Archive for the 'Surveillance' Category
The Surveillance Engine: How the NSA Built Its Own Secret Google
August 26th, 2014Via: First Look: The National Security Agency is secretly providing data to nearly two dozen U.S. government agencies with a “Google-like” search engine built to share more than 850 billion records about phone calls, emails, cellphone locations, and internet chats, according to classified documents obtained by The Intercept. The documents provide the first definitive evidence […]
Yes, Mildred, Your Cell Phone Is Used to Track Your Position on the Ground
August 24th, 2014Keep in mind, what they’re talking about here is just the mobile network information. Most phones have GPS radios built in now, so I’d assume that the position data is accurate to within a couple of meters when the observers are the Five Eyes states. What I don’t know is how often they activate the […]
Bots on Patrol: Mobile Security Robot to be Mass Produced
August 22nd, 2014Via: Factor: In a move that will rock the job security of night watchmen everywhere, the world’s first commercially available security robot is set for mass production in the US. Designed by Denver-based Gamma 2 Robotics, the robot will now be manufactured entirely in the States, with a process that can be scaled up to […]
Russia Forces Its Popular Bloggers to Register — Or Else
August 20th, 2014Via: Bloomberg: Russian President Vladimir Putin is taking names. Potentially thousands. The former KGB colonel, concerned with how social media can be used to undermine his authority, this month expanded his regulation of media to the blogosphere, requiring those with at least 3,000 daily readers to register their real names and contact information. So far, […]
NSA BIOS Backdoor a.k.a. God Mode
August 18th, 2014Via: Infosec Institute: This article is the first part of a series on NSA BIOS backdoor internals. Before we begin, I’d like to point out why these malwares are classified as “god mode.” First, most of the malware uses an internal (NSA) codename in the realms of “gods,” such as DEITYBOUNCE, GODSURGE, etc. Second, these […]
Gyroscopes in Your Phone Could Let Apps Eavesdrop on Conversations
August 15th, 2014Via: Wired: In the age of surveillance paranoia, most smartphone users know better than to give a random app or website permission to use their device’s microphone. But researchers have found there’s another, little-considered sensor in modern phones that can also listen in on their conversations. And it doesn’t even need to ask. In a […]
The Kilobot Project: A Low Cost Scalable Robot System for Demonstrating Collective Behaviors
August 15th, 2014Here’s one for your This-Will-End-Badly file folder. Via: Harvard: In current robotics research there is a vast body of work on algorithms and control methods for groups of decentralized cooperating robots, called a swarm or collective. These algorithms are generally meant to control collectives of hundreds or even thousands of robots; however, for reasons of […]
Facebook to Track Users Across Devices to Study Shopping Habits
August 14th, 2014In other news, resolution of Google satellite imagery could soon double. Via: Bloomberg: Facebook Inc. (FB) will let advertisers know where a promotion was first viewed and when it led to a purchase by tracking users between their electronic devices, a tool that may reignite privacy concerns. Marketers will be able to see the number […]
MonsterMind: NSA’s Cyberwar Bot
August 13th, 2014Via: Wired: Edward Snowden has made us painfully aware of the government’s sweeping surveillance programs over the last year. But a new program, currently being developed at the NSA, suggests that surveillance may fuel the government’s cyber defense capabilities, too. The NSA whistleblower says the agency is developing a cyber defense system that would instantly […]
The New NSA-Funded Code Rolls All Programming Languages Into One
August 11th, 2014Ah yes, NSA as computer security philanthropist… Via: Vice: Hey, web developer dudes and dudettes: What’s your favorite programming language? Is it CSS? Is it JavaScript? Is it PHP, HTML5, or something else? Why choose? A new programming language developed by researchers at Carnegie Mellon University is all of those and more—one of the world’s […]
