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It's a tragic precedent that is the result of decades of technical debt. Of course I'm not at all surprised to learn that the feds would rather take more unchec

It's a tragic precedent that is the result of decades of technical debt. Of course I'm not at all surprised to learn that the feds would rather take more unchecked power for themselves than use their mouthpieces to pressure Congress into forcing an industry wide focus on security that has teeth. From top to bottom the internet of things needs to be redesigned to treat every port and every communicated bit as potentially hostile. In the current state of affairs it is not outside the realm of possibilities for a lone actor to use a few RCEs in Windows, *nix, android and iPhones to brick billions of devices overnight. We should be glad that terrorists and nation states are using 0 days with relative discretion for profit and reputation protection instead of destroying critical infrastructure that would take in the range of years to decades to rebuild. I fear that our generation is going to have to learn this lesson the same way the Japanese learned about the horrors of nuclear bombs. Shit. Imagine if stuxnet had been given the capabilities to smoke CPUs, RAM, HDDs or anything else it could get write access to, like water pumps, or pressure regulators.

bostonsre 6y ago
> Of course I'm not at all surprised to learn that the feds would rather take more unchecked power for themselves than use their mouthpieces to pressure Congress into forcing an industry wide focus on security that has teeth. I'm not sure this was an exercise of unchecked power, they got a warrant. I'm also not sure that the FBI has the ability to tell congress what legislation should or should not be enacted. To me, congress seems to be more beholden to their constituents around election time, then lobbyists and the rest of their party the rest of the time. Yes, internet security sucks, but that is the world that we and the FBI find ourselves in. Legislation to fix that fact is somewhat plausible but I don't see it being that simple to enact. Security has always been about making a decision that balances risk with the amount of resources it takes to mitigate security risks. Sure, we could push towards perfect security with legislation, but productivity of companies and the economy will take a large hit and I don't see that as something that legislators can push for and expect to be elected again in the future. Again, yes, our internet security sucks and that is the world we live in. A nation state actor infiltrated the networks of thousands of companies in the united states. The FBI is charged with protecting the citizens of the united states. I'm sure there are a few not so great members of the FBI, but the majority truly believe in fighting to protect our citizens. They followed the law and got a warrant for this action, and assuming they kept their word about what they would and would not touch, they took actions to kick those bad actors off systems of companies in the united states. If a nation state invaded a few thousand residences of our citizens, I would expect nothing less than FBI swat teams going in and solving the issue.
- Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
  Given the stained, with the blood of innocents, history of law enforcement in the USA I'm infinitely skeptical of every action they take that sets new precedent for expansions of their powers. I recognize the need for law enforcement and largely support those involved, however they have earned their reputation with decades of bad decisions and will continue to be the subject of criticism, condemnation, and distrust until they can find it within themselves to relinquish unnecessary powers, right their wrongs, modernize their culture, and prosecute the numerous bad actors in their ranks. As far as warrants go, I don't expect anything with "national security implications" to be denied, ever. Have you heard of the fisa court? >11 denied requests out of around 34,000 granted in 35 years – equivalent to 0.03% https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Court https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intell... I'm not saying we need to burn down the internet and start over. But couldn't we toss 5-10 billion a year to leaders in the software world to design a secure os and hardware from first principles? Is humanity too vulnerable to individual whims like greed and lust for power ends prestige to accomplish such a feat? This country landed a person on the moon with computers less powerful than my cell phone, or laptop. We made the atomic bomb. Humanity is up to the task, I believe our leaders have lost their way and this article is more evidence of that.

bostonsre 6y ago

> Of course I'm not at all surprised to learn that the feds would rather take more unchecked power for themselves than use their mouthpieces to pressure Congress into forcing an industry wide focus on security that has teeth. I'm not sure this was an exercise of unchecked power, they got a warrant. I'm also not sure that the FBI has the ability to tell congress what legislation should or should not be enacted. To me, congress seems to be more beholden to their constituents around election time, then lobbyists and the rest of their party the rest of the time. Yes, internet security sucks, but that is the world that we and the FBI find ourselves in. Legislation to fix that fact is somewhat plausible but I don't see it being that simple to enact. Security has always been about making a decision that balances risk with the amount of resources it takes to mitigate security risks. Sure, we could push towards perfect security with legislation, but productivity of companies and the economy will take a large hit and I don't see that as something that legislators can push for and expect to be elected again in the future. Again, yes, our internet security sucks and that is the world we live in. A nation state actor infiltrated the networks of thousands of companies in the united states. The FBI is charged with protecting the citizens of the united states. I'm sure there are a few not so great members of the FBI, but the majority truly believe in fighting to protect our citizens. They followed the law and got a warrant for this action, and assuming they kept their word about what they would and would not touch, they took actions to kick those bad actors off systems of companies in the united states. If a nation state invaded a few thousand residences of our citizens, I would expect nothing less than FBI swat teams going in and solving the issue.

Red_Leaves_Flyy 6y ago
Given the stained, with the blood of innocents, history of law enforcement in the USA I'm infinitely skeptical of every action they take that sets new precedent for expansions of their powers. I recognize the need for law enforcement and largely support those involved, however they have earned their reputation with decades of bad decisions and will continue to be the subject of criticism, condemnation, and distrust until they can find it within themselves to relinquish unnecessary powers, right their wrongs, modernize their culture, and prosecute the numerous bad actors in their ranks. As far as warrants go, I don't expect anything with "national security implications" to be denied, ever. Have you heard of the fisa court? >11 denied requests out of around 34,000 granted in 35 years – equivalent to 0.03% https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intelligence_Surveillance_Court https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Foreign_Intell... I'm not saying we need to burn down the internet and start over. But couldn't we toss 5-10 billion a year to leaders in the software world to design a secure os and hardware from first principles? Is humanity too vulnerable to individual whims like greed and lust for power ends prestige to accomplish such a feat? This country landed a person on the moon with computers less powerful than my cell phone, or laptop. We made the atomic bomb. Humanity is up to the task, I believe our leaders have lost their way and this article is more evidence of that.