Security considerations . . .

A copper wallet insert shields your credit cards from RFID skimming.
Image: Adam Harvey

Get a Faraday wallet. Something with a lining made of copper, or steel mesh or even aluminum foil. Or add aluminum foil to the inside of the wallet you have. With one of those, “they” can “ping” you as you walk about, and the RFID’s in your credit cards and sometimes, Driver’s Licence, are shielded, and they stay silent. 

As well, street gangs and other low-lifes are getting into using ’em to identify targets to pick off, and it is alleged that they have the ability to even get through the RFID card security, get the data, and dupe an RFID card with your data.

You see, it occurs to me that the NSA could easily have all the banks' credit card data, and that means the banks' credit card RFID's chip ID’s for each account. 

So, it could be possible for “Security” to put RFID scanners all around, like TTC station exits, parking-lot doorways. Computer scan the passers-by and RFID’s belonging to “people of interest” could trip alarms. 

Similarly with your phone and its GPS, even “off” may not be off enough, and having a Faraday container will ensure that nobody can track you through your phone's GPS or by the phone's link-up with the cellular phone system. You may not be able to use your phone, but you will be a lot more “invisible” on the street, if you’re about something that you’d like to remain private.

WIRED has two reports worth checking out: Liz Stinson has an overview of security-oriented products, with an article and a Stealth Wear picture gallery, “Wanna Buy a Parka That Makes You Invisible to Drones?”, and a How-To Wiki, “Make a Faraday Cage Wallet”.

Duct Tape RULES!

A mystery in the desert . . .

— One half of the mystery. Big. —

WHAT ARE THEY UP TO? According to WIRED, it's big and mysterious and in the desert of western China: "What Did Google Earth Spot in the Chinese Desert? Even an Ex-CIA Analyst Isn’t Sure". One thing, whatever they're doing, it doesn't need a lot of water. Logistically, it's a hump.

How to win friends and influence people . . .

Hardeep Puri was asked to remove his turban at airport security, Indian media report

THE BEEB has a delightful account on how the US insists on groping turbans worn by Indian diplomats who have diplomatic immunity to that kind of thing. This, after subjecting the Indian ambassador to a search earlier this year. And the war in FUBAR province continues . . . 

Land o' Spooks . . .

TOP-SECRET AMERICA is the Washington Post's report on the burgeoning US espionage industry. According to the Post, some 850,000 Americans have Top-Secret security clearance. It could be a major cluster-fuck: how many spooks do you really need? WIRED magazine wonders, in an article on the Post's report, "Search “Top Secret America” Database of Private Spooks":

With too many analysts and too many capabilities documenting too much, with too few filters in place to sort out the useful stuff or discover hidden connections, the information overload has become its own information blackout. “We consequently can’t effectively assess whether it is making us more safe,” a retired Army three-star general who recently assessed the system tells the reporters.

Seabus bomb scare

RCMP detonated a fishing rod in a tube mistakenly left behind at the Seabus Terminal in North Vancouver yesterday, so that's one less Olympic terrorist incident to worry about.

The suspicious package was discovered at 2:30pm and detonated at 5pm after city blocks were evacuated and buses, all CNR trains on the waterfront area and the SeaBus harbour ferry connecting North Vancouver to downtown Vancouver were halted for three hours while RCMP helicopter Air One circled overhead and dog and explosive disposal units and a bomb-diffusing robot combed the area.

The Province : "RCMP spokesman Const. Michael McLauchlin said there is no longer a threat to anyone."

If you Facebook . . .

IF YOU ARE ONE OF THE FACEBOOK FLOCK, this little item by Robert Lemos, on MIT's Technology Review site may be worthy of your attention. 

Now, researchers at the University of Waterloo in Ontario have developed a browser plug-in to help users keep their information private from prying eyes and from social-network providers as well. Urs Hengartner, an assistant professor of computer science, and his colleagues say the plug-in replaces sensitive information in a user's profile and news feed with meaningless text that can only be unscrambled by trusted friends or contacts. Dubbed FaceCloak, the tool assures its users that sensitive data stays private.

The University of Waterloo researchers attempt to hide which users are encrypting their data with FaceCloak by replacing the hidden data with arbitrary text taken from sources on the Internet. "Users who submit encrypted information stand out, both to Facebook and to other users who can see the profiles, and therefore might raise suspicion," Hengartner says. "By using fake information, we can avoid this problem."

Holiday Reading

LOYOLA COLLEGE has a great website called Strategic Intelligence. It is a compendium of links to just about every place of importance in the world of spooks.


One of the links is to the CIA, and its publication, Studies in Intelligence. Many interesting articles and book reviews.


Another link from the Loyola site is to The Canadian Intelligence Resource Centre, a private site run by an enterprising chap, Jérôme Mellon.

9/11 changed everything about Steve's election campaign

"He does little mainstreeting, invariably makes announcements before small, hand-picked groups and addresses political rallies where every person in the audience has to register with officials from the local Conservative party organization."

Yesterday Harper explained why :

"Unfortunately, we live in an era where the Prime Minister of Canada faces strong security threats.... When we're dealing in an era of global terrorism and these kinds of things, there are a disturbing number of threats to the country and specifically to whoever occupies the office of prime minister. This is unfortunate but it's reality."

RCMP spokesperson : "The RCMP will respond to any situation that could potentially jeopardize the safety and security of the Prime Minister of Canada."

Why just last week Steve had to call on the RCMP to protect him from safety and security risks hiding in reporters' questions. Also at risk are all Con candidates who are approached by national reporters - particularly Dona Cadman, whose mouth is apparently under house arrest for her own protection - and several Con candidates who are unfortunately unable to safely participate even in local candidate debates.

Here Steve has sensibly set up a podium in the safety of a backyard in Richmond, BC. :

But man, this Obama guy. Does he just not get the whole 9/11 "era of global terrorism" security thing or what? :

Cross-posted at Creekside

The company Stockwell keeps.

When I read Dr. Prole's description of the new virtual strip-search device being tested at Kelowna International Airport I knew I had read about this system well over a year ago being tested in the US. Sure enough, I waded into the wayback machine and found this posting from December 2006.

On closer comparison however, I realized that they are actually two different devices. The system being tested in Phoenix Arizona's, Sky Harbor International Airport is actually an x-ray backscatter system, different from the millimeter wave system being tested in Kelowna.

I did think it worth looking at Sky Harbor International to see how the backscatter test was working out. Well look at that. Sky Harbor International now has both backscatter and millimeter wave full body scanners in operation. And the millimeter wave scanner is identical to the one now deployed in Kelowna.

I thought it a little odd, (although not shatteringly so), that the description of the operations, procedures and even the equipment trials were virtually identical between the two airports: one in the U.S. and one in Canada where the privacy laws differ.

It leads to one common point. The supplier of the millimeter wave full body scanners in both Kelowna and Phoenix is the same - L3 Communications. And it leads to the conclusion that L3 developed the procedures for both airports, including the marketing effort to downplay legitimate privacy concerns. It is too much of a coincidence that CBC reporting on Kelowna's equipment, USA Today reporting on Phoenix and the US Transportation Safety Agency's excusatory description of their whole body imaging process would all read the same and provide identical assurances and alternatives.

And then there is the curious choice of supplier. L3 Communications is not some third-floor Canadian company with an idea and a marketing plan. No. L3 Communications is a Manhattan-based Fortune-500 corporation, well entrenched in the US military-industrial complex with a deep connection to private military contracting in the Iraq war.

L3 owns Military Professional Resources Incorporated (MPRI), (acquired in 2000), which, while described as a Private Military Company, is nothing less than a mercenary group. They also own Government Services Incorporated (GSI), a private intelligence company with personnel spread out through the Middle-East at 22 US bases. Add Titan corporation to the mix. They provide interrogators and interpreters to the US military along with security and intelligence services. And through Titan, L3 is connected to detainee abuse at Abu Ghraib, although L3 did not purchase Titan until after the details of torture were disclosed. (It should be noted that when Titan's involvement in Abu Ghraib became public other companies offering to buy Titan withdrew their bids. Only L3's offer remained.)

While L3 is firmly ensconced in the Pentagon's intelligence efforts, it also seems to have a solid position with the Bush administration in other areas. Working through various subsidiaries, L3 has managed to acquire Pentagon contracts even though they have been hauled up to answer for failure to perform and failure to deliver. In fact, one contract in Iraq brought the company under criminal investigation for:

... concealing test failures and providing flawed parts for emergency radios used by Special Forces and Air Force teams in Iraq and elsewhere.

The next trip to answer for non-performance came when it was revealed that a major component of the US border security system simply did not work. The company involved, IMC, through what appears to have been a "no-bid" contract, was suppose to have installed and tested the equipment for the US Remote Video Surveillance Program on the US side of the Canadian and Mexican borders. When the DHS Inspector General reviewed the installation it was discovered that the system did not function, much of the work had not been done and was wrapped in an agreement which violated federal contracting rules. IMC is a wholly owned subsidiary of L3.

So the involvement of the Canadian government with this firm raises questions. L3 is clearly a war profiteer and benefits from the largess of the Bush administration with "no-bid" contracts. What started out as a high-tech security company has evolved to develop its own dark side with involvement in the worst of US military scandals. Its failure to deliver the material and training to the US Border Patrol on a major project is bad enough, but the fact that the investigation into the affair was suddenly dropped, without conclusions, raises further questions. And then there's this coincidence:

... the manager of the border security project was Rebecca Reyes, who is now director of policy, procedures and administration at L-3 subsidiary, MPRI. She also happens to be the daughter of Silvestre Reyes, a member of the U.S. Congress from Texas, a former Border Patrol agent who is now a senior member of both the Armed Services and Select Intelligence Committees of the House of Representatives.

Yeah, well, that was then; this is now.

The "now" is that Canada's Public Safety Minister is courting a US war profiteer with an ugly track record. Sure, it's only $200,000 per copy for L3's ProVision remote strip-search device. Sure the company has provided assurances that a person's privacy will not be violated because the process keeps them anonymous.

That, along with other guarantees they have failed to make good on.

And if you think it stops with having some stranger look at a detailed picture of your naked body during an airport screening, think again. Millimeter wave technology already has the capability to do wide area scans. Do you think they're going to stop with a silly tubular booth?