4 ms·

They are now part of Marvell Technology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavium Wonder if agreeing to enable NSA backdoors th

by rdtsc 3y ago

They are now part of Marvell Technology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavium https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cavium Wonder if agreeing to enable NSA backdoors they agreed to be compensated when eventually that fact is leaked. "If nobody starts buying your chips, don't worry, we will! ... and then promptly throw them into the recycling bin" Also interesting is if Marvell knew their acquired tech had this "cool feature".

deleted 3y ago
[deleted]
KingLancelot 3y ago
[dead]
rvnx 3y ago
The agreement with the NSA is more likely like this: "if you don't comply, you will get arrested / fined for whatever reason (crypto exports issues or failure to comply with the law), maybe even by another authority, or journalists may discover your little things about X. If you comply we may help you with some tips occasionally to make sure our partnership is working well, or just not reveal your trade secrets to your competitors"
- delfinom 3y ago
  Yea, people forget we literally have a secret kangaroo FISA court being abused to issue "national security letters" with rubber stamp that demanded compliance and threatened to throw you in jail for resisting and/or talking about it. The Patriot Act largely was responsible for it, but even now they've wiggled to other avenues since the Patriot Act expired.
- bananapub 3y ago
  er...what? why do you think any of that has happened? we already saw this happen in public once with Qwest: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2007/10/qwest-ceo-nsa-punished-qwest-refusing-participate-illegal-surveillance-pre-9-11 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2007/10/qwest-ceo-nsa-punished...
  - AdmiralAsshat 3y ago
    Happened to Yahoo as well, IIRC: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/11/yahoo-nsa-lawsuit-documents-fine-user-data-refusal https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/11/yahoo-nsa-laws...
  - hedora 3y ago
    It’s happened at least three times. They got Yahoo’s CEO to [bypass SOX compliance and] hand over access to 500 million email accounts. Last I heard, she said they convinced her she wasn’t allowed to ask corporate lawyers for guidance. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/04/yahoo-secret-email-program-nsa-fbi https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/04/yahoo-sec... Both she and Yahoo’s shareholders suffered greatly for complying. There’s also Crypto AG, which was a foreign-owned CIA front that spied on US allies: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/11/crypto-ag-cia-bnd-germany-intelligence-report https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/11/crypto-ag-ci... The Washington Post article is now bullshit-walled, but goes into more details. One of my favorite parts of the story is that the intelligence agency handlers needed to make sure they only hired incompetent / mediocre engineers and mathematicians at the actual company (algorithm and backdoor design was done at a US government agency that employed competent people). One day, a brilliant woman applied for a job. She aced the interview, and there were concerns she might be too smart, but upper management hired her on the grounds that the interview results were probably spurious. She was just a woman, after all. She ended up exposing and fixing their backdoors pretty quickly, which caused a huge containment problem for them.
    - dylan604 3y ago
      > Last I heard, she said they convinced her she wasn’t allowed to ask corporate lawyers for guidance. To me, anyone purporting to be an official government employee advising you that you cannot speak to an attorney throws up so many red flags, that I just can't imagine it being anything but sinister.
      - hedora 3y ago
        If an official government employee is already apparently breaking the law and also threatening you personally, you need to ask yourself whether they'll worry about continuing to break the law in order to make good on their threats. Note that none of the people that coerced Mayer into breaking the law have been disciplined or even named, so I guess they didn't need to worry about such things after all. I've heard EFF and corporate lawyers advise people to never speak to law enforcement under any circumstances. The reason is that the police are allowed to lie about their intentions and the facts of the case, and if you say something that is incorrect, you can be prosecuted for lying to them. So, for example, they can spew a bunch of lies and trick you into incorrectly speculating ("Since Jim was waving that gun at you, then I guess he really did buy it after all"), and then later, you need to prove (probably without the benefit of a recording) that it should have been clear to the officers that it was just speculation, or you go to jail. Their advice boiled down to politely and repeatedly respond with "I want my lawyer". At least one court has ruled that failing to respond at all to a question (even after repeatedly asking for a lawyer) means that you're now responding (perhaps with body language) and the interrogation is therefore admissible.

by rdtsc 3y ago

deleted 3y ago

[deleted]

KingLancelot 3y ago

[dead]

rvnx 3y ago

The agreement with the NSA is more likely like this: "if you don't comply, you will get arrested / fined for whatever reason (crypto exports issues or failure to comply with the law), maybe even by another authority, or journalists may discover your little things about X. If you comply we may help you with some tips occasionally to make sure our partnership is working well, or just not reveal your trade secrets to your competitors"

delfinom 3y ago
Yea, people forget we literally have a secret kangaroo FISA court being abused to issue "national security letters" with rubber stamp that demanded compliance and threatened to throw you in jail for resisting and/or talking about it. The Patriot Act largely was responsible for it, but even now they've wiggled to other avenues since the Patriot Act expired.
bananapub 3y ago
er...what? why do you think any of that has happened? we already saw this happen in public once with Qwest: https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2007/10/qwest-ceo-nsa-punished-qwest-refusing-participate-illegal-surveillance-pre-9-11 https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2007/10/qwest-ceo-nsa-punished...
- AdmiralAsshat 3y ago
  Happened to Yahoo as well, IIRC: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/11/yahoo-nsa-lawsuit-documents-fine-user-data-refusal https://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/sep/11/yahoo-nsa-laws...
- hedora 3y ago
  It’s happened at least three times. They got Yahoo’s CEO to [bypass SOX compliance and] hand over access to 500 million email accounts. Last I heard, she said they convinced her she wasn’t allowed to ask corporate lawyers for guidance. https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/04/yahoo-secret-email-program-nsa-fbi https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2016/oct/04/yahoo-sec... Both she and Yahoo’s shareholders suffered greatly for complying. There’s also Crypto AG, which was a foreign-owned CIA front that spied on US allies: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/11/crypto-ag-cia-bnd-germany-intelligence-report https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/feb/11/crypto-ag-ci... The Washington Post article is now bullshit-walled, but goes into more details. One of my favorite parts of the story is that the intelligence agency handlers needed to make sure they only hired incompetent / mediocre engineers and mathematicians at the actual company (algorithm and backdoor design was done at a US government agency that employed competent people). One day, a brilliant woman applied for a job. She aced the interview, and there were concerns she might be too smart, but upper management hired her on the grounds that the interview results were probably spurious. She was just a woman, after all. She ended up exposing and fixing their backdoors pretty quickly, which caused a huge containment problem for them.
  - dylan604 3y ago
    > Last I heard, she said they convinced her she wasn’t allowed to ask corporate lawyers for guidance. To me, anyone purporting to be an official government employee advising you that you cannot speak to an attorney throws up so many red flags, that I just can't imagine it being anything but sinister.
    - hedora 3y ago
      If an official government employee is already apparently breaking the law and also threatening you personally, you need to ask yourself whether they'll worry about continuing to break the law in order to make good on their threats. Note that none of the people that coerced Mayer into breaking the law have been disciplined or even named, so I guess they didn't need to worry about such things after all. I've heard EFF and corporate lawyers advise people to never speak to law enforcement under any circumstances. The reason is that the police are allowed to lie about their intentions and the facts of the case, and if you say something that is incorrect, you can be prosecuted for lying to them. So, for example, they can spew a bunch of lies and trick you into incorrectly speculating ("Since Jim was waving that gun at you, then I guess he really did buy it after all"), and then later, you need to prove (probably without the benefit of a recording) that it should have been clear to the officers that it was just speculation, or you go to jail. Their advice boiled down to politely and repeatedly respond with "I want my lawyer". At least one court has ruled that failing to respond at all to a question (even after repeatedly asking for a lawyer) means that you're now responding (perhaps with body language) and the interrogation is therefore admissible.