Here we go again, a document purporting to be from the US Immigration and Customs Enforcement Homeland Security Investigations SAC Intelligence Program Los Angeles dated the 9th of August 2017...


https://www.suasnews.com/2017/11/ice...se-government/

Wouldn't surprise me dude

Well, we know for a fact that various items of computer hardware, NIC cards and such coming from China had various forms of spyware on them. We caught them doing it in the 90's.

Just because we caught them at it doesn't mean they've quit doing it.

How about the various thumb drives and memory cards out there? They can contain self extracting apps that may lie dormant on your machine until some date or signal when millions of the buggers kick off and do whatever.

Or how about Kapersky? It's free! It's good! It's good and free!

And it's a product of the old Soviet Union. Think it's really safe?

I could go on but you're in the neck of the woods that should have a lot of knowledge on this sort of thing.

Let’s think about it a minute. Where are the servers that all of the video goes? And all of the waypoints? That “FREE” app was written by who? HMMMMMM........

Originally Posted by Mel Duval

Let’s think about it a minute. Where are the servers that all of the video goes? And all of the waypoints? That “FREE” app was written by who? HMMMMMM........

OK! Let's think about it.

Who says it's video? Intelligence gathering take time. You get a bunch of little pieces. Some work together and some don't.

A lot depends on what the spyware is and where it is. That is, in your home machine or maybe in some government office machine. And what the spyware is designed to do plays into it. Does it simply report back what it finds on the host machine? Or is it some kind of virus that kicks off at a certain time along with millions of others just like it?

The servers? For what? Do you know where and what servers you go through every time? I'll bet not.

Example: You buy a new thumb drive. It is labeled as a 32 gig. But in reality it's a 32.2 gig. And in that .2 gig section is a self extracting app. What does it do? Beats me. It may simply provide your machine info back to whomever put it on that thumb drive. Your name, full machine info and anything else it can find. Got your finances on the machine? The other guys have them now. Will they use them? Who knows?

I could send you an e-mail and if your dumb enough to open it, I will have a virus on your machine that will send me all manner of information it finds. The right bug will send me all your key strokes. That includes all your passwords among other things. I could ruin your day in short order.

If you still think you're safe, you're a fool! I'm not the one you need to fear. The one you need to fear is out there, hidden on the dark web. Watching all of us.

Absolutely agree with you. And USB drives have been found with just that on them. As well as other hardware with malware like Cisco routers. As a line in an old Matthew Broderick movie said “The only way to win is not to play”. Stand alone machines can only do so much, though.....

Originally Posted by Mel Duval

Absolutely agree with you. And USB drives have been found with just that on them. As well as other hardware with malware like Cisco routers. As a line in an old Matthew Broderick movie said “The only way to win is not to play”. Stand alone machines can only do so much, though.....

Any new thumb drive I buy:
1. comes from a reputable manufacturer. No guarantee but better than nothing.
2. gets a complete wash. Scanned by more than one app and reformatted 10 times.

Do the same with any new hard drive. Especially the solid state ones.