The spy who hacked me: Evildoers love IoT’s weak security

With the explosive growth of the Internet of Things (IoT), both spies and hackers are feasting on a new universe of poorly secured technology.

Recode quotes a top spy from the US National Security Agency who spoke with surprising candor about IoT’s security vulnerabilities. These vulnerabilities stem from the increasing complexity of the technology which, for cyberspooks like the NSA, offers a goldmine of eavesdropping potential.

“As my job is to penetrate other people’s networks, complexity is my friend,” said NSA deputy director Richard Ledgett at a Washington conference.

He added that the connected nature of these new IoT devices allow both spies and hackers a wireless window of opportunity. Indeed, hacking of connected technology is expected to send the IoT security market into overdrive in the coming years.

“The first time you update the software, you introduce vulnerabilities — or variables, rather,” Ledgett said. “It’s a good place to be in a penetration point of view.”

IoT offering spies more back doors?

And there is growing evidence that network penetration by intelligence agencies and cyber criminals alike is becoming easier thanks to the dramatic increase in IoT devices globally.

A Hewlett-Packard study from 2014 found that many IoT devices were shipped from the factory with low security passwords.  As well, a Veracode report from last year discovered many basic security weaknesses in such devices as hubs for home IoT networks and even garage door openers.

Ledgett even admitted that the NSA is researching potential security exploits in such biomedical equipment as pacemakers, as another “tool in the toolbox.”

In his unusually frank speech for an upper echelon NSA representative, Ledgett said that the agency finds it easier to track terrorism suspects or foreign spooks through other avenues of surveillance.

Meanwhile, others in the American intelligence community have broken silence about IoT’s as potential wellspring of actionable intelligence for both friendly and enemy spy agencies.

James Clapper, director of US national intelligence, said at a Senate hearing this year that foreign spy agencies may be specifically targeting IoT devices. They may be using the connected technology for eavesdropping, surveillance, recruiting moles or gaining network access.

So beware, your connected coffee pot may be spilling the beans to spooks with every steaming cup.

Is Russia exporting a new breed of football hooligan?

Violence has been part of Russian football for many years. Clashes inside stadiums and organised fights away from them are common. But this weekend's mass disturbances in Marseille have thrust Russian hooliganism into the international spotlight.

The Russian Football Union expressed regret over the fighting and Russia's sports minister described those involved as a disgrace. But other senior officials have praised the hooligans openly as "real men".

Meanwhile the fans themselves seem largely unrepentant, even proud.

"This showed who is the most important among hooligans," Alexei, a supporter of Moscow's CSKA football club who says he took part in the clashes, told me by phone from France.

He said Russian hooligans learned much of what they know from the English.

"In the 70s and 80s everyone would bow down before the English," Alexei says. "Now there are different hooligans. These are different times."

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More on this story:

Image copyrightAFP

• Russia's hooligan fringe have their say
• Who is to blame for Marseille violence?
• France calls for alcohol bans
• Violence raises serious questions over security

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Hashtags like #Marseilleisours appeared on Twitter after the clashes and Russian hooligan groups on social media praised participants.

English fans caught up in the violence have talked of the Russians as savage and say ordinary supporters - not fellow hooligans - were attacked. Russian fans themselves insist they were responding to provocation by the English.

But they do describe a new breed of Russian hooligan - younger, fitter and more sober than his English counterpart.

"Now many people are boxers or into mixed martial arts, and Russian hooligans often follow a very healthy way of life, avoiding alcohol which used to be part of the subculture," explains journalist Andrei Malosolov, co-founder of Russia's Fans' Union.

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Media captionA French prosecutor says there were around 150 Russian "hooligans" who travelled to Marseille "well-prepared for violence"

"The English like drinking more, and when they drink they lose quality as fighters and slow down. Our people were more prepared, because of the culture these days," he told the BBC, suggesting that the "students" have outgrown their masters.

"Russia and Poland are in top place in the hooligan chart," Andrei Malosolov says. "England has dropped a long way down."

The tabloid paper Komsomolskaya Pravda adopts a similar tone, suggesting that Russia is now clear favourite in what it called the "alternative Euros".

As such, it has published a glossary of hooligan terms for the uninitiated.

The hard-core are known simply as the "fighters", the paper explains, whilst the "Ultras" are the noisy fans behind the goal. Tactics range from a "jump" - striking a few blows then retreating - to a full "action"' aimed at the "moral destruction of the rival".

Video footage of the clashes is usually posted online.

Reports from France suggest that hooligans from multiple clubs were involved in the brawling in Marseille, including from towns little known outside Russia like Orel and Krasnodar. Fans say key members of the bigger hooligan firms, including two linked to Moscow teams CSKA and Spartak, were banned from travelling.

A recent "fans' law" introduced strict sanctions for violations including violence. The president of Russia's fans' union told the BBC that more than 100 hooligans had been blacklisted as a result.

I don't see anything terrible about fans fighting. Quite the opposite, the guys did well. Keep it up!"

Igor Lebedev, nationalist MP and executive member of Russia n Football Union

AP

But many of those who did travel, fought with their faces uncovered - apparently unconcerned about repercussions.

Both Russia and England face penalties from Uefa if the violence continues. The ultimate punishment - disqualification - would be devastating for Russia which hosts the World Cup in 2018.

But for now, the mood here is defiant.

"The lads defended the honour of their country," Russian media quoted MP Igor Lebedev, who is also on the executive committee of the Football Union.

The spokesman for Russia's powerful Investigative Committee went even further.

"A normal man, as he should be, surprises them," tweeted Vladimir Markin, referring to European outrage at Russian hooligans. "They're used to seeing 'men' at gay parades," he concluded.

So the fans' own reaction is hardly surprising.

"Of course we are worried about the team, that's the main thing," Alexei told the BBC from France, insisting that there would be no more trouble among the fans without "provocation".

He claimed that the clashes at the end of Saturday's match were sparked by a barrage of abuse from England fans.

"Maybe it was wrong what we did," Alexei admitted. "But if people shout insults, they have to be ready to pay for that."

Nail-biting start for Russia's new Vostochny space centre

Oh please, darling, fly!"

A technician standing behind me was really nervous during the launch countdown at Vostochny, a new space centre in Russia's Far East.

It was the second launch attempt - a day after the previous one had been aborted at the last minute.

I noticed that some of the technician's colleagues also had pale faces and had crossed their fingers.

It emerged later that a cable malfunction had led to the postponement of Wednesday's launch.

This time there was relief for Russia's federal space agency, Roscosmos, as the Soyuz rocket, carrying three satellites, blasted off and the booster stage separated.

President Vladimir Putin had travelled 5,500km (3,500 miles) to watch the launch and was in a black mood after Wednesday's cancellation, berating Vostochny's managers for the financial scandals that have blighted this prestige project.

Image copyrightReuters

Image captionRussia wants to show international partners that it is still a superpower in space

Image copyrightReuters

Image captionPresident Putin watched the unmanned rocket lift off successfully on Thursday

As the rocket soared away from Earth the tension evaporated - the crowd around me was laughing, hugging, drinking champagne.

Only the essential launchpad structures have been finished at Vostochny, which is still a big building site. The original plan was to have it all ready by December 2015.

When we inspected the launchpad later it appeared to be in good shape. A huge metal covering for the service cabin had plunged onto a concrete chute for the rocket exhaust gases. But a specialist insisted that the damage was not serious.

Image captionA giant tower holds the rocket in place before launch

Image captionThe fierce blast during lift-off sent this metal covering crashing to the ground from the tower

Hours earlier President Putin had warned of consequences for the management failures at Vostochny.

"If their guilt is proven, they will have to change their warm beds at home for plank-beds in prison," Mr Putin said, commenting on the arrest of four senior people involved in the project.

Only hours after Vostochny's first launch one of those managers received a three-year jail sentence for massive embezzlement.

Strategic move

Vostochny is a pet project for Mr Putin. Russia's ambition is to develop it as the main civilian space centre, eventually replacing Baikonur, the Soviet-era cosmodrome in Kazakhstan.

Baikonur has potential political risks, being outside Russia.

So Vostochny has political and propaganda significance: it must prove that, despite international sanctions and a struggling economy, Russia can still complete a new cosmodrome and run it efficiently.

The next day I asked Roscosmos head Igor Komarov how he had felt before the second, successful, launch attempt.

"How do you think I felt?" he answered, grim-faced.

The authorities were so nervous that they banned all live broadcasting before the launch and for the 10 minutes after lift-off.

But Roscosmos officials have spoken optimistically about Vostochny becoming a centre for international space co-operation in future.

The Plesetsk cosmodrome, in Russia's Arctic north, will remain the centre for military space launches.

Away from the launchpad, much of the infrastructure at Vostochny remains unfinished. The engineers are in no hurry now; the next launch will not take place until next year.

US accuses Russia over Baltic jet manoeuvre

A Russian jet fighter that intercepted a US Air Force reconnaissance plane on Friday did so in an "unsafe and unprofessional manner" over the Baltic Sea, the Pentagon has said.

It says the fighter performed a barrel roll plane over the American plane.

It is the second incident in the Baltic this month in which the US has accused Russian planes of flying aggressively.

Two Russian planes flew close to a US guided missile destroyer almost a dozen times in the Baltic on 13 April.

"There have been repeated incidents over the last year where Russian military aircraft have come close enough to other air and sea traffic to raise serious safety concerns, and we are very concerned with any such behaviour," Pentagon spokesman Daniel Hernandez said on Friday.

The US aircraft was operating in international airspace and at no time crossed into Russian territory. This unsafe and unprofessional air intercept has the potential to cause serious harm and injury to all air crews involved.

"More importantly, the unsafe and unprofessional actions of a single pilot have the potential to unnecessarily escalate tensions between countries."

Mr Hernandez said the Su-27's "erratic and aggressive manoeuvres" also threatened the safety of the US aircrew, coming within 7.6m (25ft) of the fuselage of the American plane before conducting its barrel roll.

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov on Friday defended the flybys of warplanes over the US Navy destroyer in the Baltic Sea, insisting they were only looking at the ship "from a safe distance".

Military encounters between Russia and the US and its allies have escalated significantly over the past two years, ever since Russia's annexation of Crimea and the breakdown of relations between East and West.

The BBC's Gary O'Donoghue in Washington reported after the destroyer incident that Russia's actions were regarded by defence analysts as a flexing of muscle - a reminder that Russia has military might and cannot be pushed around.

But our correspondent says the frequency of such situations means many fear that a full-on confrontation - be it deliberate or accidental - is just a matter of time between the world's two great military powers.