e-nsecure.net blog - Comments on IT security and Privacy or the lack thereof.
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(mostly in German)
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BLOGDIAL
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Famous for 15 Megapixels
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Beau Bo D'Or blog by an increasingly famous digital political cartoonist.
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HMRC is shite - "dedicated to the taxpayers of Britain, and the employees of the HMRC, who have to endure the monumental shambles that is Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC)."
Head of Legal - Carl Gardner a former legal advisor to the Government
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notes from the ubiquitous surveillance society - blog by Dr. David Murakami Wood, editor of the online academic journal Surveillance and Society
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Big Brother Watch - well connected with the mainstream media, this is a campaign blog by the TaxPayersAlliance, which thankfully does not seem to have spawned Yet Another Campaign Organisation as many Civil Liberties groups had feared.
Spy on Moseley - "Sparkbrook, Springfield, Washwood Heath and Bordesley Green. An MI5 Intelligence-gathering operation to spy on Muslim communities in Birmingham is taking liberties in every sense" - about 150 ANPR CCTV cameras funded by Home Office via the secretive Terrorism and Allied Matters (TAM) section of ACPO.
FitWatch blog - keeps an eye on the activities of some of the controversial Police Forward Intelligence Teams, who supposedly only target "known troublemakers" for photo and video surveillance, at otherwise legal, peaceful protests and demonstrations.
I beleive the German plan to track all lorries has been a total disaster. I think it may have been abandoned just before it was due to be implemented. Ha, Ha, Ha!
Any more info on this? I wonder what 'technological problems' they came up againt.
According to "Annex C Charging Technologies and Existing Schemes" of the Department of Transport's Feasability Study,
http://www.dft.gov.uk/stellent/groups/dft_roads/documents/page/dft_roads_029736.pdf
"C.68 The German lorry charging scheme was originally scheduled to go live in August 2003 but has been delayed. It is now expected to become operational in January 2005 and in a more
advanced form in January 2006."
They have been working on this since 2001 at a cost of at least 730 million Euros (over ?500 million) and this is *only* for HGVs and *only* on motorways.
c.f. our previous posting and comment
http://www.spy.org.uk/spyblog/archives/000049.html
which quotes an article on Risks Digest:
http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/go/risks/22/94/4
"For this purpose, lots of new masts were erected (as if we don't already have enough of this nonsense in Germany), and a beta test was arranged. Shipping companies complained that they were charged toll, although they were using the non-toll road that ran near a toll road. [GPS tolerance miscalculated? Maybe the German mapmakers made some mistakes?]. Others reported happily that they were charged no toll, although they were using a toll road. Some truckers reported the OBU busting its circuit breakers when the ignition in the truck was started."
Anyone have any ideas on jamming this c**p.
The more I think on all this Big Brother stuff, the more angry I become.
Would a neutron device do the job???
You have access to a *portable* neutron source ? Like in the film "Ghostbusters" ? 8-)
Jamming weak satellite signals is not too difficult.
Spoofing or replaying the signals locally so that the GPS tag believes it is in a different location, to defraud the toll systems or to allow criminals to evade electronic tagging "no go zone" restrictions, will become as least as big a business as the sale of cable and satellite tv decoders, radar speed trap detectors etc, all of which are more complicated bits of electronics, if Darling's plans ever get implemented.
I wonder how long it will take for someone to produce a jamming device like with gsm mobile phones...a few of these located at strategic points will render the gsm network useless, especially if high power was used.
the neutron bomb was only a smile :-)
there is the possibility of the government increasing the power of the gsm network on the quite.....so if your tooth filling starts to get warm...BEWARE.
Jamming large parts of the GSM network could be seen as a terrorist attack
http://www.legislation.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00011--b.htm#1
"(e) is designed seriously to interfere with or seriously to disrupt an electronic system."
It would of course, be very easy to track down the jamming equipment.
More subtle protocol based attacks are possible, however.
The recent Birmingham Hodge Hill by election was quite heavily influenced by the debate and health fears regarding Mobile Phone Masts - raising the power of GSM or 3G would increase this sensitive "Middle England" political opposition, so that it unlikely, at least before the General Election.
if the current power levels on gsm masts were upped, this would allow the tagging to be effective even in the inner cities.One should be on the look out for any signs of any proposed increases in power levels.
I really dont know what they are currently, but even a 20% increase would possibly ensure that most of the shadows are covered.
Eeven a change in frequency, would allow for deeper penetration into the shadow areas.
Either way, they seem determined to use this technology and if they go ahead with it in september, then they must of done trials some time back and are ironing out the creases.
Not convinced.
The permitted power levels are set by regulation.
The networks would have to move (expensive, need to re-apply for planning permission etc.) all their existing masts if they did that. The whole point of GSM cells is that they do not share or conflict with the frequencies being used by the neighbouring cells (typically four to six neigbours) - 25 million GSM handsets do not use 25 million different frequencies, only about 256 "colours". If you boost the signal strength of the base station masts, then they start to conflict with the cells beyond the immediate neighbours, causing chaos.
You cannot boost the GSM power of the handsets or tagging devices by 20% (the connection is bi-directional), so the blackspots caused by metallised windows, aluminium backed thermal insulation, or rising damp walls etc will still occur.
Most handsets reduce their power transmiissions when they can, in order to save battery life - which why rural users, with cells up to 35 km in diameter have to recharge more frequently than urban ones, where the cells are smaller.
It is an economic decision as to how many blackspots a network tolerates - if there is enough potential revenue, then they will install micro cell transmitters e.g. in airports or railway stations, but almost certainly not in council estates etc.
There are transient blackspots as well e.g. when there is a traffic jam, all the motorists start using their phones, and any other local users simply cannot connect to the busy cell.
Most of the networks, and indeed some of the protocols, also prioritise voice traffic over data traffic, so again, a busy voice cell as above squeezes out any data trafic which is what a tagging or road tolling system would use.
If someone is willing to pay for extra infrastructure (not me) then it is possible to cover the whole country for tagging or tolling purposes, but not with the present infrastructure which is tuned to existing voice, SMS and data uses.
the logistics would be enormous, but not impossible.We should not under estimate how quicky bills can be passed through the commons to give them the authority to make the changes needed.
off on a tangent though,
does anyone have some pics or no where i can find pics on what the millimeter scanners, used at airports actually see.
thanks
If it is all built on civilian GPS, the technology is subvertible.
1. there is no 'signature' on the signal, so you can spoof it. The Risks digest records incidents of this being done by governments, but it is probably not that hard to do. Once you spoof it, you can devalue the worth. What happens if the "pay zones" move around all the time?
2. None of the satellites, "The constellation", go above 54 degrees north or south. So from the lake district north, the satellites are all to the south, apart from the ones on the other side of the planet poking north. If you are driving down a city with a line of buildings to the south, you may not get a fix. All the scottish cities may suffer from this.
3. GPS has jitters anyway. It is not as bad as when it was degraded by the US government, but it still varies due to unexpected ionospheric conditions (solar storms expand the atmosphere, changing signal propagation and potentially slowing satellite orbits slightly). An incident around 1990 involving a drilling ship with GPS-controlled location is an example of this (see ACM risks digest, as usual).
4. Car owners, have incentives to subvert the system. This is not a GPS navigation system that benefits you -this is a tax-in-the-car. So the sat system would need to be backed up by a vast network of cameras scanning all cars and correlating that with later billing information.
As a software engineer, I find vast schemes like this fascinating in their doomed extravagance. Simple demos in controlled circumstances do not map into systems that resist malicious attacks. Even the London charging system is vulnerable to forged plates and foreign vehicles. Presumably that is why you now need both vehicle ownership proof *and photo ID* to get a number plate made up.
Time to buy cars from abroad. Hey, maybe even time to get irish citizenship by way of a grandparent.
I had a look at the website, but did not see anything that was usuable.The images were too small.There are flaws everywhere and I dabble a lot into vb and c++.
My work is R&D into antennas for vehicles incl sat,gps,gsm,bluetooth etc etc.
I am writing in response to Black Boxs In Cars,. I find this very appealing I welcome the opportunity to discuss this in more detail would be available for through any means possible at anytime.
Bring the steet lights online change the heads of the lamps so they
can SCAN AND SHED SUM LIGHT fit black boxes into cars 3 quarters of
the box will be ssh hub the other quarter will be for the M.O.T TESTER HE/SHE WILL
HAVE a hand held computer to interact with black box NOW YOU HAVE
GOVERNMENT IN CARS
Electronic driving card that slips into a small box under the dash
board just like when you put your floopy disk into your MUM no no no
INTO YOUR COMPUTER the small box will be connected to the BLACK BOX
THAT IS FITED IN THE BOOT OF YOUR CAR WHEN YOU STEP into your mum NO
NO NO YOUR car you slip your SUPREME
ELECTRONIC DRIVING CARD in the slot you then eye ball finger no no no
you finger print now IGNITION ON ITS go go go YOU will have a
microchip windscreen that will be connected to the black box
,,,,,,,now part of you windoz screen is a monitor as you drive under
the lamps and it works out that you are speeding a popup window an the
left hand side or your cars windoz screen will advise you to slow down
if you ignore it a policetraffic division will popup and he/she will
tell YOU TO SLOW DOWN if you ignore you will be awarded with 2 ponts
on your driving card IE YOUR CARD AND YOU AND YOUR CAR WILL BE ON
LINE END OFF ..............
Are YOU unemployed would you like to take part in drive in movie
where it gets projected on to the windscreen inside of car with black
box hook up interact with other cars in complex eat and drink as
much as you like with 16 year olds with no knickers on on
roller-skates severing up the food drinks to the cars max stay for
the cars 20 hours six thousand cars it holds its just like drive in
big mac price for the cars is 45 Pounds per car cheep day night out sound
cums out of your car speakers profit TWO hundred and seventy thousand
a day for more details phone 07092161338
Any screen or even "head up display" constitutes a "driving without due care and attention" criminal offence:
"A Coventry student was stopped by police as he drove his car through the city centre while watching a TV mounted on his dashboard"
http://iccoventry.icnetwork.co.uk/0100news/0100localnews/tm_objectid=14527605&method=full&siteid=50003&headline=driver-caught-watching-tv-name_page.html
Some of the existing road toll technology has infra-red connectivity for parking wardens etc. to check On Board Units through the glass of the windscreen.
6000 x ?45 = ?270,000 *turnover* not PROFIT,
unless you somehow have no expenses for the film, venue hire, projectors, "black boxes", unlimited food and drink, and the alleged "16 year olds with no knickers on on roller-skates severing up the food drinks to the cars"
The Inland Revenue and Her Majesty's Customs and Excise will also want their cut of the "profits" as well.
Is there any way that you can stop the jammer being located? For example, by creating a more or less uniform field by using several jammers?
Does anyone else think that the best way to sabotage this would be to even jam the setups in public when they test each setup? It would delay the project massively.
What "jammer" ? A GPS or even a GSM "jammer" could easily be construed as a something which might fall under section 57 of the Terrorism Acr "Possession for terrorist purpose"
http://www.opsi.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00011--g.htm#57
Alternatively, the new Fraud Bill going through parliament will make it an offence to posses or to offer for sale anything that has been designed or adapted for the purposes of fraud (an enormously wide power, at the discretion of non-technical people )
http://www.publications.parliament.uk/pa/ld200506/ldbills/007/06007.1-5.html#j300
This would easlily cover the low powered GPS signal replay devices I was alluding to earlier.
Gps recieving 'Puck' blocked by Ford heated windscreen wires. Technicians spent ages trying to discover what was wrong!
Food for thought.
eddie