March 2015 - cypherpunks - lists.cpunks.org

Help: Can anyone identify what this is?
by Alfie John 23 Mar '15

23 Mar '15

Hi everyone, We had someone loitering near our front office door today. The conversation went like this: Me: What are you doing? Him: Nothing Me: Where are you from? Him: A company Me: Do you work for Google (he was wearing a Google t-shirt)? Him: No Me: Who do you work for? Him: Leidos He had a device hidden near the stairwell door: https://www.alfie.wtf/photos/wispy.jpg Sorry for the low quality image. It was taken from a capture of a video. I've got the video at work but would rather not release it as yet because it has his face on it. The diameter of the antenna base was around 2cm and the height of the antenna was around 15cm. Someone on Reddit said that it looked like a jammer. After going to Google Images and searching for the following, it looks like he's on the right track: - "GSM detector" - "GSM jammer" - "GPS detector" - "GPS jammer" If anyone has info on what this device could be or where I could go to get more info, that would be much appreciated. Alfie -- Alfie John alfiej(a)fastmail.fm

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Re: Help: Can anyone identify what this is?
by Archivists 20 Mar '15

20 Mar '15

I'm a pen tester by trade. I don't believe these are for wireless attacks. They appear to be RF signal detectors; the dB scale is to indicate signal strength and for locating the proximity of broadcasting access points or devices. Sent from [ProtonMail](https://protonmail.ch), encrypted email based in Switzerland. -------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: Help: Can anyone identify what this is? Time (GMT): Mar 20 2015 01:49:12 From: alfiej(a)fastmail.fm To: coderman(a)gmail.com CC: cypherpunks(a)cpunks.org, cryptography(a)metzdowd.com On Fri, Mar 20, 2015, at 11:21 AM, coderman wrote: > On 3/18/15, Alfie John wrote: this is likely > automated wifi attack gear. the three units together could cover > channels 1, 6, 11 concurrently. (in my own kit, 4-8 radios is > sweet spot) Well that's interesting. I wondered why there were three units. > the extra battery capacity lets it run for days attacking on > full auto. He put it in near the stairwell door (almost next to our door RFID), but it was in full view of anyone walking to the elevators. So I don't think he was trying to hide, otherwise he would have done it from behind the stairwell door and not in plain sight. Maybe it was just bad opsec? > you should be running wireless intrusion (e.g. custom kismet?) > monitoring to look for malicious activity. and of course, it is time > to change all your WPA2 passwords! (or switch to WPA-Enterprise) Awesome. Thanks for the advice. Will look wireless intrusion detection. WPA-Enterprise too. Alfie -- Alfie John alfiej(a)fastmail.fm

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Re: Help: Can anyone identify what this is?
by Ulex Europae 20 Mar '15

20 Mar '15

Do you run a WiFi network? What is the nature of your business, is it financial? Those could be repackaged Pineapple devices, who knows. http://hakshop.myshopify.com/products/wifi-pineapple?variant=81044992 What about the person? Age? Fit? Could it have been an undercover LEO? Someone doing pentesting seems likely to me. At 04:12 AM 3/19/2015, Troy Etulain wrote: >It would be helpful to know what the units of >measurement are on the side. If they are amps it >would indicate that the boxes are transmitting a >signal, rather than listening. Can you tell from the video?Â > >Were the lights flashing? Interesting that only >one is illuminated in this photo.Â > >On Thu, Mar 19, 2015 at 5:23 AM, Alfie John ><<mailto:alfiej@fastmail.fm>alfiej(a)fastmail.fm> wrote: >Hi everyone, > >We had someone loitering near our front office door today. The >conversation went like this: > >Â Me: What are you doing? >Â Him: Nothing >Â Me: Where are you from? >Â Him: A company >Â Me: Do you work for Google (he was wearing a Google t-shirt)? >Â Him: No >Â Me: Who do you work for? >Â Him: Leidos > >He had a device hidden near the stairwell door: > >Â ><https://www.alfie.wtf/photos/wispy.jpg>https://www.alfie.wtf/photos/wispy.jpg > >Sorry for the low quality image. It was taken from a capture of a >video. I've got the video at work but would rather not release it as >yet because it has his face on it. > >The diameter of the antenna base was around 2cm and the height >of the antenna was around 15cm. > >Someone on Reddit said that it looked like a jammer. After going to >Google Images and searching for the following, it looks like he's on the >right track: > >Â - "GSM detector" >Â - "GSM jammer" >Â - "GPS detector" >Â - "GPS jammer" > >If anyone has info on what this device could be or where I could go to >get more info, that would be much appreciated. > >Alfie > >-- >Â Alfie John >Â <mailto:alfiej@fastmail.fm>alfiej(a)fastmail.fm >

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Fwd: Matt DeHart named as 3rd Courage Foundation beneficiary after Edward Snowden & Jeremy Hammond
by Bethany 19 Mar '15

19 Mar '15

Matt DeHart named as third Courage beneficiary Posted on March 2, 2015 https://couragefound.org/2015/03/matt-dehart-named-as-third-courage-benefic… https://mattdehart.com/ - 30-year-old former US National Guard drone team member and alleged WikiLeaks courier deported/extradited to US less than 24 hours ago after asylum claim declined by Canada - joins Edward Snowden and Jeremy Hammond as Courage beneficiaries - Matt’s parents Leann and Paul DeHart say: “We are comforted knowing we do not stand up against the tide alone.” - Matt DeHart appeared before a judge today in Buffalo and was ordered to be transferred to Tennessee for arraignment. Courage, the international organisation dedicated to the protection of truth-tellers, has announced that its new beneficiary will be Matt DeHart. Matt DeHart is a 30-year-old former US National Guard drone team member and alleged WikiLeaks courier who worked with the hactivist group Anonymous. In the last 24 hours, he has been deported/extradited from Canada to the United States to face charges that judges in two countries (the US and Canada) have found to lack credibility. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange said: “Canada’s actions are shameful. It may as well not have a border.” A few minutes ago Matt DeHart appeared before a judge in Buffalo and was ordered to be transferred to Tennessee for arraignment. For the past five years, Matt DeHart has been at the centre of a US national security investigation and has experienced extraordinary hardship as a result. In 2010, Matt was detained at the US–Canadian border by FBI agents, who administered an IV (intravenous line) to Matt against his will. They questioned him over several days regarding his military unit, his involvement with Anonymous and WikiLeaks. They denied him access to his lawyer, deprived him of sleep, food and water, and tortured him during this time. Although an FBI report confirms Matt was detained for an “espionage matter” and agents asked him nothing about pornography, Matt was presented with a hastily drafted criminal complaint alleging he solicited nude photos from a teenager in 2008. WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange stated: “The abuse of the law in DeHart’s case is obvious, shocking and wrong. Matt DeHart and his family have suffered enough.” On 3 April 2013, Matt and his family crossed the US–Canadian border again, seeking political asylum and protection under the United Nations Convention on Torture. Canada’s Immigration and Refugee Board turned down the family’s claim in February 2015, even though they found no “credible and trustworthy evidence” to support the charges Matt faces. Courage has accepted Matt as its third beneficiary in order to raise awareness about his case, prevent him from experiencing further mistreatment in detention and to raise urgently needed funds for his legal defence. DeHart’s legal team have confirmed that they intend to launch legal action against the US government as well as defend Matt from the charges he currently faces. Sarah Harrison, Courage’s Acting Director, said: The FBI has ruined Matt’s life to cover up what he knew and to punish his support of WikiLeaks and Anonymous. Objective judges have agreed that the child porn charges are a ruse to smear him in pursuit of national security information. Tor Ekeland, one of Matt’s lawyers, said: Knowing the Courage Foundation has Matt’s back is a great relief to everyone fighting for his cause. It’s a privilege to work with such an esteemed organisation so committed to the freedom of information, and to know that there is light in the darkness. Matt’s parents, Paul and Leann DeHart, said in a statement, We are humbled and grateful for the support of the Courage Foundation. Facing a crisis of tsunami magnitude, we are comforted knowing we do not stand up against the tide alone. In addition to hosting the defence fund, Courage will publicly advocate for Matt DeHart and build his network of support. A re-launched support website at mattdehart.com will provide regular updates on Matt’s case and raise public awareness about the threats he faces. Donations to the Matt DeHart defence fund can be made at: https://mattdehart.com/donate

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all-in-one versus segregation
by dan＠geer.org 19 Mar '15

19 Mar '15

Excerpts from this BBC article, The card aiming to end Nigeria's fraud problem www.bbc.com/news/technology-31438226 Last year, the National Electronic Identity (e-ID) Card was launched in collaboration with MasterCard, with President Goodluck Jonathan the first recipient... The smart card's Match-On-Card technology matches a holder's fingerprint against a profile stored in the embedded chip... The card is also a travel document, conforming to the same standards as international passports. It contains electronic identification information, as well as Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) technology that allows for document signing, non-repudiation and encryption. The eID card contains users' biometric data, including fingerprints... Fully 70% of adult Nigerians do not have a formal bank account... again bring up the tradeoffs between all-in-one functionality versus segregation of duties. I personally don't want one technology to rule them all, but I have many choices and I know how to make them. Others, not so much. Has anyone here been involved in design, rollout, or analysis of the Nigerian solution and want to comment on how risk management tradeoffs were evaluated? To me (the guy living in a world of choice), I don't want to be 0wned at all but, more than that, I don't want to be 0wned by one central entity even if its mission statement is to do so for my own good (cf., "I can't defend the country until I'm into all the networks." -- K. Alexander and/or cradle to grave tracking of everything in the food pipeline and/or Elon Musk's comment that it will soon be illegal to drive your own car yourself). But let's start with Nigeria, unless some one of you is better able to discuss Pakistan's new program that requires a fingerprint to get a SIM card. theguardian.com/world/2015/mar/03/pakistan-fingerprint-mobile-phone-users --dan "The wisest thing in the world is to cry out before you are hurt. It is no good to cry out after you are hurt; especially after you are mortally hurt. People talk about the impatience of the populace; but sound historians know that most tyrannies have been possible because men moved too late. it is often essential to resist a tyranny before it exists." G.K. Chesterton, _Eugenics and Other Evils: An Argument Against the Scientifically Organized State_

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Bitshops.net
by Lodewijk andré de la porte 18 Mar '15

18 Mar '15

Hey everyone, I've just yesterday released Bitshops.net. There's dragons still, but overall it works decently. It provides private e-commerce using client-side cryptography. It has Bitcoin-based escrow. There's also encrypted chat (once an order is created). Much everything I'd want to say is explained on the site (where I can update it, too). The algorithms used are AES-256 and NTRUEncrypt (through LLVM). Come pick me apart But leave enough to recover Just ask me anything Best regards, Lewis

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JoinMarket: Increase the privacy of bitcoin and earn interest
by grarpamp 18 Mar '15

18 Mar '15

https://bitcointalk.org/index.php?topic=919116 https://www.reddit.com/r/Bitcoin/comments/2zc5tc https://github.com/chris-belcher/joinmarket While JoinMarket is one specific application, it's not hard to imagine your very own microloan daemon as the next big thing. Complete with credit ratings, investment choices, anonymous p2p market channels, automation, etc.

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NIST - Cybersecurity in a Post-Quantum World
by Polity News 18 Mar '15

18 Mar '15

"The advent of practical quantum computing will break all commonly used public key cryptographic algorithms. In response, NIST is researching cryptographic algorithms for public key-based key agreement and digital signatures that are not susceptible to cryptanalysis by quantum algorithms." - NIST. http://www.nist.gov/itl/csd/ct/post-quantum-crypto-workshop-2015.cfm Workshop April 2-3, 2015 at NIST campus in Gaithersburg, Maryland (near DC). my questions - What deciphering and decryption capabilities does the US government already have? How long until encryption we use today becomes obsolete? Is it already obsolete? Will there be a situation where the US government and large corporations have quantum computers capable of deciphering today's encryption standards, but average consumers would not have access to quantum encryption? What would the impact be on mass surveillance and privacy concerns?

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IETF OpenPGP WG reopened
by Blibbet 16 Mar '15

16 Mar '15

FYI, in the last few days, the IETF OpenPGP working group has 'reopened'. This is a good time to make sure any technical issues in OpenPGP are addressed. List-Id: "Ongoing discussion of OpenPGP issues." <openpgp.ietf.org> List-Unsubscribe: <https://www.ietf.org/mailman/options/openpgp>, <mailto:openpgp-request@ietf.org?subject=unsubscribe> List-Archive: <http://www.ietf.org/mail-archive/web/openpgp/> List-Post: <mailto:openpgp@ietf.org> List-Help: <mailto:openpgp-request@ietf.org?subject=help> List-Subscribe: <https://www.ietf.org/mailman/listinfo/openpgp>, <mailto:openpgp-request@ietf.org?subject=subscribe>

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Entrepreneurship, Austrian Economics, and the Cryptorevolution
by grarpamp 16 Mar '15

16 Mar '15

Patrick Byrne, crypto, blockchain, markets, regulation, etc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vFOpSTodk_U

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