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This is critically different. Part of the issue with intelligence agencies using exploits is that using an exploit often means sending it to somebody untrusted
by XMPPwocky 7y ago
This is critically different. Part of the issue with intelligence agencies using exploits is that using an exploit often means sending it to somebody untrusted (often the target of the attack!)
c2 servers and machines used to deliver exploits are necessarily connected to the internet, and often are from low-tier commercial hosting services- c2.tao.nsa.gov is a bit too easy to attribute, as it turns out.
An IM backdoor could rely on a key kept in an HSM, across an airgapped network allowing only encrypted messages in one direction and decryptions in the other. Assuming the airgapped side only needs to decrypt something like a LEAF, communication over something like serial means almost zero attack surface would be exposed to anything reachable from the internet.
So, yes, you probably can control an IM backdoor significantly better than the NSA can control their offensive tools. Will the government manage that? Ehhhhhhh.
There are much better arguments against an IM backdoor. Saying "the government can't keep it secure" is especially problematic because if that's perceived as the anti-backdoor argument and the government comes up with a secure way to implement a backdoor...well, then, why not do it?
- beagle3 7y agoTheoretically possible, yes. But Snowden and the Shadow Brokers indicate that it is practically much harder.
- XMPPwocky 7y agoAgain, the Shadow Brokers stuff is "a staging server was compromised", which just isn't that related to the problem of securing an IM backdoor. Snowden leaked information he had access to, but measures like storing the key in an HSM (and not allowing it to be extracted) largely mitigate that threat.
- beagle3 7y agoDo you have somewhere I can read on the Shadow Brokers' compromised staging server? I was under the impression that actual source code was released (implying a much deeper break) but seems I was wrong, as no article I could find through Google mentions a source code leak -- but none mention a staging server either.
- acct1771 7y ago> Snowden leaked information he had access to ...which was...everything.
- XMPPwocky 7y agoWhat?
- closeparen 7y agoWhy would the serial protocol be less vulnerable than a network protocol?
- XMPPwocky 7y agoBecause- it shouldn't need to touch almost any code in the OS- the UART can pretty much receive raw bytes. There's no signalling layer besides start/stop. The serial "stack" is tiny- as long as you don't somehow manage to involve the OS's terminal emulation layer, which should generally not be a concern- compared to TCP/IP. there's no risk of accidentally leaving a service listening on the machine it's incompatible with normal network connections- don't really have concerns about somehow connecting it to the Internet. all network adapters on the machine can be disabled, rather than "only one network adapter" But the main point is the reduction of attack surface going from a general purpose networking stack to a bidirectional stream of bytes.
- ronsor 7y agoArguably it's harder to connect back to a C&C server if the serial-connected computer is airgapped, but other than that I can't think of anything.