-existent, when it claims that almost all of its citizens have Internet access.  My brother, who spent time in Russia setting up a legislative management system, said they counted internet connections in libraries as being used by everyone in a community.  They didn't use real numbers of people using them. 

You Can't Win With Politics

There was a good article in the Journal the other day on Google not being able to win by sponsoring a CPAC meeting which is sponsorship of conservatives.  Google's employees objected to this at a time when there are discussions on the Hill about bias in several of the tech companies.  Not good timing, on any side of the situation. 

Maybe what Google knows is that politics and business do not go together very well.  I'm not saying that certain businesses do not favor certain political parties, but that they do so without antagonizing the others.  It is a balance between sticking your finger in the eye of one group to help another.  Conservatives think Google favors the liberal thinkers, and liberals think this CPAC sponsorship is a bridge too far.  Both are right.  Google should be like the Swiss - neutral. 

That runs both ways.  Those liberal stances against working for the US Military and supporting the Chinese at the same time are clearly not good for business, but especially not good for politics.  Throttling groups' sites makes enemies of all who view them.  They invite regulation when they take stances like that.  They invite regulation when they sponsor CPAC.  That means they are trying to be "fair" and all they are doing is making enemies on both sides. 

They shouldn't make enemies; they should make better deals for their products and services and stay out of politics, both here and in China.  Their employees need to know that strategy and implement it in the way they do business.  No manipulation of the capabilities it has for any political causes - period.  I kind of wonder who on K Street is working for Google because whoever it is needs to rethink their strategy towards the powerful people sitting in Congress.  Stay away from all of them unless they try to interfere with business.  Where are the really hurting Google's business?  Nowhere that I can see - yet. 

Saturday, September 29, 2018

Warrants for Messenger

A Reuters story today says the US tried to get a warrant for data on Messenger that law enforcement could not recover on its on.  The warrant was denied by the U.S. District Court in Fresno, California.  Apparently, they only needed 3 messages, having recovered all the others on their own.  The target was MS-13, the well-known criminal gang which operates in the US, Mexico and several other Latin American countries. 

"Telecommunications companies are required to give police access to calls under federal law, but many apps that rely solely on internet infrastructure are exempt. Facebook contended Messenger was covered by that exemption.

The public court filings showed the government was intercepting all ordinary phone calls and Messenger texts between the accused gang members." 

Friday, September 28, 2018

A Stone in the Water

Some of the Muslim populations of the Middle East have recognized the Chinese are putting up to a million Muslims in camps.  From indications in an article today in the Wall Street Journal, some of the those people are women and children.  This kind of detention is not the kind China has said these camps are for - education and retraining for jobs.  Not many children are attending job training. 

I suspect this is only the beginning for them.  Demonstrations in the street are what is happening now.  It has taken the Muslim world a long time to respond to the claims that Uighurs are being detained on a massive level in the Northwest of China.  They have caused some trouble that deserves attention, but detention and keeping wives and children from their families would not seem to be a very good solution. 

Some of the most damaging terrorists came from the jails of Iraq.  They commune with one another, pray together, and establish relationships that will foster cooperation among them.  The most dangerous among them learn to make better bombs and disrupt towns and villages.  They get better at the same kinds of behaviors that put them in jail in the first place.  That is the usual scenario.  When wives and children are put in camps they are not going to learn better ways to make IEDs, or set up an ambush,but they may become more strict in their religious and political views.  They may encourage others to do so, and they may hope that their husbands and fathers can help out.  The Chinese have so far done pretty well at keeping the Uighurs under control, but they were only dealing with a few people then.  They are making new enemies faster than their ability to control them. 

Thursday, September 27, 2018

Using JVs to Steal Technology

The Wall Street Journal has a good article that points out the advantages and obvious disadvantages of joint ventures with China, which steals technology left and right.  The article is balanced, giving both sides of an emotional argument on this kind of theft of trade secrets.  It says, "China’s tactics...include pressuring U.S. partners in joint ventures to relinquish technology, using local courts to invalidate American firms’ patents and licensing arrangements, dispatching antitrust and other investigators, and filling regulatory panels with experts who may pass trade secrets to Chinese competitors."  Of course, they also patent information in China that have already valid patents in their country of origin.  This is out and out organized theft.  The US-China Economic and Security Review Committee also has a good report on the use of joint ventures in the aircraft industry to steal technology for its aircraft, both commercial and military.  GE is mentioned in all of these reports and I quoted GE in my last book because they were touting how well they did their agreements so they wouldn't transfer key technologies.  How naive is that?

Peter Navarro is quoted as saying "The combination of naiveté and hubris on the part of U.S. companies seeking to enter the Chinese market, coupled with a sophisticated Chinese effort to extract technology has been a lethal combination."  No kidding.

Apple Folds on Data Storage in China

Apple admitted to doing what it did not want to do in China, store iCloud data in a Chinese-controlled area where the government can access it.  China left them no choice.  The BBC says they will partner with Guizhou-Cloud Big Data Industry Development [GCBD] under the real force in China, China Telecom, a state-owned enterprise. 

So, if you travel to China, work there, or live there doing business, there are no pretenses of privacy.  China knows what Apple knows, and Apple knows a lot.  We still don't know what cloud services have storage facilities in China where that same kind of access will be available to the Chinese government.  Cloud companies don't talk about it.  I would love to publish the list of companies having cloud storage in China, if someone else doesn't beat me to it. 

Wednesday, September 26, 2018

China Interfering in US Midterm Elections

Surprise, surprise.  The President of the US has announced that China has been interfering in the midterm elections.  He didn't give any details, but this was not the first time there have been rumors of what the Chinese had been up to.  The President had claimed that China was a bigger threat than Russia,  o this fits with those comments.  He claims that China is trying to interfere because he is the first US President to challenge China on its trade practices.  In my second edition to the Chinese Information War I described some of the ways the Chinese had been burrowing into the local government campaigns, hoping to back people that would move up in their political ambitions.  They are growing allies from inside the US and can apply those to unseating candidates they don't like.

As it turns out, the President may have been referring to ads placed in Iowa newspapers with China's side of the trade story given out as China Watch News, published in many places and not just Iowa.  It is not news, and it is not, as the title suggests, watching China.  It is straight propaganda. The Russians do the same thing with Russia Today, still being published in the US.  The fact that it is done with the cooperation of local newspapers is interesting.  All they see is profits from advertising and should be treated accordingly by the audience of people who read them.  They must need the money. 

A Bad Sign for Big Tech

In the Wall Street Journal today is a story that will be viewed with casual interest in many homes in my area.  It is a story about States Attorneys General getting together in Washington DC for a chat about "expressed concerns about technology giants’ market dominance and user-privacy practices"  which sounds innocuous.  Another government meeting....  of which there are thousands every day around here.

As usually happens around here, there is a flurry after hearings to draft legislation (Google offered to help, which a really good idea), then start markup, during which time lobbying firms kill each other in the streets.  Then a watered down version of something is passed and we move on to the next subject of public interest.  Some of my friends will point out that I left a lot of steps out of that process.

But danger comes when the legislative process is not going well, or has elements to it that Congress is not really sure about.  Then, Washington starts looking for alternative solutions, one of which is lawsuits and anti-trust actions.  I would rather see legislation, but understand the need for the anti-trust side of this.  The insider videos of Google executives crying after the 2016 election was certainly not helpful.

What concerns me is that this is only the beginning of something nasty.  The law allowed the business model that created these companies, and I'm not sure the law can easily correct something that basic.  The issue for social media has been masked as content, when it is really more than just content.  We believe in free speech, but don't want our enemies manipulating content in the US.  That is a simple issue compared to the other.  The other is the basic model of providing a free service, in exchange for data that can be sold.  Anti-trust actions do little to change the model, but breakup companies that do better without that.  It reminds me of the genius idea to break up AT&T years ago.  We had stable networks that were reasonably secure and could be maintained.  Now we have multiple companies all doing different things that are not as good.  Cheaper does not make better.  Maybe we should give legislation a chance and cool our heels on anti-trust.

Chinese Recruiting Ethnic Chinese

In recruitment of spies the Chinese are showing their preference for dealing with ethic Chinese who have come to the US to live and work.  In the latest example, Ji Chaoqun, there is something really rotten.  Ji was in the US since 2013 but had a position in the Army Reserve.  To get into the reserves, he must have had a security clearance, which requires a background check.  What kind of background gives a security clearance to a Chinese national with less than 5 years in the United States?  Are we crazy? Even a national agency check should have turned up the fact that he was not in the US very long and came from China.  The Army needs to get its collective act together.

Ji was looking for the type of person the Chinese have used to spy - people who work in tech businesses in the US (in this case, Defense contractors), have relatives or friends still living in China, and will talk about what they do in those contractor facilities.  All eight of the people in those dossiers were Chinese nationals who came to the US and got US citizenship, then were allowed to work in Defense contractor facilities.  See a pattern here?  He prepared dossiers on these individuals and passed them to Chinese intelligence.  Since the Chinese stole all the security clearance records from the US, they have other background they can look at to find friends, coworkers, bosses, types of work performed, and locations of that work.  They can pick out the best ones and work from there.

Two things: our security clearance process is seriously lacking when a person in this country for 5 years can get access to defense workplaces and have access to sensitive programs;  and two, there seems to be a lot of this going on.  Policy changes - in defense industries and government - need to be made to stop the Chinese from studying in the US, getting jobs in the US, then selling or stealing technology that the Chinese want.  I hope they are not here on HB1 visas.  All that crying from US tech industries will seem hollow when this is investigated and stopped.

Tuesday, September 25, 2018

S-300 Missiles in Syria

Several outlets have reported on the introduction of the Russian S-300 anti-air missile system into Syria.  The Wall Street Journal and Al Jazeera show similar stories.  Last week Syria shot down a Russian intelligence aircraft trying to defend against an attack by Israel on Iranian targets in Syria. Yes, its complicated.

Russia and Iran support Assad, and both have sent troops to do their fighting.  Iran sends its terrorist groups as proxies.  It is sometimes hard to tell the "Syrian forces" from either one of those since they blend in so well.  Israel does not want Iranian offensive weapons on its doorstep and has destroyed some of them before they ever got delivered.  The Israelis are good at that sort of thing.  In the process, the Syrians shot down the Russian plane.  The BBC says that was because the Israeli aircraft were using the reconnaissance aircraft for cover, but it is just as easy to blame it on the fog of war.  Iran will blame the US for everything, even if it makes no sense.

Of course, we remember when the Russians brought one of its Buk missiles into the Ukraine and shot down a civilian aircraft, so nobody wanted a repeat of that sort of thing.  This was pretty close to that same situation.  The Russians already, by the Al Jazeera account, have operators being trained in Russia.  That should help us believe that they weren't trained very well on the missiles that shot down the Russian aircraft last week.  There is not enough time to train anyone on this complex defensive system, so you can bet a lot of those "Syrian operators" will be Russian to avoid another mistake.  It is really hard to get good help these days.

The Russian S-300 has not made the Israelis happy, and everybody knows what that means.  In the meantime, the Russians will have a very accurate missile with much better targeting capabilities sitting on their bases, with Russians and Hezbollah side by side.  The EU continues to support Iran through all of this, even today announcing a financing vehicle to avoid US sanctions on Iran.


Monday, September 24, 2018

Pre-Election Chaos

With what we know about the Russian operations in the 2016 elections, we might spend more time looking for the same kind of activities going on right now.  Is anyone looking? Apparently, some are. 

in April, the US-CERT reported some "Russian State-Sponsored actors" were rerouting Internet traffic to their own domains, something the Chinese have been doing for years.  This gives them plenty of opportunities for man-in-the-middle attacks which can be used to read material from several different groups and political parties, alter communications, and target both support for groups and issues they want to sponsor.  They can influence, disrupt, and manipulate as they did in the national election. 

Of course this relies on the Telecommunciations giants and social media actually looking for those doing this to identify what they are up to.  In the national election, they were very reluctant to do that, and I understand their concerns but see a difference in doing this for "extremist groups" and representatives from foreign intelligence services.  Should we apply the same standard to "hate speech" that we apply to disruption attempts by foreign intelligence services?  Of course not, but it is not easy to tell the difference between the two, especially because they overlap.  The only people who can reliably do that well are in multiple intelligence services.  Algorithms are not very agile, and cannot discover all that needs to be known. 

That is more complicated than just simply telling social media what intelligence services know.  Tradition is against telling the social media and cloud environments where the activity is going on.  The more people who hear a secret, the more likely it is to be compromised. Eventually, the people trying to influence will figure out how we are collecting information about them.   For example, we all know the Internet Research Agency is a front for all kinds of activities so that name will show up less in Russian operations against us.  They know that we know what they have been up to. 

On the other hand, social media companies are not inclined to want to cooperate with the government agencies, though they are doing better at that now than a year ago.   Some argue that no oversight by anyone is justified in the name of free speech.  Does the GRU get the same right as anyone else? 


Sunday, September 23, 2018

Russian GRU Agents Caught in Passport Limbo

The Guardian reports Russian agents Alexander Petrov and Ruslan Boshirov have been using multiple passports from an office that routinely handles passports from government officials and intelligence services.  If they are tourists who wanted to visit Salisbury they hardly needed passports from the GRU office that handles them, and coincidentally are within a few numbers of each other. 

We are able to determine this kind of nonsense because of investigative reporting inside Russia.   Besides being good reporters, these people are also brave.  President Putin has a short fuse when it comes to press people that get out of line.  The article tells us the obvious, "If the reporting is confirmed, it would be a major blunder by the intelligence agency, allowing any country to check passport data for Russians requesting visas or entering the country against a list of nearly 40 passport files of suspected GRU officers."  Some of them even listed the GRU headquarters address as their home address on their application. 

Still, it is funny to have the Russians caught in such a stupid mistake, after the stupid mistake of trying to kill a former agent in UK.  It is really hard to top that one, but this comes close.  Maybe the GRU is getting stretched a little thin after all the election work they have been doing in the US.  Couldn't happen to a nicer bunch of guys. 


National Security Presidential Memorandum 13

John Bolton has confirmed what others have been quietly saying for some months now.  The policies of the Trump Administration are changing the approach used by the Obama Administration, formalized in Presidential Policy Directive 20, compromised by Edward Snowden.  At least we won't have a Top Secret policy floating around on the Internet this time.  That will be a nice change.

Second, Bolton's comments make it clear that the emphasis is not on offensive use of cyber weapons, but the deterrence of foreign use of those same kind of weapons.  I have been advocating that for years. The Obama White House thought deterrence could come from defensive reactions, including non-cyber, to deter offensive cyber attacks.  That clearly was not a good strategy.  By the time the reply took place, the perpetrator had forgotten why they were being attacked.  Speeding up that process is a good thing.

But any new strategy should also be clear that the Defense Department is not the place to put this deterrence strategy.  It belongs in the Intelligence Community.  Defense has made power grab after power grab, even trying to get into defense of public networks by redefining what they are responsible for.   Now that the cyber position is gone in the White House, Defense was the logical place to put it, but it is because that position never did what it was supposed to be able to do, bring together the various components of cyber defense of the national infrastructure.  Defense cannot do that, and we tried it before.  Defense tries to bulldoze its way into everything, including commercial networks where it has no contracts for service or domain.  Homeland Security was the only alternative but wasn't up to the job.  Defense continued to maintain it was the best place for the mission, and it looks like they finally won.

FireEye Says Delphi Packer Upends Classification

For years most of the security companies have used classification as a way of identifying the classes of attack tools that hackers use to get into a system.  So, John Doe hacker hits a credit union in Idaho and investigators want to find out what tools were used and what the defenses against those tools should be. Security research firms use different names for hacker tools, but this helps to get to a common understanding of where these tools originate and how they spread.  This helps improve defenses and gives basic knowledge of the classes of tools being used across the world.  Security vendors build those profiles and various types of tools like antivirus and end-point solutions. 

FireEye  has identified the use of tool of hackers to undo that capability.  Delphi is a programming language that is a development environment used in the design of object oriented software.  When used with hacker tools it can mask those and make them look like other legitimate programs.  What FireEye saw was the lengths it goes to to avoid detection in analysis by security vendors, how well it checks for things such as the user updates applied to their own systems (security patches).  Tara Seals has a nice explanation of how this all works together. 

Hacker tools have been running encrypted, stored encrypted and made more difficult to detect as a matter of commercial survival.  People sell these things to make money and they want them to work without being detected within seconds after they have been installed.  In some cases that would be too late, but in most that allows the tool to be set in place before security tools can detect it.  If a tool can run undetected, it can wait until conditions are right for its use, then execute.  I see this an incremental jump in detection defense that will cause security vendors real problems in the long run.  What good is vendor security tools that will not detect what hackers are using to get into systems?  Not much. 

As long as security vendors and hackers do not make serious technology advances they stay in balance.  That balance is good for both sides.  Hackers can still get into most systems, but a determined defender can keep them out.  When the balance tilts, the other side has to devote more time and effort to do better.  The vast number of security vendors have not been keeping up, though FireEye is one of the better ones.  You and I can do very little about either of these things.  We rely on vendors to save us from the hacker.  When they can't, we are in real trouble.  We need to be more careful about paying monthly fees for software that isn't detecting what is really out there.  Testing the tools they use is the best way to do that, and vendors are only now just getting around to detection of some of the most sophisticated penetration tools on the black market. 

Saturday, September 22, 2018

Iran Blames US for Attack by ISIS

Most everyone knows about the Iranian parade being attacked by gunmen, killing at least 29.  With the number of injuries, it will be more. 

The irony of this is that Iran referred to this attack as one by  "regional terror sponsors" and their "US masters".  The regional terror organization is said to be "Takfiri gunmen" who are sometimes ISIS, certainly no friend to the USA.  The US has fought ISIS all over the map and probably would not make a good teaming partner for them.  Iran needs to come clean on who actually did this attack, since ISIS on Iran would be an interesting development. 

Later reports said "Saudi-affiliated Al-Ahwaz".  In 2015, The Telegraph published a story said to be by a member of the group who had been jailed an tortured by Iranians for an extended period.  Given the extent of his injuries, it is not hard to figure out why the group is not happy with Iran's leadership.  If any of that story is true (it certainly sounds familiar) then Iran has a group of enemies that will be hard to stop and want revenge. 

Friday, September 21, 2018

US Supports Saudi's in War with Yemen

The US has sided again with its allies in Saudi Arabia over continuing the war with Yemen.  The Journal says it was "over the objections of staff in the State Department".    That seems about right what with all the resistance going on with other elements of the Federal Government.  They are getting more and more brazen every day.  We should note that the Intelligence Committee was brazen enough to countermand the order of the President of the United States when he ordered the declassification of a FISA warrant used to start the investigation currently run by Director Mueller.  It would almost seem natural for the Clinton State Department to have many embedded supporters in the weeds of all those bureaucrats.  There are too many of them in State and Justice.  This is where politics should end.

The Saudis are fighting Iran in this proxy war and doing better than they had been.  If we actually thought it was in US interests to back off of that fight, then we would be favoring Iran in this mess.  That would be a mistake.  Iran is worse than most of our other enemies in sponsoring terrorism and undermining the development of the Middle East.  In spite of visits from John Kerry who seems to be on some other planet, Iran is not very trustworthy and certainly not a friend of ours.  They don't need any help undermining the Middle East, and the Saudis have decided to stop that at the source.  The Yemen rebels fired a number of medium range missiles into Saudi territory.  Do we want that to start all over again?

This is resistance gone mad, becoming a second government trying to rule without being elected.  That isn't resistance as we usually think about it.  That is mutiny.

Thursday, September 20, 2018

Article on Shadowbanning

I was a little unsure of what this was all about, until recently.  Now I know.  This is a good representation of the problem with having censorship by commercial companies who have political views. 

https://thefederalist.com/2018/08/17/screenshots-show-google-shadowbans-conservative-pro-trump-content/

Monday, September 17, 2018

Russian Bases Attacked by Drones

The Russians in Syria are finding out that drones can work two ways.  There was a story last week on it, and this was after the Palestinians have tried to do the same thing.  Hezbollah has been building some big ones too.  The Russians say they have been shooting them down, but that claim sounds incredible.  They may be jamming them, but shooting them down is almost impossible.  Wired has a video with the different defenses being touted as successful against small drones.   They are short range defenses against commercial drones flying almost stationary.  That is like testing an anti-airgun against a bird sitting in a tree.  Watch some of those racing videos and tell me a drone can be stopped that way.  Those kids can race a drone through obstacles and around corners like nobody else.

The Russian bases are taking hits from drones, which they claim to not know the source of.  That may add some mystery to it, but the Russians are not fooling themselves.  Not everyone wants them in their country and they have to expect more resistance as time goes on.  Russia is making as many enemies as friends with their adventurism.


North Korea Sanctions Violations

Well, we all already knew it, but the main sanctions violators for North Korea are China and Russia.  Almost before the ink is dry on a sanction, they are getting companies to find ways to avoid them.  This article has pictures that show how it is being done.  In a second article, the Journal describes how coal is smuggled from the North to the South.  In a third, they show how Russia and China have set up front companies to facilitate the transfers of goods.  The sanctions violations are rampant, and not just those for North Korea.  As the case of ZTE showed, they have their state-owned enterprises feeding all the sanctioned countries whatever they need.  China and Russia agree to the sanctions, then violate them almost immediately.  They use a variety of methods that are constantly using different company names and methods of transportation. 

Sanctions are a dream come true for someone who wants to pretend to be doing something, but not actually doing it.  There is no point in pretending we can have a denuclearized North Korea when the basics of that are aligned with China and China has not stopped supporting the effort.  There is no diplomacy that works with China and Russia because they are criminal states.  Normal methods do not work against them, and diplomacy especially will not work.  The only thing either one will bow to is credible retaliation.  Piling more sanctions on sanctions they violate is clearly not working. 

Thursday, September 13, 2018

Disappearing in China

It may seem like magic, but the Chinese have become accustomed to seeing high ranking corporate officials who disagree with policy, suddenly disappear and not be found for some time.  But what we have to wonder about is that lovely star of cinema, Fan Bingbing, who played Blink in X-men.  I don't watch that series myself, but lots of people in the US and China know her name. 

Disappearing is not the same as being arrested anywhere else in the world.  No charges are necessarily brought;  no comments are made;  no relatives get to post questions about her whereabouts while in government hands.  She just disappears. 

When she emerges, we will find out what she was charged with because we can see her confession and know her sentence.  She probably won't be making any movies for a long time, if ever.  It is curious way of prosecuting a person in a criminal justice system that is not known for fairness.  If you haven't heard of "black jails" I suggest you do a little reading on the subject.  It is foreign to most free-world countries to contemplate such a thing. 

A Theft Before Equifax

I thought Equifax must be completely stupid when it lost all that data about people's credit records, but given the story in today's Wall Street Journal, the real problem may have been with the geniuses at the Justice Department who seem to have ignored almost everything while they played politics.  Equifax reported the theft of proprietary data to the FBI two years before the big theft of data took place.  The article describes the basics this way:  "In the previously undisclosed incident, security officials feared that former employees had removed thousands of pages of proprietary information before leaving and heading to jobs in China. Materials included code for planned new products, human-resources files and manuals." China, as it turns out, was building its own credit reporting agency and wanted the software (no doubt source code) the manuals (why write your own?), and the people necessary to make it work.

Seven years ago, when I wrote my first book, it was difficult to get anyone to believe the Chinese were stealing anything of that magnitude.  It was difficult to listen to the experts who were saying China was just competing with the US the way any other business did.  Now, most everyone can point to a place where China has stolen something, and we have to believe they are getting much more than we are detecting.  So, when the President of the United States says China is stealing our technology, he is really understating the problem.  They are stealing whole enterprises, including the people to manage and run the competition.  They are staging hacks that don't take anything, for a time when they may need something and want to be able to get it.  It has been so successful they can't quit.

Second, the China uses ethnic Chinese to do most of the thefts.  They send people to the best schools; they work in good jobs in the industries they are stealing;  they get US citizenship so they can work in sensitive places;  they buy people from those places.  "At one point, Equifax grew so worried it began building a way to monitor the computer activity of all of its ethnic-Chinese employees, according to people familiar with the investigation. The resource-heavy project, which raised legal concerns internally, was short-lived."

China uses our laws against us.  They have no problem monitoring their own people, but know we won't do the same here.  They hire lawyers, delay, and start building competing systems before the courts catch up with them.  By that time, the processes are embedded in their products and they have patented them in their own country.

Then their intelligence services can steal the information from those businesses that allow them to compete.  That can be used for further thefts and espionage.

Are we surprised the FBI did not do much to prevent what should have been an obvious theft in a way well known at that time?  The scale of these thefts exceeds their capability.
https://dennispoindexter.blogspot.com/

Wednesday, September 12, 2018

Attitudes

There was a story in the Financial Times, yesterday, that finally gave some indication of what is driving some of the trade difficulties with the US.  The article is US-EU trade talks move towards November deal (11 Sept), which sounded like good news.  However, hidden in the good news was some attitudes that not conducive to good relations.  The EU Agriculture Commissioner said “The EU does not welcome the America First bully...It will deal with him where it can, but will always stand four—square against the idea that the America can put its elbows on the table and dictate terms.”  I didn’t like that very much, because from time to time we get the idea that the bully is sitting in Brussels, and putting more than elbows on the table.

The EU thinks it can bash our technology sector and extract money from it for doing exactly the same kind of thing they blame the US for.  The hypocrisy and over regulation are good indicators of why it is so difficult to find common ground in anything agricultural, a problem shared with Canada by the way.  There are long-term attitudes towards the over-regulation of different sectors, but agriculture is a good example governed by ancient customs and procedures that the Romans must have put into place.  We agree that trying to undo all of these agreements in one or two years is not a good idea, and is an attitude that does not serve us well.  We have no patience.

But do not call us bullies just because we object to some of the trade practices that have Made Europe Great Again.  I really can’t blame Great Britain for getting out of the EU.  The attitudes of bureaucrats used to make me mad enough to leave my family political party held for 150 years.  We aren’t bullies.  We have just had enough and wanted a change.

Low Tech Solution to a High Tech Problem

Europe is imposing another one of its rules on the rest of the world by forcing social media companies to take down extremist on-line postings in an hour after they are notified.  Who are they kidding?  Maybe they don't have anyone over on the continent who understand IT very well, but these are really big networks, scattered all over the world, with Billions of users, and hundreds of thousands of servers, caches and storage areas.  Nobody can get rid of anything in an hour.

Security always has this kind of problem with classified material of one classification "leaking" into a system that is not supposed to have that kind of material.  I have supervised some very big operations that looked for this stuff - usually email.  It takes days to find it and get rid of it so it won't come back.  If you don't believe me talk to someone in your own operations that have done it.  This is ludicrous, illogical and technically not possible.  I see the intent but legislation alone will not solve a technical problem like this. It is a goal, but you don't fine companies for not meeting goals.  You fine them if they don't make a valid effort and make improvements in performance. 

China Strong-arming the White House

We are about to see the subtle approach used by China to try to bend the White House towards easing up on trade tariffs.  China has hired lobbyists here in Washington to start a push to persuade lawmakers and the White House to change its mind about Chinese tariffs.  They are planning an assault like no other, coordinated with business leaders who operate in China.  Cooperate or we will make life more interesting for you in China.  Companies there are used to this kind of thing, so Robert Swan, Chuck Robbins and Ken Cook will be finding excuses for coming to Washington to chat with their Congressional leaders and to have dinner with their White House contacts.  They have probably already talked to them on the phone.  Those tariffs must be really hurting. 

I hasten to mention that this is all legal and above board, and that is the way the Chinese want us to see it.  Unlike the Russians who started political groups, created fake news, and bought help with ads for some questionable groups, the Chinese like to be seen as complying with the laws of the land.  They apply pressure subtly and do not want to get caught doing otherwise. 

The White House may offer them another alternative:  make your goods in the US, where labor rates are three-four times what they are in China  The argument is Chinese rates are rising at a fairly good clip, with transportation costs increasing too.  No tariffs either.  China will be responding to those arguments with steady labor costs and more efficient transport through all those ports it is buying up.  They can pressure shipping in the South China Sea and make it tough to not trade with China, using Chinese approved transport.  They will try to strangle, or buy, the competition.  All that is legal. 

Tuesday, September 11, 2018

Russia-China Military Cooperation

A few years ago, I wrote about Russian-Chinese ships doing maneuvers together in the South China Sea.  That was the beginning of public displays of cooperation, which comes and goes between these two.  The exercises they are going to undertake this time involves 3200 troops (they can muster numbers for anything, can't they?), 30 fixed wing aircraft, and a host of weapons.  Putting those numbers in an exercise area on their border used to make us wonder if one of them was worried about an attack on the other.  Funny how things change.

The Chinese are said to be learning how to deploy large forces beyond their borders.  In the past they have never had many problems with doing that (did we forget Korea and Vietnam already?)   They may have to upgrade their methods to do it in scale and quickly enough to matter, but don't sell them short.  They have the capability and don't need that much cooperation unless someone attacks their borders.  That isn't going to happen soon.

These exercises are a demonstration that they can fight the US and whatever allies it can muster in that region.  There are not many.  China has bought most of them in a new demonstration of economic warfare techniques that dwarf the Information War Russia has used on the US.  That effort is to make it harder for the US to come into the region under any circumstances.  They are reinforcing their little islands with weapons and military personnel.  They have linked oil platforms and ships' radars to make a radar net that will pick up most anything.  They are putting millions into their navy.  They are investing in missiles and other strategic space assets.  That sounds like they are building up for something, probably taking Taiwan from the people there now, even helping Russia take back some of territory while they do it.  Imagine Russia attacking Ukraine et al,  and China taking over Taiwan without a shot, both on the same day.

https://dennispoindexter.blogspot.com/

A Most Curious Opinion

In today's Wall Street Journal there is a most curious opinion piece which begins like this:  "Across Turkey’s southern border, Bashar Assad’s criminal regime has for seven years targeted Syria’s citizens with arbitrary arrests, systematic torture, summary executions, barrel bombs, and chemical and conventional weapons. As a result of the Syrian civil war, which the United Nations Human Rights Council calls “the worst man-made disaster since World War II,” millions of innocent people have become refugees or been internally displaced."  It almost sounds like something Nikki Haley would say.  Only it wasn't our UN Ambassador;  it was Recep Tayyip ErdoÄŸan, the President of Turkey.  The same editorial was Twittered, appears in the New York Times, the Guardian, and lots more.  This was a world-wide dissemination strategy that managed to make the opinion pages and regenerate a lot of stories about the situation in both Syria and Turkey.  That was a good way to start that discussion.

How odd this seems, since one of his best buddies has been Vladimir Putin who, almost single-handed, managed to keep Assad afloat when lots of countries would have liked to see him gone.  Just this week,  ErdoÄŸan appeared in an equal number of news outlets, holding hands of Putin and Rouhani, Iran's leader.  The Russians managed to keep their military bases in Syria at the expense of everyone else around that region.  The Russians and Assad are about the only countries in the world who use chemical weapons on their own people, sometimes when they are in other countries.  The US and some of its allies are preparing for that to happen again.

ErdoÄŸan says he has some 3.5 million Syrian refugees in his country and he is probably glad he does not have more.  Now that few other countries will take them, he wants them to go back to Syria.  They are a little afraid to do that, and nobody has trouble blaming them for not wanting to.  As he says in this opening paragraph, Assad has not been a friend to his own people.  Those gas attacks are not particularly inviting.

Lest we have sympathy for Syrian refugees in Turkey, Turkey itself, or those people in Idlib who are about to be bombed, lets try to remember how it came to be that they are being bombed by their own leadership and the Russians.  The Russians were bombing those people when Turkey shot down a Russian jet.  You forgot that?  How could you not when Putin and Turkey's leaders are such good friends now.

Monday, September 10, 2018

What is the New York Times Thinking?

I used to warn people about doing anything that would end up on the front page of the Washington Post.  Lots of the things we did would have made great stories, but those stories will not ever be told - not anywhere, not by anybody.

So, when something new comes up in the New York Times, we could caution the same kind of things.  The Times says the US entertained some people from Venezuela and those folks were contemplating revolution against the current government.  What were they thinking?  They must have known this would kick off a search for anyone coming to New York or anywhere close the the USA.  That gets people killed in Venezuela, whether they were up to what the New York Times reported or not. 

The New York Times might be desperate for news, but I doubt it.  They have plenty to choose from and very little of it will be a stupid as outing some revolutionaries in a leftist government where the retribution is sure to be swift and deadly.  To quote a famous person, How Stupid is That?

We have to believe the New York Times has crossed a journalistic line by reporting something like this.  They had no business doing it, and surely know better.  The only ones that benefit are the leftists in power in Venezuela's extreme government.  Is the New York Times that far left that it needs to support the likes of Nicolas Maduro?  We might speculate more about the foundations of the Times if that is the case.  They could not publish in Venezuela without more oversight that that newspaper could tolerate. Hypocritical is word that comes to mind, but more than that, reckless .  Like Wikileaks, they will deny that anything they disclosed will be the cause of the death of anyone.  The real victims will be covered over and gone before anyone knows the truth.

https://dennispoindexter.blogspot.com/

Congress Can't Agree on Hacked Data

This is a very confusing time in politics in the US, but this instance is really beyond most of us.  The two major parties cannot agree to not use data stolen by hackers in campaign ads

It really doesn't matter why they didn't agree.  This is an amazingly complicated issue.  Can political parties use data that they know to be stolen (it shouldn't matter whether a hacker took it or an insider planted by the party that publishes it)?  So far, the answer is yes - the wrong answer.   That encourages theft of data. 

Campaign security has to get better all around.  There are holes in the pre-employment screening, in network security, in internal document security (including email), handheld and mobile security, vetting of opposition research, and a host of other things that are typical of trusting groups that have to rely on their members for much of the security that is done.  They say they cannot afford to pay for professional security services, which is a story we have all heard before in government and in industry.  They have to pay for it, and there is no excuse for not doing it. 

Beyond that, the use of data stolen by a criminal is already established in law.  So, it is illegal to steal it, illegal to buy it, and illegal to use it knowing it is stolen.  Yet, it is a $1.7 Trillion industry.  Lots of people are doing all of those things, and that doesn't count security services doing the same thing for political gain. 

Congress is debating - and can't agree - about the wrong issues.  They need agreement on prohibiting the hiring of hackers or thieves, directly or indirectly.  Unfortunately, both parties do that.  They hire companies that hire companies and isolate themselves from "knowingly" buying any data that is stolen.  Not all of the data produced is stolen because research companies take advantage of the posting of government data on public sites.  That needs more legislation as well. 

The other side of this is ethical and not just legal.  How much ethics is left in politics? 

Can Google Beat the EU?

I hope Google can win this one, a fight over how far the EU - or any country - can extend their rules for the Internet.  The Wall Street Journal today lays out the arguments for Google which is challenging the "right to be forgotten" rules of the EU.  Google has a lot of experience with the laws of different countries.  China tried to enforce its own laws of censorship on Google- all over the world.  That resulted in China calling for data originated in China to be stored in China, another larger issue that eventually needs to be addressed (Microsoft had a similar case with the US Justice Department over email).  If Google wins this one, the EU will be flabbergasted.

I wrote about this 7 years ago because it is difficult to see how a country, or the EU enforce data requirements on users who are external to their state boundaries.  In that context, I was talking about clouds, which can store data in any country and not just their country of origin.  Long-haul communications have not been very cognizant of jurisdictional borders, choosing to not ask permission but apologize later if caught.  I studied this in Defense with encryption rules for countries that are transited by communications that are encrypted.  Some countries are claiming they want to see this data and not allow it to go through encrypted.  Some want to have access to everything transiting their country.  Good luck with that.  I don't want my encrypted data being read by somebody in another country claiming domestic authority to do so.  I don't want my service provider giving them that data without any notice to me.  Good luck with that one too.

Vodaphone produced a report several years ago that laid out all these conflicting rules and named names (except China and the US) of countries that make demands on telecoms to access phone calls inside their countries.  The current Google matter is simple compared to the multitude of countries out there that have conflicting rules, but it is a start.  We need to support Google in this to limit the overreach of the EU.


Sunday, September 9, 2018

Political Information War

I have been researching the parallels between political parties and governments in the use of Information Warfare techniques, finding far too many.

A Wall Street Journal published an Editorial Board piece two days ago that rang true with what evidence there is that political parties use the same information warfare techniques that the Russians and other governments use.  I'm not sure yet who learns from whom, but the manipulation of facts to fit a narrative lies at the heart of it.

Just for a minute, let's compare a BBC story on Russian disinformation in the case of two GRU agents who attempted to assassinate Sergei Skripal.  The BBC says the Russians have posted 30 stories that try to debunk the facts as the UK sees them, i.e. that these two killers came from Russia, planted the nerve agent, and escaped.  There are several variations, none very convincing when compared to the British story that was laid out well by the government.  They have lots of pictures, one of which the Russians seized upon because it had the same time line on two separate pictures.  It is odd, but hardly proof, as the Russians say, that the whole thing was made up to blame the Russians.  They focus on small things in hope of putting holes in any story, just as they did in the Ukraine when Russian soldiers were operating there.  Did we really believe they were volunteers on vacation?

The US Senate seems to have adopted the same sort of strategy to try to prevent a nominee to the Supreme Court from getting approval.  The Journal story names names and the sort of nonsense the "leaders of the party" came up with in their attempt to stop that nominee.  Some were easily refuted, like the one raised by the Gentlewoman from Hawaii, where he "must have known" about a future boss of his, Judge Kozinski, who was sexually harassing his employees.  It happened before the nominee got there.

The Russians omit relevant facts and substitute outright lies when it suits their purpose.  This aspect seems to have caught on outside their own realm.  The Journal ends with this:  "These Democrats may be U.S. Senators, but as conspiracy theorists this week they were hard to distinguish from the likes of Alex Jones."  Alex Jones was banned from almost every social media channel in the space of a few weeks, after operating for years on all of them.

What politicians fail to take into consideration is the similarity between methods - the idea that the Kamala Harris's of the world can proclaim a fact that she should have known wasn't true - and then later inferring that he should have corrected her - they confuse the work of the world's intelligence services who are enemies of the US, with their own political objectives.  Are we able to distinguish an attack by the GRU from one by any political party?  Maybe some can, but it is getting to be harder and harder, something our enemies take gleeful pleasure in.



Friday, September 7, 2018

Charging Foreign Intelligence Services

In the latest of these adventures, the US Justice Department is charging a North Korean with the Sony hack and the Wannacry attacks.  "Park Jin Hyok was accused in a criminal complaint dated June 8 but unsealed Thursday of working with other unnamed co-conspirators to conduct a series of cyberattacks on corporate and financial networks to steal money and information at the direction of the North Korean government."

In the same week, the British have charged two GRU officers who attempted to murder Sergei Skripal with a Russian nerve agent.  That was on top of the Chinese military officers charged for stealing corporate secrets (link to previous post) .  Somewhere along the line, governments seem to have discovered that intelligence services do things the governments deny, so indicting them years later is proof that their denials were hollow. 

I want to remind everyone what DNI James Clapper said about this in one of his many testimonies on the Hill.  He was referring to the theft of data from OPM, our holder of security clearance information.  "People should remember we live in glass houses."  He elaborated on it, but the idea was intelligence services do this kind of thing all the time but they don't arrest one another, or even make this kind of discovery public.  It makes other intelligence services be more careful to not get caught.  That makes intelligence collection everywhere harder to do.  They have enough help with that aspect from our technology companies in the US. 

I think these indictments are a waste of time and done by people who know very little about how Intelligence works.  Trials, even trial preparation, expose sources and methods.  The prosecution has to say how they know the person is guilty, should he ever come to trial (not likely).  So exposing sources and methods for a person or persons who will never stand trial is not just a waste of time;  it is an unnecessary risk to the community. 

Thursday, September 6, 2018

China Angered by British

It seems the Chinese are easily angered by anyone with power floating ships "too near" one of their little islands.  It's the too near part that causes the friction with almost everyone, including the US.  They don't think the 12 mile limit is all that bad, but the Chinese are challenging anyone that gets within 100 miles of one of them.  That pretty much means the Chinese don't recognize the rules of the sea that nations usually follow.  Why we should tolerate this is beyond me.

Finally, the US has decided to call China on its diplomatic push to isolate Taiwan, one of those islands that China claims.  China wants to persuade other countries that Taiwan is part of China and not an independent country, in spite of most of history to the contrary.  Because past leaders have allowed this kind of thing to go on for so long, prying them out of the South China Sea and taking back Taiwan is going to be really hard to do.  These little steps are an indication that some countries are willing to take them on, as the Philippines did when it took China to the Arbitration Council.  Money talked to keep them from enforcing their win, but that money is not a prevalent as it once was.  It reminds me of a movie where everyone gets along until the mob leader has no cash or prizes to hand out.  It doesn't take long for the herd to change it minds about the power structure.  Somebody in Great Britain and the US has decided to not let this go any further, and do something.  Maybe some others will take note and start doing the same thing.

Apply Often, Get Guns

A recent GAO report on cases referred for prosecution shows that there were 8 million checks for people purchasing guns, of which 112,000 were denied.  Not quite 13,000 were referred for investigation, but only 12 were actually prosecuted.  So, if a person fails to get an approval, they can always try again or get a gun from another source.  Denials are rare enough, but we have to wonder why so many are not investigated further by ATF.  It might be a resource issue, but if that is the case, we should consider giving ATF more people to follow-up on this kind of denial. 

British Charge Two Russians

Several stories today note the charges against two Russian military intelligence officers (GRU) for the attempted murder of Sergei Skripal with a Russian nerve agent.  The operation to kill him was “...almost certainly also approved outside the GRU at a senior level of the Russian state.”

These two shown in several pictures don't look like the usual intelligence operatives we might see in the movies or on TV.  They look like a couple of thugs, recruited from the backstreets of Moscow's gangs.  They look more like the Mafia wannabes arrested in Boston, New York or Cleveland.  There are plenty of examples.

The British did a good job of putting this story together, tracing the two from the time they got into the country, through their reconnaissance of the target sight, to the actual smearing of the door of his house with the nerve agent.  It will make a great movie, which is the last time we will ever see these two again.  Putin has already said he will not give up his operatives.  Of course not.  They are doing what he is asking them to do.  Why would he?

This afternoon, the US, France, Germany and Canada agreed to support the British story on this.  You can bet that means there is more coming.  They can't agree on much these days so this says a lot. 

Wednesday, September 5, 2018

Social Media Lacking

I think Google was smart not to involve themselves in the Senate Intelligence Committee Hearings, supposedly on what to do about Russian interference in elections.  It did touch on that a little.

This was not a partisan affair like the roasting of the Supreme Court nominee.  Congress is obviously not able to come to grips with how to deal with the social media's use of personal information, nor their role in detecting and removing fake accounts.  Both Facebook and Twitter promised to do better and said they were doing better on both counts.   But, I left these long question and answer sessions feeling like they did not answer the questions that were asked.  They had scripted responses that referenced their policies on the use of the media by customers, and they did sound coordinated.

Twitter's CEO, Jack Dorsey, was the most straight-forward about it.  He was asked if he knew the difference between Russia, China and the US in enforcement of his policies, and he gave the impression he didn't know what the question was about.  To Twitter and Facebook, there is no difference.  If you violate the policy, you can be ejected off the platform.  Where you live does not matter, and the content of your comments does not violate the basic policies of pornography,  hate speech (nobody asked for a definition of that), or encouraging destructive acts.  I have to agree with their replies to a certain extent, because nobody can find context in speech.  Symbolism, cultural references, and the like are very hard to interpret and just like the Chinese who get around censorship with the same tactics, people in the US can do the same thing.  Social media can't find these things on their own, and really don't want government help in doing it either, though they often said they did.

We should remember that China doesn't have these media per se.  They have stolen the software and business models of both and publish their own, making their own social media from it.  Russia is trying to do the same thing, with China's help.  They avoid the problem by controlling the vehicle that is used to convey those messages.  The US has yet to come to grips with that, and in the end, will not deal with it in the same way.  So, there is a difference between Russia, China and the US.  Both of them are ahead of us in dealing with the issues, even though we may not agree with how they are doing it.  There is also another difference, the US has yet to do much, so both countries will exploit that with their intelligence services.  They will continue to do it until we stop them, or make it painful enough to continue that they stop on their own.  The 2020 election will be on us before plans are worked out.

DoD Fails to Establish Security Clauses for Outsourcing Ulitilies

It isn't like they don't know better, but the Defense Department seems to have forgotten to include clauses in their contacts that require security for those outsourced utilities.  How Stupid is That? 
It isn't like they don't have these clauses already prepared - they do.  It isn't like there aren't places for security to be included in a contract - there are.  This is our famously lazy contracting officers just leaving these clauses out. 

The report says:  "DOD has taken steps to add a cybersecurity clause to its utilities privatization
contracts that requires contractors take steps to ensure safeguards are put in place to protect covered defense information, which is defined as information that is processed, stored, or transmitted on the contractor’s information system or industrial control systems. To implement the clause, DOD first must identify what, if any, covered defense information is provided to or developed by the contractor in performance of the contract. However, the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) and military department officials stated that they have not begun to implement the clause because they need DOD to issue procedures concerning how the military departments are to determine what, if any, covered
defense information associated with utilities privatization contracts is provided or developed by the contractor in performance of the contract. Without these procedures, the military departments and DLA will not have assurance that such information is being safeguarded."

Really?  I am astounded by this.  We have had these clauses included in almost every communications contract for the past 20 years.  Now, all of a sudden, it has become too hard to do.  The usual reasons for this are the contractors don't want this clause in the contract and won't bid if they have it.  Yes, that happens.  Defense Logistics needs to get its act together and stop this wishy-washy approach to security.  Now, while they are at it, go back and do an assessment of the contractors who don't have these clauses and see what damage has been done. 

Hank Greenberg on China Trade

Maurice Raymond "Hank" Greenberg was on Fox Business today with some good ideas about trade.  He knows.  He was one of the originals with business in China and is still there doing business, and making money.  He built bridges in the insurance industry and expanded his world-wide business.   Two things I noted from his lengthy comments:

1.  China is no longer a third world trader and it is still formally treated like one.  The Chinese have a good deal when we ignore how the World Trade Organization treats China, and Greenberg simply said, "We need to remind them of that."  In his opinion piece in the Wall Street Journal  he reminds us that the US was very helpful to China in establishing processes that would allow them to be successful and grow.  They took advantage of that, but now seem entitled to continue that same treatment.  That is a simple and elegant approach that may have been overlooked in the current White House.  He did say it is unlikely to produce a good outcome for the US, but it does provide context for further discussions.  He believes China will be the world's number one economy in the near future.  China cannot keep pretending it isn't. 

2.   From his Journal story, he notes that China has to change.  "China cannot expect to continue receiving favorable trade and investment terms in foreign markets when it is unwilling to reciprocate. It is in China’s interest to reform, and the U.S. is right to press to level the playing field. China no longer needs the same accommodations as in its initial stages of economic development. It makes sense to reassess the terms of bilateral trade and make them more fair and equitable, with each trading partner securing equal and unhindered market access across all sectors." 

I admire his approach and wish he had more influence in these trade talks.  He certainly has the experience with China and understands what it takes to get progress in negotiations. 

Tuesday, September 4, 2018

Revisiting Iran in Iraq

Several stories appeared last week on the declassified reports of Iranian-influenced leaders who were interrogated by the US during the Iraq War.  Two of these folks are now prominent in Iraqi political circles, Qais al-Khazali and Moqtada al-Sadr.  They are both trying to outdo each other for political position.

Before we start an outcry about this kind of story, try to remember that the leaders of quite a few countries started as rebels and some spent time in jail before gaining political position.  In this case, their loyalty is to Iran, and we might not want to forget that either.

I had read these reports of Iran's influence on these leaders years ago.  Lots of Congressmen and military leaders knew where they got their money and why they were supporting Iran in killing US servicemen and women.  Several foreign intelligence services knew just as much as the US did.  As they gathered political support and moved up in their food chains, I wondered why nobody killed them, or the leader of ISIS, Abu Bakr al Baghdadi.  Being a terrorist leader is a dangerous profession.  Part of it might be luck, not being at the wrong place at the wrong time.  Part of it might be good advice from strangers on where not to be at any particular time.  Part of it is just moving around to not become a fixed target.  The process of elimination teaches them what not to do if they want to stay alive.

But, in the end, it is often a matter of dealing with a devil you know, rather than one that you never heard of.  Yes, these guys were terrorists to some of us, but they are not in charge of the government.  They are parts of a coalition which probably represents the Iraqi people who survived a long stream of wars with neighbors and each other.  Better them that some unknown. 

China Buying Chip Talent from Taiwan

Reuters has an interesting story today on how the Chinese buy talent from Taiwan, but I found the graphic they chose for it to be as interesting as the story itself.

Talent seeks money, which we all know.  Offer money and perks, like a new three-bedroom apartment to a young person and it is hard to say no.  But, as one smart guy told me once, "For that kind of money, they expect a miracle every day.  Do you have one to give them?"  I didn't and turned them down the offer.  I was glad forever, so before you take that offer and move into a Communist government controlled environment - think.  Do I really want to live where they watch everything I do, manage my life down to reproduction of offspring, and live in controlled harmony with everyone around me?  That is a lot to give up for money and may not be worth it.  It always looks good when the money is there, but is it really worth what you get for it, or what you pay for it?

Now, to the graphic.  It is interesting they chose a graphic that talks about protecting a company's technological edge by keeping its proprietary data secret.    That is from a Lockheed poster from their security education program in the 1980's.  A woman with her finger to her lips saying "shush".

How odd that poster seems now when the Chinese are hiring talent from Taiwan where proprietary technology is the reason that country still exists on its own.  The Chinese are slowly strangling every aspect of Taiwan's life and rounding up any country that recognizes Taiwan as not part of China.  Before a person goes to China they might remember that aspect of being bought.  They are buying Taiwan bit by bit.

Monday, September 3, 2018

Japan Increases Spending on Missile Defense

Let North Korea fire a couple of missiles over your territory and it sets off some ill will in people who may not have thought about missiles hitting their homeland.  Japan has increased its defense spending  by 2% to cover additions to missile defense. So, whatever the North Koreans thought they were doing by flying over Japan, they probably didn't get the reaction they thought they were going to get.  Instead of getting more negotiations with Japan, they got the butt end of a missile system that can shoot down their missiles.  The Chinese went ballistic when THAAD went into South Korea, so I hope they keep thinking good thoughts about Japan doing the same thing.  The Japanese have a long history with China and they are not likely to budge much.  They are not afraid of China or the North. 

China Blocks ABC

BBC, which has had more than its fair share of being blocked by China, says ABC was blocked on August 22.    The usual reason is not enough self-censorship.  Shame on you ABC....  trying to corrupt the Chinese innocents.  The New YorkTimes and BBC are always blocked after they ran (and still run) stories about the rich and famous in China.  That is enough to get you blocked, so China blocks a lot more than just those two.  I get blocked there too, so consider myself in good company, now that ABC has joined.

In their usual fashion, the story followed with this:  "An official at the Office of the Central Cyberspace Affairs Commission told the journalists: "China's internet is fully open. We welcome internet enterprises from all over the world to provide good information to the netizens of China."  Oh yes, we can see that.