NSA/GCHQ Accused of Hacking Belgian Cryptographer

There has been a lot of news about Belgian cryptographer Jean-Jacques Quisquater having his computer hacked, and whether the NSA or GCHQ is to blame. There have been a lot of assumptions and hyperbole, mostly related to the GCHQ attack against the Belgian telecom operator Belgacom.
I'm skeptical. Not about the attack, but about the NSA's or GCHQ's involvement. I don't think there's a lot of operational value in most academic cryptographic research, and Quisquater wasn't involved in practical cryptanalysis of operational ciphers. I wouldn't put it past a less-clued nation-state to spy on academic cryptographers, but it's likelier this is a more conventional criminal attack. But who knows? Weirder things have happened.

TRINITY: NSA Exploit of the Day

Today's item from the NSA's Tailored Access Operations (TAO) group implant catalog:

TRINITY (TS//SI//REL) TRINITY is a miniaturized digital core packaged in a Multi-Chip Module (MCM) to be used in implants with size constraining concealments.
(TS//SI//REL) TRINITY uses the TAO standard implant architecture. The architecture provides a robust, reconfigurable, standard digital platform resulting in a dramatic performance improvement over the obsolete HC12 microcontroller based designs. A development Printed Circuit Board (PCB) using packaged parts has been developed and is available as the standard platform. The TRINITY Multi-Chip-Module (MCM) contains an ARM9 microcontroller, FPGAA, Flash and SDRAM memories.
Status: Special Order due vendor selected.
Unit Cost: 100 units: $625K

Page, with graphics, is here. General information about TAO and the catalog is here.

Another Fake NSA Codename Generator

Generate your own fake TAO implant. This is even more fun than the fake NSA program generator.
Sadly, the NSA will probably use these to help develop their R&D roadmap.

SWAP: NSA Exploit of the Day

Today's item from the NSA's Tailored Access Operations (TAO) group implant catalog:

SWAP (TS//SI//REL) SWAP provides software application persistence by exploiting the motherboard BIOS and the hard drive's Host Protected Area to gain periodic execution before the Operating System loads.
(TS//SI//REL) This technique supports single or multi-processor systems running Windows, Linux, FreeBSD, or Solaris with the following file systems: FAT32, NTFS, EXT2, EXT3, or UFS1.0.
(TS//SI//REL) Through remote access or interdiction, ARKSTREAM is used to reflash the BIOS and TWISTEDKILT to write the Host Protected Area on the hard drive on a target machine in order to implant SWAP and its payload (the implant installer). Once implanted, SWAP's frequency of execution (dropping the playload) is configurable and will occur when the target machine powers on.
Status: Released / Deployed. Ready for Immediate Delivery
Unit Cost: $0

Page, with graphics, is here. General information about TAO and the catalog is here.

Dispute Resolution Systems for Security Protocols

Interesting paper by Steven J. Murdoch and Ross Anderson in this year's Financial Cryptography conference: "Security Protocols and Evidence: Where Many Payment Systems Fail."

Abstract: As security protocols are used to authenticate more transactions, they end up being relied on in legal proceedings. Designers often fail to anticipate this. Here we show how the EMV protocol -- the dominant card payment system worldwide -- does not produce adequate evidence for resolving disputes. We propose five principles for designing systems to produce robust evidence. We apply these to other systems such as Bitcoin, electronic banking and phone payment apps. We finally propose specific modifications to EMV that could allow disputes to be resolved more efficiently and fairly.

SOMBERKNAVE: NSA Exploit of the Day

Today's item from the NSA's Tailored Access Operations (TAO) group implant catalog:

SOMBERKNAVE (TS//SI//REL) SOMBERKNAVE is Windows XP wireless software implant that provides covert internet connectivity for isolated targets.
(TS//SI//REL) SOMBEKNAVE is a software implant that surreptitiously routes TCP traffic from a designated process to a secondary network via an unused embedded 802.11 network device. If an Internet-connected wireless Access Point is present, SOMBERKNAVE can be used to allow OLYMPUS or VALIDATOR to "call home" via 802.11 from an air-gapped target computer. If the 802.11 interface is in use by the target, SOMBERKNAVE will not attempt to transmit.
(TS//SI//REL) Operationally, VALIDATOR initiates a call home. SOMBERKNAVE triggers from the named event and tries to associate with an access point. If connection is successful, data is sent over 802.11 to the ROC. VALIDATOR receives instructions, downloads OLYMPUS, then disassociates and gives up control of the 802.11 hardware. OLYMPUS will then be able to communicate with the ROC via SOMBERKNAVE, as long as there is an available access point.
Status: Available -- Fall 2008
Unit Cost: $50K

Page, with graphics, is here. General information about TAO and the catalog is here.

1971 Social Engineering Attack

From Betty Medsger's book on the 1971 FBI burglary (page 22):

As burglars, they used some unusual techniques, ones Davidon enjoyed recalling years later, such as what some of them did in 1970 at a draft board office in Delaware. During their casing, they had noticed that the interior door that opened to the draft board office was always locked. There was no padlock to replace, as they had done at a draft board raid in Philadelphia a few months earlier, and no one in the group was able to pick the lock. The break-in technique they settled on at that office must be unique in the annals of burglary. Several hours before the burglary was to take place, one of them wrote a note and tacked it to the door they wanted to enter: "Please don't lock this door tonight." Sure enough, when the burglars arrived that night, someone had obediently left the door unlocked. The burglars entered the office with ease, stole the Selective Service records, and left. They were so pleased with themselves that one of them proposed leaving a thank-you note on the door. More cautious minds prevailed. Miss Manners be damned, they did not leave a note.