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posted by takyon on Tuesday March 07 2017, @11:43PM   Printer-friendly
from the year-zero dept.

The anti-secrecy organization WikiLeaks said Tuesday that it has obtained a vast portion of the CIA's computer hacking arsenal, and began posting the files online in a breach that may expose some of the U.S. intelligence community's most closely guarded cyber weapons.

A statement from WikiLeaks indicated that it planned to post nearly 9,000 files describing code developed in secret by the CIA to steal data from targets overseas and turn ordinary devices including cellphones, computers and even television sets into surveillance tools.

The hacking organisation made the statement as it announced a huge release of confidential documents from the CIA as part of its mysterious Year Zero series, founder Julian Assange claimed. The group said that from October 2014 the CIA was "looking at infecting the vehicle control systems used by modern cars and trucks" to enable them to "engage in nearly undetectable assassinations."

takyon: WikiLeaks: Vault 7: CIA Hacking Tools Revealed and (selected document) Weeping Angel (Extending) Engineering Notes. Also at NYT, USA Today, BBC, and Reuters. The Hill reports that Democratic Congressman Ted Lieu has called for an investigation... into the leak of the documents and tools.


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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 08 2017, @03:06AM (4 children)

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 08 2017, @03:06AM (#476294)

    The CIA has good intentions, at least from the perspective of those who benefit from the power of the USA. This includes indirect beneficiaries, such as Japan and South Korea and NATO countries. If you benefit from the success of these, then you too are a beneficiary. From your perspective the CIA is good, even if you'd rather not admit it.

    Now, if you happen to be a Russian general or a tribal leader in Yemen (on soylentnews WTF), the CIA does not have good intentions. Consider becoming a US ally so that you can be on the same team.

  • (Score: 4, Insightful) by Runaway1956 on Wednesday March 08 2017, @03:18AM

    by Runaway1956 (2926) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 08 2017, @03:18AM (#476302) Journal

    That's it - keep drinking the Kool-Aid, comrade. CIA = good! CIA can do no wrong! The CIA would never consider destroying a legitimately elected democratic government for the sake of corporate profits, right?

    Don't bother to search for Operation Ajax, don't bother to read about it, and most certainly don't try to understand what it was all about. Don't even think about British Petroleum, in any of it's incarnations. Don't even ponder why the CIA would destroy a democratic government for the sake of BP's profits. Just drink some more Kool-Aid, and you'll feel good.

  • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Thexalon on Wednesday March 08 2017, @04:19AM

    by Thexalon (636) on Wednesday March 08 2017, @04:19AM (#476319)

    The CIA has good intentions, at least from the perspective of those who benefit from the power of the USA.

    And who exactly is that? As a citizen of the USA, I'm reasonably certain I don't in fact benefit from the power of the US government abroad: For instance, if you're going to tell me that gas costs me $2 per gallon rather than the $7 per gallon most of the world pays, I'll point out that the amount of tax money I end up contributing to pay for the military and intel to secure that power that lowers the gas price is far more than the $5 per gallon I save.

    And on top of that, there's a reasonable question as to whether the CIA has in fact furthered the power of the USA, or done more harm than good in their constant efforts to, for instance, overthrow and/or kill elected leaders of foreign countries. What did the USA gain by killing Mohammed Mossaddegh and Salvadore Allende? How about trying to take out Fidel Castro over 500 times? Or more recently, how exactly did killing Osama bin Laden expand the power of the United States?

    --
    The only thing that stops a bad guy with a compiler is a good guy with a compiler.
  • (Score: 2) by c0lo on Wednesday March 08 2017, @04:22AM

    by c0lo (156) Subscriber Badge on Wednesday March 08 2017, @04:22AM (#476321) Journal

    The CIA has good intentions, at least from the perspective of those who benefit from the power of the USA. This includes indirect beneficiaries, such as Japan and South Korea and NATO countries. If you benefit from the success of these, then you too are a beneficiary. From your perspective the CIA is good, even if you'd rather not admit it.

    Allow me to have some doubts on the good intentions of CIA (don't make me list all the CIA's "operation ajax"-like actions to justify my doubts, the list would take quite a while).

    But, even if CIA would bleed their hearth out from all the good intentions it has, don't forget the The road to Hell is paved with good intentions aphorism.

    --
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aoFiw2jMy-0 https://soylentnews.org/~MichaelDavidCrawford
  • (Score: 3, Interesting) by NotSanguine on Wednesday March 08 2017, @03:42PM

    by NotSanguine (285) <NotSanguineNO@SPAMSoylentNews.Org> on Wednesday March 08 2017, @03:42PM (#476482) Homepage Journal

    The CIA has good intentions, at least from the perspective of those who benefit from the power of the USA. This includes indirect beneficiaries, such as Japan and South Korea and NATO countries. If you benefit from the success of these, then you too are a beneficiary. From your perspective the CIA is good, even if you'd rather not admit it.

    Now, if you happen to be a Russian general or a tribal leader in Yemen (on soylentnews WTF), the CIA does not have good intentions. Consider becoming a US ally so that you can be on the same team.

    But doing the wrong (i.e., unethical or destructive) things for the "right" (in support of agendas with which we agree) reasons is just as execrable as doing them for the "wrong" (in support of agendas with which we disagree) reasons.

    I know, I know. Ethical behavior is passe. I'm just a fool who thinks that respect for oneself and others is important.

    --
    No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr