
Theremin's Bug: How the Soviet Union Spied on the US Embassy for Seven Years - ajarmst
https://hackaday.com/2015/12/08/theremins-bug/
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gediminas_
A sweet and short read about the Thing.
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thing_(listening_device)](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thing_\(listening_device\))
There's an article in wiki as well, but reading stuff with personal touch is a
lot nicer

~~~
mercer
This is also an excellent story about it:
[https://thecorrespondent.com/3789/operation-easy-chair-or-
ho...](https://thecorrespondent.com/3789/operation-easy-chair-or-how-a-little-
company-in-holland-helped-the-cia-bug-the-russians)

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fortythirteen
> In 1938, with the Nazi threat growing stronger, Theremin returned to Russia.
> He expected to send for his wife a few weeks after his arrival.
> Unfortunately, that wasn’t to be the case. Léon and Lavinia never saw each
> other again.

I was always under the impression he was abducted from his home in NY and sent
back. At least, that was the story told in _Theramin, An Electronic Odyssey_
[0].

[0] -
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAOpVAHwLic](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fAOpVAHwLic)

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memracom
If this kind of technical creativity (way outside of the box) was possible in
Russia under the Soviet yoke, then what kind of things are they capable of
creating today?

Perhaps a whole bunch of electronic warfare devices like those used against
AEGIS and the USS Donald Cook? And what about the fact that NASA and the US
space program are so dependent on Russian rocket engines? Or the Russian jet
that can hover or reverse in mid flight?

We know that the Russian system of higher education is very rigourous and
places a lot of emphasis on mathematics Could this be the root of it? Or is it
something else in the culture of Russia?

One of the biggest mistakes of the USA after the Cold War was to stop taking
Russia seriously and to stop watching what Russians were doing. The west
accepted the views put forward by Ukrainians about Russia, instead of going
direct to the source. Now we know that neo-nazi forces within Ukraine were
spreading misinformation about Russia in order to benefit Ukrainian oligarchs.

It is time to move beyond this. More of us need to learn Russian fluently and
analyze Russia based on direct knowledge of the country and people. Russia isa
powerful nation and it has a rich and vibrant culture. There is a lot to learn
there, not just about technology but also about how to approach and solve
impossible problems.

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gargravarr
I remember reading about this back in school in the library; I found it very
sophisticated that it was specifically designed with no power source, and thus
almost impossible to detect. A very, very clever design.

And also a wonderful illustration of political machinations, in that the olive
branch extended to you often has a covert team watching exactly how your
fingers grasp it.

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bognition
Wow I'd heard this story before but I never knew that the bug had no power
source. Thats pretty slick.

~~~
zwerdlds
Pedantic, I know, but the projected beam was it's power source. It had no
_built-in_ power source, which is pretty cool, all the same.

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upofadown
Check the comment by BrightBlueJim. I too have thought that the common
description of "The Thing" was incomplete. To make it work well enough to be
practical it would of required some non-linear element.

Current bug detectors explicitly detect non-linear elements. A hilarious
practical joke involves adding diodes to the concrete mix for a high security
facility. Back in the cold war the Russians actually did this to the Americans
in Moscow.

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DigitalJack
I wonder if the microwave based "acoustic attacks" in cuba were simply their
attempt at powering such a bug.

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bakenator
The Thing is on display at the NSA museum in Maryland. Very interesting museum
for crypto history.

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dayofthedaleks
snoopy RFID

