{"id":854,"date":"2024-09-27T07:37:00","date_gmt":"2024-09-27T07:37:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/?p=854"},"modified":"2024-09-27T07:37:00","modified_gmt":"2024-09-27T07:37:00","slug":"red-alert-about-red-buttons","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/?p=854","title":{"rendered":"Red Alert about Red Buttons"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n<\/div>\n

By KIM BELLARD<\/p>\n

In a week where, say, the iconic brand Tupperware declared bankruptcy<\/a> and University of Michigan researchers unveiled<\/a> a squid-inspired screen that doesn\u2019t use electronics, the most startling stories have been about, of all things, pagers and walkie-talkies.<\/p>\n

Now, most of us don\u2019t think much about either pagers or walkie-talkies these days, and when we do, we definitely don\u2019t think about them exploding. But that\u2019s what happened in Lebanon this week, in ones carried by members of Hezbollah. Scores of people were killed and thousands injured, many of them innocent bystanders. The suspicion, not officially confirmed, is that Israel engineered the explosions.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t want to get into a discussion about the Middle East quagmire, and I condemn the killing of innocent civilians on either side, but what I can\u2019t get my mind around is the tradecraft of the whole thing. This was not a casual weekend cyberattack by some guys sitting in their basements; this was a years-in-the-making, deeply embedded, carefully planned move.<\/p>\n

A former Israeli intelligence official told WaPo<\/em> that, first, intelligence agencies had to determine \u201cwhat Hezbollah needs, what are its gaps, which shell companies it works with, where they are, who are the contacts,\u201d then \u201cyou need to create an infrastructure of companies, in which one sells to another who sells to another.\u201d\u00a0 It\u2019s not clear, for example, if Israel someone planted the devices during the manufacturing process or during the shipping, or, indeed, if its shell companies actually were<\/em> the manufacturer or shipping company.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Either way, this is some James Bond kind of shit.<\/p>\n

The Washington Post<\/em> reports<\/a> that this is what Israeli officials call a \u201cred-button\u201d capability, \u201cmeaning a potentially devastating penetration of an adversary that can remain dormant for months if not years before being activated.\u201d One has to wonder what other red buttons are out there.<\/p>\n

Many have attributed the attacks to Israel\u2019s Unit 8200, which is roughly equivalent to the NSA.\u00a0 An article in Reuters<\/em><\/a> described the unit as \u201cfamous for a work culture that emphasizes out-of-the-box thinking to tackle issues previously not encountered or imagined.\u201d\u00a0 Making pagers explode upon command certainly falls in that category.<\/p>\n

If you\u2019re thinking, well, I don\u2019t carry either a pager or a walkie-talkie, and, in any event, I\u2019m not a member of Hezbollah, don\u2019t be so quick to think you are off the hook. If you use a device that is connected to the internet \u2013 be it a phone, a TV, a car, even a toaster \u2013 you might want to be wondering if it comes with a red button. And who might be in control of that button.<\/p>\n

Just today, for example, the Biden Administration proposed a ban<\/a> on Chinese software used in cars.<\/p>\n

<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cCars today have cameras, microphones, GPS tracking and other technologies connected to the internet. It doesn\u2019t take much imagination to understand how a foreign adversary with access to this information could pose a serious risk to both our national security and the privacy of U.S. citizens,\u201d said Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo. \u201cIn an extreme situation, foreign adversaries could shut down or take control of all their vehicles operating in the United States all at the same time.\u201d<\/em><\/p>\n

\u201cThe precedent is significant, and I think it just reflects the complexities of a world where a lot of connected devices can be weaponized,\u201d Brad Setser, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, told The New York Times<\/em><\/a>. \u00a0In a Wall Street Journal<\/em> op-ed<\/a>, Mike Gallaher, head of defense for Palantir Technologies, wrote: \u201cAnyone with control over a portion of the technology stack such as semiconductors, cellular modules, or hardware devices, can use it to snoop, incapacitate or kill.\u201d<\/p>\n

Similarly, Bruce Schneier<\/a>, a security technologist, warned<\/a>: \u201cOur international supply chains for computerized equipment leave us vulnerable. And we have no good means to defend ourselves\u2026The targets won\u2019t be just terrorists. Our computers are vulnerable, and increasingly so are our cars, our refrigerators, our home thermostats and many other useful things in our orbits. Targets are everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

If all this seems far-fetched, last week the FBI, NSA, and the Cyber National Mission Force (CNMF) issued a Joint Cybersecurity Advisory<\/a> detailing how the FBI had just taken control of a botnet of 260,000 devices. \u201cThe Justice Department is zeroing in on the Chinese government backed hacking groups that target the devices of innocent Americans and pose a serious threat to our national security,\u201d said<\/a> Attorney General Merrick B. Garland. The hacking group is called Flax Typhoon, working for a company called Integrity Technology Group, which is believed to be controlled by the Chinese government.<\/p>\n

Ars Technica<\/em> described<\/a> the network as a \u201csophisticated, multi-tier structure that allows the botnet to operate at a massive scale.\u201d It is the second such botnet taken down this year, and one has to wonder how many others remain active. Neither of these attacks were believed to be preparing anything to explode, being more focused on surveillance, but their malware impacts could certainly cause economic or physical damage.<\/p>\n

Unit 8200, meet Flax Typhoon.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year Microsoft said<\/a> Flax Typhoon had infiltrated dozens of organizations in Taiwan, targeting \u201cgovernment agencies and education, critical manufacturing, and information technology organizations in Taiwan.\u201d Red buttons abound.<\/p>\n

\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2014\u2013<\/p>\n

Ian Bogost<\/a>, a contributing writer for The Atlantic<\/em>, tried to be reassuring, saying<\/a> that your smartphone \u201calmost surely\u201d wasn\u2019t going to just explode one day. \u201cIn theory,\u201d Professor Bogost writes, \u201csomeone could interfere with such a device, either during manufacture or afterward. But they would have to go to great effort to do so, especially at large scale. Of course, this same risk applies not just to gadgets but to any manufactured good.\u201d<\/p>\n

The trouble is, there are such people willing to go to such great effort, at large scale.<\/p>\n

We live in a connected world, and it is growing evermore connected. That has been, for the most part, a blessing, but we need to recognize that it can also be a curse, in a very real, very physical way.<\/p>\n

If you thought pagers exploding was scary, wait until self-driving cars start crashing on purpose. Wait until your TVs or laptops start exploding. Or wait until the nanobots inside you that you thought were helping you suddenly start wreaking havoc instead.<\/p>\n

If you think the current red button capabilities are scary, wait until they are created \u2013 and controlled \u2013 by AI.<\/p>\n

Kim is a former emarketing exec at a major Blues plan, editor of the late & lamented\u00a0<\/em>Tincture.io<\/em><\/a>, and now regular THCB contributor<\/em><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By KIM BELLARD In a week where, say, the iconic brand Tupperware declared bankruptcy and University of Michigan researchers unveiled a squid-inspired screen that doesn\u2019t use electronics, the most startling stories have been about, of all things, pagers and walkie-talkies. Now, most of us don\u2019t think much about either pagers or walkie-talkies these days, and…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":853,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-854","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-articles"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=854"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/854\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/853"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=854"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=854"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/medical-article.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=854"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}