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Mass snooping fake mobile towers 'uncovered in UK'
- tomtoise 11y agoThe Mets stance on this to me seals any doubt about their involvement in deploying these boxes. I've been watching developments in the surveillance state in the UK with some concern, this just puts the final nail in the coffin. You can't defend such dragnet surveillance techniques as 'terrorist prevention'. How can I make a difference? I don't want my country to become America 2.0 (It's already starting to look like that with water cannons on standby, internet filtering and now this).
- jalfresi 11y agoIt's become so ridiculous that I'm really, seriously considering wether having a mobile phone on me for my convenience is worth the constant surveillance.
- abluecloud 11y agoThen you go home, open you laptop and communicate with people over the internet. What's the difference.
- TazeTSchnitzel 11y agoYour phone knows your location.
- eterm 11y agoYour phone is your location.
- Jtsummers 11y agoIf the phone is powered on it allows for (potential) pervasive location tracking. Your communications can be listened to whether mobile or a home computer, but all that using your home computer reveals (by using it, not the contents) is that you're home. Using your mobile reveals that you're at Starbucks or on I-40 stuck in traffic, or that you're frequently connected to the same tower as some other persons of interest. And that's what can be known before observing the actual contents of the communication.
- dredmorbius 11y agoIn addition to other responses (particularly location data): VPN or Tor usage from a desktop is, for now at least, more viable from desktop than mobile. Desktops can also have camera(s) and / or mics disable more readily than phones.
- wumbernang 11y agoBetter cover your face as well. There are 11 cameras within 50m of my house in London.
- tomtoise 11y agoMandatory 4 lions link; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dss_9FmCqtg https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dss_9FmCqtg
- wumbernang 11y agoHahahaha. That's such a good film and a good reference too.
- sancha_ 11y agoNo offense, but I always thought the UK is surveillance state #1 in the world and the US follows a close second. Why? There is no country in the world with more public surveillance cameras, and they were always playing ball with the US when it came to mass collection of citizens data.
- abluecloud 11y agoI agree, and most of the public don't even care.
- anon1385 11y ago>There is no country in the world with more public surveillance cameras Do you have a source for that? Every discussion of the number of CCTV cameras in the UK I've seen has always been talking about both public and private cameras (with by far the majority being private). Also I assume you meant to say per capita. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed-circuit_television#United_Kingdom https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Closed-circuit_television#Unit...
- sancha_ 11y agoYes, per capita, e.g. this article says there is one camera for every eleven people in the UK. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/10172298/One-surveillance-camera-for-every-11-people-in-Britain-says-CCTV-survey.html http://www.telegraph.co.uk/technology/10172298/One-surveilla...
- Silhouette 11y agoBut most of those cameras are privately held for things like security in small shops or around homes or garages. They aren't connected to some centralised Big Brother database. In fact, the authorities probably don't even know most of them are there until, say, the police turn up to investigate a theft from a shop and the owner offers relevant CCTV footage to help the investigation. There are also a lot of state-controlled cameras monitoring places like public spaces in big cities, and we do have things like ANPR cameras monitoring lots of our roads, and there are genuine and legitimate privacy concerns about these technologies and how they are used. But please let's keep any discussion of them proportionate and based on the facts not the FUD. There are greater threats to privacy in this country than cameras that show you where the queues on the roads are before you set off to your London job in the morning.
- dazc 11y ago"You can't defend such dragnet surveillance techniques as 'terrorist prevention'. How can I make a difference?" I'm beginning to think the police in the UK have lost all interest in normal law enforcement - maybe it's just too much hard work?
- jwdunne 11y agoThe police are facing and have experienced funding cuts. I wonder if CCTV is a more efficient approach than PCSOs.
- dazc 11y agoGetting out on the street by foot would seem to be a good way of deterring and clearing up a lot of petty crime and anti-social behaviour? It would save a fortune on transport costs too. PCSOs are just pointless.
- jwdunne 11y agoI think PCSOs do deter from petty crime when patrolling, especially teenagers in deprived areas.
- crimsoneer 11y agoPlease, please can we stop with the attitude that PCSOs are pointless. They certainly are not. To deter low level crime - the only type of crime "foot patrol" prevents - a PCSO is far, far better value for money than a PC. We are losing any ability to conduct neighbourhood policing, and that's entirely because the public fetishises police officer numbers, so we fire a bunch of far cheaper, more competent and specialized police staff. A lot of crime prevention and fighting is walking through areas, talking to people and giving out leaflets. You really want PCs doing that and being paid for it?
- dazc 11y ago"A lot of crime prevention and fighting is walking through areas, talking to people and giving out leaflets. You really want PCs doing that and being paid for it?" Yes I do. I get the impression that a lot of petty crime happens because the perpetrators know there is a negligible chance of being caught in the act. Having police officers 'walking about' may be seen as a waste of resources by senior police officers looking to make easy cost savings. I don't think most law abiding people would agree? I am wrong to say PCSOs are 'useless'. They are a better than nothing solution, maybe?
- fweespeech 11y ago> I don't want my country to become America 2.0 (It's already starting to look like that with water cannons on standby, internet filtering and now this). It already is America 2.0 with all the cameras and transport surveillance the FBI wished they had. ;)
- rudolf0 11y agoThe UK is actually much less progressive than the US when it comes to censorship and filtering. There is no Internet filtering of any kind by any ISP in the US; it's illegal for a common carrier to filter traffic in that way. Some lobbyists are pushing ISPs to block access to sites that allow copyright infringement, but nothing of that nature has started yet. The UK is very arguably also less progressive in terms of surveillance and espionage; GCHQ seems to be even more unethical than NSA, going by a few dozen of the leaked presentations.
- lmm 11y ago"progressive" is very much the wrong term to use here. Many of the worst measures have been pushed by parties that position themselves as "conservatives".
- themeek 11y agoNo filtering by ISP, though there has been plenty of legislation with an attempt to set this up. The filtering happens at the content provider level - Youtube, Twitter, Facebook, etc.
- blackbagboys 11y agoPeople in the UK not infrequently face criminal sanction for things as petty as rude or obnoxious tweets, so I'd argue that the situation is actually quite a bit worse than in America.
- swombat 11y agoPeople travelling to the US have been turned away at the border for humorous tweets... so I'd argue the situation is equally bad there. Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16810312 http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-16810312
- mineshaftgap 11y agoPeople in the UK do jail time for offensive tweets, that is quite a bit different.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- lotsofcows 11y agoYeah, we seem to prefer the "freedom of speech is a responsibility not a right" angle. Personally, I agree.
- Plough_Jogger 11y agoWater cannons are actually fairly uncommon in the US; the preferred water-based crowd deterrent is the fire hose.
- randomname2 11y agoThe UK has always been much worse than the US in that regard. Often you'll see the US only adopt such measures after a "trial run" in the UK.
- mcintyre1994 11y ago> You can't defend such dragnet surveillance techniques as 'terrorist prevention'. Of course they can. They'll never be made to tell us who they were targeting or what they collected and I'm sure if they need to make a statement the government will lend them a counter terrorism team to stand with for the cameras. It's the easy thing to do, I doubt they'll do anything else if push comes to shove (unless Theresa May needs another anti-extremism news story I guess). I think you were getting at the fact it's a ridiculous response to the supposed threat - I agree, but unfortunately at this point I don't think there's much the government won't do if they can call it terrorist prevention.
- themeek 11y agoMass surveillance is about terrorism. It's just not only about terrorism, or mostly about terrorism. When terrorism is invoked what the public is left with is, 'oh it's used for that so that's what it's intended for'. Surveillance is about power, plain and simple. Surveillance is information and this is the information age. Information is a weapon and it drives the world. Intelligence on persons of interest, propaganda, censorship, 21st century census operations, information for guiding policy, protest and riot management, aid in background checks, information support for public affairs and diplomacy, detection of cyber attacks - all of these things are enabled by massive data collection and analysis systems. There are hints, from the Snowden docs especially, and from others, that these systems are used for these purposes. So yeah, they are used for terrorism. In the US when the Attorney General did an investigation into why the brothers hadn't been caught by the FBI and National Counter Terrorism Center, it did just that. The report named the NSA two times - ones in the opening paragraph and once in the appendix. FBI use NSA intelligence to support investigations, but the NSA is not in charge of counter-terrorism. Other agencies have asks of the NSA and yes - I think it was Drake, but maybe it was Binney? - whistleblowers have reported on these capabilities being used to do background checks (in this case on Obama before he ran for President); they've been used against journalism outfits (the Associated Press); they've been used in cyberwar; they've been used for corporate espionage; their fusion centers have been used to target political parties (Tea Party) and protests (Occupy); the UK used them for propaganda in the Falkin Islands. Dragnet surveillance is not about terrorism. Or rather, it is not, has never been, and will never be merely about terrorism.
- harkyns_castle 11y agoIn terms of making a difference, I think we face the "tyranny of the majority". Whilst a lot of "us" feel strongly about where this is all going, it seems like the average Joe just hears from the media: "Its to protect you from XYZ threat of the month". Annoys me greatly.
- teddyuk 11y agoIs this why mobile phone data access is so shit in london?
- wumbernang 11y agoUpvote for funny. Its pretty ok on O2 4G for me. Everything else seems congested.
- Mikushi 11y agoSame experience, on 3G with Three it's shody at best, but with EE 4G I get 30 to 40Mbps
- Silhouette 11y agoWe have noticed a very striking degradation in performance of all our 3G connections (multiple work and personal ones, on multiple mobile networks) in recent years, with a particularly obvious drop around the time 4G became a big deal. It could just be coincidental of course, because obviously in terms of radio signals they shouldn't interfere. However, our more cynical parts can't help wondering whether resources previously used to support 3G networks are being redirected over time towards the new and more profitable 4G services, leaving those still using the same 3G at the same price with fewer stations to connect with, less regular maintenance, etc.
- benashford 11y agoI noticed something similar, but note OFCOM is allowing operators to use any part of their allocations for 4G services. I'm wondering if they're reusing some of their 2G and 3G bandwidth for 4G services.
- Silhouette 11y agoThe standard PR seems to be that network operators claim they aren't doing this and continue to develop their 2G and 3G capacity in parallel, with any degradations in performance being due to supporting increased loads and therefore contention on those 2G and 3G networks. Meanwhile, just about everybody who actually uses mobile networks seems to tell roughly the same story that I did before, and there seem to have been occasional more rigorous/scientific surveys that showed a definite, measurable drop in service quality on 2G and 3G over the relevant time period.
- rlpb 11y ago> Met Commissioner Bernard Hogan-Howe told Sky News: "We're not going to talk about it, because the only people who benefit are the other side, and I see no reason in giving away that sort of thing." Apply the same logic to the justice system and courts would operate behind closed doors. The public needs to know because it is the public who is supposed to oversee the authorities via the polling booth. The public should be able to assess whether the supposed benefits of this practice are valid and decide whether they want their privacy violated in order to get these benefits.
- anon1385 11y ago>Apply the same logic to the justice system and courts would operate behind closed doors. That has already happened: http://www.theguardian.com/law/2013/jun/14/what-are-secret-courts http://www.theguardian.com/law/2013/jun/14/what-are-secret-c...
- madaxe_again 11y agoYup. They quashed all powerful opposition to this pretty brutally. Ended a close family friend's career as a high court judge and suicided his wife, as he vehemently opposed this. You'll know him as a pedophilia apologist from the press. Court transcripts tell a very different story. Dark times.
- pjc50 11y agoMost of the press play a big part in supporting this kind of nastiness, sadly.
- madaxe_again 11y agoAnd it comes from the highest possible levels - or at least so it appears - the BBC and many other outlets carried a video-bite of David Cameron condemning the poor man.
- x5n1 11y agoi am shocked, shocked i tell you
- mhax 11y agoAfter the Snowden leaks, none of this should be surprising. Still makes me cringe though, just to have it confirmed.
- JonnieCache 11y agoDon't miss the "All the data captured by the investigation has been put in a Google document" link that points to a 50mb file called "Complete BB firewall logs.rtf," which I'm sure will be of interest.
- indeed30 11y agoHave you had a look at it? There's no location information that I can see so the usefulness is somewhat limited. There are 160 lines with "Suspicion: LOW" or higher, but I'm really not sure what I'm looking at. If someone with a bit more domain expertise could point out the smoking gun here, it could be very interesting.
- qrmn 11y agoIMSI catchers are transceivers. They are not hard to find, they are easily triangulated: they literally broadcast their location. Honestly, denying their usage is remarkably pointless. If you want a location, then I suggest: grab a spectrum analyser; head to Knightsbridge; tell me what happens when you get close to Hans Crescent; then look on the corner and guess why. And, don't take your phone. Obviously.
- dogshoes 11y agoI'm curious, but not in London. All I could see on Google Street View, which is likely old, is a standard cell site on the A4 in that area. https://www.google.com/maps/@51.499897,-0.163137,3a,49y,276.26h,126.63t/data=!3m4!1e1!3m2!1sF_Y8Dd9elLdFrCH-eyALcg!2e0 https://www.google.com/maps/@51.499897,-0.163137,3a,49y,276.... Would you happen to have a picture of the install they have in that area?
- grkvlt 11y agoI believe he's referring to the Ecuadorian Embassy located on that street, where Mr Assange is located presently. There are obvious reasons (WikiLeaks) for keeping track surreptitiously of those visiting him.
- snorrah 11y agoIt's almost guaranteed that whenever something privacy-invading gets uncovered in the US, it shortly is found in the UK too. If I didn't know better, I'd think the UK government have an 'anything you can do, we can do better' attitude about their orwellian antics.
- wumbernang 11y agoActually most of it is talk, then a hastily pushed through bill, then a technological measure, then a pile of consultancy, then a pile of tendering, then armies of consultants filing expenses for 5 years, then a royal fuck up due to nothing been delivered, then some resignations and reassignments, then a sudden declaration of success based on something purely coincidental that looked like the first grand idea was the answer. That is literally every government project here in the UK.
- xedarius 11y agoHow about I have something on my phone that verifies I'm connected to an authentic provider tower, and not connect to anything else. Another thing to think about, if it's happening in the UK, it's probably happening in your own country too.
- keithpeter 11y agoIf the Stingray units are only $1000, and if the manufacturing company is prepared to keep purchases confidential as suggested by the OA, I'd imagine these units are being bought by a variety of agencies in many countries. I'm wondering what they gather: I'm guessing that if I were to walk past one, it would be able to log a unique identifier in my phone. Then I presume it could log future visits to the area. Is this all it is? Same effect as having a CID officer in an unmarked car with a flask and an empty 2.5 litre coke bottle?
- nitrogen 11y agoIs this all it is? Same effect as having a CID officer in an unmarked car with a flask and an empty 2.5 litre coke bottle? There is not much to be learned about pervasive, 24/7 dragnet surveillance from comparing it to one officer in one location. They are completely different concepts with different consequences. An officer can track a few people for a short time. Stingrays and the like can build an ongoing narrative about everyone who passes them, criminal or innocent.
- keithpeter 11y agoOver time yes, I agree. Factual question: What can Stingray collect? Is it 'device number NNN was in my capture range at 095627 on June 11th 2015' and then the local police have to analyse the data over time? Or can they get more precise location information by triangulating with several Stingrays?
- AnoniMoose 11y agoFactual Answer: Logging of IMSI (sim card ID) and IMEI (phone ID). Potentially also logging pTMSI (temporary IMSI used over the air), MSISDN (phone number). You should be able to get good idea of the handsets distance from the station based on timing delay. As it's acting as a full fake site it could potentially be used to deny service, drain the battery, MiTM outgoing SMS & phone calls, possibly use the E911 provision to request GPS location from the handset too...
- darkhorn 11y agoWhy they use such tools? In Turkey police can listen any phone from the police station. Because all telecommunication companies are required to give access to their network and even if you are the owner of the telecommunication company you cannot know when is your custemers being listened.
- schoen 11y agoCell site simulators can be used for location tracking even when a device is isn't actively communicating at the application layer. (However, the carriers may already know that information as well, and might be required to turn it over to police too.) Edit: also, you can use a cell site simulator without telling anyone who you are, whom you're interested in, or what legal authority (if any) you claim to have to monitor them.
- darkhorn 11y agoYes, cell towers log all connections (I don't mean phone calls or SMS). And we see news like "the criminals telephone was in this area two months ago", "these people were here according the cell towers". I'm talking about Turkey again. Of course the police needs warrant to get these kind of logs. Even the web sites need to log what IP was connected to them, which is pretty lame.
- schoen 11y agoIn the U.S. these things are kept incredibly secret (even through strenuous efforts to keep the details out of court testimony) and it takes many years to learn more about them.
- voxic11 11y agoBecause you need a court order to get that information in many countries. These devices allow police to bypass the courts oversight.
- darkhorn 11y ago
- upofadown 11y agoLast I heard, the Harris Stingrays were licensed for "emergency use only" in the US. So how are these things licensed in the UK?
- themeek 11y agoEmergancy use in the US (I'm not sure if this has changed) has in practice meant very liberal use and sometimes statewide blanket coverage (e.g. Florida).
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- tomlongson 11y agoAre there any ways to ensure your phone is not interacting with a Stingray device? It was not long ago that the FBI was revealed to be using them from light aircraft routinely: http://bgr.com/2015/06/03/fbi-dirtbox-stingray-spy-plane-program/ http://bgr.com/2015/06/03/fbi-dirtbox-stingray-spy-plane-pro...
- flashman 11y agoHow would I go about building an IMSI catcher? Preferably supporting LTE.
- abawany 11y agoHere is an open-source one as reference: https://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?fdfilter=imsi&fdid=com.SecUpwN.AIMSICD https://f-droid.org/repository/browse/?fdfilter=imsi&fdid=co...
- xyzzy123 11y agoI tested it out with OpenBTS and a USRP1; that configuration definitely works. Also needed a high-precision clock board (ClockTamer). I ran with 2G only. For 3G/4G/LTE there's network authentication, so "in theory" you can't do it... I've read a bunch of stuff which says you're supposed to be able to jam or disrupt non-2G frequencies to force a fallback to 2G... however, I'd expect a telco van to turn up if you tried this for more than a short period of time (the ranges you'd want to jam are massive) and I didn't try it for obvious reasons. BUT - what I found in practice (2011, field testing on an island near Auckland NZ) was that a surprising amount of stuff would just straight up camp to a 2G base station, presumably because the signal was stronger. You don't need LTE if the phone is happy to look for the best signal. I didn't analyse what models of phone did this, it seemed like everything did at the time. A more interesting approach which I haven't tried involves downloading a several GB of rainbow tables and cracking TMSIs with kraken; no idea how well that works in practice.
- omginternets 11y agoLet's talk about the real travesty here: making the data available ... in RTF format -__-