5 ms·

Kremlin turns back to typewriters to avoid security leaks

16 points by giorgiofontana 13y ago

ColinWright 13y ago
Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6031114 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6031114 Other submissions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026289 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026289 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026605 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026605 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026661 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026661 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6034914 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6034914
zachlatta 13y ago
Any advantages this would have over a computer without an internet connection?
- kryten 13y ago
  Yes: no software, no ports, all media is tangible, no storage, hard to fingerprint (compared to say inkjets). However there is one problem with typewriters people generally forget: you can extract everything that has been typed from used typewriter ribbons...
  - ams6110 13y ago
    Typewriters are trivial to fingerprint. All of them have slight imperfections in characters, spacing, alignment. A cloth ribbon would be hard to extract anything from, I'd think, maybe you could with a brand new one. Carbon film ribbons as used in the Selectric yes, you can easily read them but they can be shredded or burned to dispose of them securely.
- trestles 13y ago
  bradley manning used cd's and supposedly edward snowden has a bunch of usb drives. Solves a very reasonable problem
- ams6110 13y ago
  Computer displays can be read remotely by their RF emissions. At least it was possible with CRT displays. Not sure if LCD displays have this characteristic.
  - DanBC 13y ago
    There is immense amount of work on audio, possibly coming from the need to discover and identify submarines. It is easier to tell what a typist is typing from their audio signature than it is to TEMPEST a monitor, especially now with modern EMC requirements cutting down the usable signal. Some people used to have "low emission fonts"; fuzzy edges in very low contrast.
    - Daniel_Newby 13y ago
      Worse, these are electric typewriters, allowing for remote power line snooping.
    - keithpeter 13y ago
      http://freesound.org/people/keithpeter/sounds/123344/ http://freesound.org/people/keithpeter/sounds/123344/ Anyone care to process this clip? I might even have the 'plain text' around somewhere. On a serious note; I used to get about 5 carbons max on a mechanical office typewriter years go using 'onion skin' paper. Photocopiers mostly use scanners these days? Back to square one?
    - D9u 13y ago
      The electrical emanations from the typewriter can be used to detect the characters typed regardless of whether or not an electronic display is used, and TEMPEST, which is a method of securing electronic devices, will protect the typewriter's emanations from outside detection, and, as mentioned by Daniel_Newby, electric typewriters are vulnerable to power line reading, but if the system is entirely disconnected from any external power source, as TEMPEST dictates, and the entire facility is held to TEMPEST standards, then the typewriter will be secured against external eavesdropping. Any attempts at picking up audio|electronic emanations will be foiled by traditional TEMPEST type protection. Typewriter ribbons can be dealt with by old fashioned incineration. The only way to acquire a signal would be by infiltration of the facility housing the targeted systems.
popee 13y ago
Imagine. Steampunk typewriter with something like Arduino for Ethernet/TCP/IP/SSH support :-)
- DanBC 13y ago
  You can buy conversion kits for typewriters, to convert them to USB. (http://www.usbtypewriter.com/ http://www.usbtypewriter.com/)
- gamegoblin 13y ago
  I actually have fantasies about going back to the late 1800s and making a hyper-simple steampunk style internet with telegraph wires and whatnot. You'd have 'servers' which set up static pages in some analog format (akin to moveable type) which could then be easily coded and decoded across the wire and printed onto a ticker of some sort. You could have a set of panels that flipped to one side of the other (black or white) to form a rudimentary display, maybe 256x128 or something.
liveinoakland 13y ago
like BSG

Discussion: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6031114 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6031114 Other submissions: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026289 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026289 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026605 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026605 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026661 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6026661 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6034914 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6034914

zachlatta 13y ago

Any advantages this would have over a computer without an internet connection?

kryten 13y ago
Yes: no software, no ports, all media is tangible, no storage, hard to fingerprint (compared to say inkjets). However there is one problem with typewriters people generally forget: you can extract everything that has been typed from used typewriter ribbons...
- ams6110 13y ago
  Typewriters are trivial to fingerprint. All of them have slight imperfections in characters, spacing, alignment. A cloth ribbon would be hard to extract anything from, I'd think, maybe you could with a brand new one. Carbon film ribbons as used in the Selectric yes, you can easily read them but they can be shredded or burned to dispose of them securely.
trestles 13y ago
bradley manning used cd's and supposedly edward snowden has a bunch of usb drives. Solves a very reasonable problem
ams6110 13y ago
Computer displays can be read remotely by their RF emissions. At least it was possible with CRT displays. Not sure if LCD displays have this characteristic.
- DanBC 13y ago
  There is immense amount of work on audio, possibly coming from the need to discover and identify submarines. It is easier to tell what a typist is typing from their audio signature than it is to TEMPEST a monitor, especially now with modern EMC requirements cutting down the usable signal. Some people used to have "low emission fonts"; fuzzy edges in very low contrast.
  - Daniel_Newby 13y ago
    Worse, these are electric typewriters, allowing for remote power line snooping.
  - keithpeter 13y ago
    http://freesound.org/people/keithpeter/sounds/123344/ http://freesound.org/people/keithpeter/sounds/123344/ Anyone care to process this clip? I might even have the 'plain text' around somewhere. On a serious note; I used to get about 5 carbons max on a mechanical office typewriter years go using 'onion skin' paper. Photocopiers mostly use scanners these days? Back to square one?
  - D9u 13y ago
    The electrical emanations from the typewriter can be used to detect the characters typed regardless of whether or not an electronic display is used, and TEMPEST, which is a method of securing electronic devices, will protect the typewriter's emanations from outside detection, and, as mentioned by Daniel_Newby, electric typewriters are vulnerable to power line reading, but if the system is entirely disconnected from any external power source, as TEMPEST dictates, and the entire facility is held to TEMPEST standards, then the typewriter will be secured against external eavesdropping. Any attempts at picking up audio|electronic emanations will be foiled by traditional TEMPEST type protection. Typewriter ribbons can be dealt with by old fashioned incineration. The only way to acquire a signal would be by infiltration of the facility housing the targeted systems.

popee 13y ago

Imagine. Steampunk typewriter with something like Arduino for Ethernet/TCP/IP/SSH support :-)

DanBC 13y ago
You can buy conversion kits for typewriters, to convert them to USB. (http://www.usbtypewriter.com/ http://www.usbtypewriter.com/)
gamegoblin 13y ago
I actually have fantasies about going back to the late 1800s and making a hyper-simple steampunk style internet with telegraph wires and whatnot. You'd have 'servers' which set up static pages in some analog format (akin to moveable type) which could then be easily coded and decoded across the wire and printed onto a ticker of some sort. You could have a set of panels that flipped to one side of the other (black or white) to form a rudimentary display, maybe 256x128 or something.

liveinoakland 13y ago

like BSG