Why they keep pushing PIPA, SOPA?

Disclaimer: I am not the original creator of this post. Got only in a certain forum cause i capture my little (pet) este interest.

For a while now we have watched as congress has pushed one stupid internet control law after another.
For many (us included) we have felt that this was at the request of the MPAA, RIAA and other copyright holders.


Still there were other items that did not seem to make any sense (at the time) that popped up or that someone tried to tack onto laws like PIPA and SOPA. Some of these were new powers to the NSA, Department of Homeland Security and the FBI.


Now it looks like the reason for the draconian and ridiculously restrictive laws and bills is coming clear.
it is slowly becoming apparent that the internet can no longer be considered the high-tech playground that everyone once thought it was.

Nothing is accidental in situations like these.
.
In 2009 President Obama ordered US intelligence assets to continue development of a worm for a sophisticated cyber-attack on Iran which began under the Bush administration. This was the Stuxnet worm that allowed for penetration into SCADA devices by infecting the programmable logic controllers in them. The target was Iran’s nuclear program and it was effective by delaying the program by two years. The problem was that in 2010 Stuxnet managed to get out on the Internet and spread. It was picked up by researchers that did what they do; they broke down the code and analyzed what it did.


Now if you remember not that long ago the head of NSA claimed that Anonymous could possibly hit the SCADA systems in critical US infrastructure services.
This was in February of 2012 and even referenced Stuxnet in the report. At the time it was seen by many as fear mongering against Anonymous (and it was). The real reason to push this for this and to have Anonymous as the scapegoat was because the US had initiated a clandestine cyber-attack on Iran and government officials were (and still are) concerned that there would be retaliation. Many US infrastructure services use the same type of SCADA devices that were targeted by Stuxnet.

Stuxnet was designed to shut down Iran's Natanz plant where the country was suspected of conducting nuclear research. However, due to a programming error, it leaked onto the internet.

Read more: http://news.techeye.net/security/obama-administration-admits-the-usa-was-behind-stuxnet#ixzz1weuC238D
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/01/world/middleeast/obama-ordered-wave-of-cyberattacks-against-iran.html?pagewanted=1&_r=1
http://www.decryptedtech.com/index.php?option=com_k2&view=item&id=551:the-nsa-is-trying-to-spread-fud-about-anonymous-to-cover-holes-in-us-infrastrcuture-security&Itemid=139
http://www.nytimes.com/reuters/2012/05/28/technology/28reuters-cyberwar-flame.html?_r=1&smid=tw-share

In contrast to Stuxnet, Flame appeared to be designed not to do damage but to secretly collect information from a wide variety of sources.


A similar dissecting process is now under way to figure out the origins of another cyberweapon called Flame, a data-mining virus that in May 2012 penetrated the computers of high-ranking Iranian officials, sweeping up information from their machines. But the computer code appears to be at least five years old, and American officials say that it was not part of Olympic Games. They have declined to say whether the United States was responsible for the Flame attack.
http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/05/flame/all/1


“This virus copies what you enter on your keyboard; it monitors what you see on your computer screen,” Mr. Napelian said. That includes collecting passwords, recording sounds if the computer is connected to a microphone, scanning disks for specific files and monitoring Skype.

“Those controlling the virus can direct it from a distance,” Mr. Napelian said.
“Flame is no ordinary product. This was designed to monitor selected computers.”




Kaspersky’s researchers examined a system that was destroyed by Wiper/Viper and found no traces of that malware on it, preventing them from comparing it to the Flame files. The disk destroyed by Wiper/Viper was filled primarily with random trash, and almost nothing could be recovered from it, Gostev said. “We did not see any sign of Flame on that disk.”

Because Flame is so big, it gets loaded to a system in pieces. The machine first gets hit with a 6-megabyte component, which contains about half a dozen other compressed modules inside. The main component extracts, decompresses and decrypts these modules and writes them to various locations on disk. The number of modules in an infection depends on what the attackers want to do on a particular machine.

Once the modules are unpacked and loaded, the malware connects to one of about 80 command-and-control domains to deliver information about the infected machine to the attackers and await further instruction from them. The malware contains a hardcoded list of about five domains, but also has an updatable list, to which the attackers can add new domains if these others have been taken down or abandoned.

While the malware awaits further instruction, the various modules in it might take screenshots and sniff the network. The screenshot module grabs desktop images every 15 seconds when a high-value communication application is being used, such as instant messaging or Outlook, and once every 60 seconds when other applications are being used.


“It took us half a year to analyze Stuxnet,” he said. “This is 20 times more complicated. It will take us 10 years to fully understand everything.”

But even with all of the potential physical damage that can be caused by cyber-hackers, there is a virtual world, the internet itself, that is at risk of total annihilation. That's right -- total and complete virtual annihilation.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/gil-laroya/cispa-and-the-emergence-o_b_1459448.html

Imagine for a second, a scenario where groups of cyber-hackers wage all out war online.

Using infected code, their targets include companies, then websites, and then eventually servers themselves. Imagine all of the world's largest servers, those that make up the backbone of the internet as we know it, being laid waste by continuous cyber-attacks, until the internet becomes a virtual wasteland. Don't think this can happen? It's not that far-fetched.

This brings about the inevitable idea, that with all of the cyber-firepower that exists around the world -- viruses, hackers, worms, trojan horses, the list goes on -- the internet can easily be presented with a situation where the war becomes a no-win scenario. A cyber-détente, where both sides realize that the outcome will be total destruction, based on an all-or-nothing form of warfare.


“Most of us spend seven-plus hours a day in a network environment in front of our computer and so we make all sorts of information available on the Internet. It’s an integral part of our everyday life.

And of the information that’s being compromised,95 percent of it is our personal information

Spoiler:

http://www.pcworld.com/article/254669/cispa_4_viewpoints_you_should_hear.html


It will be interesting to see where CISPA will take the national debate on individual privacy-versus-cyber security. One can only hope that the discussion will protect the internet from a virtual brink of destruction, and keep cyberspace safe for everyone.

A Weapon’s Uncertain Future

American cyberattacks are not limited to Iran, but the focus of attention, as one administration official put it, “has been overwhelmingly on one country.” There is no reason to believe that will remain the case for long. Some officials question why the same techniques have not been used more aggressively against North Korea. Others see chances to disrupt Chinese military plans, forces in Syria on the way to suppress the uprising there, and Qaeda operations around the world. “We’ve considered a lot more attacks than we have gone ahead with,” one former intelligence official said.

Mr. Obama has repeatedly told his aides that there are risks to using — and particularly to overusing — the weapon. In fact, no country’s infrastructure is more dependent on computer systems, and thus more vulnerable to attack, than that of the United States.
It is only a matter of time, most experts believe, before it becomes the target of the same kind of weapon that the Americans have used, secretly, against Iran.


In short : -
#1 US lauched a program to hack,which was leaked
#2 It was modified by some unknown
#3 Evidence suggests it has been spreading from 2 years back to access private data in Middle East countries
#4 Hence US is fortifying itself

more money i guess? it's all business. but even though we are talking about "rights", intellectual property and so on. i'm against this. you will understand why. ahaha

SOPA AND PIPA they shutdown lots of FileHosting site, atleast they didnt shutdown Mediafire :D

jehu wrote:SOPA AND PIPA they shutdown lots of FileHosting site, atleast they didnt shutdown Mediafire :D

i wonder why? did mediafire pay them? ahaha lol. MEGAUPLOAD. that's one big filehosting site and they shutdown it!

naluluge daw mga producer!

wala na yata balita dito, natapunan ng mga botohan sa obama vs romney?? lol ahahahahaha