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The New York Times Quietly Pulls Article Blaming Encryption in Paris Attacks
Questions about how the terrorists behind Friday’s attacks in Paris managed to evade electronic surveillance have fueled worrisome speculation in Europe and in the U.S. from intelligence experts, lawmakers and the press — including The New York Times, which on Sunday quietly pulled from its website a story alleging the attackers used encrypted technology.
On Sunday, the Times published a story citing unidentified “European officials” who told the outlet the attackers coordinated their assault on the French capital via unspecified “encryption technology.”
“The attackers are believed to have communicated using encryption technology, according to European officials who had been briefed on the investigation but were not authorized to speak publicly,” the article, which has since been removed, stated.
“It was not clear whether the encryption was part of widely used communications tools, like WhatsApp, which the authorities have a hard time monitoring, or something more elaborate. Intelligence officials have been pressing for more leeway to counter the growing use of encryption.”
Sorry, Grey Lady, after the past decade of shilling for the Powers-That-Be, the credibility ship has sailed...
ISIS Encrypted Communications with Paris Attackers
And So it Starts. ArsTechnica is carrying a story where they quote from a story in The New York Times the speculation of an un-named French Official:
European officials said they believed the Paris attackers had used some kind of encrypted communication, but offered no evidence. “The working assumption is that these guys were very security aware, and they assumed they would be under some level of observation, and acted accordingly,” said a senior European counterterrorism official who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss confidential information.
Ars points out that there is still no evidence of encryption used, and in any event, there were lots of digital tracks (meta data) left by these terrorists with communication between Belgium and Syria.
[More after the break.]
The use of encrypted communications by ISIS has prompted various former intelligence officials and media analysts to blame NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden for tipping off terrorist organizations to intelligence agencies' surveillance capabilities and for their "going dark" with their communications. Former CIA Director James Woolsey said in multiple interviews that former NSA contractor and whistleblower Edward Snowden "has blood on his hands".
Ars also mentions that encryption has been used for decades by terrorist organizations
It's been known for some time that terror organizations use cryptography of various sorts. Since the late 1990s, Al Qaeda has used various forms of encryption to hide files on websites for dissemination, as well as using encrypted or obfuscated files carried on CDs or USB drives by couriers.
The story points out that placing of blame on Snowden for terrorists using encryption seems "outlandish" but they jump right in and do it anyway, listing a wide variety of software known or suspected to be used for this purpose, including WhatsApp, Signal, RedPhone, Wickr, and Telegram.
Ars suggests it is just such an incident as this that governments have been waiting for to impose some regulations on encryption. Of course a lot of people have been suggesting this would happen eventually.
Will there be a push to outlaw any form of encryption of private communication? What percentage of people will rally around that idea?
(Score: 4, Informative) by fnj on Thursday November 19 2015, @02:56PM
The tools of oppression will let no crisis go wasted in order to use baseless speculation to support their war against encryption and privacy.
Les sanglots longs
Des violons
De l'automne
Blessent mon cœur
D'une langueur
Monotone.
~~~~~~~~~~
With long sobs
the violin-throbs
Of autumn
wound my heart
with languorous
And monotonous sound.
It's Paul Verlaine's famous poem "Chanson d'automne" ("Autumn Song"), lines from which were broadcast for the French Resistance to hear as coded information/instructions about/for the invasion of Normandy. Sending the first stanza meant D-Day was scheduled for some time during the coming two weeks. The second stanza meant it was within 2 days away, and to begin an outburst of sabotage.
For us today, consider it as a demonstration of the futility of trying to stop encryption. There is absolutely no way to crack a message like this. All you can do is apply good police/intelligence work to identify and reach the actors and hope you can crack them (the matter of HOW you crack them is beyond the scope of this discussion). There is no code book. You simply pre-arrange the meaning using some out-of-band means of contact. The items you need to communicate to coordinate a simple outbreak of violence such as that in Paris are extremely limited.
So how do you stop people SMSing poems? Hmmm? Or if I SMS an acquaintance "fuck NSA", am I (1) expressing simple frustration, (2) urging sexual relations with an object to which the concept cannot apply, or (3) ordering or urging an attack? If you ASSUME anything other than (1), you would be not only mistaken, but (if you are the authorities) heading down the path of persecution and oppression.