NSA Exposed, Hiding Spying Software Deep Inside Hard Drives

[unhappycamper]

http://www.opednews.com/articles/NSA-Exposed-Hiding-Spying-by-Dave-Lefcourt-Cyberwarfare_NSA_Spying_Surveillance-150219-535.html

NSA Exposed, Hiding Spying Software Deep Inside Hard Drives
By Dave Lefcourt
OpEdNews Op Eds 2/19/2015 at 12:46:45

A story published Monday by Reuters revealed a Moscow based security software maker, "Kaspersky Lab" [1] , discovered the NSA has hidden spying software deep within hard drives made by top computer manufacturers including Western Digital, Seagate, Toshiba, IBM, Micron, and Samsung.

In a way it's not exactly a new story as the Snowden revelations made known the NSA used "back door" entry [2] into software products they intercepted after they'd been shipped by the manufacturer-without their knowledge- then repackaged the infected software and reshipped it to the unsuspecting buyer.

When manufacturers discovered the NSA's secret scheme they complained to the White House billions in profits would be lost once owners-foreign governments, corporations, weapons manufacturers, intelligence agencies-discovered their software had been compromised allowing the NSA to spy on the users.

It's hard to imagine the government has done anything to curtail the NSA's skullduggery. Read this from Peter Swire, a member of President Obama's so called "Review Group on Intelligence and Communications Technology" when he said, "The Kaspersky report showed that it is essential for the country to consider the possible impact on trade and diplomatic relations before deciding to use its knowledge of software flaws for intelligence gathering. There can be serious negative effects on other US interests." Please, what a crock.

[Turbineguy]

1. Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

Remember guys, it's about protecting the country, not harming it.

[TheBlackAdder]

2. This has seen known for years. Even the SSL issue, which was known back in 1994.

Computer nerds, the folks who used to go to those computer festivals back in the late 1980's and early 1990's when few places sold odd computer equipment and software, knew this was being one. Kaspersky Labs didn't produce some new enlightenment, they just rehashed the crap the NSA has been doing for years, including having the OSes and mainboards opened for their access.

Back in the early 1990's folks were developing their own encryption schemes and certain members of the government wanted to make custom encryption schemes illegal... since the government wouldn't be able to crack the codes. Back then, we knew the NSA was pushing the whole encryption process. Folks using most unix and linux builds have NSA hooks in them too.

This is one of the reasons why our machines get hacked by third-party folks.

The back door gate calls in WIN OSes is another issue, dating back to when they forced ISVs to follow one set of API standards while their products used unpublished calls to speed up their products... calls that hackers found out about and monopolized upon. The old browser wars.... "Gee, I wonder why Netscape Navigator is so slow, I think I'll use IE instead, because it's faster." Office tools and most other products has similar restrictions placed on them. Years back... back in the OS/2 and Apple/WIN OS plan days, there was talk about having WIN run in a protected supervisor state that would prevent any virus... we see where that went.