new Russian surveillance demands are impossible

Thread Starter

#12

Joined Nov 30, 2010
18,224
Here's a good joke. Putin just made a list of demands for his Surveillance State that are literally impossible.

"Some experts have estimated it would take every data storage manufacturer in the world seven years of continuous work before Russia would even have the internal infrastructure to be able to store and process such a high volume of data."

http://theantimedia.org/putin-spying-bankrupt/

It seems that there is no limit to the government desire to spy on every citizen in the world.
Fortunately the American government spent $1.5 billion to build the infrastructure to spy on all of us instead of demanding that communication carriers foot the bill.

https://nsa.gov1.info/utah-data-center/index.html
 

tracecom

Joined Apr 16, 2010
3,944
Don't forget the Bumblehive slogan. "If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear." Of course, the inverse of that is, "If you have something to hide, you have something to fear," and all of us have secrets that we don't want disclosed: account numbers, passwords, and financial records are three examples of legitimate information that I try to keep to myself and to a select few others of my choosing. I wonder when the federal government will disclose all its secrets. After all, if the politicians had nothing to hide, they would have nothing to fear.
 

jpanhalt

Joined Jan 18, 2008
11,087
Or, as some recent high-profile cases illustrate, "Do you know whether you have something you should hide?"

If you aren't sure, absolutely sure, then you better hide almost everything.

John
 

jpanhalt

Joined Jan 18, 2008
11,087
Yes, I am well aware of that. Moreover, because of some very broad categories, you may commit several felonies of the same category. That potentially makes you a repeat offender subject to even longer periods of incarceration.

When you are old and on a fixed income, some of my generation consider retirement by incarceration in a Federal spa as an attractive alternative to burdening one's family with those EOL expenses. Watch out for the (new) gray panthers. ;)

John
 

BR-549

Joined Sep 22, 2013
4,928
I received this from my VPN a few days ago. They took all the Russian servers off.

To Our Beloved Users,

The Russian Government has passed a new law that mandates that every provider must log all Russian internet traffic for up to a year. We believe that due to the enforcement regime surrounding this new law, some of our Russian Servers (RU) were recently seized by Russian Authorities, without notice or any type of due process. We think it’s because we are the most outspoken and only verified no-log VPN provider.

Luckily, since we do not log any traffic or session data, period, no data has been compromised. Our users are, and will always be, private and secure.

Upon learning of the above, we immediately discontinued our Russian gateways and will no longer be doing business in the region.

To make it clear, the privacy and security of our users is our number one priority. For preventative reasons, we are rotating all of our certificates. Furthermore, we’re updating our client applications with improved security measures to mitigate circumstances like this in the future, on top of what is already in place. In addition, our manual configurations now support the strongest new encryption algorithms including AES-256, SHA-256, and RSA-4096.

All Private Internet Access users must update their desktop clients at https://www.privateinternetaccess.com/pages/client-support/ and our Android App at Google Play. Manual openvpn configurations users must also download the new config files from the client download page.

We have decided not to do business within the Russian territory. We’re going to be further evaluating other countries and their policies.

In any event, we are aware that there may be times that notice and due process are forgone. However, we do not log and are default secure against seizure.

If you have any questions, please contact us at helpdesk@privateinternetaccess.com.

Thank you for your continued support and helping us fight the good fight.




Sincerely,
Private Internet Access Team
 

BR-549

Joined Sep 22, 2013
4,928
Because I use PIA VPN. That means I can choose from many servers around the world as my ISP. (a little over $3 a month) Cox, my residential ISP, never knows where I go. They can only tell if there is traffic. Everything is encrypted.

And there is no record or log of my internet activity on any server. There is a log on my computer, but I have it set to erase whenever I close browser.

Being that Russia seized some of the servers, there were no logs, but they got the security certs. for the clients. The client is the VPN program on individual machines. I had to download and install the new client certs. And of course no more using Russian severs.

I highly recommend a VPN for all devices. That $3 fee includes 5 devices at once on one password.

EDIT: A VPN is your only friend.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
13,086
Because someone in Virginia might have traffic that is routed through a server in the Russian Federation. You have to be living under a rock if you don't know this.
Most encryption is software end-to-end based. Even if all your packets were routed to Russia and logged only you have the private password in Virginia for decryption of the data. As usual Russia is 30 years behind the times.

The corrupt government is also taking huge risks with Russian data, this is a gold mine for the NSA. The suppliers for large data-storage and telecom infrastructure are all foreign so the money spent will be a net drain on Russia while everybody and their Uncle Sam will have a direct tap into the Russia FSB telecom infrastructure.
 
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Thread Starter

#12

Joined Nov 30, 2010
18,224
because of some very broad categories, you may commit several felonies of the same category. That potentially makes you a repeat offender subject to even longer periods of incarceration.
A long time ago, I arrived at the theory that, if every one of my my (or your) misdeeds was known, right down to every time you didn't come to a complete stop at a stop sign, everyone on the planet would be doing life + 99 years. This megalomaniacal demand for every fact on the planet makes it easy for any government to dispose of anybody at any time. But my government would never do that. They just want to spend billions of dollars to get that power because they will never use it.
 

Kermit2

Joined Feb 5, 2010
4,162
A long time ago, I arrived at the theory that, if every one of my my (or your) misdeeds was known, right down to every time you didn't come to a complete stop at a stop sign, everyone on the planet would be doing life + 99 years. This megalomaniacal demand for every fact on the planet makes it easy for any government to dispose of anybody at any time. But my government would never do that. They just want to spend billions of dollars to get that power because they will never use it.
http://www.complex.com/life/2016/07/police-arrest-chris-leday-who-filmed-alton-sterling-shooting
 

wayneh

Joined Sep 9, 2010
17,496
You have to be living under a rock if you don't know this.
Perhaps, but it's not lonely under here. Do you really think this is common knowledge? I sure don't. In fact when I trace routes, I don't think I've ever seen a server out of the country be part of the route, let alone in Russia.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
13,086
Act of retaliation?
Prove it and get a paycheck. He's going to need it after paying $1,231 for unpaid traffic tickets after shouting his info to the world (and the police who ran his name for wants) on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram. :rolleyes:
“At the time, I couldn’t afford it, then I was just being stubborn about it,” he said.
https://photographyisnotacrime.com/...rrested-24-hours-later-on-fabricated-charges/
 

tcmtech

Joined Nov 4, 2013
2,867
It seems that there is no limit to the government desire to spy on every citizen in the world.
Fortunately the American government spent $1.5 billion to build the infrastructure to spy on all of us instead of demanding that communication carriers foot the bill.
It's a double cover-up.:rolleyes:

Really it's just a giant government owned BitCoin mining center disguised as a data collection/spying center. :p

Do you really think it takes a 100 petaflop/sec capacity number cruncher to figure out what my daily agenda is?o_O
 

Thread Starter

#12

Joined Nov 30, 2010
18,224
Do you really think it takes a 100 petaflop/sec capacity number cruncher to figure out what my daily agenda is?o_O
No, it takes that much computing power to track all 324 million people in the U.S.
Every phone call, every website we look at, every traffic camera, every e-mail, every credit card transaction, every license plate reader...
and then there is the ability to turn on the microphones and cameras in smart phones to check on us when we're not in public.
It takes a lot of bits to store that much analog information.
 

Kermit2

Joined Feb 5, 2010
4,162
Maybe not, but should the burning eye of government ever focus on you, those terabytes of data will reveal everything about you.

Even the number of grey pubes to left of your pecker will be counted and surveyed.

:)

Edit: I pity the poor slob who has to watch my life movie at the NSA. Some things need to remain forever secret.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
13,086
Edit: I pity the poor slob who has to watch my life movie at the NSA. Some things need to remain forever secret.
http://www.newslo.com/verizon-customers-have-the-most-boring-lives-ever-reports-nsa/
WASHINGTON – On the heels of the shocking revelation that the National Security Agency has been subpoenaing records of phone calls made by Verizon customers, new allegations have arisen claiming said customers have “the most boring lives ever” according to sources at the NSA.
...
The news has shocked most Americans, though some see potential value in the unprecedented action. “Look, we live in a post-9/11 world and these are some of the compromises you have to make in order to stay safe,” remarked Denise Franz of Santa Monica, CA. “And if the NSA can monitor my ex and make sure he doesn’t call me anymore, I would probably pay extra for that service. Just sayin’.”
:p
 

Thread Starter

#12

Joined Nov 30, 2010
18,224
Because someone in Virginia might have traffic that is routed through a server in the Russian Federation. You have to be living under a rock if you don't know this.
The act of sending American communication outside the country, and then back in, so it can be intercepted as, "foreign" data is called, "boomeranging".
This news is so old that I can't find it in a 20 minute search.
I assume by now, the NSA doesn't use this workaround to the law. They just collect everything and don't even bother to set up a fake excuse.
 

nsaspook

Joined Aug 27, 2009
13,086
The act of sending American communication outside the country, and then back in, so it can be intercepted as, "foreign" data is called, "boomeranging".
This news is so old that I can't find it in a 20 minute search.
I assume by now, the NSA doesn't use this workaround to the law. They just collect everything and don't even bother to set up a fake excuse.
You don't have to send American communication outside the country. The NSA is a member of the Five_Eyes. US communications are foreign intelligence to the others who share data.
Documents leaked by Snowden in 2013 revealed that the FVEY have been spying on one another's citizens and sharing the collected information with each other in order to circumvent restrictive domestic regulations on surveillance of citizens.[7][8][9][10]

Despite the impact of Snowden's disclosures, some experts in the intelligence community believe that no amount of global concern or outrage will affect the Five Eyes relationship, which to this day remains one of the most comprehensive known espionage alliances in history.[11]
The parties agree to the exchange of the products of the following operations relating to foreign communications:-

  1. Collection of traffic.
  2. Acquisition of communications documents and equipment.
  3. Traffic analysis.
  4. Cryptanalysis.
  5. Decryption and translation.
  6. Acquisition of information regarding communications organizations, procedures, practices and equipment.
http://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/documents/ukusa-highlights-guide.pdf
https://www.nsa.gov/news-features/d...kusa/assets/files/new_ukusa_agree_10may55.pdf
 
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