Vodafone reveals direct government wiretaps

This has been going on since 2003: it&#x27;s not new.<p><a href="http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/07/11/greek_mobile_wiretap_latest/" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.theregister.co.uk&#x2F;2007&#x2F;07&#x2F;11&#x2F;greek_mobile_wiretap...</a><p>TL:DR; Vodafone Greece is known to have been bugged, to spy on the lines of top government officials <i>including the Prime Minister</i> by persons unknown. Kostas Tsalikidis, Vodafone Greece’s head of network design, was found hanged in a supposed suicide in 2005. As far as I know, nobody was identified, much less charged&#x2F;tried&#x2F;convicted in this scandal.<p>Here&#x27;s an in-depth report in IEEE Spectrum:<p><a href="http://spectrum.ieee.org/telecom/security/the-athens-affair" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;spectrum.ieee.org&#x2F;telecom&#x2F;security&#x2F;the-athens-affair</a><p>The take-away I got from this is that the &quot;hackers&quot; <i>must</i> have had highly specific knowledge of how Ericsson AXE exchanges allow lawful intercepts, plus knowledge of how Vodafone Greece&#x27;s backbone was configured, and the credentials to install diversions in that system. Which screams &quot;Five Eyes&quot;.<p>And if it is known to have been happening in Greece prior to 2004, it was probably going on in other national Vodafone subsidiaries at the same time or even earlier.

This surveillance apparatus is built and operated by programmers and engineers. It goes against the beliefs of 90% of programmers and engineers that I know. Software people tend to place very high value on privacy and due process, and they tend to be anti-authoritarian.<p>I can&#x27;t understand why they haven&#x27;t been leaking these massive violations to the press and public.<p>They don&#x27;t need to do &quot;a Snowden&quot;. They don&#x27;t have to even quit their job. If anyone in the world can engineer an anonymous leak, surely a software engineer building or operating the secret surveillance apparatus can do it.<p>EDIT: The public is indifferent when it&#x27;s abstract or they think it doesn&#x27;t include them. I think most people would be horrified if a million snippets of mundane conversation were leaked from a complicit telecom, and people heard their <i>own voice</i> in there.

<i>The firm said it could not specify the countries that have a direct line into its networks, because those countries have laws prohibiting disclosure of surveillance methods.</i><p><i>In six out of the 29 countries, governments have a permanent link to monitor communications, the BBC understands.</i><p>So can they list the 23 countries who do not have a direct link to monitor communications?

&gt;&gt; &quot;The firm said it could not specify the countries that have a direct line into its networks, because those countries have laws prohibiting disclosure of surveillance methods.&quot;<p>I find this such a bullshit excuse. What will the consequences be realistically if you disclose? Disclosure is the only way these laws are going to get repealed. I&#x27;m glad the UK isn&#x27;t one of the 6 countries but as a Vodafone user this makes me sick.<p>1) Can other countries listen into my calls or as a Vodafone UK customer am I safe?<p>2) If I travel to one of these countries and use my Vodafone service is the country now able to monitor all my communications?

<i>the UK, law enforcement and intelligence agencies must have a warrant</i><p>That&#x27;s surprising. The GCHQ was the agency that tapped Google&#x27;s datacenter fiber. They actually had more-direct access to Google data than the NSA.<p><i>The firm said it could not specify the countries that have a direct line into its networks, because those countries have laws prohibiting disclosure of surveillance methods.</i><p>Couldn&#x27;t someone compile a list of countries with such laws?

When its done in 3rd world countries, western countries stating this is against privacy and violating human rights. But when western countries do it, its to protect national security! Btw I&#x27;m not against it, I&#x27;m against the way of dealing with it.

UK is one of those countries with direct access and Vodafone doesnt like it.<p>Recent project TEMPORA ( CIRCUIT &#x2F; TIMPANI &#x2F; CLARINET &#x2F; REMEDY &#x2F; GERONTIC ) leak gave them some courage to speak up?

&quot;Direct&quot; in the headline is meaning that the government apparently has arbitrary access without requiring warrants.<p><i>EDIT</i> Fixed confusing phrasing backed on follow-up comments.

Hah! They miss one of the most glaring thefts of metadata in the world, AMDOCS &#x27;outsourced billing&#x27;.<p>They do at least mention that: <i>It is possible to learn a great deal about an individual’s movements, interests and relationships from an analysis of metadata and other data associated with their use of a communications network, which we refer to in this report generally as ‘communications data’ – and without ever accessing the actual content of any communications. In many countries, agencies and authorities therefore have legal powers to order operators to disclose large volumes of this kind of communications data.</i><p>Well, the game was won long ago by these guys, who are Israeli (widely considered Mossad affiliated) though they did recently reshuffle their corporate entities to pretend to be American. Partial client list at <a href="http://www.amdocs.com/About/Success/Pages/customer-success.aspx" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.amdocs.com&#x2F;About&#x2F;Success&#x2F;Pages&#x2F;customer-success.a...</a> ... includes Vodafone in at least these markets: <i>global</i>, Australia, India, Germany, Netherlands, Romania, UK.

I&#x27;m shocked, shocked to find that wiretapping is going on in here! -- said no-one ever without irony after Snowden&#x27;s leaks.<p>My default assumption is now everything with tapped, everything is monitored and recorded and while cryptography can help it is increasingly hard to trust both the implementation and correct use by both parties. The further this belief and approach spreads, the sooner we&#x27;ll see constructive steps towards restoring privacy, security and trust in communications.

The actual reports and country by country information is really good. I wonder if any retractions will occur? Interesting they can declare disclosure illegal yet disclose that fact at the same time. I would have expected some countries to demand no comment whatsoever<p>So are all countries on this list valuable enough to warrant turning over call information to authorities?

So moment a baby comes out of the uterus, doctor should read him&#x2F;her the Miranda Warning.<p>Kid! everything is bugged, we are watching and recording everything. any thing you say or type, will be used against you in some kangaroo court. .... You have the right to consult an attorney and his cell phone and emails are bugged too. So nothing is confidential....<p>Good luck

Maybe we should have some kind of tor phone that randomizes phone numbers and scrambles the sound over the wire and reconstitutes the sound through some well engineered Kickstarter phone.<p>This would render most govt taps moot.

We know not to be surprised by all this by this point, right? I mean, regardless of whether you think this is analogous to, say, a speed trap - but in cyber space - regardless, we aren&#x27;t surprised? Yes?

I feel so save. They must have captured all the terrorists by now.

<a href="http://www.vodafone.com/content/sustainabilityreport/2014/index/operating_responsibly/privacy_and_security/law_enforcement/country_by_country.html#country27" rel="nofollow">http:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.vodafone.com&#x2F;content&#x2F;sustainabilityreport&#x2F;2014&#x2F;in...</a><p>Well, I&#x27;d say the fact the US isn&#x27;t there means they are one of the 6 with direct links who don&#x27;t need a warrant or to bother with any of the other legal niceties.<p>Meh.<p>EDIT: I was wrong, they sold in 9&#x2F;13. Ah well, my memory isn&#x27;t perfect.