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> The real motivation is that the Kremlin loves to spy on its own citizens. And they already did that for a long time. This doesn't prevent or help Russia from

> The real motivation is that the Kremlin loves to spy on its own citizens. And they already did that for a long time. This doesn't prevent or help Russia from spying on its own citizens. I get that you are anxious. But the traffic that travels from your computer to servers outside of Russia is just as easy to spy on for Russian intelligence services as the case where the servers are located inside the country. It does, however, make it more difficult for the US to spy on Russian citizens, which it has been caught trying to do.

int_19h 10y ago
No, it does make a huge difference, actually. If the traffic is travelling to outside servers, it can be encrypted, and there's no mitigation that they can do to get access. But if it ends up on the servers inside the country, they control the endpoint where it has to be decrypted to be processed. Then it becomes a kind of a reverse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SORM#SORM-2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SORM#SORM-2 set-up, with every prominent service provider having a preinstalled tap for the agencies.
- soundwave106 10y ago
  I wonder what the Kremlin thinks of Livejournal.ru these days? Livejournal's a "back in the 2000s" memory for most of the English world, but as far as I know, Livejournal.ru is the top blogging-oriented network in Russia (http://blog.webcertain.com/targeting-russia-the-top-8-russian-social-networks-you-need-to-know/07/07/2014/ http://blog.webcertain.com/targeting-russia-the-top-8-russia...). Also as far as I know, LJ's servers are still in the USA.
- jwtadvice 10y ago
  Mentioned this in another thread off the same converasion: Russia intelligence services can almost certainly break consumer grade encryption.
  - zzzcpan 10y ago
    There is no supporting infrastructure for this at the moment, even if you presume, that they stole secret keys from some CAs.
    - jwtadvice 10y ago
      Are you claiming that the Russian government doesn't have a domestic surveillance infrastructure?
      - zzzcpan 10y ago
        Technically it has, but only for unencrypted communications and without cooperation from internet companies. Which they really want to change with all the new laws and everything.
        jwtadvice 10y ago
        So the assertion is that Russian intelligence services cannot thwart encryption, including the encryption that it standardized for civilian use? If this were true, I would feel very comfortable speaking about politics in Russia, as in the United States all consumer-grade encryption is being broken by our intelligence services.
        zzzcpan 10y ago
        There is no "encryption for civilian use", they did, however, standardize the encryption for government use.
        int_19h 10y ago
        I'm not sure what you mean by "civilian use encryption". If it's SSL, then I don't see how they would have the means - so far as I know, it's still cryptographically secure, and unlike US, they can't just force certificate authorities to cooperate and allow them to do MITM. There have been some attempts by the ISPs to enable MITM, but it's very crude - they basically block SSL, except for their own custom root certificate that they explicitly require you to install, and then they use that to MITM you. It's all very blatant, and I think there was only one ISP actually trying to do it. Also, I'm not aware of any cases of dissenters caught because their encryption was broken. Most people who get persecuted for their views said all the things they did out in the open, either to make a stand, or because they were careless.
nothrabannosir 10y ago
But the traffic that travels from your computer to servers outside of Russia is just as easy to spy on for Russian intelligence services as the case where the servers are located inside the country. Ehh.. no? TLS protects the data against snooping, but only borders protect you from warrants. Russia based servers are subject to Russian law and warrants.
- jwtadvice 10y ago
  > TLS protects the data against snooping I see that the tacit assumption in this thread is that the FSB can't defeat simple consumer encryption. The certificates in Russian citizens' browsers allow the Russian government to intercept their communications. This is just one of hundreds of weaknesses to that belief.
  - tobltobs 10y ago
    I guess everbody wants to know now how those certificates are included in Russian citizens browsers. Care to enlighten us? And while you are at it you could also tell us how this regulation > make it more difficult for the US to spy on Russian citizens ???
    - jwtadvice 10y ago
      Sure. > everbody wants to know now how those certificates are included in Russian citizens browsers. Included in the builds. > And while you are at it you could also tell us how this regulation make it more difficult for the US to spy on Russian citizens The traffic will stay inside of infrastructure controlled by the Russian government through its domestic ISPs, rather than exiting the country to ingestion nodes disclosed by Snowden to be used to surveil on internet traffic.
      - tobltobs 10y ago
        > Included in the builds. Russian citizens download and install specially crafted builds instead of the officials ones? Are they forced, or do they they trust those FSB builds more? > The traffic will stay inside of infrastructure controlled by the Russian government through its domestic ISPs, rather than exiting the country. I guess we are not talking about the same, because the the regulation doesn't dictate this. It "just" says, that there has to be a copy of the data in Russia. The server can still be outside of Russia.
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]

int_19h 10y ago

No, it does make a huge difference, actually. If the traffic is travelling to outside servers, it can be encrypted, and there's no mitigation that they can do to get access. But if it ends up on the servers inside the country, they control the endpoint where it has to be decrypted to be processed. Then it becomes a kind of a reverse https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SORM#SORM-2 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SORM#SORM-2 set-up, with every prominent service provider having a preinstalled tap for the agencies.

soundwave106 10y ago
I wonder what the Kremlin thinks of Livejournal.ru these days? Livejournal's a "back in the 2000s" memory for most of the English world, but as far as I know, Livejournal.ru is the top blogging-oriented network in Russia (http://blog.webcertain.com/targeting-russia-the-top-8-russian-social-networks-you-need-to-know/07/07/2014/ http://blog.webcertain.com/targeting-russia-the-top-8-russia...). Also as far as I know, LJ's servers are still in the USA.
jwtadvice 10y ago
Mentioned this in another thread off the same converasion: Russia intelligence services can almost certainly break consumer grade encryption.
- zzzcpan 10y ago
  There is no supporting infrastructure for this at the moment, even if you presume, that they stole secret keys from some CAs.
  - jwtadvice 10y ago
    Are you claiming that the Russian government doesn't have a domestic surveillance infrastructure?
    - zzzcpan 10y ago
      Technically it has, but only for unencrypted communications and without cooperation from internet companies. Which they really want to change with all the new laws and everything.
      - jwtadvice 10y ago
        So the assertion is that Russian intelligence services cannot thwart encryption, including the encryption that it standardized for civilian use? If this were true, I would feel very comfortable speaking about politics in Russia, as in the United States all consumer-grade encryption is being broken by our intelligence services.
        zzzcpan 10y ago
        There is no "encryption for civilian use", they did, however, standardize the encryption for government use.
        int_19h 10y ago
        I'm not sure what you mean by "civilian use encryption". If it's SSL, then I don't see how they would have the means - so far as I know, it's still cryptographically secure, and unlike US, they can't just force certificate authorities to cooperate and allow them to do MITM. There have been some attempts by the ISPs to enable MITM, but it's very crude - they basically block SSL, except for their own custom root certificate that they explicitly require you to install, and then they use that to MITM you. It's all very blatant, and I think there was only one ISP actually trying to do it. Also, I'm not aware of any cases of dissenters caught because their encryption was broken. Most people who get persecuted for their views said all the things they did out in the open, either to make a stand, or because they were careless.

nothrabannosir 10y ago

But the traffic that travels from your computer to servers outside of Russia is just as easy to spy on for Russian intelligence services as the case where the servers are located inside the country. Ehh.. no? TLS protects the data against snooping, but only borders protect you from warrants. Russia based servers are subject to Russian law and warrants.

jwtadvice 10y ago
> TLS protects the data against snooping I see that the tacit assumption in this thread is that the FSB can't defeat simple consumer encryption. The certificates in Russian citizens' browsers allow the Russian government to intercept their communications. This is just one of hundreds of weaknesses to that belief.
- tobltobs 10y ago
  I guess everbody wants to know now how those certificates are included in Russian citizens browsers. Care to enlighten us? And while you are at it you could also tell us how this regulation > make it more difficult for the US to spy on Russian citizens ???
  - jwtadvice 10y ago
    Sure. > everbody wants to know now how those certificates are included in Russian citizens browsers. Included in the builds. > And while you are at it you could also tell us how this regulation make it more difficult for the US to spy on Russian citizens The traffic will stay inside of infrastructure controlled by the Russian government through its domestic ISPs, rather than exiting the country to ingestion nodes disclosed by Snowden to be used to surveil on internet traffic.
    - tobltobs 10y ago
      > Included in the builds. Russian citizens download and install specially crafted builds instead of the officials ones? Are they forced, or do they they trust those FSB builds more? > The traffic will stay inside of infrastructure controlled by the Russian government through its domestic ISPs, rather than exiting the country. I guess we are not talking about the same, because the the regulation doesn't dictate this. It "just" says, that there has to be a copy of the data in Russia. The server can still be outside of Russia.

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]