One Riot Cop Per Protester at G8 Meeting
June 6th, 2007Via: Guardian:
A multinational coalition of protesters will today begin their bid to physically prevent world leaders from gathering at the G8 summit despite widespread criticism of violent tactics during growing demonstrations in Germany.
Water cannons, riot vans and 16,000 police officers – one per protester – last night fanned out around the Baltic resort of Heiligendamm to end the protests.
More than 1,000 people were injured on Saturday in Rostock, the nearest city, in some of the most violent protests seen in postwar Germany. The authorities are desperate to avoid a repeat of the violence that marred the 2001 G8 in Genoa, where a student was shot dead by police.
Related: The Education of Cindy Sheehan
Remember My Warnings About Proxy Services?
June 6th, 2007Mike Ruppert responded to my post about Armorware. As I expected, he didn’t address any of the several concerns I raised. He confirms what we already knew: He’s virtually clueless about computer security and is promoting something he doesn’t understand because it looks “elegant” to him. * sigh * He did, however, mention Alex Jones.
In his response, to my post, Mike Ruppert wrote, “I get slammed for promoting one prouduct. [sic] How many paid advertisers are there on Alex Jones’ sites?”
I didn’t know if Alex Jones was promoting/endorsing/offering any computer security or anonymity products. I’d never heard of him doing do, but since Ruppert mentioned it, I thought I’d look into the matter, just to make sure.
Uhhhhhhgh. I feel ill.
Before you read about what I found, this is what I wrote about proxy services in my Ugly Truth About Online Anonymity essay:
Many technologies that amateur anonymity fetishists are attracted to are actually designed to harvest information. Put yourself in the shoes of the NSA. If you wanted a concentrated haul of the most interesting information what would you do?
You would establish a honeypot: a service (free or paid) that purported to provide an anonymous web browsing/email capability. Who knows what people might get up to if they thought nobody was looking? That, of course, is the idea with honeypots.
If you’re relying on a proxy server, how will you know that it’s not simply recording your entire session for examination by acreages of the Homeland’s supercomputers that are running advanced statistical Magic 8 Ball algorithms? Because the company or individual providing your proxy service says that they don’t keep logs? HA
Now, here’s what I just found over at Prison Planet, an Alex Jones site:
New Prison Planet.tv Member Feature: Anonymous Surfing and E Mailing
Prison Planet | June 13 2005
We are offering our Prison Planet.tv members two exclusive new features which come completely free at no extra charge.
Anonymous surfing and e mailing options are now available to our great members!
The anonymous surfer allows to you to safely traverse the web while been protected against malicious tracking cookies and government surveillance. Your online privacy is guaranteed.
Also available is the anonymous e mailer option which allows you to send private, anonymous e mails.
Prison Planet.tv members can access these two great new features at no extra charge right now.
Click here to access the anonymous surfer. Click here to access the anonymous emailer.
Not a Prison Planet.tv member? These features barely scratch the surface of what members receive. All of Alex Jones documentary films, Alex Jones’ weekly television reports, all major audio interviews from the Alex Jones Show, Alex Jones’ book Descent Into Tyranny, Paul Joseph Watson’s book Order Out of Chaos.
There is already a comprehensive library of material online just waiting for members going back over a year.
Click here to subscribe, it’s just 15 cents a day if you subscribe for a year or $5.95 a month.
I searched back through my archives, and do you know when I first warned people about this kind of thing?
2002.
In 2002, I wrote the following to a Cryptogon reader:
Few people have “clean,” that is anonymous Internet access. The people who “think” they have it are paying extra for it, and may just be supporting a NSA honeypot. I get a good chuckle when I see webwasher and anonymiser hits in my log.
Read Sun Tzu’s, “Art of War.” If he wanted people to think they were anonymous online, so he could learn their maneuvers and tactics, how would he go about it? He’d set up an ISP offering “anonymous” surfing and post ads for it all over the dissident backwaters of the Internet. He might even require clients to run an executable in order to access the “anonymous” browsing system. That way, he gets every keystroke, in addition to all Internet activity.
In 2005, both Alex Jones and Mike Ruppert began promoting possible honeypot email and web anonymity services…
I feel ill. I’m literally sitting here, holding my head in my hands.
In mindwar, which is what this is, the battlespace is littered with bullshit and honeypots. Getting outside the boxes lands you inside other boxes. It is like planning an ambush far in advance. When the enemy (you and me) walks along the path and starts taking fire, we leap into the bushes for cover… and land in a mine field.
Another analogy. The Internet is like a safety valve on a pressure cooker. If the thing is getting dangerous, dissidents and activists of EVERY possible description can meet up with the handfull of other people who share similar interests, sit in front of their computers, and spend a lot of time accomplishing nothing. In the meantime, valuable intelligence may be gleaned about us via the methods I discuss above, and probably techniques we can’t begin to imagine.
When I studied information warfare in college, this now long forgotten essay was a big deal, but twelve years later, have we learned anything?
The Internet could also be used offensively as an additional medium in psychological operations campaigns and to help achieve unconventional warfare objectives. Used creatively as an integral asset, the Internet can facilitate many DoD operations and activities.
Strategic Assessment: The Internet
Prepared by Mr. Charles Swett
Assistant for Strategic Assessment
Office of the Assistant Secretary of Defense for Special Operations and Low-Intensity Conflict
July 1995
What about some of the most prominent dissidents and activists?
Oh, they’re busy writing books, making documentaries and selling computer “security” products and services to the people who listen to them. This would be hilarious if it wasn’t so sad.
Related: Remember My Warnings About Closed Source Computer Security Products and Services?
The Power Crisis Mythology, the 40% Efficient Solar Cell and the Cost of the War in Iraq
June 5th, 2007Spectrolab, Inc., a subsidiary of Boeing, has developed a solar cell technology that has a conversion efficiency of 40.7%. They accomplished this with a grant from the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
The annual budget of the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory: $210 million
The cost of America’s war in Iraq per day: $300 million
The U.S. spends more on the war in Iraq in one day (about $300 million) than it does on the ANNUAL BUDGET for the primary government laboratory that is tasked with renewable energy and energy efficiency research and development. As absurd as that is, a recipient of a grant from this lab has developed a 40% efficient solar cell.
What if that lab had the funding equivalent of what the U.S. is spending on the war over a period of two or three days?
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again: The energy scarcity argument, on its own, is like the American dream: you’d have to be asleep to believe it.
Top soil depletion: Yes.
Water scarcity: Yes.
Energy scarcity: Yes, by design.
My guess is that the clean energy technology will become ubiquitous after the kill off phase has thinned out the herd by a few billion people. In the meantime, keep thinking that there are no solutions to the global power crisis… Even if the purpose of that idiotic meme is to help make kill off look more like die off.
Via: Physorg:
Scientists from Spectrolab, Inc., a subsidiary of Boeing, have recently published their research on the fabrication of solar cells that surpass the 40% efficiency milestone—the highest efficiency achieved for any photovoltaic device. Their results appear in a recent edition of Applied Physics Letters.
Most conventional solar cells used in today’s applications, such as for supplemental power for homes and buildings, are one-sun, single-junction silicon cells that use only the light intensity that the sun produces naturally, and have optimal efficiency for a relatively narrow range of photon energies.
The Spectrolab group experimented with concentrator multijunction solar cells that use high intensities of sunlight, the equivalent of 100s of suns, concentrated by lenses or mirrors. Significantly, the multijunction cells can also use the broad range of wavelengths in sunlight much more efficiently than single-junction cells.
“These results are particularly encouraging since they were achieved using a new class of metamorphic semiconductor materials, allowing much greater freedom in multijunction cell design for optimal conversion of the solar spectrum,” Dr. Richard R. King, principal investigator of the high efficiency solar cell research and development effort, told PhysOrg.com. “The excellent performance of these materials hints at still higher efficiency in future solar cells.”
In the design, multijunction cells divide the broad solar spectrum into three smaller sections by using three subcell band gaps. Each of the subcells can capture a different wavelength range of light, enabling each subcell to efficiently convert that light into electricity. With their conversion efficiency measured at 40.7%, the metamorphic multijunction concentrator cells surpass the theoretical limit of 37% of single-junction cells at 1000 suns, due to their multijunction structure.
While Spectrolab’s primary business is supplying PV cells and panels to the aerospace industry (many of their solar cells are used on satellites currently in orbit), the company envisions that this breakthrough will also have applications in commercial terrestrial solar electricity generation.
The research that led to the discovery of the high efficiency concentrator solar cell was funded partly by the U.S. Department of Energy’s National Renewable Energy Laboratory, and will play a significant role in the government’s Solar America Initiative, which aims to make solar energy cost-competitive with conventional electricity generation by 2015. The company has said that these solar cells could help concentrator system manufacturers produce electricity at a cost that is competitive with electricity generated by conventional methods today.
What if Our Mercenaries Turn on Us?
June 5th, 2007If?
Via: Philadelphia Enquirer:
Armed units from the private security firm Blackwater USA opened fire in Baghdad streets twice in two days last week. It triggered a standoff between the security contractors and Iraqi forces, a reminder that the war in Iraq may be remembered mostly in our history books for empowering and building America’s first modern mercenary army.
There are an estimated 20,000 to 30,000 armed security contractors working in Iraq, although there are no official figures and some estimates run much higher. Security contractors are not counted as part of the coalition forces. When the number of private mercenary fighters is added to other civilian military “contractors” who carry out logistical support activities such as food preparation, the number rises to about 126,000.
“We got 126,000 contractors over there, some of them making more than the secretary of defense,” said House defense appropriations subcommittee Chairman John Murtha (D., Pa.). “How in the hell do you justify that?”
The privatization of war hands an incentive to American corporations, many with tremendous political clout, to keep us mired down in Iraq. But even more disturbing is the steady rise of this modern Praetorian Guard. The Praetorian Guard in ancient Rome was a paramilitary force that defied legal constraints, made violence part of the political discourse, and eventually plunged the Roman Republic into tyranny and despotism. Despotic movements need paramilitary forces that operate outside the law, forces that sow fear among potential opponents, and are capable of physically silencing those branded by their leaders as traitors. And in the wrong hands, a Blackwater could well become that force.
American taxpayers have so far handed a staggering $4 billion to “armed security” companies in Iraq such as Blackwater, according to House Oversight and Government Reform Committee Chairman Rep. Henry Waxman (D., Calif.). Tens of billions more have been paid to companies that provide logistical support. Rep. Jan Schakowsky (D., Ill.) of the House Intelligence Committee estimates that 40 cents of every dollar spent on the occupation has gone to war contractors. It is unlikely that any of these corporations will push for an early withdrawal. The profits are too lucrative.
Mercenary forces like Blackwater operate beyond civilian and military law. They are covered by a 2004 edict passed by American occupation authorities in Iraq that immunizes all civilian contractors in Iraq from prosecution.
Blackwater, barely a decade old, has migrated from Iraq to set up operations in the United States and nine other countries. It trains Afghan security forces and has established a base a few miles from the Iranian border. The huge contracts from the war – including $750 million from the State Department since 2004 – have allowed Blackwater to amass a fleet of more than 20 aircraft, including helicopter gunships. Jeremy Scahill, the author of Blackwater: The Rise of the World’s Most Powerful Mercenary Army, points out that Blackwater has also constructed “the world’s largest private military facility – a 7,000-acre compound near the Great Dismal Swamp of North Carolina.” Blackwater also recently opened a facility in Illinois (“Blackwater North”) and, despite local opposition, is moving ahead with plans to build another huge training base near San Diego. The company recently announced it was creating a private intelligence branch called “Total Intelligence.”
Erik Prince, who founded and runs Blackwater, is a man who appears to have little time for the niceties of democracy. He has close ties with the radical Christian Right and the Bush White House. He champions his company as a patriotic extension of the U.S. military. His employees, in an act as cynical as it is dishonest, take an oath of loyalty to the Constitution. But what he and his allies have built is a mercenary army, paid for with government money, which operates outside the law and without constitutional constraint.
Mercenary units are a vital instrument in the hands of despotic movements. Communist and fascist movements during the last century each built rogue paramilitary forces. And the appearance of Blackwater fighters, heavily armed and wearing their trademark black uniforms, patrolling the streets of New Orleans in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, may be a grim taste of the future. In New Orleans Blackwater charged the government $240,000 a day.
“It cannot happen here’ is always wrong,” the philosopher Karl Popper wrote. “A dictatorship can happen anywhere.”
Related: The Sack of Washington
U.S. Congressman Charged with Racketeering, Solicitation, Money Laundering, Wire Fraud, Conspiracy and Violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act
June 5th, 2007Just another day at the office.
Via: CNN:
Nearly two years after federal agents reported finding $90,000 in a freezer in his Washington home, U.S. Rep. William Jefferson has been charged with a global campaign to solicit bribes, obstruct justice and engage in racketeering, Justice Department officials said Monday.
The veteran Louisiana Democrat faces 16 criminal counts, said Alice Fisher, assistant U.S. attorney general in the criminal division.
“This case is about greed, power and arrogance,” said Joe Persichini, director of the FBI’s Washington field office, which led the investigation.
In addition to the racketeering and solicitation charges, Jefferson has been charged with money laundering, wire fraud, conspiracy and violating the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act.
CATEGORY 5 CYCLONE AIMED AT STRAIT OF HORMUZ
June 5th, 2007Could get interesting. Stay up to the minute with The Oil Drum.
Via: STRATFOR:
A Category 5 cyclone with winds of up to 195 mph is heading toward one of the world’s most productive energy basins, threatening local devastation and global disruption at a point at which oil prices are already flirting with record highs. For once, the region in question is not the Gulf of Mexico. There is cause for concern; Cyclone Gonu is headed directly for the Strait of Hormuz.
The cyclone is rotating counterclockwise — as it would in the Gulf of Mexico — meaning that, should it enter the Persian Gulf, the gulf’s west coast would suffer the most serious damage. Along the west coast, low-lying areas are the norm, and there are few barrier islands like the ones that line the Gulf of Mexico to absorb much of the storm surge that could therefore penetrate miles inland.
Like all weather phenomena, hurricanes and cyclones are notoriously fickle, so there is (thankfully) no guarantee Gonu will enter the Persian Gulf, much less wreck it. But there are two facilities that bear specific mention: the Ras Tanura and Ras al-Juaymah oil loading platforms in Saudi Arabia. So far, the chances of either of these facilities suffering a direct hit are very slim — Gonu is still 750 miles away from those export points — but they collectively pump nearly 10 million barrels per day (bpd) of crude. These facilities, while critical to global energy supplies and — due to their size — largely immune to terrorist attacks, are not particularly hurricane resistant. After all, they were built in an area where such storms are almost unheard of. Other (hardly insignificant) energy installations dot the region in Saudi Arabia, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates — most of them on the west coast. Luckily, there is little offshore production in the Persian Gulf — unlike in the Gulf of Mexico — so there is unlikely to be much permanent damage to the oil production facilities themselves.
More likely is shipping disruption. Right now, Gonu is on a collision course with the Strait of Hormuz, a major chokepoint that transits some 17 million bpd of crude. Within the next few hours, the tankers and supertankers — not to mention the massive container ships that often visit regional hubs in the United Arab Emirates — that ply that route will be scurrying out of the storm’s way. In the Gulf of Mexico, such storm-dodging is an annual ritual that is no major concern, but in the world’s “Cradle of Oil,” this is a completely new sport, and even a short disruption with minimal damage is sure to send the price of a barrel of crude sharply upward.
Currently the “best guess” indicates Gonu will slowly lose force to be “only” Category 3 when it makes initial landfall in Oman, forecast for June 5 at 6 p.m. local time.
Chinese Markets: Panic Selling
June 5th, 2007Via: Reuters / Yahoo:
China stocks tumbled 8.3 percent on Monday in their second biggest drop this decade, erasing $340 billion in market value and extending big losses from last week after the government hiked the share trading tax to cool a feverish bull run.
In an apparent attempt by authorities to restore confidence, front-page editorials in official newspapers tried to reassure investors the market’s medium- and long-term outlook was still positive, and that the tax hike was merely aimed at speculators.
But that failed to stop selling by many of the anxious and often inexperienced individual investors who had jumped into the market in recent months for what seemed like easy money.
“This is obviously panic selling, and the sentiment is quickly spreading across the market,” said Wang Jing, deputy general manager at Everbright Securities.
…
The key index has now lost 15.3 percent from last Tuesday’s record intra-day high. A fall of 10 percent is an internationally accepted definition of a bear market in stocks.
Arkansas GOP Head: We Need More ‘Attacks on American Soil’ So People Appreciate Bush
June 4th, 2007Via: Rawstory:
In his first interview as the chairman of the Arkansas Republican Party, Dennis Milligan told a reporter that America needs to be attacked by terrorists so that people will appreciate the work that President Bush has done to protect the country.
“At the end of the day, I believe fully the president is doing the right thing, and I think all we need is some attacks on American soil like we had on [Sept. 11, 2001],” Milligan said to the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette, “and the naysayers will come around very quickly to appreciate not only the commitment for President Bush, but the sacrifice that has been made by men and women to protect this country.”
Milligan, who was elected as the new chair of the Arkansas Republican Party just two weeks ago, also told the newspaper that he is “150 percent” behind Bush in the war in Iraq.
The Corporate Takeover of U.S. Intelligence
June 3rd, 2007We’re solidly into the post-mortem phase of the analysis now.
Via: Salon:
More than five years into the global “war on terror,” spying has become one of the fastest-growing private industries in the United States. The federal government relies more than ever on outsourcing for some of its most sensitive work, though it has kept details about its use of private contractors a closely guarded secret. Intelligence experts, and even the government itself, have warned of a critical lack of oversight for the booming intelligence business.
On May 14, at an industry conference in Colorado sponsored by the Defense Intelligence Agency, the U.S. government revealed for the first time how much of its classified intelligence budget is spent on private contracts: a whopping 70 percent. Based on this year’s estimated budget of at least $48 billion, that would come to at least $34 billion in contracts. The figure was disclosed by Terri Everett, a senior procurement executive in the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, the agency established by Congress in 2004 to oversee the 16 agencies that make up the U.S. intelligence infrastructure. A copy of Everett’s unclassified PowerPoint slide presentation, titled “Procuring the Future” and dated May 25, was obtained by Salon. (It has since become available on the DIA’s Web site.) “We can’t spy … If we can’t buy!” one of the slides proclaims, underscoring the enormous dependence of U.S. intelligence agencies on private sector contracts.
The DNI figures show that the aggregate number of private contracts awarded by intelligence agencies rose by about 38 percent from the mid-1990s to 2005. But the surge in outsourcing has been far more dramatic measured in dollars: Over the same period of time, the total value of intelligence contracts more than doubled, from about $18 billion in 1995 to about $42 billion in 2005.
“Those numbers are startling,” said Steven Aftergood, the director of the Project on Government Secrecy at the Federation of American Scientists and an expert on the U.S. intelligence budget. “They represent a transformation of the Cold War intelligence bureaucracy into something new and different that is literally dominated by contractor interests.”
Big Brother, Big Business
June 3rd, 2007Here’s a two hour CNBC piece about privacy, surveillance and the emerging biometric lockdown. Even though the situation presented here is grim, we know that it’s much worse.
If, however, you or someone you know is looking for a general, easy to understand presentation on these issues, and have about two hours to spare, this is pretty good. (The player allows you to fast forward through the commercials.)
