Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information(theage.com.au)
theage.com.au
Indian High Commission to use typewriters for sensitive information
http://www.theage.com.au/technology/technology-news/indian-high-commission-to-use-typewriters-for-sensitive-information-20130928-2ukkr.html
11 comments
Yahoo! and Google ids are very widely used across the full spectrum of government and bureaucracy in India, in large parts because the official email offered by government body NIC is horribly unusable.
Take a look at the email ids for officials, including cabinet ministers, in India's Ministry for Communications and IT: http://deity.gov.in/content/people-and-offices
Aside from being a massive security risk it's also hugely embarrassing to some of us Indians.
Take a look at the email ids for officials, including cabinet ministers, in India's Ministry for Communications and IT: http://deity.gov.in/content/people-and-offices
Aside from being a massive security risk it's also hugely embarrassing to some of us Indians.
Embarrassing indeed. They were mulling stopping govt employees to stop using gmail and yahoo. http://articles.economictimes.indiatimes.com/2013-08-30/news... . But I guess the education has to start from Minister of Communication & IT who is using a gmail address.
That is why something like lavabit is important for India.
You keep mentioning Lavabit, even after they shut down?
So? The model/architecture behind lavabit is what should be replicated for all government communications. Don't provide it to citizens maybe, but do safeguard their own communication.
Fair enough. You meant "a service similar to Lavabit" and I was reading it as "Lavabit", especially because your first comment said "India should totally adopt Lavabit".
While the first picture of a typewriter that comes to the mind is an archaic, metallic, clunky one, the story doesn't really give more details to complete the picture.
Perhaps the typewriters are noiseless, electronic ones, with a touch-based input system? Perhaps, they generate characters which can't be traced (with the help of randomized glitches for example). And perhaps they only use paper which is not traceable (if such a thing exists).
Perhaps the typewriters are noiseless, electronic ones, with a touch-based input system? Perhaps, they generate characters which can't be traced (with the help of randomized glitches for example). And perhaps they only use paper which is not traceable (if such a thing exists).
> Ah. How are they gonna transmit data?
If there only were some sort of non-electronic version of email.
If there only were some sort of non-electronic version of email.
Or even an electronic device capable of digitizing a sheet of paper and sending it over some communication system such as a phone line. It would make facsimiles of the original... I guess we could call it a facs machine for short?
I supposed one can use carrier pigeons or trained ravens.
Which means interception and time limits.
Send it with a person in a diplomatic bag. If it gets intercepted it will be an international incident and you'll know 100% of the time that you are compromised.
Fair enough. But it also imposes time limits for critical communication.
Yes and they may use other avenues when required. As much as I sing songs about incompetence and ineptitude of most government offices (of my country), they do have a knack to survive (or competing forces are just as inadequate, take your pick).
//How are they gonna transmit data//
Pigeons of course!
A couple of you have mentioned the traceability of typewriters as a downside. In fact that is a primary reason for using them. Like a gun, every typewriter has unique quirks that can be used to uniquely identify content typed on that machine. In the event of a leak, the Russians (for example) hope to use this forensic info to identify the leaker. The general knowledge of this acts as a deterrent.
Moreover, it's a common strategy to step back a few levels of tech innovation to defeat an opponent. Bayonets. Cops on bike patrols. Hipster bike messengers. Insurgents originally used cell phones to detonate IEDs (Iraq or Afghanistan), but then they had their phones jammed by the USM--so they switched to string. Al-Qaeda uses hand written notes, hand-delivered.
FOIA laws and e-discovery also cause people to go low tech. To get around FOIA requests government officials have simply stopped using email (others used webmail under a false name). And in my last start up, serious issues raised on email elicited a response by phone in part to avoid potential e-discovery in a lawsuit. That kind of shady behavior caused me to leave.
Moreover, it's a common strategy to step back a few levels of tech innovation to defeat an opponent. Bayonets. Cops on bike patrols. Hipster bike messengers. Insurgents originally used cell phones to detonate IEDs (Iraq or Afghanistan), but then they had their phones jammed by the USM--so they switched to string. Al-Qaeda uses hand written notes, hand-delivered.
FOIA laws and e-discovery also cause people to go low tech. To get around FOIA requests government officials have simply stopped using email (others used webmail under a false name). And in my last start up, serious issues raised on email elicited a response by phone in part to avoid potential e-discovery in a lawsuit. That kind of shady behavior caused me to leave.
Not discussing serious/legal issues over email is SOP at large companies, at least in my experience. Not because we thought we were doing anything wrong - it's just what the lawyers advise you.
As an aside, during the Cold War, Soviet embassies abroad used manual typewriters for all sensitive information due to the various ways in which electronic typewriters could be bugged.
For an example of the sophistication of such attacks, see the Project GUNMAN document on the NSA's history subsite:
http://www.nsa.gov/about/cryptologic_heritage/center_crypt_h...
For seven years the Soviets had bugged IBM Selectric typewriters in the US embassy in Moscow. The bugging device was remarkable, keying-off the magnetic flux of the machine's operation and transmitting this data by burst radio transmission.
For an example of the sophistication of such attacks, see the Project GUNMAN document on the NSA's history subsite:
http://www.nsa.gov/about/cryptologic_heritage/center_crypt_h...
For seven years the Soviets had bugged IBM Selectric typewriters in the US embassy in Moscow. The bugging device was remarkable, keying-off the magnetic flux of the machine's operation and transmitting this data by burst radio transmission.
head explodes: this announced the same day as a paper showing how to use an iphone accelerometer to reverse engineer keystrokes.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6456360
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6456360
Hope they remember to keep the ink ribbon. Old school attacks.
Nobody is going to get it right on the first try, after decades of neglecting data security.
Cool those tapes will be really easy to read.
my Aunty Paige just got an awesome yellow Nissan Rogue SUV by working part time from a home computer... find more information ...................http://redir.ec/buzz55
Wow. Apu Fuck-knuckles is so incompetent that he deserves to be taken for a ride by every intel agency in the world. (Typewriter sounds are more easily surveilled and decoded into letters than a well-shielded computer. A given typewriter is trivially traceable to a particular office and even individual. Typing paper is somewhat easy to trace. Typewriters requires use of photocopiers, which are a centralized easily-surveilled point of weakness. And going outdoors is what you do when you are so horrifically out of touch and worthless that you have never seen a parabolic microphone on a football pitch. Somewhere an NSA field agent just had a spygasm.)
Your comment is good. "Apu Fuck-knuckles" is not. You should change it while you can still edit. It completely occludes your otherwise decent comment.
Wow - you're a racist bigot!
I am neither racist nor bigoted. What I am is opposed to spacefaring nuclear powers who are utterly incompetent at their jobs. They put all our lives in danger. If the Brits pulled this crap I would insult them with "Johnny Fuck-knuckles". (For example, "I am staggered that Johnny Fuck-knuckles would send agents to fling around office equipment at the Guardian's offices.")
I'm sorry sir, but you clearly are both racist and bigoted without apparently seeming to realize it.
"The Apu travesty" - http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/jul/16/theaput...
"The Apu travesty" - http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2007/jul/16/theaput...
I'm racist for making fun of the embassy security chief because you do not like a Simpsons character. I do not know whether to laugh or cry.
well - being racist also towards brits - doesnt make you any less racist.
The Russians are doing this, too.
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jul/11/russia-reverts-...
How do you know they won't do a thorough sweep for bugs? How do you know their mode of transportation? If the Russians are doing it, there must be some merit to the solution. Granted it doesn't sound logical. Your worthless assumptions aside, you seem to have a lot of hate pent up there.
No need for name calling, Cletus. And it's sad to see this in someone with 12 yrs of professional experience as a "software and electrical" engineer.
No need for name calling, Cletus. And it's sad to see this in someone with 12 yrs of professional experience as a "software and electrical" engineer.
> If the Russians are doing it, there must be some merit to the solution.
That's like saying, "I saw my doctor smoking so it can't be that bad for you, right?" Maybe there's merit to the method, maybe not... but just because someone else is doing it too doesn't mean it's good to do.
That's like saying, "I saw my doctor smoking so it can't be that bad for you, right?" Maybe there's merit to the method, maybe not... but just because someone else is doing it too doesn't mean it's good to do.
Hate? They've got missiles, nukes, a dirty little war with Pakistan, and many regional political challenges. It is not some lolcat site that takes PayPal, it is armies and central bank policies. They were caught with their intel pants down and their response was to make a show of unbuttoning their shirt. It's like a Tom Clancy story ghostwritten by Robin Williams. A little hate is warranted.
> They've got missiles, nukes, a dirty little war with Pakistan, and many regional political challenges. It is not some lolcat site that takes PayPal, it is armies and central bank policies.
In short, like the USA, which does all of these at far greater scale?
> A little hate is warranted.
And apparently, a little racism and bigotry.
In short, like the USA, which does all of these at far greater scale?
> A little hate is warranted.
And apparently, a little racism and bigotry.
I agree! It is exactly like the USA! Like the USA, the Indian foreign service needs to use modern security techniques. Not cargo culting with typewriters and walks in the park like a bad movie script.
Indian is not a race or even an ethnicity. It is a geopolitical affiliation, like Londoner. Nor am I a bigot. If I could read Hindi, I could point you to the Indian IT discussion forums where the thousands of competent security specialists are ripping into their government in ways that make my comment look like high praise. My fury is nothing compared to the people being sold out by the imbeciles at the Indian embassy.
Indian is not a race or even an ethnicity. It is a geopolitical affiliation, like Londoner. Nor am I a bigot. If I could read Hindi, I could point you to the Indian IT discussion forums where the thousands of competent security specialists are ripping into their government in ways that make my comment look like high praise. My fury is nothing compared to the people being sold out by the imbeciles at the Indian embassy.
> Like the USA, the Indian foreign service needs to use modern security techniques.
Absolutely, but as another HN user already replied to you:
> Your comment is good. "Apu Fuck-knuckles" is not. You should change it while you can still edit. It completely occludes your otherwise decent comment.
And please stop with the pointless arguments that "India isn't a race or even an ethnicity" (it isn't, but that's irrelevant) to somehow prove your original comment wasn't racist. By that logic, no one can ever be racist to Indians, because, hey, Indians don't have a race!
Absolutely, but as another HN user already replied to you:
> Your comment is good. "Apu Fuck-knuckles" is not. You should change it while you can still edit. It completely occludes your otherwise decent comment.
And please stop with the pointless arguments that "India isn't a race or even an ethnicity" (it isn't, but that's irrelevant) to somehow prove your original comment wasn't racist. By that logic, no one can ever be racist to Indians, because, hey, Indians don't have a race!
Definitely agree with the premise of you comments though. The Indian govt. has been grossly negligent in the past. But with the size, bureaucracy, corruption and red-tape involved, it is incredibly hard for any generally-sane citizen to bring about change. Hopefully, thing will get better in the future. The next to-be-elected prime minister is a bit of hard nut and is expected to bring about change for the good.
In a country that's stricken with extreme poverty, a caste system that births you into such a fate until death, where women can't walk the street at night without the fear of getting brutally raped or molested, a country that starves while massive stockpiles of food reserves perish due to kafkaesque bureaucracy and corruption; I hardly think that privacy breaches are India's top concern.
The political system is already ineffective and the use of typewriters to "secure" communications only proves that the priorities of the leaders are so misaligned to what the country needs to make any progress with it's problems.
India has great potential to develop into something more than it is, but until there's significant political reform then it's progress will always be slow and its people will continue to suffer.
The political system is already ineffective and the use of typewriters to "secure" communications only proves that the priorities of the leaders are so misaligned to what the country needs to make any progress with it's problems.
India has great potential to develop into something more than it is, but until there's significant political reform then it's progress will always be slow and its people will continue to suffer.
Oh for crying out loud, not the "India is so poor that they shouldn't bother with expensive luxuries like space programs and Internet privacy" argument again!
Pray tell me, what is the connection between "extreme poverty, a caste system, the safety of women walking the streets at night and massive stockpiles of food" with better Internet privacy measures?
Are the two a zero-sum game? Will implementing more secure email and Internet communications across all government departments somehow make Indian women more likely to get raped or molested? Or entrench the caste system even further?
> India has great potential to develop into something more than it is
Thank you for your vote of support. Do let us know when we'd become eligible for Internet privacy though.
Pray tell me, what is the connection between "extreme poverty, a caste system, the safety of women walking the streets at night and massive stockpiles of food" with better Internet privacy measures?
Are the two a zero-sum game? Will implementing more secure email and Internet communications across all government departments somehow make Indian women more likely to get raped or molested? Or entrench the caste system even further?
> India has great potential to develop into something more than it is
Thank you for your vote of support. Do let us know when we'd become eligible for Internet privacy though.
Did I say they should do without expensive luxuries and internet privacy? No. I did say that prioritising using typerwriters for internal communications of a handful of their government offices above the fundamental issues that affect hundreds of millions of their countrymen is ridiculous.
The article isn't about internet privacy for their residents. if it were, are you saying that the rights of women and the starving population is fine as long as no sneaky NSA is reading your emails?
The article isn't about internet privacy for their residents. if it were, are you saying that the rights of women and the starving population is fine as long as no sneaky NSA is reading your emails?
Allow me to quote you:
> In a country that's stricken with extreme poverty, a caste system that births you into such a fate until death, where women can't walk the street at night without the fear of getting brutally raped or molested, a country that starves while massive stockpiles of food reserves perish due to kafkaesque bureaucracy and corruption; I hardly think that privacy breaches are India's top concern.
Your infering that privacy should hardly be India's top concern is a non-sequitur.
Privacy doesn't need to be India's "top concern" for its government to fix it. And neither is there a link between fixing it and all the other (valid) ills you described prior to it.
> In a country that's stricken with extreme poverty, a caste system that births you into such a fate until death, where women can't walk the street at night without the fear of getting brutally raped or molested, a country that starves while massive stockpiles of food reserves perish due to kafkaesque bureaucracy and corruption; I hardly think that privacy breaches are India's top concern.
Your infering that privacy should hardly be India's top concern is a non-sequitur.
Privacy doesn't need to be India's "top concern" for its government to fix it. And neither is there a link between fixing it and all the other (valid) ills you described prior to it.
Exactly, privacy shouldn't be India's top concern - but evidently it's the only item on the checklist that they've ticked. I'll add it's also one that doesn't help address any of the fundamental issues, and as I mentioned only slows things down in an already burdened government.
Privacy, or security, or both?
Nations can rarely afford to have mutually exclusive streams of work. You don't see the U.S waiting till they solve their economic crisis to figure out what to do in Syria.
One of the major problems with the rank generalizations in both domestic and international media about India is that it reduces the problem to a simple combination of inept leadership, useless bureaucracy and abject poverty.
The fact, though, is that there also a lot of good people doing good work at levels (government, leadership etc.), but there is also a large number of people who are doing crappy jobs.
And as far as something like poverty goes, the causes, extent and solution for it differ from region to region. The concept of India is one of the greatest abstractions the world has ever seen. Take away the tricolour, cricket and the movie industry and you'll find people who rarely have much to identify with each other at a national level.
Consequently, any solution will take time and it will be chaotic; at least until a better genuinely progressive leader emerges, which looks unlikely for a long time to come. Waiting for all that to fall in place till measures are taken to ensure data security and privacy may well mean those won't happen in my lifetime.
p.s: The state of IT in the government is terrible in India. Any smart citizen have to live under the assumption that everything is compromised, by the state itself and by other states.
Nations can rarely afford to have mutually exclusive streams of work. You don't see the U.S waiting till they solve their economic crisis to figure out what to do in Syria.
One of the major problems with the rank generalizations in both domestic and international media about India is that it reduces the problem to a simple combination of inept leadership, useless bureaucracy and abject poverty.
The fact, though, is that there also a lot of good people doing good work at levels (government, leadership etc.), but there is also a large number of people who are doing crappy jobs.
And as far as something like poverty goes, the causes, extent and solution for it differ from region to region. The concept of India is one of the greatest abstractions the world has ever seen. Take away the tricolour, cricket and the movie industry and you'll find people who rarely have much to identify with each other at a national level.
Consequently, any solution will take time and it will be chaotic; at least until a better genuinely progressive leader emerges, which looks unlikely for a long time to come. Waiting for all that to fall in place till measures are taken to ensure data security and privacy may well mean those won't happen in my lifetime.
p.s: The state of IT in the government is terrible in India. Any smart citizen have to live under the assumption that everything is compromised, by the state itself and by other states.
> I did say that prioritising using typerwriters for internal communications of a handful of their government offices above the fundamental issues that affect hundreds of millions of their countrymen is ridiculous.
Your comment is mind-boggling. Using typewriters for better security is somehow a prioritization over solving fundamental issues? As in, if they spent some effort over security at their embassies, it affects their ability to solve other problems? You should get over yourself.
Your comment is mind-boggling. Using typewriters for better security is somehow a prioritization over solving fundamental issues? As in, if they spent some effort over security at their embassies, it affects their ability to solve other problems? You should get over yourself.
You misread, I wrote the opposite to what you're saying.
[deleted](1)
India should totally adopt lavabit.
Incompetent and embarrassing bit: They use yahoo address for one of the consulates in Iran: http://www.indianembassy-tehran.ir/consulates_iran.php