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GCHQ intercepted foreign politicians' communications at G20 summits

158 points by bcn 13y ago

deftnerd 13y ago
The fact that they talk about how this is nearly routine now would make me expect that the UK might not be a premier destination for international diplomatic conferences for much longer.
swombat 13y ago
I wonder how many more G* meetings will be hosted in the UK or US. On a more serious note, perhaps this will spur further investment in open, reliable encryption technologies around the world. After all, governments can put vast amounts of money into this, that individuals and most companies cannot. And on a further note, I hope that these revelations keep coming, keep the outrage up, and force politicians to realise that they're in the crosshairs too.
- mpyne 13y ago
  In my view it's kind of embarrassing that any nations got caught by this at all, even in 2009 you had VPNs which could be used to setup a secure network over a dumb and unencrypted pipe. If the keyboards are smartcard-capable you could even have possibly used S/MIME. In the worst case, use the telephone in your hotel room to setup a SLIP or PPP connection back home using a known-good and known-clean laptop brought from home. But an Internet cafe? Really?
  - discostrings 13y ago
    It's embarrassing, but it's not surprising. Clearly some of the participating countries were more focused on an economic discussion than a game of cloak and dagger. But there's a lot more to this than countries not taking proper security measures. It's not easy if your "adversary" has a 0-day exploit for your Blackberry that came straight from the company that made it (which may be the case). Seeing secure, totally open hardware come out of this would be great.
    - mpyne 13y ago
      Yes, that would be great... the U.S. uses Blackberries everywhere too and whatever hacks GCHQ or NSA can come up could be found by FSB or others as well. Not to mention the rest of us "average Joes" who would be at risk from insecure phone software.
    - signed0 13y ago
      I wonder if this will cause countries to abandon OSX & Windows in favor of open source software. The bigest takeaway from all of this is that you can't trust closed software that was developed by foreign corporations.
      - mpyne 13y ago
        Firefox logs in to GMail and Facebook just as well as Internet Explorer does, and the open protocols that would be used by OSS are just as susceptible to interception on the wire as the closed protocols used by Skype. I do agree (and have for years) that people with Important Data should rely exclusively on open-source software if it is important that the data is handled properly, but OSS is not a panacea to this by any means.
discostrings 13y ago
It's impossible for business to continue as usual as more of this apparatus is revealed. Both legal changes and more secure technologies are imminent. Let's get working on easy, ubiquitous encryption and secure logon.
tarkin2 13y ago
Reminds me of Clare Short's statement about the British government spying on Kofi Annan[1] in the run up to the Iraq war. [1] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3488548.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3488548.stm
abritishguy 13y ago
Is this legal? I mean they aren't uk nationals so they aren't protected by the normal laws. I'd like to know what, if any, laws were broken or whether this is simply an ethical issue.
- mpyne 13y ago
  Was spying ever legal?
- uh_oh 13y ago
  There is very little international law that governs interactions between nations. Those governments trusted their host. They were betrayed.
  - objclxt 13y ago
    It's embarrassing that it's public, but I highly doubt the countries involved trusted their hosts. Do you really think Russia trusts the UK and the US?
    - signed0 13y ago
      If they did't trust their hosts they wouldn't have used internet cafes. Though they may just be technically inept.
    - vidarh 13y ago
      Russia clearly didn't, given the encrypted satellite phone link for Medvedev, but it appears some others did. And now they know better.
- objclxt 13y ago
  Almost certainly none at all. The UK intelligence services have a remit for espionage against foreign governments. Domestic targeting...that's another, altogether thornier issue. I suppose you could say it was an ethical issue, but I can't imagine attendees not being aware that they were probably under surveillance. I would bet the countries caught out were those inexperienced in high-level foreign intelligence. The Guardian article alludes to this somewhat - it says GCHQ managed to "[target] the Turkish finance minister and possibly 15 others in his party", but only "receive reports from an NSA attempt to eavesdrop on the Russian leader". "Attempt" is the operative word here. It would be incredibly naive for the Russians to go to a G8 conference in the UK and not expect to be bugged - and vice versa, if the conference was in Moscow. It's not as if the spying just stopped when the Cold War ended.
mpyne 13y ago
Not to excuse the interception, but did a "top 20" nation's diplomats really use an Internet cafe to check and send email? Fake cafe or not, that seems like an awfully irresponsible act for what should be sensitive diplomatic traffic. Note that Russia was not nearly so inept; Medvedev's phone calls were encrypted, though NSA tried to decrypt (it's unspecified whether they did). I wonder what Snowden is thinking by leaking the real cloak-and-dagger stuff though. Diplomacy has been at least somewhat adversarial since the world's "second oldest profession" came about, and the flipside to advancing your own citizens' negotiating position by spying is to allow the other nations to conspire against you behind your back. Diplomacy is a dangerous, dangerous game to insert yourself into, Mr. Snowden, and will never have clear friends or enemies.
lambada 13y ago
I'd love to hear more information on what they mean by "penetrated Blackberry's security". Given BlackBerry's current troubles, and their certifications for Government use, this could cause them quite a bit of brand damage.
- discostrings 13y ago
  I wonder if it's related to back doors RIM was forced to include, or security vulnerabilities that RIM shared with these agencies before fixing them. I'm very interested to see where the argument for forcing manufacturers to include back doors goes once events like this are part of the public consciousness.
  - Spearchucker 13y ago
    If the debacle between RIM, India and I think it was Saudi Arabia a year or two ago is anything to go by[1], then it's not a back door as much as giving out the private key to the servers located in a country. India and Saudi got those keys on the threat of disallowing Blackberries in their respective countries. I remember thinking at the time that surely the US would have the keys to US servers. [1] Whenever there's doubt, there is no doubt.
    - lambada 13y ago
      My understanding is that if the phone is linked with a self-hosted Enterprise Server (BES, not hosted by RIM) then RIM don't actually have the keys to hand over. I would have assumed that a government would have enough cash (and sense) to purchase and run its own BES software, keeping the keys out of RIMs hands.
return0 13y ago
Why are spies making powerpoints to brag about their achievements? Aren't these things supposed to be secret?
- drrotmos 13y ago
  Hence the classification "TOP SECRET STRAP 1" at the bottom of the slide.
llamataboot 13y ago
"The September meeting of finance ministers was also the subject of a new technique to provide a live report on any telephone call made by delegates and to display all of the activity on a graphic which was projected on to the 15-sq-metre video wall of GCHQ's operations centre as well as on to the screens of 45 specialist analysts who were monitoring the delegates. "For the first time, analysts had a live picture of who was talking to who that updated constantly and automatically," according to an internal review."
mongol 13y ago
What kind of Powerpoint slides are these? Are the spying agencies trying to "sell" their skills for larger budgets, or what?
- 7952 13y ago
  They even have a cheesy corporate template.
downandout 13y ago
As a software engineer and fan of Tom Clancy novels, I find this fascinating. As an American who would like to be able to do business with people outside the country, I find this worrisome. This type of thing will increase the distrust of Americans (while this occurred in the UK, it was done in conjunction with the NSA). It paints us as diabolical geniuses running around spying on everyone and everything. Many international companies may decide that buying technology or related services from American companies simply isn't worth the risk that there will be some kind of monitoring going on.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
jdp23 13y ago
There's a companion story about the NSA targetting Russian President Medvedev at the G20 summit: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/16/nsa-dmitry-medvedev-g20-summit http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/16/nsa-dmitry-medve...
Silhouette 13y ago
Pointed observation from the article: The disclosure raises new questions about the boundaries of surveillance by GCHQ and its American sister organisation, the National Security Agency, whose access to phone records and internet data has been defended as necessary in the fight against terrorism and serious crime. So, are the diplomatic and political representatives of allied powers suspected criminals or suspected terrorists then? I'm not sure how they can possibly wriggle out of this one without much egg on face, and possibly some significant consequences for diplomatic standing too, with the G8 summit taking place this week.
- objclxt 13y ago
  There's really no diplomatic issue here. There's some egg on face for it becoming public, but spying pre-dates terrorism. Governments spy on other governments. It's what's done. I disagree with the article here. PRISM absolutely raises serious questions about the boundaries of intelligence agencies. But spying on other governments - which is the whole reason for GCHQ existing - that's exactly what these agencies exist to do. It's like all those Russian sleeper agents in the US back in 2010. It was highly embarrassing for Russia, but there was virtually no change to diplomatic or political relations...because it's what spying is about. And exactly the same thing happened a few months ago when Russia threw out a US 'diplomat' (or, as it turned out, CIA agent) for totally botching a recruitment job. Embarrassing for the US, but no diplomatic consequences of any noticeable kind.
  - Silhouette 13y ago
    I agree that spies spying on people is hardly news. As far as any possible diplomatic consequences, it was more idly wondering whether anyone would try to turn the fact that this time it got out to their advantage during the G8. But it doesn't reflect well on all the politicians rushing to defend mass surveillance/dragnet operations on the grounds that these capabilities are only used in serious crime/terrorism/whatever other specific cases they admitted to. It's also rather surprising that some of these tactics were used or worked at all, not because there was any real doubt that these kinds of organisations could use them if they were willing to commit enough resources, but more because anyone attending a high profile event like that actually fell for the tactics and made it worthwhile to bother trying them in the first place.
alan_cx 13y ago
This is precisely what the likes of GCHQ and the NSA are for. I would imagine that any G20 host and it allies would use the opportunity to gather intelligence. I would also assume that where ever it is hosted, many intelligence agencies would be active. If not, then what are these agencies for? They were never designed for crime fighting or mass surveillance of populations. There were and still are for spying on nations. G20 summits are a prime and legit target. IMHO, this is a proper use of such agencies.
- Spearchucker 13y ago
  Whilst I agree with you, Id add that leaks such as this are good anyway, in that they raise awareness and make intelligence gathering capabilities clearer.
- acqq 13y ago
  Maybe Snowden now has enough material to claim that he's a political refugee? Now there are many nations being involved in his leaks.
- zxcdw 13y ago
  What is the moral reasoning behind such agencies? How is it not violating assumed trust between nations for whatever personal/local/domestic gain? I really can't reason about this suff, so someone help me out here. To me the whole existence of such agencies is borderline immoral.
  - barry-cotter 13y ago
    With enemies really, who cares about the morality? They're out to get you, you're out to get them. With allies if you're both spying on each other you are thoroughly in the verify part of "Trust but verify." A decent intelligence network can give one a much higher level of security in one's allies good intentions. Also, morality? Intelligence agencies? This is realpolitik man. If we assume high level politicians resemble executives they're 20% pstchopaths. The other 80% are also quite capable of reasoning amorally about goals and power.
JulianMorrison 13y ago
I love the timing on this. Just exactly when Putin is visiting the UK. So totally deliberate. The Guardian is having fun, but I imagine there are spies out there who are having no fun at all tonight.
6d0debc071 13y ago
I've always found it odd as hell that G20 summits aren't done by teleconferencing with one time pads. It's not like it'd be difficult, given the resources they have, to securely exchange a few TB of stuff for when you wanted really secure chats.
Oculus 13y ago
This shouldn't be a concern to countries because if they are in any way competent, they'd be securing their channels of communication regardless.
Zigurd 13y ago
If you want to go exploring the rabbit hole regarding spying on diplomatic communications, read about Crypto AG: http://rense.com/politics2/crypto.htm http://rense.com/politics2/crypto.htm That drunk Swiss guy that Snowden knew about may be some distant echo of this exploit.

158 points by bcn 13y ago

The fact that they talk about how this is nearly routine now would make me expect that the UK might not be a premier destination for international diplomatic conferences for much longer.

swombat 13y ago

I wonder how many more G* meetings will be hosted in the UK or US. On a more serious note, perhaps this will spur further investment in open, reliable encryption technologies around the world. After all, governments can put vast amounts of money into this, that individuals and most companies cannot. And on a further note, I hope that these revelations keep coming, keep the outrage up, and force politicians to realise that they're in the crosshairs too.

mpyne 13y ago
In my view it's kind of embarrassing that any nations got caught by this at all, even in 2009 you had VPNs which could be used to setup a secure network over a dumb and unencrypted pipe. If the keyboards are smartcard-capable you could even have possibly used S/MIME. In the worst case, use the telephone in your hotel room to setup a SLIP or PPP connection back home using a known-good and known-clean laptop brought from home. But an Internet cafe? Really?
- discostrings 13y ago
  It's embarrassing, but it's not surprising. Clearly some of the participating countries were more focused on an economic discussion than a game of cloak and dagger. But there's a lot more to this than countries not taking proper security measures. It's not easy if your "adversary" has a 0-day exploit for your Blackberry that came straight from the company that made it (which may be the case). Seeing secure, totally open hardware come out of this would be great.
  - mpyne 13y ago
    Yes, that would be great... the U.S. uses Blackberries everywhere too and whatever hacks GCHQ or NSA can come up could be found by FSB or others as well. Not to mention the rest of us "average Joes" who would be at risk from insecure phone software.
  - signed0 13y ago
    I wonder if this will cause countries to abandon OSX & Windows in favor of open source software. The bigest takeaway from all of this is that you can't trust closed software that was developed by foreign corporations.
    - mpyne 13y ago
      Firefox logs in to GMail and Facebook just as well as Internet Explorer does, and the open protocols that would be used by OSS are just as susceptible to interception on the wire as the closed protocols used by Skype. I do agree (and have for years) that people with Important Data should rely exclusively on open-source software if it is important that the data is handled properly, but OSS is not a panacea to this by any means.

discostrings 13y ago

It's impossible for business to continue as usual as more of this apparatus is revealed. Both legal changes and more secure technologies are imminent. Let's get working on easy, ubiquitous encryption and secure logon.

tarkin2 13y ago

Reminds me of Clare Short's statement about the British government spying on Kofi Annan[1] in the run up to the Iraq war. [1] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3488548.stm http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/3488548.stm

abritishguy 13y ago

Is this legal? I mean they aren't uk nationals so they aren't protected by the normal laws. I'd like to know what, if any, laws were broken or whether this is simply an ethical issue.

mpyne 13y ago
Was spying ever legal?
uh_oh 13y ago
There is very little international law that governs interactions between nations. Those governments trusted their host. They were betrayed.
- objclxt 13y ago
  It's embarrassing that it's public, but I highly doubt the countries involved trusted their hosts. Do you really think Russia trusts the UK and the US?
  - signed0 13y ago
    If they did't trust their hosts they wouldn't have used internet cafes. Though they may just be technically inept.
  - vidarh 13y ago
    Russia clearly didn't, given the encrypted satellite phone link for Medvedev, but it appears some others did. And now they know better.
objclxt 13y ago
Almost certainly none at all. The UK intelligence services have a remit for espionage against foreign governments. Domestic targeting...that's another, altogether thornier issue. I suppose you could say it was an ethical issue, but I can't imagine attendees not being aware that they were probably under surveillance. I would bet the countries caught out were those inexperienced in high-level foreign intelligence. The Guardian article alludes to this somewhat - it says GCHQ managed to "[target] the Turkish finance minister and possibly 15 others in his party", but only "receive reports from an NSA attempt to eavesdrop on the Russian leader". "Attempt" is the operative word here. It would be incredibly naive for the Russians to go to a G8 conference in the UK and not expect to be bugged - and vice versa, if the conference was in Moscow. It's not as if the spying just stopped when the Cold War ended.

mpyne 13y ago

Not to excuse the interception, but did a "top 20" nation's diplomats really use an Internet cafe to check and send email? Fake cafe or not, that seems like an awfully irresponsible act for what should be sensitive diplomatic traffic. Note that Russia was not nearly so inept; Medvedev's phone calls were encrypted, though NSA tried to decrypt (it's unspecified whether they did). I wonder what Snowden is thinking by leaking the real cloak-and-dagger stuff though. Diplomacy has been at least somewhat adversarial since the world's "second oldest profession" came about, and the flipside to advancing your own citizens' negotiating position by spying is to allow the other nations to conspire against you behind your back. Diplomacy is a dangerous, dangerous game to insert yourself into, Mr. Snowden, and will never have clear friends or enemies.

lambada 13y ago

I'd love to hear more information on what they mean by "penetrated Blackberry's security". Given BlackBerry's current troubles, and their certifications for Government use, this could cause them quite a bit of brand damage.

discostrings 13y ago
I wonder if it's related to back doors RIM was forced to include, or security vulnerabilities that RIM shared with these agencies before fixing them. I'm very interested to see where the argument for forcing manufacturers to include back doors goes once events like this are part of the public consciousness.
- Spearchucker 13y ago
  If the debacle between RIM, India and I think it was Saudi Arabia a year or two ago is anything to go by[1], then it's not a back door as much as giving out the private key to the servers located in a country. India and Saudi got those keys on the threat of disallowing Blackberries in their respective countries. I remember thinking at the time that surely the US would have the keys to US servers. [1] Whenever there's doubt, there is no doubt.
  - lambada 13y ago
    My understanding is that if the phone is linked with a self-hosted Enterprise Server (BES, not hosted by RIM) then RIM don't actually have the keys to hand over. I would have assumed that a government would have enough cash (and sense) to purchase and run its own BES software, keeping the keys out of RIMs hands.

return0 13y ago

Why are spies making powerpoints to brag about their achievements? Aren't these things supposed to be secret?

drrotmos 13y ago
Hence the classification "TOP SECRET STRAP 1" at the bottom of the slide.

llamataboot 13y ago

"The September meeting of finance ministers was also the subject of a new technique to provide a live report on any telephone call made by delegates and to display all of the activity on a graphic which was projected on to the 15-sq-metre video wall of GCHQ's operations centre as well as on to the screens of 45 specialist analysts who were monitoring the delegates. "For the first time, analysts had a live picture of who was talking to who that updated constantly and automatically," according to an internal review."

mongol 13y ago

What kind of Powerpoint slides are these? Are the spying agencies trying to "sell" their skills for larger budgets, or what?

7952 13y ago
They even have a cheesy corporate template.

downandout 13y ago

As a software engineer and fan of Tom Clancy novels, I find this fascinating. As an American who would like to be able to do business with people outside the country, I find this worrisome. This type of thing will increase the distrust of Americans (while this occurred in the UK, it was done in conjunction with the NSA). It paints us as diabolical geniuses running around spying on everyone and everything. Many international companies may decide that buying technology or related services from American companies simply isn't worth the risk that there will be some kind of monitoring going on.

deleted 13y ago
[deleted]

jdp23 13y ago

There's a companion story about the NSA targetting Russian President Medvedev at the G20 summit: http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/16/nsa-dmitry-medvedev-g20-summit http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jun/16/nsa-dmitry-medve...

Silhouette 13y ago

Pointed observation from the article: The disclosure raises new questions about the boundaries of surveillance by GCHQ and its American sister organisation, the National Security Agency, whose access to phone records and internet data has been defended as necessary in the fight against terrorism and serious crime. So, are the diplomatic and political representatives of allied powers suspected criminals or suspected terrorists then? I'm not sure how they can possibly wriggle out of this one without much egg on face, and possibly some significant consequences for diplomatic standing too, with the G8 summit taking place this week.

objclxt 13y ago
There's really no diplomatic issue here. There's some egg on face for it becoming public, but spying pre-dates terrorism. Governments spy on other governments. It's what's done. I disagree with the article here. PRISM absolutely raises serious questions about the boundaries of intelligence agencies. But spying on other governments - which is the whole reason for GCHQ existing - that's exactly what these agencies exist to do. It's like all those Russian sleeper agents in the US back in 2010. It was highly embarrassing for Russia, but there was virtually no change to diplomatic or political relations...because it's what spying is about. And exactly the same thing happened a few months ago when Russia threw out a US 'diplomat' (or, as it turned out, CIA agent) for totally botching a recruitment job. Embarrassing for the US, but no diplomatic consequences of any noticeable kind.
- Silhouette 13y ago
  I agree that spies spying on people is hardly news. As far as any possible diplomatic consequences, it was more idly wondering whether anyone would try to turn the fact that this time it got out to their advantage during the G8. But it doesn't reflect well on all the politicians rushing to defend mass surveillance/dragnet operations on the grounds that these capabilities are only used in serious crime/terrorism/whatever other specific cases they admitted to. It's also rather surprising that some of these tactics were used or worked at all, not because there was any real doubt that these kinds of organisations could use them if they were willing to commit enough resources, but more because anyone attending a high profile event like that actually fell for the tactics and made it worthwhile to bother trying them in the first place.

alan_cx 13y ago

This is precisely what the likes of GCHQ and the NSA are for. I would imagine that any G20 host and it allies would use the opportunity to gather intelligence. I would also assume that where ever it is hosted, many intelligence agencies would be active. If not, then what are these agencies for? They were never designed for crime fighting or mass surveillance of populations. There were and still are for spying on nations. G20 summits are a prime and legit target. IMHO, this is a proper use of such agencies.

Spearchucker 13y ago
Whilst I agree with you, Id add that leaks such as this are good anyway, in that they raise awareness and make intelligence gathering capabilities clearer.
acqq 13y ago
Maybe Snowden now has enough material to claim that he's a political refugee? Now there are many nations being involved in his leaks.
zxcdw 13y ago
What is the moral reasoning behind such agencies? How is it not violating assumed trust between nations for whatever personal/local/domestic gain? I really can't reason about this suff, so someone help me out here. To me the whole existence of such agencies is borderline immoral.
- barry-cotter 13y ago
  With enemies really, who cares about the morality? They're out to get you, you're out to get them. With allies if you're both spying on each other you are thoroughly in the verify part of "Trust but verify." A decent intelligence network can give one a much higher level of security in one's allies good intentions. Also, morality? Intelligence agencies? This is realpolitik man. If we assume high level politicians resemble executives they're 20% pstchopaths. The other 80% are also quite capable of reasoning amorally about goals and power.

JulianMorrison 13y ago

I love the timing on this. Just exactly when Putin is visiting the UK. So totally deliberate. The Guardian is having fun, but I imagine there are spies out there who are having no fun at all tonight.

6d0debc071 13y ago

I've always found it odd as hell that G20 summits aren't done by teleconferencing with one time pads. It's not like it'd be difficult, given the resources they have, to securely exchange a few TB of stuff for when you wanted really secure chats.

Oculus 13y ago

This shouldn't be a concern to countries because if they are in any way competent, they'd be securing their channels of communication regardless.

Zigurd 13y ago

If you want to go exploring the rabbit hole regarding spying on diplomatic communications, read about Crypto AG: http://rense.com/politics2/crypto.htm http://rense.com/politics2/crypto.htm That drunk Swiss guy that Snowden knew about may be some distant echo of this exploit.