Un'immagine del futuro? L'auto elettrica che raccoglie dati facciali degli automobilisti a loro insaputa.

Xpeng Motors fined by Chinese watchdog for facial recognition breach

 

 

TechNode, by Jill Shen Dec 15, 2021 

 

Chinese electric vehicle maker Xpeng has been ordered to pay RMB 100,000 ($15,710) in fines by China’s local market watchdog for collecting customers’ facial data without consent, Chinese media reported, as Beijing looks to tighten rules over user data privacy.

Why it matters: The latest penalty reflects the Chinese authorities’ goal of tightening data privacy rules following a series of controversies over the use of consumers’ personal data. The moves are changing the way Chinese tech companies operate.

 

"German automaker BMW was also found

using facial recognition technology on customers

without their knowledge"

 

Details: A district office under Shanghai’s market regulator (Shanghai Municipal Administration for Market Regulation) has imposed a fine of RMB 100,000 on an Xpeng subsidiary for unlawfully gathering facial data without customers’ knowledge, state-owned media The Paper reported Tuesday, citing Tianyancha, a Chinese business data inquiry platform.

• The Alibaba-backed EV maker was handed the fine for installing a total of 22 facial-recognition cameras in seven showrooms in Shanghai, according to a penalty bill (in Chinese) viewed by state-owned media outlet China News Service.
• The company reportedly used these cameras to collect more than 430,000 facial images during the first six months of this year without declaring the practice to the public, thus breaching China’s consumer protection law, the report said, citing the market watchdog.
• Xpeng said in a Tuesday statement to local media that it used the technology to gather information such as traffic flows, hoping to improve sales and better customer service. The company added that it had deleted all collected facial data and will strictly comply with regulations and protect customers’ personal information in the future.
  

 

Context: Xpeng is not the first automaker in China to violate customers’ privacy. German automaker BMW was found using facial recognition technology on customers without their knowledge, state broadcaster CCTV reported in March. 

• The Chinese government in August passed the Personal Information Protection Law, which came into effect on Nov. 1. The law requires companies to gain consent before collecting personal data. 

 

 

Link originale: https://technode.com/2021/12/15/xpeng-motors-fined-by-chinese-watchdog-for-facial-recognition-breach/

L'involuzione digitale dell'Umanità: l'epoca della solitudine (sorvegliata)

Da homo sapiens a homo digitalis: l’involuzione umana nella società digitale moderna

 

 

 

Ettore Guarnaccia, ettoreguarnaccia.com, 12 Novembre 2021

 

L’evoluzione digitale, iniziata con le migliori intenzioni, ha portato all’avvento e allo sviluppo di social media e dispositivi digitali. Questo ha modificato profondamente la società, i nostri comportamenti e le nostre attitudini, causando di fatto un’involuzione dell’essere umano facilmente osservabile e molto preoccupante. Mentre non è difficile immaginare quale sarà il risultato futuro di questa involuzione, se non si agisce tempestivamente sarà invece sempre più difficile cambiare rotta e dirigersi verso una reale evoluzione dell’essere umano.

 

"Okay Houston, we’ve had a problem here!"

 

 La frase pronunciata il 13 aprile 1970 da John Leonard “Jack” Swigert Jr., pilota del modulo di comando della missione Apollo 13, subito dopo l’esplosione e il danneggiamento di due serbatoi di ossigeno, col senno di poi, sarebbe stata perfetta se pronunciata anche nel 2002, quando fu lanciato il primo social network Friendster, oppure nel 2003, quando MySpace divenne famoso e utilizzato a livello mondiale, il 4 febbraio 2004, quando fu lanciato Facebook, o ancora il 9 gennaio 2007, quando fu presentato al mondo l’Apple iPhone, il primo esemplare di smartphone che introdusse contestualmente anche il concetto di “app”.

Avvenimenti che, nell’arco di soli 5 anni, hanno condotto la società nell’era digitale cambiandola profondamente, portando moltissimi vantaggi in termini di comunicazione, ubiquità della connessione a Internet e al Web, relazione a distanza, scambio di informazioni, innumerevoli servizi, applicazioni e giochi sempre a portata di mano. In pochissimo tempo, lo smartphone è diventato un’estensione del nostro corpo, onnipresente nella nostra quotidianità, contornato da altri oggetti digitali connessi, auricolari, smartwatch, sistema di entertainment dell’automobile e molto altro. Oggi diamo tutto questo per scontato, eppure solo 15 anni fa non avremmo mai lontanamente immaginato un’evoluzione tecnologica così rapida e pervasiva.

 

Tutto è avvenuto in maniera inizialmente graduale, ma con una progressione in costante accelerazione che ancora oggi sta procedendo a ritmi sempre più rapidi e inarrestabili. Basti pensare all’introduzione del 5G, delle reti satellitari, di smartphone sempre più funzionali e potenti, e dei tantissimi oggetti di uso comune (televisori, stereo, telecamere, frigoriferi, lavastoviglie, friggitrici, ecc.) connessi a Internet e allo smartphone. Tutto è connesso, tutto è digitale, tutto è “smart”.

Ma quello che inizialmente sembrava così utile, strabiliante e stupefacente, in realtà ha comportato un elevato prezzo da pagare, e non mi riferisco ai soldi.

Moltissime funzionalità introdotte da social e smartphone sono state create con intenti positivi, per aumentare la soddisfazione, e di conseguenza l’interazione degli utenti, pur sempre con l’obiettivo unico e imprescindibile di fare business. Ci viene costantemente raccontato dalla pubblicità che le evoluzioni tecnologiche servono per migliorare la nostra vita e metterci a disposizione nuovi strumenti mirabolanti ed efficienti: in parte è accidentalmente vero, ma la realtà è sempre e solo una: dietro tutto questo, il fine unico e imprescindibile è il profitto, cui si arriva anche attraverso la raccolta dei dati e il controllo dei comportamenti degli utenti. Lo hanno pubblicamente denunciato diversi esponenti e sviluppatori delle big tech di Silicon Valley.

Così, con le migliori intenzioni, sono nati il “like” di Facebook, la riproduzione automatica di YouTube, le notifiche di Apple, il “pull-to-refresh” di Twitter, i cuoricini di Instagram, le “loot box” dei videogiochi e tante altre funzionalità che hanno contribuito ad aumentare sensibilmente l’interazione e, quindi, lo screen-time degli utenti. Funzionalità che sono state largamente adottate dai produttori, spesso in combinazione tra loro, come è accaduto con gamblification e gamification, che hanno portato rispettivamente l’azzardo all’interno di videogiochi, social e app, e la parvenza di videogiochi all’interno del mondo dell’azzardo e delle app. Giochi di abilità per acquisire punteggi e oggetti di vario genere, sorteggi o estrazioni di premi, quiz e sondaggi, sono oggi presenti in moltissime app bancarie, assicurative, di e-commerce o della grande distribuzione. Queste funzionalità si sono dimostrate maledettamente efficaci nel fidelizzare i clienti e favorire il business.

 

Da qualche anno a questa parte – cioè da quando i produttori di piattaforme social e app hanno compreso le potenzialità degli effetti di determinate funzionalità digitali sui meccanismi neurologici degli utenti – dispositivi, app e social media sono stati appositamente disegnati e sviluppati per catturare l’attenzione degli utenti, fidelizzarli e mantenerli il più possibile incollati al display. Già oggi per molte persone, soprattutto per bambini e adolescenti, lo smartphone è l’ultima cosa con cui si interagisce prima di dormire e la prima al risveglio. Le sollecitazioni sono numerose e frequenti, non passa un minuto senza che riceviamo una notifica, un messaggio, un “din!” che dirotta la nostra attenzione e il nostro sguardo sul dispositivo digitale. Queste tecnologie hanno preso in ostaggio la mente e la volontà degli utenti, dominandone il pensiero, interrompendone ripetutamente azioni e intenzioni, generando una lenta e inavvertibile assuefazione, attraverso stimolazioni ripetute a brevissima distanza l’una dall’altra o con iperstimolazioni derivanti da più stimoli concomitanti (es. smartphone, tablet, console di gioco e televisione utilizzati nello stesso momento).

In questo processo, etica, principi, ragionevoli cautele e buon senso sono stati sacrificati sull’altare del business, del profitto e della rapidità di evoluzione tecnologica, e molti processi neurologici che inducono assuefazione e dipendenza sono stati sfruttati il più possibile, senza scrupoli e senza informarne gli utenti. Anzi, questo sfruttamento è avvenuto, e avviene tuttora, senza che venga in alcun modo bilanciato da un’adeguata preparazione degli utenti, in forma di educazione digitale, conoscenza informatica, coscienza dei meccanismi neurologici e consapevolezza degli effetti che tutto ciò ha sulla mente, sulle scelte personali e sui comportamenti. Chi ha visto il film-documentario “The Social Dilemma” capirà un po’ meglio quanto affermo, ma c’è molto di più dietro le quinte.

 

Il meccanismo neurologico più sfruttato è quello della ricompensa variabile, spesso nell’ambito di un preciso processo di aggancio (“hook”) come descritto dall’esperto di psicologia del consumatore Nir Eyal nel suo libro “Hooked”. Il processo è: [trigger + azione + ricompensa variabile + investimento]. Il trigger è l’innesco che attiva il comportamento (es. la notifica di una nuova e-mail, un messaggio, un like, un nuovo follower, ecc.), l’azione è il comportamento che adotta l’utente nella speranza di una ricompensa (es. aprire l’e-mail, visualizzare il messaggio, scorrere la timeline di un social media, ecc.) che deve però essere variabile, nel senso che se l’utente non sa cosa aspettarsi (es. la notifica può riguardare un messaggio positivo molto atteso, una delusione o qualcosa che gli è indifferente) l’effetto assuefacente risulta estremamente più potente. Infine, l’investimento, sotto forma di tempo impiegato nel perpetrare il comportamento, di soldi spesi per proseguire, di impegno profuso nella raccolta (di like, commenti, follower, ecc.), nella costruzione di contenuti (es. Instagram, TikTok e YouTube) o nel partecipare a community tematiche, tutte cose che aumentano la fidelizzazione e spingono alla reiterazione del comportamento.

È l’attesa di una ricompensa variabile a generare veri e propri boom di dopamina in specifiche aree del cervello, le stesse interessate dalle varie forme di dipendenza comportamentale o da sostanze, che vengono così rafforzate dall’azione di questo neurotrasmettitore che attiva le sinapsi che collegano i neuroni. La chiave è proprio l’attesa, per questo slot machine, lotterie, roulette, sorteggi, estrazioni, l’apertura di bauli, lo scrolling di Instagram o TikTok, la visualizzazione in sequenza di video su YouTube o di episodi di serie TV su Netflix e Prime Video, o anche il semplice refresh della videata di un’app, risultano così attraenti e diabolicamente assuefacenti. Inoltre, il rafforzamento delle aree cerebrali legate alla dipendenza, soprattutto se sollecitate da ricompense di tipo artificiale, predispone ad abbracciare ulteriori forme di dipendenza in futuro.

I retroscena sul caso TIM-KKR: Prysmiangroup, la fibra ottica e l'arsenale di armi informatiche della CIA

"Vault 7": CIA Hacking Tools Revealed

 

Press Release

 

Today, Tuesday 7 March 2017, WikiLeaks begins its new series of leaks on the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency. Code-named "Vault 7" by WikiLeaks, it is the largest ever publication of confidential documents on the agency.

The first full part of the series, "Year Zero", comprises 8,761 documents and files from an isolated, high-security network situated inside the CIA's Center for Cyber Intelligence in Langley, Virgina. It follows an introductory disclosure last month of CIA targeting French political parties and candidates in the lead up to the 2012 presidential election.

Recently, the CIA lost control of the majority of its hacking arsenal including malware, viruses, trojans, weaponized "zero day" exploits, malware remote control systems and associated documentation. This extraordinary collection, which amounts to more than several hundred million lines of code, gives its possessor the entire hacking capacity of the CIA. The archive appears to have been circulated among former U.S. government hackers and contractors in an unauthorized manner, one of whom has provided WikiLeaks with portions of the archive.

 

"Year Zero" introduces the scope and direction of the CIA's global covert hacking program, its malware arsenal and dozens of "zero day" weaponized exploits against a wide range of U.S. and European company products, include Apple's iPhone, Google's Android and Microsoft's Windows and even Samsung TVs, which are turned into covert microphones.

Since 2001 the CIA has gained political and budgetary preeminence over the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA). The CIA found itself building not just its now infamous drone fleet, but a very different type of covert, globe-spanning force — its own substantial fleet of hackers. The agency's hacking division freed it from having to disclose its often controversial operations to the NSA (its primary bureaucratic rival) in order to draw on the NSA's hacking capacities.

 

By the end of 2016, the CIA's hacking division, which formally falls under the agency's Center for Cyber Intelligence (CCI), had over 5000 registered users and had produced more than a thousand hacking systems, trojans, viruses, and other "weaponized" malware. Such is the scale of the CIA's undertaking that by 2016, its hackers had utilized more code than that used to run Facebook. The CIA had created, in effect, its "own NSA" with even less accountability and without publicly answering the question as to whether such a massive budgetary spend on duplicating the capacities of a rival agency could be justified.

In a statement to WikiLeaks the source details policy questions that they say urgently need to be debated in public, including whether the CIA's hacking capabilities exceed its mandated powers and the problem of public oversight of the agency. The source wishes to initiate a public debate about the security, creation, use, proliferation and democratic control of cyberweapons.

Once a single cyber 'weapon' is 'loose' it can spread around the world in seconds, to be used by rival states, cyber mafia and teenage hackers alike.

 

Julian Assange, WikiLeaks editor stated that "There is an extreme proliferation risk in the development of cyber 'weapons'. Comparisons can be drawn between the uncontrolled proliferation of such 'weapons', which results from the inability to contain them combined with their high market value, and the global arms trade. But the significance of "Year Zero" goes well beyond the choice between cyberwar and cyberpeace. The disclosure is also exceptional from a political, legal and forensic perspective."

Wikileaks has carefully reviewed the "Year Zero" disclosure and published substantive CIA documentation while avoiding the distribution of 'armed' cyberweapons until a consensus emerges on the technical and political nature of the CIA's program and how such 'weapons' should analyzed, disarmed and published.

Wikileaks has also decided to redact and anonymise some identifying information in "Year Zero" for in depth analysis. These redactions include ten of thousands of CIA targets and attack machines throughout Latin America, Europe and the United States. While we are aware of the imperfect results of any approach chosen, we remain committed to our publishing model and note that the quantity of published pages in "Vault 7" part one (“Year Zero”) already eclipses the total number of pages published over the first three years of the Edward Snowden NSA leaks.

 

Analysis

 

CIA malware targets iPhone, Android, smart TVs

CIA malware and hacking tools are built by EDG (Engineering Development Group), a software development group within CCI (Center for Cyber Intelligence), a department belonging to the CIA's DDI (Directorate for Digital Innovation). The DDI is one of the five major directorates of the CIA (see this organizational chart of the CIA for more details).

The EDG is responsible for the development, testing and operational support of all backdoors, exploits, malicious payloads, trojans, viruses and any other kind of malware used by the CIA in its covert operations world-wide.

The increasing sophistication of surveillance techniques has drawn comparisons with George Orwell's 1984, but "Weeping Angel", developed by the CIA's Embedded Devices Branch (EDB), which infests smart TVs, transforming them into covert microphones, is surely its most emblematic realization.

The attack against Samsung smart TVs was developed in cooperation with the United Kingdom's MI5/BTSS. After infestation, Weeping Angel places the target TV in a 'Fake-Off' mode, so that the owner falsely believes the TV is off when it is on. In 'Fake-Off' mode the TV operates as a bug, recording conversations in the room and sending them over the Internet to a covert CIA server. 

As of October 2014 the CIA was also looking at infecting the vehicle control systems used by modern cars and trucks. The purpose of such control is not specified, but it would permit the CIA to engage in nearly undetectable assassinations.

 

The CIA's Mobile Devices Branch (MDB) developed numerous attacks to remotely hack and control popular smart phones. Infected phones can be instructed to send the CIA the user's geolocation, audio and text communications as well as covertly activate the phone's camera and microphone.

Despite iPhone's minority share (14.5%) of the global smart phone market in 2016, a specialized unit in the CIA's Mobile Development Branch produces malware to infest, control and exfiltrate data from iPhones and other Apple products running iOS, such as iPads. CIA's arsenal includes numerous local and remote "zero days" developed by CIA or obtained from GCHQ, NSA, FBI or purchased from cyber arms contractors such as Baitshop. The disproportionate focus on iOS may be explained by the popularity of the iPhone among social, political, diplomatic and business elites.

A similar unit targets Google's Android which is used to run the majority of the world's smart phones (~85%) including Samsung, HTC and Sony. 1.15 billion Android powered phones were sold last year. "Year Zero" shows that as of 2016 the CIA had 24 "weaponized" Android "zero days" which it has developed itself and obtained from GCHQ, NSA and cyber arms contractors.

These techniques permit the CIA to bypass the encryption of WhatsApp, Signal, Telegram, Wiebo, Confide and Cloackman by hacking the "smart" phones that they run on and collecting audio and message traffic before encryption is applied.

 

CIA malware targets Windows, OSx, Linux, routers

The CIA also runs a very substantial effort to infect and control Microsoft Windows users with its malware. This includes multiple local and remote weaponized "zero days", air gap jumping viruses such as "Hammer Drill" which infects software distributed on CD/DVDs, infectors for removable media such as USBs, systems to hide data in images or in covert disk areas ( "Brutal Kangaroo") and to keep its malware infestations going.

Many of these infection efforts are pulled together by the CIA's Automated Implant Branch (AIB), which has developed several attack systems for automated infestation and control of CIA malware, such as "Assassin" and "Medusa".

Attacks against Internet infrastructure and webservers are developed by the CIA's Network Devices Branch (NDB).

The CIA has developed automated multi-platform malware attack and control systems covering Windows, Mac OS X, Solaris, Linux and more, such as EDB's "HIVE" and the related "Cutthroat" and "Swindle" tools, which are described in the examples section below.

 

CIA 'hoarded' vulnerabilities ("zero days")

In the wake of Edward Snowden's leaks about the NSA, the U.S. technology industry secured a commitment from the Obama administration that the executive would disclose on an ongoing basis — rather than hoard — serious vulnerabilities, exploits, bugs or "zero days" to Apple, Google, Microsoft, and other US-based manufacturers.

Serious vulnerabilities not disclosed to the manufacturers places huge swathes of the population and critical infrastructure at risk to foreign intelligence or cyber criminals who independently discover or hear rumors of the vulnerability. If the CIA can discover such vulnerabilities so can others.

The U.S. government's commitment to the Vulnerabilities Equities Process came after significant lobbying by US technology companies, who risk losing their share of the global market over real and perceived hidden vulnerabilities. The government stated that it would disclose all pervasive vulnerabilities discovered after 2010 on an ongoing basis.

"Year Zero" documents show that the CIA breached the Obama administration's commitments. Many of the vulnerabilities used in the CIA's cyber arsenal are pervasive and some may already have been found by rival intelligence agencies or cyber criminals.

As an example, specific CIA malware revealed in "Year Zero" is able to penetrate, infest and control both the Android phone and iPhone software that runs or has run presidential Twitter accounts. The CIA attacks this software by using undisclosed security vulnerabilities ("zero days") possessed by the CIA but if the CIA can hack these phones then so can everyone else who has obtained or discovered the vulnerability. As long as the CIA keeps these vulnerabilities concealed from Apple and Google (who make the phones) they will not be fixed, and the phones will remain hackable.

The same vulnerabilities exist for the population at large, including the U.S. Cabinet, Congress, top CEOs, system administrators, security officers and engineers. By hiding these security flaws from manufacturers like Apple and Google the CIA ensures that it can hack everyone &mdsh; at the expense of leaving everyone hackable.

Una videorecensione di "UROPIA il protocollo Maynards" del Professore-Youtuber Simone Bulleri

Simone Bulleri (YouTube) Videorecensione di UROPIA- il protocollo Maynards

di Pietro Bargagli Stoffi, thriller distopico (edizioni Bibliotheka, 2019)

Postiamo volentieri una approfondita e sofisticata videorecensione dello youtuber Simone Bulleri, pubblicata dal Professore toscano sul suo gradevole canale dove conversa di storia, filosofia, letteratura e cinema con competenza e piacevolezza, condividendo spesso con i followers le sue doti attoriali coltivate in anni e anni di teatro.

Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yoex26KBIv0&t=14s

Aggiornamenti sul leak di chiavi digitali dei Greenpass EU

EU’s Green Pass Vaccination ID Private Key Leaked: updates

threatPost - Author: Lisa Vaas - October 28, 2021 11:34 am

 

UPDATE: French & Polish authorities found no sign of cryptographic compromise in the leak of the private key used to sign the vaccine passports and to create fake passes for Mickey Mouse and Adolf Hitler, et al.

As of Thursday morning Eastern time, Adolf Hitler and Mickey Mouse could still validate their digital Covid passes, SpongeBob Squarepants was out of luck, and the European Union was investigating a leak of the private key used to sign the EU’s Green Pass vaccine passports.

Two days earlier, on Tuesday, several people reported that they’d found a QR code online that turned out to be a digital Covid certificate with the name “Adolf Hitler” written on it, along with a date of birth listed as Jan. 1, 1900.

On Wednesday, the Italian news agency ANSA reported that several underground vendors were selling passes signed with the stolen key on the Dark Web, and that the EU had called “several high-level meetings” to investigate whether the theft was an isolated incident.

The private key used to verify Hitler’s pass was reportedly revoked as of Wednesday, but there were multiple reports of working certificates still being sold online. Threatpost confirmed this on Thursday morning by using the official Verifica C19 app to scan a QR code that had been shared on Twitter by a penetration tester.

 

Try to scan this QR code with the official government APP "Verifica C19"

2/3 pic.twitter.com/2y65c4vsc9

— reversebrain (@reversebrain) October 26, 2021

 

Adolf’s certificate got the green light, as shown in the screen capture below:

Other QR codes posted to GitHub turned up a validly signed certificate for Mickey Mouse, though SpongeBob’s certificate has since been turned away as the key(s) gets revoked.

 

As of Thursday, the certificate for Adolf Hitler was also still being accepted by Germany’s Covid app “CovPass,” where the private certificate itself appears to originate from France.

 

Serious Repercussions of a Leaked Private Certificate

 

Dirk Schrader, global vice president of security research at New Net Technologies (NNT), now part of change management software provider Netwrix, told Threatpost on Thursday that this leak is likely going to be a big issue as travelers increasing require proof of vaccination.

“A leaked private certificate is a likely a big issue as other nations, specially non-EU nations, might require additional proof for any traveler, once the full scope of this incident unfolds,” he said via email. “The market for such fake vaccination certificates seems to be promising, as the use of Mickey Mouse and other fictitious and historic names certainly is used as a proof and assurance for potential buyers.”

 

Authentic EU Digital Passports Could Be Invalidated

 

The worst potential outcome of this, Schrader pointed out, would be revocation of that private key – an outcome that could  affect 278 million EU citizens.

Joseph Carson, chief security scientist and Advisory CISO at ThycoticCentrify, a Washington D.C. based provider of cloud identity security solutions, said the news of the leak is “shocking,”

“It is a major concern that the private keys have been reportedly leaked/sold and actively being used to create forged EU Digital COVID passports,” he told Threatpost on Thursday. “This leak could, in fact, invalidate existing authentic EU Digital Passports unless a full incident response and root cause analysis is determined that could minimize any potential damage this could cause.”

Carson pointed out that aach country is responsible for their private keys, so one country being compromised “would not be a major surprise.”

That, however, isn’t the case: multiple countries are being reported, which is going to damage the trust that the EU Digital Passport provides and which “could force a revamp on travel restrictions or trust in the passport,” Carson said.

“The whole trust is based on keeping those private keys secured and protected, and I just hope that the impacted countries have minimized the risks and [are] not dependent on a single set of private keys for all EU Digital Passports,” he continued.

“[Determining] how the private keys have been compromised should be a top priority,” while reducing the risks of such a leak reoccurring should mean that security and protection of the keys will be significantly improved, he said.

 

A ‘Growing Black Market’ in Forged Vaccine Passports

 

Besides fictional or dead characters, the penetration tester who shared the QR code – @reversebrain – noted that this is no laughing matter. “This is worrying,” they said. “If the leak would be confirmed, this means that fake EU Digital COVID Certificate can be forged to any person.”

It wouldn’t be the first time. In June, Germany set up a police task force to battle what the BBC called a growing black market in forged vaccine certificates, as scammers communicated via the encrypted Telegram messaging service to dupe people into paying about €100 (£86; $122) for a whole lot of nothing.

Telegram is again featuring in the forged certificates this time around. GitHub user Emanuele Laface said on Tuesday that the encrypted messenger service is where most of the forged Green Passes are being passed around:

“On various groups (Telegram mainly) are circulating several forged Green Pass with valid signature.” —Emanuele Laface’s Oct. 26 GitHub post

Laface suggested that the leak could encompass more than just one private key. Rather, it could be  that a database of private keys was compromised: a possibility that “may [end] up in a break of the chain of trust in the Green Pass architecture,” they noted.

That chain of trust could be broken in a lot of places: According to BleepngComputer, the fake certificates circulating online have been issued from countries including France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, North Macedonia, Poland, and more, “indicating the issue could very well impact the entire EU.”

 

EU (Slowly) Moves to Block Bogus Certificates

 

102821 13:05 UPDATE: The European Commission told Threatpost on Thursday that it’s in contact with the relevant Member States authorities that are investigating and which are putting remedial actions in place.

A spokesperson said that Member States in the eHealth Network decided on Wednesday to coordinate their actions on the incident. As a first step, he said, “Member States have agreed to block the two fraudulent certificates so that they will be shown as invalid by the verifying apps.”

The Commission didn’t give a timeline for when the certificates will be blocked, nor why Threatpost and others could still validate some of the bogus certificates on Thursday. 

But the Commission did say that Member States and the Commission are working at the national and European level on improving invalidation and revocation systems, “to be able to react to any such cases even more quickly.” 

The Commission condemned the private key theft: “The Member States and the Commission condemn this malicious act in the strongest possible terms, which comes at a time when health services in all Member States are under pressure fighting the pandemic.”

 

Cryptographic Keys Not Compromised

 

The Commission’s statement said that  the certificates were apparently generated “by persons with valid credentials to access the national IT systems, or a person misusing such valid credentials.” 

An investigation now being conducted by authorities in France and Poland is looking into possible causes of the fraudulent activity, including potential forgery of documents and identity theft. 

At this point, the investigation has ruled out a compromise of the cryptographic keys used to sign certificates, according to the Commission:

“According to the information available, the cryptographic keys used to sign certificates have not been compromised. This incident is caused by an illegal activity and not by a technical failure. Together with the Member States, we reaffirm our full trust in the EU Digital COVID Certificate system.”

 

102821 13:23 UPDATE: Added input from the European Commission.

102821 13:39 UPDATE 2: Added input from Dirk Schrader, Joseph Carson.

 

 

 

Link originale: https://threatpost.com/eus-green-pass-vaccination-id-private-key-leaked/175857/

La proposta di legge UE violerebbe la privacy dei dati, dicono gli esperti di sicurezza

Auto-scans of phones would violate data privacy, say security experts

Leading cryptographers warn the proposed schemes to detect child abuse images are a form of mass surveillance Apple’s plans to install software on American iPhones to scan continuously for child abuse imagery have been delayed

FINANCIAL TIMES - Madhumita Murgia in London 15th of October 2021 

A group of world-leading cryptography and security experts has warned that scanning images on smartphones, like a scheme proposed by Apple in August, should be treated like mass surveillance and prohibited by law. “[Device scanning] makes what was formerly private on a user’s device potentially available to law enforcement and intelligence agencies, even in the absence of a warrant,” said the authors, who include Whitfield Diffie, an inventor of public key cryptography, Ronald Rivest, an inventor of the widely used RSA encryption system, and firewall expert Steven Bellovin.
“Because this privacy violation is performed at the scale of entire populations, it is a bulk surveillance technology,” they added. The researchers raised the alarm as calls to circumvent encryption from intelligence and law enforcement agencies around the world become increasingly strident, with the EU due to propose a new law on child protection that may include suggestions for device scanning in December.

It also follows now-delayed plans by Apple to install software on American iPhones to scan continuously for child abuse imagery. Such an automated system would proactively alert a team of human reviewers who would then contact law enforcement, if they believe illegal imagery is detected. Apple halted plans to launch the software after a fierce backlash from privacy campaigners and other tech companies.
“The concern is that European institutions could bring in a law making something like Apple’s child abuse blocking proposal mandatory for people providing phones and chat apps,” said Ross Anderson, a co-author of the paper, titled “Bugs In Our Pockets”, and a professor of security engineering at the University of Cambridge. “Interfering with the security of people’s devices by making them intrinsically easy to wiretap, putting in government-mandated snooping software that will look at your pictures, texts and videos to see if there is anything the government doesn’t like, really does cross a red line.”

Scanning a user’s device, known as “client-side scanning”, has been proposed by governments as a way to identify unlawful content — including child abuse and terrorism — on a person’s phone, while nominally preserving end-to-end encryption. “But unfortunately it’s not that simple . . . client-side scanning would render the user privacy and security guarantees of encryption hollow,” wrote Erica Portnoy, senior technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation. “Even a well-intentioned effort to build such a system will . . . open the door to broader abuses.”

Scanning stored data on a user’s device “brings surveillance to a new level”, Anderson and his colleagues write, adding that promises by companies like Apple that its use would be limited to child abuse imagery is “illusory”. 

In 2016, Apple went to court with the FBI, defending its use of encryption when pressured by the authorities to access a terror suspect’s iPhone following a shooting in San Bernardino, California. The researchers said that the proposal to pre-emptively scan all user devices for targeted content was “far more insidious” than the FBI asking for specific access to an individual’s device.
They said: “The [intelligence] agencies’ direction of travel is the bulk scanning of everyone’s private data, all the time, without warrant or suspicion. Is it prudent to deploy extremely powerful surveillance technology that could easily be extended to undermine basic freedoms?”

Link originale: https://www.ft.com/content/64a74bde-4d64-4940-8c03-e01eeecc6e54