2 ms·

I fear this is the future. We need plausible deniability and a way to hide that these tools are even being used.

otagekki 3y ago
As long as your Tails and your VeraCrypt utility are in a USB key out of reach from the police, you should be able to plausibly deny.
- boomboomsubban 3y ago
  If they have the ability to take your computer, presumably they have the ability to search your residence. Where would you keep it out if reach while also being able to regularly use it? Or what would you do if the police showed up while using it?
  - ajsnigrutin 3y ago
    https://www.etsy.com/listing/267826934/micro-sd-card-reader-usb-butt-plug-and https://www.etsy.com/listing/267826934/micro-sd-card-reader-... (nsfw... if you can't open it, the url explains it all)
    - boomboomsubban 3y ago
      Having the storage device on your person nearly 24/7 seems like a complete failure on the "plausible deniability" front.
  - CommitSyn 3y ago
    They have electronics sniffing K9s now. https://www.techrepublic.com/article/electronics-sniffing-dogs-how-k9s-became-a-secret-weapon-for-solving-high-tech-crimes/ https://www.techrepublic.com/article/electronics-sniffing-do...
  - otagekki 3y ago
    For your first question, it's a stash at a walkable distance out of your residence. For fingerprints, wrap it up in a condom every time you fetch it. If you live in an apartment complex, store it out of your apartment at a place where people would never look thoroughly: the garbage room, for instance. There should be a way to make the Tails OS in such a way that each time the USB is plugged in, the contents of the flash drive are moved to your computer RAM, so that if you plug it off without running `shutdown` explicitly, not only you'll shut the computer down in 2 seconds, but your USB is also clean. The `shutdown` command being run with the USB still plugged in then copies the image from RAM back to your thumb drive. Your non-destructive shutdown routine will obviously take a lot longer though.
- Pseudonymity 3y ago
  you're over thinking this. The USB does not even necessarily have to be undiscoverable, VeraCrypt is enough. Just put a couple of K on some crypto wallets and hold them in the main volume. The fact that you've got valuable data on the "boring" volume is enough to explain why it is encrypted. If you use an amnesic OS that does not right to the USB and is read only on the hidden volume, you won't be racking up the SMART data clocks on write cycles when within the "interesting" volume, making it look completely like a passive USB, sat there looking pretty and gathering dust just holding your wallets. But even then, you could explain any high usage in the SMART data as it being a random USB you had lying around that you used to use daily, that you decided to throw your wallets on. The SMART data is not timestamped, it's just a total cumulative counter that goes up over the entire life of the device.
FpUser 3y ago
No. We need to government that government does not harass people for doing totally legal things and punishes actual decision makers criminally when they do.
- ajsnigrutin 3y ago
  We need personal responsibility for government officials. There are quite a few people in the whole process from surveillance to arresting and detaining them, that should have noticed, that they did nothing illegal (or atleast are employed there to be the ones who should be noticing stuff like this). Engineer builds a house, uses way less material then needed to be safe, because it saves money,... then house collapses, engineer knew (or should have known) how much concrete/rebar is needed, still approved it, criminal negligence, jail. Why not the same for police, prosecutors, judges, etc.?
  - aakresearch 3y ago
    Absolutely agree with the opening statement. However, the example given suggests that the same principle applied to government would result in endless lockdowns and "safety" measures above any reasonable boundary. Officials' accountability should be pinned to something else, not "safety" and not even "money", I think.
wiml 3y ago
Plausible deniability works great... in a liberal, rule-of-law, legal-by-default society.
ActorNightly 3y ago
Generally, if you are doing something adversarial on a massive scale, plausible deniability is next to meaningless. You aren't going to win in a system that you are trying to fight against. If you are doing something smaller personal means that just happens to be against the law, if you have to resort to plausible deniability, you already fucked up in a lot of ways. The sad truth is that many of the "hackers" are like a few steps away from being script kiddies, without basic understanding of opsec. The actual good people all realized that its much easier to go white hat and get paid reliable salary and live a comfortable life rather than fight an ideological war that doesn't matter in the end.
Pseudonymity 3y ago
Is that not the point of VeraCrypt(formerly TrueCrypt)? Normal everyday OS in Main encrypted volume, then your secret hidden OS in the hidden volume. Should someone make you divulge your password, you give them the one to get access to the normal boring mundane volume, and they have no proof that the other volume exists.

As long as your Tails and your VeraCrypt utility are in a USB key out of reach from the police, you should be able to plausibly deny.

boomboomsubban 3y ago
If they have the ability to take your computer, presumably they have the ability to search your residence. Where would you keep it out if reach while also being able to regularly use it? Or what would you do if the police showed up while using it?
- ajsnigrutin 3y ago
  https://www.etsy.com/listing/267826934/micro-sd-card-reader-usb-butt-plug-and https://www.etsy.com/listing/267826934/micro-sd-card-reader-... (nsfw... if you can't open it, the url explains it all)
  - boomboomsubban 3y ago
    Having the storage device on your person nearly 24/7 seems like a complete failure on the "plausible deniability" front.
- CommitSyn 3y ago
  They have electronics sniffing K9s now. https://www.techrepublic.com/article/electronics-sniffing-dogs-how-k9s-became-a-secret-weapon-for-solving-high-tech-crimes/ https://www.techrepublic.com/article/electronics-sniffing-do...
- otagekki 3y ago
  For your first question, it's a stash at a walkable distance out of your residence. For fingerprints, wrap it up in a condom every time you fetch it. If you live in an apartment complex, store it out of your apartment at a place where people would never look thoroughly: the garbage room, for instance. There should be a way to make the Tails OS in such a way that each time the USB is plugged in, the contents of the flash drive are moved to your computer RAM, so that if you plug it off without running `shutdown` explicitly, not only you'll shut the computer down in 2 seconds, but your USB is also clean. The `shutdown` command being run with the USB still plugged in then copies the image from RAM back to your thumb drive. Your non-destructive shutdown routine will obviously take a lot longer though.
Pseudonymity 3y ago
you're over thinking this. The USB does not even necessarily have to be undiscoverable, VeraCrypt is enough. Just put a couple of K on some crypto wallets and hold them in the main volume. The fact that you've got valuable data on the "boring" volume is enough to explain why it is encrypted. If you use an amnesic OS that does not right to the USB and is read only on the hidden volume, you won't be racking up the SMART data clocks on write cycles when within the "interesting" volume, making it look completely like a passive USB, sat there looking pretty and gathering dust just holding your wallets. But even then, you could explain any high usage in the SMART data as it being a random USB you had lying around that you used to use daily, that you decided to throw your wallets on. The SMART data is not timestamped, it's just a total cumulative counter that goes up over the entire life of the device.

FpUser 3y ago

No. We need to government that government does not harass people for doing totally legal things and punishes actual decision makers criminally when they do.

ajsnigrutin 3y ago
We need personal responsibility for government officials. There are quite a few people in the whole process from surveillance to arresting and detaining them, that should have noticed, that they did nothing illegal (or atleast are employed there to be the ones who should be noticing stuff like this). Engineer builds a house, uses way less material then needed to be safe, because it saves money,... then house collapses, engineer knew (or should have known) how much concrete/rebar is needed, still approved it, criminal negligence, jail. Why not the same for police, prosecutors, judges, etc.?
- aakresearch 3y ago
  Absolutely agree with the opening statement. However, the example given suggests that the same principle applied to government would result in endless lockdowns and "safety" measures above any reasonable boundary. Officials' accountability should be pinned to something else, not "safety" and not even "money", I think.

wiml 3y ago

Plausible deniability works great... in a liberal, rule-of-law, legal-by-default society.

ActorNightly 3y ago

Generally, if you are doing something adversarial on a massive scale, plausible deniability is next to meaningless. You aren't going to win in a system that you are trying to fight against. If you are doing something smaller personal means that just happens to be against the law, if you have to resort to plausible deniability, you already fucked up in a lot of ways. The sad truth is that many of the "hackers" are like a few steps away from being script kiddies, without basic understanding of opsec. The actual good people all realized that its much easier to go white hat and get paid reliable salary and live a comfortable life rather than fight an ideological war that doesn't matter in the end.

Pseudonymity 3y ago

Is that not the point of VeraCrypt(formerly TrueCrypt)? Normal everyday OS in Main encrypted volume, then your secret hidden OS in the hidden volume. Should someone make you divulge your password, you give them the one to get access to the normal boring mundane volume, and they have no proof that the other volume exists.