Cyber War & Globalism: Race to the Bottom

Colorado's 9News reported:

The United States is preparing the battlefield for a future cyber-war by encoding trap doors, viruses and secret codes in enemy power grids, defense systems and modes of transportation, according to a top Homeland Security expert.

The U.S. can then use the embedded codes to launch attacks at will against a nation's critical infrastructure, according to Richard Clarke, who served 11 years in White House national security policy roles.

"You can't just wake up one day and decide you want to hack your way into an opponent's power grid. The U.S. has to do that months or years in advance," Clarke said. "You have to embed now because the enemy is constantly changing firewalls and installing new intrusion devices. You want to be inside the network and leave a trap door so that you can get back inside at all times."

Clarke says a half a dozen other countries are also engaging in the cyber-espionage by getting into the networks of their opponents every day without ever being detected.

He says the most developed and most dangerous threat to America is from China, which manufactures computer parts used in laptops and network computers around the world.

Four years ago I shared my concerns:

Why did the SEC allow the partial sale of IBM’s personal computer division to a Chinese company if it was worried about improper use of those PC’s to spy on America? Better yet, why did the State Department purchase 16,000 of the machines if they had such a concern? A Virginia representative raised concerns after learning 900 of those machines would be used for highly classified work.

Is this how China got into U.S. embassy computers? China's military modernization was driven by:

"The first rule of unrestricted warfare is that there are no rules, with nothing forbidden."

In 2004, a Chinese Army white paper stated that its primary goal in modernizing was "building an informationalized force and winning an informationalized war."

In December 2004 IBM sold its PC division to China's Lenova.
Let's be clear, your back is exposed. Global financial innovation discarded quality and safety, while running free of regulatory structures. Instead of effectively protecting citizen privacy, governments installed the Matrix's KeyMaster on computers, power girds, defense systems and transportation.

What foreign country or company will line up to buy from the U.S. knowing our spooks can remotely pull the plug or turn a product into a weapon?

As the U.S. is now an endemic spying society, what Trojan Horses exist in people's homes? Did they arrive on a Chinese made PC or did Uncle Sam deliver it under rain, snow, sleet or shine?

Government spies will make products more dangerous, as if companies need any assistance. Did spooks cause my new electric weed eater to fast feed line with a defective shield cutter? It took no time for the trimmer to whack my shins instead of foliage. I informed the Consumer Product Safety Commission using their online form. The NSA might already know that I wasn't the only victim. A lady returned her leg whacker to the same Walmart worker, only her wounds were deeper and more numerous.

It's buyer beware in spades.

Update: Will the NSA install its trap door domestically via "Public Citizen"?

Update 7-14-11:  The Pentagon had its worst reported cyber attack, which resulted in the theft of 24,000 files.

Update 8-24-13:  Spy agencies including the CIA and MI5 have refused to use PCs from Chinese-founded vendor Lenovo for most of the last decade over suspicions that its equipment has had back doors inserted to aid espionage.

Update 10-4-18:  BloombergBusinessweek reported on Chinese computer manufacturers inserting backdoor chips for spying purposes.

Update 2-11-20:   U.S. and German intelligence were behind a global encryption company.  It takes one to know one.