5G Espionage (II)

 

BERLIN/BEIJING/WASHINGTON (Own report) – An opening is emerging for Berlin to be able to include Huawei in Germany’s 5G grid installation – contrary to the massive US campaign. The President of the Federal Office for Information Security (BSI) Arne Schönbohm declared that “an anti-espionage treaty” between Germany and China could help, open the possibility of Huawei’s participation in setting up the grid. Chancellor Angela Merkel is currently seeking to conclude such an agreement. The industry is in favor of using Huawei Technology, because it promises to be the fastest and most cost-effective construction of the strategically important 5G grid. Experts warn that without Huawei, Germany could lag at least two years behind in the development. Meanwhile it has become known that for years, the NSA has been eavesdropping not only on China’s president but on Huawei as well. Allegedly, US spies cannot show any evidence of Huawei being involved in espionage operations – even after having read the emails of numerous employees and those of the company’s board chair.

Huawei Is Being Targeted Because Of The “Tech Arms Race”, Not The “Trade War”

Acting U.S. Attorney General Matthew Whitaker answers questions from reporters as he stands in front of Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, right, at the Justice Department in Washington on Jan. 28.

 

Huawei is the only company capable of competing with Apple, and it’s also the global leader in the 5G technology that’s expected to take the “Fourth Industrial Revolution” to its next phase. The US fears losing its global monopoly on the internet in general and wireless technologies in particular, especially in what it had previously regarded as its lucrative “captive markets” in the West, so it has an incentive to fearmonger about Huawei’s intentions in order to deter others from doing business with them. It also shouldn’t be seen as coincidental that American ally Poland recently cracked down against an alleged Huawei conspiracy as well, since this sends a trans-Atlantic signal of what the US is after.

Five Eyes

BERLIN/WASHINGTON/BEIJING (Own report) – In the dispute over boycotting the Chinese Huawei corporation, the German government is considering joining a campaign of the “Five Eyes” intelligence-sharing network, it was reported in Canada and Australia. According to the media, intelligence chiefs of the five English-speaking “Five Eyes” countries launched a boycott campaign last July under US leadership. The campaign seeks not only to put pressure on the governments of Five Eyes members Great Britain and Canada, which – for economic reasons – have initially been reluctant to boycott Huawei, but also to increase the pressure on the Germany and Japan. Experts in Australia speculate that, in return for its participation in the boycott, Berlin could become an accepted FIVE Eyes member, something Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service (BND) has been striving to do for years. To “maintain their own technology competence,” EU companies should develop 5G, according to Berlin. German managers, however, are up in arms, fearing falling far behind and never catching up with China.

The Battle Over Huawei (II)

 

BERLIN/WASHINGTON/BEIJING (Own report) – Strong criticism is coming from Germany’s business community, as the German government prepares to exclude the Chinese company Huawei Technologies from the development of Germany’s 5G network. According to media reports, the government tender for the 5G will be formulated in such a way that Huawei cannot apply. This is based on allegations of espionage by US intelligence services, for which, not a single piece of evidence has been presented anywhere in the world. The Trump administration is seeking to shut Huawei and other Chinese high-tech companies out of the US market, to drive them bankrupt. The US is calling on its allies to join; and in mid-December, a US delegation visited Germany’s foreign ministry to apply pressure. This aggression is aimed at halting China’s ascendance. Protest is being raised from Germany’s business community: Huawei is leading in 5G technology and a functioning 5G network is imperative for using state-of-the-art technologies of the future. Managers warn that excluding Huawei would mean higher costs and a painful setback in Germany’s 5G development.

Chinese spy caught in ‘rare’ sting after ‘plot to steal US trade secrets’

US federal agents lured a Chinese government spy to Belgium, where authorities transferred him to the US for prosecution on economic espionage charges. Photo: AP

 

Yanjun Xu, a senior officer with China’s Ministry of State Security, is accused of seeking to steal trade secrets from leading defence aviation firms, top Justice Department officials said

US agents have arrested a top Beijing intelligence official for allegedly attempting to steal trade secrets from GE Aviation and other US aerospace companies after luring the suspect to Belgium in what the US Justice Department called “an unprecedented extradition”.

Xu Yanjun, who also uses the names Qu Hui and Zhang Hui, was extradited to the US on Tuesday with assistance from Belgian authorities for seeking “to steal trade secrets and other sensitive information from an American company that leads the way in aerospace”, Assistant Attorney General for National Security John C. Demers said in a Justice Department announcement on Wednesday.

New Evidence Of Chinese Spy Hardware Found By Ex-Mossad Investigators; Super Micro Shares Plunge

 

A major US telecommunications company found “manipulated” hardware from Super Micro Computer Inc. in its network in August – bolstering claims in a Bloomberg report last week alleging that China installed bugging devices on hardware bought by Apple, Amazon and a host of other companies.

According to a new report by Bloomberg, the unnamed telecom company hired former Israeli Intelligence Corps security expert Yossi Appleboum, now of Maryland-based Sepio Systems, who provided “documents, analysis and other evidence of the discovery” following last week’s report detailing how China’s intelligence agencies had ordered subcontractors to install malicious chips in Super Micro motherboards between 2013 and 2015. 

The Big Hack: How China Used a Tiny Chip to Infiltrate U.S. Companies

Recognition of this urgent and grave matter is finally receiving recognition by the mainstream media. Chinese microchips have been planted within every facet of U.S. life, from the military to household PC components, as well as everyday appliances such as irons and microwaves.

Further information previously archived on Global Geopolitics can be found within the following previous posts:

The Secret Ways of Chinese Telecom Giant Huawei (2013)

Security backdoor found in China-made US military chip (2012)

 

Click for a larger animated version. (Illustrator: Scott Gelber for Bloomberg Businessweek)

 

The attack by Chinese spies reached almost 30 U.S. companies, including Amazon and Apple, by compromising America’s technology supply chain, according to extensive interviews with government and corporate sources.

In 2015, Amazon.com Inc. began quietly evaluating a startup called Elemental Technologies, a potential acquisition to help with a major expansion of its streaming video service, known today as Amazon Prime Video. Based in Portland, Ore., Elemental made software for compressing massive video files and formatting them for different devices. Its technology had helped stream the Olympic Games online, communicate with the International Space Station, and funnel drone footage to the Central Intelligence Agency. Elemental’s national security contracts weren’t the main reason for the proposed acquisition, but they fit nicely with Amazon’s government businesses, such as the highly secure cloud that Amazon Web Services (AWS) was building for the CIA.

Germany, seeking independence from US, pushes cyber security research

German Interior Minister Horst Seehofer talks to journalists after the ARD- Sommerinterview in front of the Reichstag building in Berlin, Germany August 5, 2018. REUTERS/Joachim Herrmann

 

BERLIN: Germany on Wednesday announced a new agency to fund cutting-edge research on cyber security and to end its reliance on digital technologies from the United States, China and other countries.

Interior Minister Horst Seehofer told reporters that Germany needed new tools to become a key player in the field of cybersecurity and shore up European security and independence.

Russian Military Spy Software is on Hundreds of Thousands of Home Routers

Russian President Vladimir Putin and presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov, left, attend a meeting during the 5th Caspian summit in Aktau, the Caspian Sea port in Kazakhstan, Sunday, Aug. 12, 2018. [Alexei Nikolsky, Sputnik, Kremlin Pool Photo (Via AP)]

 

In May, the Justice Department told Americans to reboot their routers. But there’s more to do — and NSA says it’s up to device makers and the public.

LAS VEGAS — The Russian military is inside hundreds of thousands of routers owned by Americans and others around the world, a top U.S. cybersecurity official said on Friday. The presence of Russian malware on the routers, first revealed in May, could enable the Kremlin to steal individuals’ data or enlist their devices in a massive attack intended to disrupt global economic activity or target institutions.

On May 27, Justice Department officials asked Americans to reboot their routers to stop the attack. Afterwards, the world largely forgot about it. That’s a mistake, said Rob Joyce, senior advisor to the director of the National Security Agency and the former White House cybersecurity coordinator.

“The Russian malware is still there,” said Joyce.

Cyber Command moves closer to a major new weapon

A proposal for the next generation cyber operations platform went out to industry recently, however, details are scarce. (J.M. Eddins Jr./Air Force)

 

The Air Force issued a formal proposal earlier this month for the Department of Defense’s long-awaited cyber weapon system, known as the Unified Platform, sources tell Fifth Domain.

DoD officials have said the Unified Platform is one of U.S. Cyber Command’s largest and most critical acquisition programs to date. Industry officials have said it is necessary to conduct cyber operations and is critical to national security.

Obama Aide Admits U.S. Armed ISIS

(Photo Credit: Peter Souza/The White House)

 

Ben Rhodes, while promoting his new book, said the situation led to a schizophrenic U.S. policy in Syria.

In a recent interview with The Intercept, former Deputy National Security Adviser Ben Rhodes finally admitted the Obama administration armed jihadists that became the foundation of ISIS in Syria.

The NSA’s Hidden Spy Hubs in Eight U.S. Cities

A VERY long read that is worth your while.

It reminds you of how well you don’t know your city if you’re living in one of these eight.

 

420 South Grand Avenue, Los Angeles

 

The secrets are hidden behind fortified walls in cities across the United States, inside towering, windowless skyscrapers and fortress-like concrete structures that were built to withstand earthquakes and even nuclear attack. Thousands of people pass by the buildings each day and rarely give them a second glance, because their function is not publicly known. They are an integral part of one of the world’s largest telecommunications networks – and they are also linked to a controversial National Security Agency surveillance program.

Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, New York City, San Francisco, Seattle, and Washington, D.C. In each of these cities, The Intercept has identified an AT&T facility containing networking equipment that transports large quantities of internet traffic across the United States and the world. A body of evidence – including classified NSA documents, public records, and interviews with several former AT&T employees – indicates that the buildings are central to an NSA spying initiative that has for years monitored billions of emails, phone calls, and online chats passing across U.S. territory.

The NSA considers AT&T to be one of its most trusted partners and has lauded the company’s “extreme willingness to help.” It is a collaboration that dates back decades. Little known, however, is that its scope is not restricted to AT&T’s customers. According to the NSA’s documents, it values AT&T not only because it “has access to information that transits the nation,” but also because it maintains unique relationships with other phone and internet providers. The NSA exploits these relationships for surveillance purposes, commandeering AT&T’s massive infrastructure and using it as a platform to covertly tap into communications processed by other companies.

Obama Allies Scheme to Kneecap Trump’s New National Security Team

Fred Fleitz

 

Organizations and individuals entrenched in the Obama administration’s pro-Iran echo chamber are engaging in a new plot to defame top White House national security officials, a campaign that mirrors a successful effort by these same groups to oust former Trump administration National Security Adviser Michael Flynn, according to sources familiar with the new effort.

After targeting Flynn, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, and former senior Trump adviser Sebastian Gorka, organizations closely tied to the Obama administration are setting their sites on National Security Adviser John Bolton and his newly formed team.

Graham: Trump’s Going to End North Korea’s Nuclear Program by End of His First Term

 

‘If it takes a war to end that nuclear threat, so be it’

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) predicted Friday that President Donald Trump would bring a conclusion to the North Korean nuclear crisis by the end of his first term, saying he would go to war if necessary to secure the United States.

FBI: Iran to Launch New Cyber Attacks

 

Iranian hackers poised for wide-ranging strikes in retaliation for U.S. leaving nuclear deal

The FBI is warning that Iranian hackers could conduct new cyber attacks on American businesses and government networks in response to the Trump administration’s withdrawal from the Iran nuclear deal.

“The FBI assesses foreign cyber actors operating in the Islamic Republic of Iran could potentially use a range of computer network operations—from scanning networks for potential vulnerabilities to data deletion attacks—against U.S.-based networks in response to the U.S. government’s withdrawal from the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA),” the FBI said in a cyber alert to U.S. businesses.