The U.S. National Security Agency has figured out how to hide spying software deep within hard drives made by Western Digital, Seagate, Toshiba and other top manufacturers, giving the agency the means to eavesdrop on the majority of the world's computers, according to cyber researchers and former operatives. That long-sought and closely guarded ability was part of a cluster of spying programs discovered by Kaspersky Lab, the Moscow-based security software maker that has exposed a series of Western cyber espionage operations. Kaspersky said it found personal computers in 30 countries infected with one or more of the spying programs, with the most infections seen in Iran, followed by Russia, Pakistan, Afghanistan, China, Mali, Syria, Yemen and Algeria. The targets included government and military institutions, telecommunication companies, banks, energy companies, nuclear researchers, media, and Islamic activists, Kaspersky said. Read on here... http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article41018.htm --------------------------------------- Wow, isn't that convenient? No more live spies needed. I bet, they have me on their radar, too.... I have a Toshiba computer that has been acting up lately. Anyway, this is a great invention and should cut down on lengthy wars now. The evil planning opponent could be nipped in the butt before he even gets his boots on!! I wonder, though, if the Russians and Chinese haven't developed similar "bugs"? Question is, should I take the sledgehammer to my Toshiba??? How do you see this problem and how would you tackle it, IF you were, let's say, Vladimir Putin? I hope we have some bright men and women on the forum who could and would discuss this issue more broadly and let the rest of us know how to protect ourselves from being spied on 24/7.
The solution? Control over what you're using. You don't want a bugged CPU, don't buy one from an untrustworthy source. In the case of Russia, it could mean going so far as previously threatened - developing a domestic alternative to the Wintel platform, at least for official uses. I believe Elbrus http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elbrus_(computer) is working on a variety of systems for such uses.
That sounds impressive, although I've never heard of them before. The Kreml sure would need a system that would not be infested with a bug from the Pentagon.
