
Secrecy mounts over White House cybersecurity staff shakeup - cpeterso
http://www.zdnet.com/article/white-house-chief-information-security-officer-departs/
======
pcl
This story has been flagged, and I think that's a shame. I understand the
concerns about turning HN into another political discussion rant forum.
However, this is relevant news to this audience, for two reasons:

\- It's about the CISO of a high-profile establishment, and his team.

\- National cybersecurity policies are likely to impact the decisions that the
software and hardware folks of us will make over the coming years.

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mjevans
I think I'd rather Trump just rolled the Whitehouse back to Battle Star
Galactia feeling hardlines and no-microprocessors period level security.

You know, classic, tangible, "built to last" stuff.

It would be amazing if they went back to typewriters as being 'unhackable'
devices.

~~~
DanBC
> It would be amazing if they went back to typewriters as being 'unhackable'
> devices.

Considerable amounts of money and expertise have been thrown at sound
analysis, and it's used in a range of situations from telling what submarine
is in your waters to knowing what a typist is typing.

And eventually people put parallel ports on typewriters because typists are
more expensive than a parallel port, at which point you've got a cumbersome
but very hackable printer.

Researchers recover typed text from audio recording:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7448976](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=7448976)

Acoustic snooping: [https://freedom-to-tinker.com/2005/09/09/acoustic-
snooping-t...](https://freedom-to-tinker.com/2005/09/09/acoustic-snooping-
typed-information/)

And Germany was thinking of trying exactly this:
[http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/109...](http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/germany/10968316/Germanys-
plan-to-take-on-NSA-Block-eavesdroppers-with-classical-music-and-use-
typewriters.html)

~~~
razvanh
An interesting tangent: sound can be recovered from visual information too:

Algorithm recovers speech from the vibrations of a potato-chip bag filmed
through soundproof glass - [http://news.mit.edu/2014/algorithm-recovers-
speech-from-vibr...](http://news.mit.edu/2014/algorithm-recovers-speech-from-
vibrations-0804)

------
cyberferret
Not a fan of Trump's policies, actions or attitudes here, but this 'article'
wasn't much more than a series of rumours, guesses and third had accounts
gathered together on one page. One could infer many things from this story,
and that does a disservice to the journalism profession.

If providers are serious about stamping out the constant cries of 'fake news',
I would like to think that articles be more well researched, and solid &
verifiable proof of evidence is found, and presented in a way that cannot be
refuted or challenged.

~~~
simplicio
Really? Other than two sentences from an anonymous source, everything in the
article is verifiable. The story itself is fairly opaque, but then that's what
the article is reporting, that it isn't clear why the CISO left, and that
neither the WH or the man himself will comment.

They don't offer any guesses, and even the headline stresses that they don't
know.

