Once again my computer has been messed with

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Re: Once again my computer has been messed with

Postby Simulist » Mon Jun 04, 2012 2:12 pm

Canadian_watcher wrote:
Simulist wrote:
Canadian_watcher wrote:This sort of shit happens with me quite regularly, too.

That sort of shit used to happen to me quite regularly, too — or so it seemed to me then that it did. I became convinced that we were all under 24/7 surveillance by the corporate state. And you know what? I was probably right.

And then I pretty much stopped noticing.

Because I pretty much stopped caring.

(That's been quite freeing, actually.)


did I say somewhere that I cared?
edit.. no "tone" intended in that.

No you didn't.

(And I wouldn't have cared if you had! ;) )
"The most strongly enforced of all known taboos is the taboo against knowing who or what you really are behind the mask of your apparently separate, independent, and isolated ego."
    — Alan Watts
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Re: Once again my computer has been messed with

Postby StarmanSkye » Mon Jun 04, 2012 2:57 pm

Just, that Fuck'n shit sure is some extreme damn-it-all messed-up Fuck'n bullshit, and THEN some!

Targetting rescuers and mourners -- half-a-world-away from our genteel suburban-neighborhoods of boulevard-streets, tree-shaded sidewalks & automatically-watered manicured lawns fronting gracious abodes of quaint bungaloos, sprawling ranchhomes & two-story duplexes, but its a universe-away from anything we know first-hand or can understand.

But at the very least, why can't/won't Americans grasp that Pakistan public's very predictable outrage and simmering resentment at the US's arrogant recklessness & careless disregard for the anguish caused and lives indiscriminately shattered by such heartless mechanized acts of long-range remote-controlled bombing-by-numbers sudden violence seemingly coming from nowhere and everyone at-once -- are anything but just and noble -- they are indefensible monstrous crimes that mock the rule of law, defile Pakistan's sovereignty and brutalize the people's sense of national dignity, rudely undermining faith and trust in their state's institutions and their leader's ability to lead and protect their interests.

Its inevitable that the US's contemptuous disregard for the lives of Pakistan's citizens and disdain for the nicities of civil procedure like respect for the rule of law and honouring civil & human rights will incite a deep & festering anger, it will provoke bitter resentment and add to the region's already smouldering anti-American hostility caused by the example of American warmonger perfidy, arouse popular sentiment for vengeance & reprisal in return for victimization & betrayal.

But maybe that's exactly what's intended by those in the Pentagon, White House, Congress, MIC corporate boardrooms, foundations & thinktanks who pull the strings of US's militaristic & neo-Imperialistic foreign policy -- to instigate ever-greater political crisis that can be prodded to erupt in conflicts, instability and violence that the US and its NATO partners-in-crime can exploit to expand its geostrategic & neoliberal agenda.

So many non-aligned and unconquered nations, oh so little time!
***
BTW Nordic et al:
I used to have pretty severe intermittant computer-glitch virus-bug, trojans & malware problems that really messed with my computer's functioning, probably picked-up as info-warfare bombs from my visiting controversial truther, liberation and anti-war/pro-liberty & freedom -type sites (like RI) -- not quite as bad as your being locked-out of facebook but otherwisely problems. Until I installed a pro-active commercial-grade internet security program, Iolo System Shield. I highly recommend it for fixing errors, finding and removing bugs and Real Time monitoring/keeping my computer bug-free and running great.
$30 for 2 machines is cheap just for the Peace of Mind it gives, and it has a great scanning feature, is well-integrated w/ windows. 'Course, if you are lucky and tech-savvy enough to not run windows (you run a MAC, right?) you probably already have a pretty effective top-shelf anti-bug program, you ay need to do a complete OS reprogram to get rid of root-directory level junk.

Best of Good luck tho!
Hope you don't rip too-much of your hair out before you get the situation fixed! Computer malfunctions really stress me out because I'm not as software proficient as I wish I was, I do a lot of agonized fumbling and head-scratching, its been a steep up-and-down learning curve. I sometimes would rather do a brake job or replace a clutch or even oil-change than try to debug an especially obscure nasty-error malfunction. I AM getting some-better tho!
Cheers.
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Re: Once again my computer has been messed with

Postby Nordic » Sat Apr 19, 2014 3:45 am

I wonder if this computer issue I had wasn't this:

http://articles.latimes.com/2014/mar/12 ... e-20140312

NSA posed as Facebook to infect computers with malware
March 12, 2014|By Salvador Rodriguez



The NSA has reportedly been using an automated system codenamed TURBINE… (Patrick Semansky / Associated…)
The National Security Agency has reportedly used automated systems to infect user computers with malware since 2010, according to a Wednesday report. And at times the agency pretended to be Facebook to install its malware.

The NSA has been using a program codenamed TURBINE to contaminate computers and networks with malware "implants" capable of spying on users, according to The Intercept, which cited documents provided by whistleblower Edward Snowden.

Between 85,000 and 100,000 of these implants have been deployed worldwide thus far, the report said.

ALSO: Will Flappy Bird fly again? Developer is 'considering it'

To infect computers with malware, the NSA has relied on various tactics, including posing as Facebook.

The federal agency performed what is known as a "man-on-the-side" attack in which it tricked users computers into thinking that they were accessing real Facebook servers. Once the user had been fooled, the NSA hacked into the user's computer and extracted data from their hard drive.

Facebook said it had no knowledge of the NSA"s TURBINE program, according to the National Journal. However, the social network said it is no longer possible for the NSA or hackers to attack users that way, but Facebook warned that other websites and social networks may still be vulnerable to those types of attacks.

"This method of network level disruption does not work for traffic carried over HTTPS, which Facebook finished integrating by default last year," Facebook told the National Journal. "If government agencies indeed have privileged access to network service providers, any site running only HTTP could conceivably have its traffic misdirected."

Other ways the NSA infects malware onto computers include sending out spam emails.

The NSA is capable of installing different kinds of malware, each capable of performing different tasks. According to the report, certain malware can:

Use a computer's microphone to record audio
Use a computer's webcam to take photos
Record a computer's Internet browsing history
Record login details and passwords use for Web services
Log users' keystrokes
Extract data from flash drives when they are plugged into infected computers
Block users from accessing certain websites
Corrupt files that computers attempt to download
When the NSA first began infecting computers with malware in 2004, it would do so manually, according to the report. At that time, only between 100 and 150 implants had been deployed.



"He who wounds the ecosphere literally wounds God" -- Philip K. Dick
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Re: Once again my computer has been messed with

Postby Nordic » Mon Apr 27, 2015 12:31 am

Just saw this:

http://www.wired.com/2015/04/researcher ... ert-hacks/


AMONG ALL OF the NSA hacking operations exposed by whistleblower Edward Snowden over the last two years, one in particular has stood out for its sophistication and stealthiness. Known as Quantum Insert, the man-on-the-side hacking technique has been used to great effect since 2005 by the NSA and its partner spy agency, Britain’s GCHQ, to hack into high-value, hard-to-reach systems and implant malware.

Quantum Insert is useful for getting at machines that can’t be reached through phishing attacks. It works by hijacking a browser as it’s trying to access web pages and forcing it to visit a malicious web page, rather than the page the target intend to visit. The attackers can then surreptitiously download malware onto the target’s machine from the rogue web page.

Quantum Insert has been used to hack the machines of terrorist suspects in the Middle East, but it was also used in a controversial GCHQ/NSA operation against employees of the Belgian telecom Belgacom and against workers at OPEC, the Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries. The “highly successful” technique allowed the NSA to place 300 malicious implants on computers around the world in 2010, according to the spy agency’s own internal documents—all while remaining undetected.

But now security researchers with Fox-IT in the Netherlands, who helped investigate that hack against Belgacom, have found a way to detect Quantum Insert attacks using common intrusion detection tools such as Snort, Bro and Suricata.

The detection focuses on identifying anomalies in the data packets that get sent to a victim’s browser client when the browser attempts to access web pages. The researchers, who plan to discuss their findings at the RSA Conference in San Francisco today, have written a blog post describing the technical details and are releasing custom patches for Snort to help detect Quantum Insert attacks.
"He who wounds the ecosphere literally wounds God" -- Philip K. Dick
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Re: Once again my computer has been messed with

Postby 82_28 » Mon Apr 27, 2015 2:56 am

It is certainly not 101% fail-safe, but I have had ZERO intrusions on all the computers I have used since I began using Linux and I have been online all that time. Viruses? Nope. Anti-virus software in which you have to make payments monthly? Nope. 15 long years of nothing to worry about. Beauty is is that I actually use windows all the time. I probably have a good 10 instances of windows open right now in fact in virtual IE. It's all virtual machine stuff para trabajo. When that crashes as it does all the time, I have to lean on Linux to reboot office 2007 suite and get back to what all the others in the company are using. Then I get calls from others as to how to fix something because something quits on them.

However, as I have said in that other recent computer thread, get thee KUBUNTU. Back your shit up before you install! Just photos, documents, audio etc. Come up with a good password for your personal and SUDO account. Lickety split. SUDO is su or "super user". But your shit you use can't get hacked in a FUBAR way, because it will just be your home directory not the main vein. Again, not saying it is 101% fail safe, but 15 years of using it non-stop I have yet to encounter any kind of problem and my computer performs exactly as I want it to. If you decide to take the plunge, I can help you with simple questions. I read a new stable version of Debian came out yesterday, but I don't have the time to check it out. Also Kubuntu/Ubuntu is Debian based. You'll like it. Both my 60+ parents use it because I got tired of having to explain to them why they "got new icons" or something.

Seriously. Problem solved.
There is no me. There is no you. There is all. There is no you. There is no me. And that is all. A profound acceptance of an enormous pageantry. A haunting certainty that the unifying principle of this universe is love. -- Propagandhi
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Re: Once again my computer has been messed with

Postby 82_28 » Mon Apr 27, 2015 3:23 am

Then again, I have no idea of how packet sniffing works. So anything you send and receive is the same no matter what OS you use. Most people just use the Internet to well, use the Internet. Drew might have more on that. All I can tell you is what I know of central office wire centers. All I can say is that I find it impossible for everything to be copied in real time. Also, I find the reason to do so, so stupid that I really don't know what to say.

The last football game I went to with 75k people I couldn't get a connection -- the backhaul system was overloaded. What if I needed to get a hold of my terrorist team to give the go ahead for the attack? The attack would have never happened because I couldn't get through so I would just have to sit there and watch the Broncos get beat by the Seahawks. How much bandwidth would be needed to get my information jotted down in their all important information collecting HDs in order for them to save the day? None. They wouldn't have gotten my "go-ahead".
There is no me. There is no you. There is all. There is no you. There is no me. And that is all. A profound acceptance of an enormous pageantry. A haunting certainty that the unifying principle of this universe is love. -- Propagandhi
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Re: Once again my computer has been messed with

Postby waugs » Mon Apr 27, 2015 10:06 am

what 82_28 said. I've been using Kubuntu for the last year and a half as well. Its anti-virus capabilities is one of the reasons I switched (besides hating Windows). I also find it to be a beautiful and highly customizable and easy to work with.

on a side note, 82, I just upgraded my netbook to Lubuntu 15.04 over the weekend and it kicks ass! It's running a lot smoother than 14.04 and looks pretty too! highly recommended (although it doesn't have LTS yet). I'll wait to upgrade my Kubuntu desktop until they release the LTS version of that.
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Re: Once again my computer has been messed with

Postby temp-monitor » Sun May 03, 2015 10:11 pm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stasi#Zersetzung

…the Stasi often used a method which was really diabolic. It was called Zersetzung, and it's described in another guideline. The word is difficult to translate because it means originally "biodegradation". But actually, it's a quite accurate description. The goal was to destroy secretly the self-confidence of people, for example by damaging their reputation, by organizing failures in their work, and by destroying their personal relationships. Considering this, East Germany was a very modern dictatorship. The Stasi didn't try to arrest every dissident. It preferred to paralyze them, and it could do so because it had access to so much personal information and to so many institutions.
—Hubertus Knabe, German historian [28]


Main article: Zersetzung

The Stasi perfected the technique of psychological harassment of perceived enemies known as Zersetzung (pronounced [ʦɛɐ̯ˈzɛtsʊŋ]) – a term borrowed from chemistry which literally means "decomposition".

By the 1970s, the Stasi had decided that the methods of overt persecution that had been employed up to that time, such as arrest and torture, were too crude and obvious. It was realised that psychological harassment was far less likely to be recognised for what it was, so its victims, and their supporters, were less likely to be provoked into active resistance, given that they would often not be aware of the source of their problems, or even its exact nature. Zersetzung was designed to side-track and "switch off" perceived enemies so that they would lose the will to continue any "inappropriate" activities.

Tactics employed under Zersetzung generally involved the disruption of the victim's private or family life. This often included psychological attacks, such as breaking into homes and subtly manipulating the contents, in a form of gaslighting – moving furniture, altering the timing of an alarm, removing pictures from walls or replacing one variety of tea with another. Other practices included property damage, sabotage of cars, purposely incorrect medical treatment, smear campaigns including sending falsified compromising photos or documents to the victim's family, denunciation, provocation, psychological warfare, psychological subversion, wiretapping, bugging, mysterious phone calls or unnecessary deliveries, even including sending a vibrator to a target's wife. Usually, victims had no idea that the Stasi were responsible. Many thought that they were losing their minds, and mental breakdowns and suicide could result.

One great advantage of the harassment perpetrated under Zersetzung was that its subtle nature meant that it was able to be plausibly denied. This was important given that the GDR was trying to improve its international standing during the 1970s and 80s, especially in conjunction with the Ostpolitik of West-German chancellor Willy Brandt massively improving relations between the two German states.

Zersetzung techniques were used by other East Bloc intelligence and security agencies. This includes extensive use by the hierarchically superior agency in the USSR intelligence framework, the Russian KGB. Techniques that would be described as Zersetzung techniques, would otherwise be described and fall under those of "active measures" as termed by the KGB.[29] Techniques that would be classified as active measures or Zersetzung continue to be employed by selected security and intelligence organizations worldwide to this date. The Russian FSB, which has the present organizational responsibilities and congruent authorizations to the internal security, CI, investigatory directorates of the former KGB has been widely implicated in continued use of active measures techniques in numerous operations.[30]


http://www.historycommons.org/context.j ... lizethreat

Early December 1999: US Takes Action to Stop Al-Qaeda Millennium Bombing Plot

The CIA learns from the Jordanian government about an al-Qaeda millennium bombing plot in that country (see November 30, 1999). Further, the CIA concludes more attacks are likely soon, including some inside the US (see December 8, 1999). Counterterrorism “tsar” Richard Clarke is told of this, and he implements a plan to neutralize the threat. [Clarke, 2004, pp. 205, 211] The plan, approved by President Clinton, focuses on harassing and disrupting al-Qaeda members throughout the world. The FBI is put on heightened alert, counterterrorism teams are dispatched overseas, a formal ultimatum is given to the Taliban to keep al-Qaeda under control, and friendly intelligence agencies are asked to help. There are Cabinet-level meetings nearly every day dealing with terrorism [Washington Post, 4/2/2000; Associated Press, 6/28/2002]
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