Keyloggers in laptops
- Thread starter imported_thefonz
- Start date
Well gee, all it is is a bunch of random pictures and some unsupported claims. I will say this though, I'm a little suspicious, for several reasons.
1. This is not what DHS does. In fact, it's hard to tell what the heck they do, but I have never seen anything that suggests they do anything related to SIGINT. In fact, everything I HAVE seen suggests they couldn't find their ass with both hands and a map...that does not speak highly of their ability to run a vast conspiracy.
2. Speaking of which, the "vast conspiracy" part of it doesn't help either. Installing this on every laptop would be a huge undertaking, particularly as most are made outside of the US. Organizing it all would involve WAY too many people to keep secret for very long, particularly as this would be an obvious and pretty substantial breach of the law. Things much smaller than this leak all the time, there is no way to keep something like this secret. Especially as the author seems to be claiming that the tech support people and the local police are in on it. And the NYT and Washington Post don't have it by now? Give me a break.
3. If this IS some plot to spy on everything everyone types, it's a particularly hamfisted way of going about it. It's a huge piece of "obvious" hardware instead of something much simpler. A few more chips on the motherboard could do the same thing, and nobody would notice. For that matter, do it in software...it's easier and less likely to be caught.
This has all the earmarks of the bullshit conspiracy. Lack of information, a brilliantly secret operation that seems to involve virtually everyone on the planet, and an approach so ludicrously stupid that it can't possibly be both secret AND true. Anyone dumb enough to do this would be too dumb to keep it secret.
1. This is not what DHS does. In fact, it's hard to tell what the heck they do, but I have never seen anything that suggests they do anything related to SIGINT. In fact, everything I HAVE seen suggests they couldn't find their ass with both hands and a map...that does not speak highly of their ability to run a vast conspiracy.
2. Speaking of which, the "vast conspiracy" part of it doesn't help either. Installing this on every laptop would be a huge undertaking, particularly as most are made outside of the US. Organizing it all would involve WAY too many people to keep secret for very long, particularly as this would be an obvious and pretty substantial breach of the law. Things much smaller than this leak all the time, there is no way to keep something like this secret. Especially as the author seems to be claiming that the tech support people and the local police are in on it. And the NYT and Washington Post don't have it by now? Give me a break.
3. If this IS some plot to spy on everything everyone types, it's a particularly hamfisted way of going about it. It's a huge piece of "obvious" hardware instead of something much simpler. A few more chips on the motherboard could do the same thing, and nobody would notice. For that matter, do it in software...it's easier and less likely to be caught.
This has all the earmarks of the bullshit conspiracy. Lack of information, a brilliantly secret operation that seems to involve virtually everyone on the planet, and an approach so ludicrously stupid that it can't possibly be both secret AND true. Anyone dumb enough to do this would be too dumb to keep it secret.
I gotta go with Rainsford on this one. I see no way or reason for this to be effective at accomplishing anything more than raising suspicions. It would be much simpler and less conspicuous to tap into the BIOS through circuitry on the motherboard that could easily be concealed. While I have no doubt that there are many nefarious government programs currently underway, large pieces of hardware installed in laptops surely isn't one of them.
DarkThinker
Platinum Member
- Mar 17, 2007
- 2,822
- 0
- 0
I'll open up my T60 sometime this week and check out if there is anything connected to my ethernet that shouldn't be. Everything deserves to at least be investigated, if there is any laptop that the government would like to see tapped it's got to be the T series.
First
Lifer
- Jun 3, 2002
- 10,518
- 271
- 136
It's probably as much COMINT as SIGINT, but in the end, I agree that DHS doesn't have the organizational abilities to pull this off.
I disagree about hiding a keylogger on a motherboard or in software; as a former motherboard editor myself, that's something you probably notice, unless you have DHS working with every Chinese and Taiwanese engineer from every mobo company in the world to covertly conceal the ICs keyloggers, which is essentially logistically impossible. And though I'm not a hacker or programmer myself, I would have to imagine that something like a software trace would be found instantly. Just a couple days ago, in fact, German hackers were vowing to reveal in detail any attempt by the German gov't to install keylogger-type devices in the name of national security. And Germany is seriously considering doing this apparently.
I used to work for an authorized IBM shop and know for a fact that they do put rom chips in new laptops (T60 and up) that can be GPS'ed in the event of theft. Basically, anyone that steals a new laptop nowadays is in big trouble if they attempt to connect to the net anywhere.
Also, if you try to swap the chip out with a different one, the laptop becomes a paperweight. I think that I read that Dell is doing something similar.
TastesLikeChicken
Lifer
- Sep 12, 2004
- 16,852
- 59
- 86
I took my aunt's Dell Inspiron apart a couple of weeks ago to fix some heat-related problems with it and there was no such wire. There was a small ribbon cable connecting the keyboard and m/b but no wire like the pictures on that site show.
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