
The Ex-Google Hacker Taking on the World’s Spy Agencies - wacvasconcelos
http://www.wired.com/2014/07/morgan-marquis-boire-first-look-media/
======
zmanian
If you've ever heard Morgan's talking about dissassembling malware in Syrian
beheading videos it is chilling.

Morgan and Citizen Lab's analysis of malware for sale to governments.
[https://citizenlab.org/2014/06/backdoor-hacking-teams-
tradec...](https://citizenlab.org/2014/06/backdoor-hacking-teams-tradecraft-
android-implant/)

Morgan's talk at 30c3 [https://citizenlab.org/2014/01/morgan-marquis-boires-
talk-30...](https://citizenlab.org/2014/01/morgan-marquis-boires-talk-30c3/)

Morgan's talk at RightsCon
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05KkCY7Zgm0](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=05KkCY7Zgm0)

Blog post of Vietnamese govt malware attacking the EFF.
[https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/01/vietnamese-malware-
get...](https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/01/vietnamese-malware-gets-
personal)

~~~
voltagex_
>If you've ever heard Morgan's talking about dissassembling malware in Syrian
beheading videos it is chilling.

I am very interested in these kind of talks, but I've seen things on the
Internet I'd rather not see again - is it safe to watch?

~~~
zitterbewegung
He doesn't play the actual video of it happening. Just the first frame really
to make a point. I would say its pretty tame.

------
cottonseed
Since I got my PhD (math, with background in CS, startups), the only job
inquiry I've made is to First Look. I wish I had an in there. Their job page
is rather vague. I realize they're growing quickly.

~~~
rokhayakebe
Bump, maybe something is "looking."

------
higherpurpose
Finfisher, a stealthy collection of spying tools sold by the British firm
Gamma Group that they eventually tracked to _command-and-control servers in 25
countries_.

This is why I always take stories about "attack coming from China" with a huge
grain of salt. It should be trivial to make an attack look like it came from a
certain country, especially for an agency like NSA that has direct access to
_millions_ of computers in China.

~~~
mox1
Would you run a SAAS service, website , etc. from mainland China, even if the
hosting was free? Probably not. Between the great firewall of China shutting
you down for "maintenance", Carrier Grade NAT blocking your server, etc. etc.
it makes no sense.

Personally, I would choose a former USSR country, one with reliable internet
access (blame it on the Russians) or Canada, Germany, etc.

Think big picture, your Malware C&C has to have good uptime :), the terrorists
don't sleep!

------
Sami_Lehtinen
Technical tools aren't enough. Those can also make the situation worse. If
people don't receive general security training. Plain tools could be just a
trap.

------
iew98
bullshit .. there are tons of people with ultra smart than this fame-ass !
people from russia , china are very very smart than this look-at-me i m so ex-
google. if you are that smart why you need article and fame ? why do name
dropping ( using google for those ass-hats who don't know what name dropping
is ) seriously , get a life

------
tekacs
There seem to have been a lot of 'person profile's on HN recently. Might
anyone know if this is a summer, current journalism thing, or just HN's recent
preference?

~~~
incision
HN trends happen regularly. Right now it's profiles, in the past it has been
military aircraft, biology, whatever.

It's pretty neat and seems to work well - waves of variety without the
segregation of something like subreddits or the chaos of a completely theme-
less forum.

Ideally, I'd have a "More like this" button that would identify recent
submissions belong to the same topic cluster.

------
eat
Just more Google marketing. Trying to win hearts and minds, while like
Facebook, profiting off of the sale of user data.

~~~
digitalengineer
Comparing Google with aggressive governments? Last I knew I was not forced to
be a user of Google products. Also: Google does not track and arrest/beat up
people with other opinions than the rulers.

~~~
nfoz
I find it extremely difficult to avoid interacting with Google products: \- a
LOT of the web employs google analytics to track you \- very many of my
contacts use Gmail, so perhaps the majority of my email ends up on their
servers \- Friends take photos of me that are uploaded to Google+ \- My home
and car have been captured by the GoogleMaps surveillance van

I agree that it's important to distinguish Google vs. governments. But let's
not pretend that you can "opt out" of Google's surveillance on you, even if
you aren't using their products.

Edit: Let's also acknowledge that whatever Google collects, the governments
have access to.

~~~
BrandonMarc
Yes, Google Analytics is on most of the web. Guess what else is? AdSense. Even
if a site doesn't have Analytics, if it has AdSense, then most of the same
tracking comes into play.

A massive fraction of the web - at least, the websites that get traffic - has
either or both of these built in.

