5 ms·

Smart determined people don't come for cheap, and you don't get world class cryptanalysts and mathematicians working on such a specific endeavor out of "determi

by batista 14y ago

Smart determined people don't come for cheap, and you don't get world class cryptanalysts and mathematicians working on such a specific endeavor out of "determination". Plus, we can all guess what wealthy nation-state developed the software and similar things in the past, let's not be hypocritical here...

bcrescimanno 14y ago
I think the point was more that the amount of money it would take would not necessarily come from a "wealthy nation-state." I'm not arguing over who actually did it; but I agree with the above that it's a pretty big leap to include that only. There are a lot of organizations in the world, corporate, criminal, and otherwise, that can muster say $25 million (which, I admit is a number I just pulled out of my ass) to accomplish a monumental task. I'm just not sure that I'm ready to believe that the money amounts we're talking here are restricted only to the wealthiest of nation states. Is the claim that you would need literally billions of dollars to get the smart people and equipment?
- kposehn 14y ago
  That was basically my thinking. The purpose of Flame seems to be clear intelligence gathering, so most likely it is a state actor that wanted it; I wonder however if it was indeed developed by a state or a private group on behalf of a state. Plausible deniability is useful after all.
  - bcrescimanno 14y ago
    Absolutely. I have very little doubt that it was indeed a nation-state who developed it; but, my main issue is with the distinction of it being a "wealthy" one. Couldn't Flame, perhaps, have been developed by Iran and released on themselves as a means for drumming up anti-Israeli or anti-American sentiment? I realize something like that is totally conjecture; but, I don't see it as any further conjecture than, "it must be the US and / or Israel" [Edit] Since somehow this didn't come across in my post; throwing up conjecture at another possible source of Flame outside of US / Israel doesn't mean I believe any of these explanations--my point was merely that both ideas are pure conjecture with little (at least that I'm aware of) evidence to support the claim.
    - johnlepson 14y ago
      The US is not a nation-state.
      - Symmetry 14y ago
        Um, what is it then? Since the 20th Century most inhabitants of the US seem to think of themselves as Americans as opposed to Pennsylvanians or whatever. The US has a few things that look sort of like imperial possessions (e.g. Puerto Rico), but those are a pretty small part.
    - dfc 14y ago
      If Iran developed Flame you think they would chose to use it as a PR stunt over using it for intelligence gathering. From what I understand Iran is more interested in developing nukes than generating bad press for US/Israel.
    - wkw3 14y ago
      Considering that the New York Times this week published a leak from within the administration admitting responsibility for Stuxnet and Duqu, both of which targeted Iran, do you honestly believe that Iran developing Flame as a false flag operation is equally credible?
      - bcrescimanno 14y ago
        No, I don't "honestly believe" that at all; I thought my post made it quite clear that is was pure conjecture. I don't see it as "outside the realm of possibility;" though, it is quite unlikely.
    - scott_s 14y ago
      It depends on how one defines "wealthy." The IMF has Iran at 25th out of 182 wealthiest in the world, World Bank has them at 29 out of 190, and the CIA has them at 25 out of 191 (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nomin... ). I think they're using "wealthy" to mean "wealthy enough for the government to fund non-trivial computer science research."
planetguy 14y ago
Would one smart, determined person, working in his spare time and for his own satisfaction, be capable of doing it? I mean, if I had the capability to screw up Iran's nuclear program in my spare time I probably would, because, y'know, fuck Iran.
- stcredzero 14y ago
  Probably not. There are people who have the math chops, and the coding chops, and the other knowledge around security, but with so many qualifiers, that's getting pretty rare. Several smart, determined people capable of it together would be easier to find, and well within the reach of many nations and large organizations.
- batista 14y ago
  >I mean, if I had the capability to screw up Iran's nuclear program in my spare time I probably would, because, y'know, fuck Iran. Fuck Iran why exactly? Because toppling their democratically elected government and establishing a puppet in the fifties wasn't enough? Or arming Saddam's Iraq to fight them in the eighties? Or maybe because, say, TX can execute 15 year old "criminals" and ban abortion and/or gay marriage, but Iranians don't get to decide how they want to live? Or maybe because what's OK for Saudi Arabia is not OK for everybody? Or is it because they haven't harmed anyone in the region, where other nations have already invaded 2 nearby countries? Or just because, you know, muslims are bad in general? (I don't like the religion myself, but they have the right to do as they damn please in their OWN country).
  - keithpeter 14y ago
    I understand your position here, but, please make contact with some Iranian refugees/dissidents near you for the full picture. Its bad. Worse than I understand Texas to be, by several ball parks.
    - batista 14y ago
      >I understand your position here, but, please make contact with some Iranian refugees/dissidents near you for the full picture. Its bad. Worse than I understand Texas to be, by several ball parks. Sure, but those are "refugees/dissidents", of course they would think that. It's not like the great Iranian masses are held there by force or hate their culture. In general, dissidents are also overplayed for political gain by other countries. I mean, even the USSR played upon US political dissidents, the McCarthy era etc. If you are going to judge a whole country better ask the locals, not the dissidents.
stcredzero 14y ago
you don't get world class cryptanalysts and mathematicians working on such a specific endeavor out of "determination" In World War II, you had such in Poland: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marian_Rejewski http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marian_Rejewski (Who deserves some of the credit for cracking Enigma and thus for the outcome of World War II.) What you can get for lots of money, you can also get for patriotism and somewhat less money. There are over 30 countries with populations over 40 million. Most of these are industrialized. The odds are that they've produced the requisite mathematical talent. The only question is if they've been able to retain and apply it.
- batista 14y ago
  Yes, but I was talking in context here. The level of patriotism you had in Poland in World War II, is nothing like the (far lower) level of patriotism you get of scientists in affluent modern states in no immediate danger. Plus, the rest of the context is the target of the attack and precedence. Given those constraints, one can only thing of 2 such states. And it's not like those "30 countries with populations over 40 million" are not spied to death already, or that they had foreign policy autonomy on the level of making such attacks without asking consent from a certain power.
  - stcredzero 14y ago
    One of those countries is Iran. That said, Japan prior to and during World War II knew of its pressing need, had plenty of patriotism to draw upon, had high levels of education and infrastructure, and still failed to compete in that area.
rhplus 14y ago
According to their careers page[1], the NSA is offering $42K - $97K for mathematicians and $72K - $134K for computer scientists. I'm guessing that's on par with many academic and industrial research positions, especially for the locations they have offices (i.e. not Silicon Valley or New York). [1] http://www.nsa.gov http://www.nsa.gov

by batista 14y ago

bcrescimanno 14y ago

I think the point was more that the amount of money it would take would not necessarily come from a "wealthy nation-state." I'm not arguing over who actually did it; but I agree with the above that it's a pretty big leap to include that only. There are a lot of organizations in the world, corporate, criminal, and otherwise, that can muster say $25 million (which, I admit is a number I just pulled out of my ass) to accomplish a monumental task. I'm just not sure that I'm ready to believe that the money amounts we're talking here are restricted only to the wealthiest of nation states. Is the claim that you would need literally billions of dollars to get the smart people and equipment?

kposehn 14y ago
That was basically my thinking. The purpose of Flame seems to be clear intelligence gathering, so most likely it is a state actor that wanted it; I wonder however if it was indeed developed by a state or a private group on behalf of a state. Plausible deniability is useful after all.
- bcrescimanno 14y ago
  Absolutely. I have very little doubt that it was indeed a nation-state who developed it; but, my main issue is with the distinction of it being a "wealthy" one. Couldn't Flame, perhaps, have been developed by Iran and released on themselves as a means for drumming up anti-Israeli or anti-American sentiment? I realize something like that is totally conjecture; but, I don't see it as any further conjecture than, "it must be the US and / or Israel" [Edit] Since somehow this didn't come across in my post; throwing up conjecture at another possible source of Flame outside of US / Israel doesn't mean I believe any of these explanations--my point was merely that both ideas are pure conjecture with little (at least that I'm aware of) evidence to support the claim.
  - johnlepson 14y ago
    The US is not a nation-state.
    - Symmetry 14y ago
      Um, what is it then? Since the 20th Century most inhabitants of the US seem to think of themselves as Americans as opposed to Pennsylvanians or whatever. The US has a few things that look sort of like imperial possessions (e.g. Puerto Rico), but those are a pretty small part.
  - dfc 14y ago
    If Iran developed Flame you think they would chose to use it as a PR stunt over using it for intelligence gathering. From what I understand Iran is more interested in developing nukes than generating bad press for US/Israel.
  - wkw3 14y ago
    Considering that the New York Times this week published a leak from within the administration admitting responsibility for Stuxnet and Duqu, both of which targeted Iran, do you honestly believe that Iran developing Flame as a false flag operation is equally credible?
    - bcrescimanno 14y ago
      No, I don't "honestly believe" that at all; I thought my post made it quite clear that is was pure conjecture. I don't see it as "outside the realm of possibility;" though, it is quite unlikely.
  - scott_s 14y ago
    It depends on how one defines "wealthy." The IMF has Iran at 25th out of 182 wealthiest in the world, World Bank has them at 29 out of 190, and the CIA has them at 25 out of 191 (source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nominal) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_GDP_(nomin... ). I think they're using "wealthy" to mean "wealthy enough for the government to fund non-trivial computer science research."

planetguy 14y ago

Would one smart, determined person, working in his spare time and for his own satisfaction, be capable of doing it? I mean, if I had the capability to screw up Iran's nuclear program in my spare time I probably would, because, y'know, fuck Iran.

stcredzero 14y ago
Probably not. There are people who have the math chops, and the coding chops, and the other knowledge around security, but with so many qualifiers, that's getting pretty rare. Several smart, determined people capable of it together would be easier to find, and well within the reach of many nations and large organizations.
batista 14y ago
>I mean, if I had the capability to screw up Iran's nuclear program in my spare time I probably would, because, y'know, fuck Iran. Fuck Iran why exactly? Because toppling their democratically elected government and establishing a puppet in the fifties wasn't enough? Or arming Saddam's Iraq to fight them in the eighties? Or maybe because, say, TX can execute 15 year old "criminals" and ban abortion and/or gay marriage, but Iranians don't get to decide how they want to live? Or maybe because what's OK for Saudi Arabia is not OK for everybody? Or is it because they haven't harmed anyone in the region, where other nations have already invaded 2 nearby countries? Or just because, you know, muslims are bad in general? (I don't like the religion myself, but they have the right to do as they damn please in their OWN country).
- keithpeter 14y ago
  I understand your position here, but, please make contact with some Iranian refugees/dissidents near you for the full picture. Its bad. Worse than I understand Texas to be, by several ball parks.
  - batista 14y ago
    >I understand your position here, but, please make contact with some Iranian refugees/dissidents near you for the full picture. Its bad. Worse than I understand Texas to be, by several ball parks. Sure, but those are "refugees/dissidents", of course they would think that. It's not like the great Iranian masses are held there by force or hate their culture. In general, dissidents are also overplayed for political gain by other countries. I mean, even the USSR played upon US political dissidents, the McCarthy era etc. If you are going to judge a whole country better ask the locals, not the dissidents.

stcredzero 14y ago

you don't get world class cryptanalysts and mathematicians working on such a specific endeavor out of "determination" In World War II, you had such in Poland: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marian_Rejewski http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marian_Rejewski (Who deserves some of the credit for cracking Enigma and thus for the outcome of World War II.) What you can get for lots of money, you can also get for patriotism and somewhat less money. There are over 30 countries with populations over 40 million. Most of these are industrialized. The odds are that they've produced the requisite mathematical talent. The only question is if they've been able to retain and apply it.

batista 14y ago
Yes, but I was talking in context here. The level of patriotism you had in Poland in World War II, is nothing like the (far lower) level of patriotism you get of scientists in affluent modern states in no immediate danger. Plus, the rest of the context is the target of the attack and precedence. Given those constraints, one can only thing of 2 such states. And it's not like those "30 countries with populations over 40 million" are not spied to death already, or that they had foreign policy autonomy on the level of making such attacks without asking consent from a certain power.
- stcredzero 14y ago
  One of those countries is Iran. That said, Japan prior to and during World War II knew of its pressing need, had plenty of patriotism to draw upon, had high levels of education and infrastructure, and still failed to compete in that area.

rhplus 14y ago

According to their careers page[1], the NSA is offering $42K - $97K for mathematicians and $72K - $134K for computer scientists. I'm guessing that's on par with many academic and industrial research positions, especially for the locations they have offices (i.e. not Silicon Valley or New York). [1] http://www.nsa.gov http://www.nsa.gov