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@luanaspinetti We've got to use application layer !crypto. We can no longer trust transport layer security like https (Thanx, Lenovo!) or hardware security like smart cards (Thanx, GCHQ!)
- lnxw48 (Linux Walt) repeated this.
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Of course we can trust transport layer security, as long as we don't blindly trust a factory image to come configured in a secure fashion. :)
Heck, even harddrives have been known to come preloaded with trojans because they were "pre-formatted" with a filesystem (and someone had measled in an evil .exe). Can't really remember who had this problem, but I think it was #Maxtor or someother.
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@mmn I think it was an HP product ... whichever drives they were using.
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@mmn @bobjonkman It isn't transport layer that is the problem. It is blindly trusting the corrupt #CertAuthority system to handle offline verification. Companies install #MITM appliances in #coffee shops and hotels, as well as most corporate networks. Knowing this, why would we _ever_ think #HTTPS is secure?
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@mmn If I format that drive with e.g. #ext4 is then the trojan horse gone as it is stored on the file system (#NTFS I presume?) or is it somewhere else stored on the drive, e.g. hidden? I always format any new drive I get as I mostly want to encrypt it with #LUKS and #GPG. :-)
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In the case I was thinking about you could format it either way you wanted.
The more dangerous backdoors are the ones the #NSA have access to, where the actual firmware of the disk is tampered with (giving possibilities to circumvent many security measures).
And such tampering is already available publically for SD cards (and SSDs in general I guess) since bunnie et al. presented it on 30c3.
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@mmn Ah, yes. But what if I scramble the disk and use #LUKS + encryption? It (firmware) cannot access the files there.
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@lnxw48 I see that like you ... what you think, is it possible to store root certs in the UEFI ... or does some companies do that ?
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@roland The firmware could _pretend_ to scramble the disk, but leave the underlying hardware fully-readable.
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@lnxw48 True, https is still good. And yes, the entire PKI business is corrupt (Thanx, Diginotar and Com…
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@lnxw48 No, that is not possible. You cannot do something against #dd if=/dev/urandom of=/dev/sda or so. Then the firmware has to virtualize the whole hard drive.
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@roland The firmware in a $5 flash drive virtualizes the whole drive (to spread writes out and slow down wear). Why would #NSA or its equivalent not think to do something similar with a hard drive's firmware?