Wednesday, June 20, 2018

Little Tich...

When visiting friends in Bedfordshire I mentioned that I've been looking into French vaudeville and liked what I've thus far seen. 

Dave asked me if I'd come across Little Tich.  Well, no.  I hadn't encountered him.  So he sent me the following video.  It's of the English Vaudeville performer working in Paris.  I think it's brilliant.  Have a look and see what you think.


Tuesday, June 12, 2018

Yvette Horner...

Zounds!

Yvette Horner has died.

If you don't know who she is, look her up. 

Great artist.  Great music.  Great personality.  IMNSHO.

Thursday, June 7, 2018

Democracy Risks, Data Collection, and Chinese Spy Operations...

I swore I would stay away from this topic after I was laid off from my last job.  I have not been in industry for going on seven years, but a story compels me try and provide relevant detail so people can understand the deeper issues in play. 

It was recently revealed that Facebook has granted Chinese telephone manufacturers and data network providers access to user data.   In February of this year the FBI Director Christopher Wray continued to warn US consumers to avoid buying products from these same companies.

Why does the story matter?  Afterall, we never hear of US companies having a problem sharing data with businesses in other countries.  Certainly US companies do share data with non-US businesses, right?  What makes China special?

During a public debrief of the then current state of People's Republic of China industrial espionage and data theft activities, a representative from one of the three letter agencies visited the company I worked for.  He shared that two foreign companies in particular were his "biggest headaches."  There were certainly other Chinese entities that merited close attention, but dealing with activities of these two Chinese state-run entities consumed more of his time than anything else his job also required.

The companies in question are ZTE and Huawei.

ZTE has been in the news recently.  It seems as if the company may be on the verge of folding.  But  "...the president announced he wished to rescue ZTE, which is on the verge of bankruptcy because of the U.S. decision to not only ban the company from selling phones here, but also buying essential U.S.-made components. As the president noted, shutting down ZTE penalizes thousands of innocent Chinese workers."


Huawei, too, has been in the news.  "Six top US intelligence chiefs, including the heads of the FBI, CIA and NSA, told Americans they wouldn't recommend buying products or services from the Chinese manufacturer..."

In defense of products from Huawei and ZTE, occasionally a person can find writers who say it's crazy to think anything bad could happen by letting Chinese designed and manufactured technology products into the US.  But based on research of un-classified and widely available publical materials, such a defensive position appears to be naive and perhaps even dangerous.


"...General James Cartwright, while serving as the Combatant Commander of the US Strategic Command, testified before a Congressional commission that China is actively engaging in cyber reconnaissance by probing the computer networks of US government agencies as well as private companies…"  - Capability of the People’s Republic of China to Conduct Cyber Warfare and Computer Network Exploitation. Prepared for The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission. Project Manager Steve DeWeese, Principal Author Bryan Krekel, Subject Matter Experts George Bakos and Christopher Barnett, October 9, 2009, page 52


In short, on-going Chinese cyber-operations target not only US Government computer operations, but private industry, too.  The cost to US businesses is quite high in several dimensions, not the least of which include risks to long term viability and profitability.



"...Foreign intelligence services have discovered that… private sector information, once unreachable or requiring years of expensive technological or human asset preparation to obtain, can now be accessed inventoried and stolen with comparative ease using computer network operations tools. The return on present investment for targeting sensitive US information in this way (the intelligence gain) can be extraordinarily high while the barriers to entry (the skills and technologies required to implement an operation) are comparatively low… China is most frequently cited as the primary actor behind much of the activity noted in media reporting, and US officials are increasingly willing to publicly acknowledge that China’s network exploitation and intelligence collection activities are one this country’s most consuming counterintelligence challenges… [China] has successfully exfilterated at least 10 to 20 terabytes of data from US Government networks as of 2007… - Capability of the People’s Republic of China to Conduct Cyber Warfare and Computer Network Exploitation. Prepared for The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission. Project Manager Steve DeWeese, Principal Author Bryan Krekel, Subject Matter Experts George Bakos and Christopher Barnett, October 9, 2009, page 51

The problem is compounded by the fact that US businesses design, manufacture, and distribute very complex technically challenging products.  With this in mind, US business operations conducted in China are at particular risk.


"...The growing amount of R&R conducted in China by foreign multinational corporations provides a potentially more promising avenue for the PRC to obtain technological know-how..." - China’s Program for Science and Technology Modernization: Implications for American Competitiveness. Prepared for The US-China Economic and Security Review Commission. By Micah Springut, Stephen Schlaikjer, and David Chen. CENTRA Technology, Inc. 4121 Wilson Boulevard, Suite 800, Arlington, VA 22203, pg7


"...The investigation concludes that the risks associated with Huawei’s and ZTE’s provision of equipment to U.S. critical infrastructure could undermine core U.S. national-security interests..." - Investigative Report on the U.S. National Security Issues Posed by Chinese Telecommunications Companies Huawei and ZTE - A report by Chairman Mike Rogers and Ranking Member C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence - U.S. House of Representatives 112th Congress October 8, 2012


The problem leads naturally to a question of what are the Chinese up to?  What do they want?  What are they going to do with it?

"...Malicious Chinese hardware or software implants would also be a potent espionage tool for penetrating sensitive U.S. national security systems, as well as providing access to the closed American corporate networks that contain the sensitive trade secrets, advanced research and development data, and negotiating or litigation positions that China would find useful in obtaining an unfair diplomatic or commercial advantage over the United States..." - Investigative Report on the U.S. National Security Issues Posed by Chinese Telecommunications Companies Huawei and ZTE - A report by Chairman Mike Rogers and Ranking Member C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger of the Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence - U.S. House of Representatives 112th Congress October 8, 2012


"...The Chinese government and Chinese companies have developed joint strategies to influence future developments to the advantage of Chinese ICT products. China’s role in setting international technology standards is likely to increase, and similar strategies are likely to be used in the future in fields beyond ICT, such as pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, medical technology, nanotechnology, virtual reality, and artificial intelligence. Until U.S. leadership takes this vulnerability seriously, it will remain an ‘easy button’ for our adversaries..." - Testimony before the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission Hearing on “China, the United States, and Next Generation Connectivity” March 8, 2018 Jennifer Bisceglie CEO and President of Interos Solutions, Inc.


Now it is revealed that Facebook shares data with Huawei and ZTE (as well as with other Chinese manufacturers and service providers).  The Chinese didn't have to dig for the data.  They didn't have to steal it.  They were given the data by Facebook.

It would be a real stretch of the imagination to believe that the same three letter agencies that visited the company I used to work for do not on a regular basis pay similar visits to Facebook to increase Facebook's awareness of national and corporate security risk areas that needed to be addressed.  After the Chinese hack of Google chased the huge search engine out of China, Google changed its corporate approach to how it dealt with the PRC.

The Russian influenced outcome of the last US election used, in part, Facebook to achieve their goals.  In similar time, Facebook allowed an English firm, Cambridge Analytica, to analyze data and to target users in Cambridge Analytica support of the Trump campaign.  And Facebook has now admitted to be working with China state-actors.  In the face of national security threats, it appears that Facebook has changed little to nothing in the way it conducts its business.

What else has Facebook done?  What other access has Facebook granted to state or private entities that work to shape our minds, ideas, decisions?  How much damage has been done to US democracy, US government institutions, US businesses, and public thinking/feeling on a wide range of topics?

On the face of things I can't help but feel that Facebook requires close regulation, if not outright closure.

We can't just throw up our hands and say there's nothing to be done since the cat is out of the bag anyway.  That, to me, would be a defeatist, non-American approach to a very real and very serious problem.