Your Computer May Already Be Hacked - NSA Inside

[hueymahl]

Below is an excerpt from a blog post by Steve Blank (original at http://steveblank.com/2013/07/15/your-computer-may-already-be-hacked-nsa-inside/). Steve Blank is a very well respected entrepreneur and angel investor in silicon valley. His history makes him particularly well situated to analyze this type of information and understand its possibilities (including stints in the military and "spook stuff" - his term: http://steveblank.com/about/).

Bottom line - If you are not scared of the NSA's power AND THE POTENTIAL FOR ITS ABUSE, you should be.

Bypass Encryption
While most outside observers think the NSA’s job is cracking encrypted messages, as the Prism disclosures have shown, the actual mission is simply to read all communications. Cracking codes is a last resort.


The NSA has a history of figuring out how to get to messages before or after they are encrypted. Whether it was by putting keyloggers on keyboards and recording the keystrokes or detecting the images of the characters as they were being drawn on a CRT.
Today every desktop and laptop computer has another way for the NSA to get inside.

Intel Inside

It’s inevitable that complex microprocessors have bugs in them when they ship. When the first microprocessors shipped the only thing you could hope is that the bug didn’t crash your computer. The only way the chip vendor could fix the problem was to physically revise the chip and put out a new version. But computer manufacturers and users were stuck if you had an old chip. After a particularly embarrassing math bug in 1994 that cost Intel $475 million, the company decided to fix the problem by allowing it’s microprocessors to load fixes automatically when your computer starts.



Starting in 1996 with the Intel P6 (Pentium Pro) to today’s P7 chips (Core i7) these processors contain instructions that are reprogrammable in what is called microcode. Intel can fix bugs on the chips by reprogramming a microprocessors microcode with a patch. This patch, called a microcode update, can be loaded into a processor by using special CPU instructions reserved for this purpose. These updates are not permanent, which means each time you turn the computer on, its microprocessor is reset to its built-in microcode, and the update needs to be applied again (through a computer’s BIOS.).

Since 2000, Intel has put out 29 microcode updates to their processors. The microcode is distributed by 1) Intel or by 2) Microsoft integrated into a BIOS or 3) as part of a Windows update. Unfortunately, the microcode update format is undocumented and the code is encrypted. This allows Intel to make sure that 3rd parties can’t make unauthorized add-ons to their chips. But it also means that no one can look inside to understand the microcode, which makes it is impossible to know whether anyone is loading a backdoor into your computer.

To be clear, he is not saying Intel is working with the NSA and has already installed backdoors on all our computers. What he is saying is that they have the absolute capability to do so, and there is no way for us to know if they have already done so or will do so in the future.

[FirstLight]

1. Isn't that comforting?

You know, I was recently thinking of shutting off Microsoft Updates on my computer because of this very thought... Wonder how long it would be before my computer crashed though...

not cool, bro

[Dash87]

3. That wouldn't help, and in fact would make your computer worse.

Without patching, your computer still has open areas that can be exploited by viruses or hackers.

Don't worry - the NSA won't hack you, and if they wanted to, they would anyways.

[Dash87]

2. The NSA can just hack you through zero-day exploits anyways.

Backdoors just make it easier.

[Vinnie From Indy]

4. Why wouldn't they is the question to be asked at this point.

It seems the other known programs already killed the 4th Amendment, so why would they conceivably stop at hacking your processor? To believe the NSA is NOT doing this, you would have to believe that bank robbers would leave a bag of money behind solely because they didn't want anyone to think they were greedy.

[Catherina]

5. Nothing " outside of a face-to-face conversation, that they could not have access to"

"I cannot think of anything, outside of a face-to-face conversation, that they could not have access to." Wolf Ruzicka, CEO of EastBanc Technologies

http://www.observer-reporter.com/article/20130615/NEWS05/130619525/-1/NEWS

Rec'd

[Octafish]

6. Gen Clapper is the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human being I've ever known in my life.

This is some serious solitaire stuff, Raymond.

[Pholus]

7. Thanks for this article.

Glad to be treated as an automatic suspect by my country...

[SomethingFishy]

8. No news here.. When you agree to those "terms of service"

Last edited Mon Jul 15, 2013, 03:46 PM - Edit history (1)

you know the ones no one reads, you have already given them permission to climb up your ass with a microscope.

Which is why I don't understand this battle at all. We already lost. All thats left is for us to complain about it and try to get it changed. The NSA has complete access to your life, Snowden is a wanted fugitive and on the run, the Data Center in Utah is on track, and the Patriot Act is firmly in place.

What I find hilarious is, people are not trying to convince me that we need this as it's already in place, what they are apparently trying to do is to convince me I should like it.

[Hydra]

11. Funny enough, they NEED that last step you mentioned

They can always do things, but for them to do them regularly and in certain ways, it has to be accepted by the populace.

Even the King needs the acquiescence of his subjects, otherwise he's just some guy with a crown.

[Egalitarian Thug]

9. To paraphrase Henry Ford, "It is well enough that people of the nation do not understand

anything about our information and networking infrastructure, for if they did, I believe there would be a revolution before tomorrow morning."

For anybody with the good sense to be concerned about this, know that there are several alternative methods to at least hinder this kind of thing by making your systems too much trouble for them to bother with.

[BumRushDaShow]

10. Try this

http://www.popularmechanics.com/technology/gadgets/news/4253628

[Coyotl]

12. Funny how this graphic overlooks the splitters capturing ALL COMMUNICATIONS long before first date

Nov-09-07
Are ALL COMMUNICATIONS routed overseas to circumvent US law and the Constitution?
http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=389x2245762

I knew about this in early 2006!

[mzmolly]

13. I'd bore them to tears.

[leveymg]

14. KNR. Thank you for that clear explanation re: microcode and MS updates by Blank. eom