Wikileaks Cracks Pentagon Encryption; My Faith in Our Leaders is Restored (or NOT)

This is hilarious--well, assuming you think massive incompetence being a Pentagon job requirement is funny. Can you believe this? Apparently there was a password on the politically sensitive file at this URL:

http://oneteam.centcom.mil/isc/Shared%20Documents/NATO%20Master%20Narrative.doc

By the look of it, the only thing protecting the contents of this file is the fact that it's a password-protected MS Word doc. Wtf?? What bright-eyes thought this would be a good idea? Let's just leave a politically sensitive WORD DOC in an unprotected directory and expect a fracking MS Word password to keep it safe. WHAT COULD HAPPEN?

So, anyway, the post at Wikileaks.org (see screencap above or original here: https://secure.wikileaks.org/wiki/N1 ) doesn't explain how the "encryption" was "cracked" but I suspect it was something simple, like the highly technical process of entering random words until something worked.

You may be wondering what was so politically sensitive in the Word doc. Well, it turns out it was a document meant for NATO officials, and it tells them not to tell anyone that the country of Jordan is involved in helping us with the War Against Terror (aka tWAT) in Afghanistan. What's the catch with the world knowing Jordan is involved? It's supposed to be a secret. Apparently, back in 2001 they officially withdrew from the ISAF (International Security Assistance Force), which is officially in charge of our efforts in Afghanistan. It seems like they sure didn't stop helping us.

Why is it a big deal that Jordan is still involved in our Afghani efforts? Well, it seems they're real big in the torture community. They are also said to be big helpers with our extraordinary renditions program. So, essentially, they help us when we go into one country, kidnap a suspect and deliver said suspect to another country where we ask them questions and let local authorities torture if we don't like the answers.

In an obviously related story the Pentagon shut their entire site down this afternoon. Gee, I wonder why they did that!

Does anyone still wonder why the world has so much wrong with it when our leaders are smegging moronic enough to use only a single password to protect sensitive information?

OH yeah and the password on the doc? Progress.

Well done, Pentagon! Well done!!

Massive kudos to Twitter-user Zaibatsu who posted about Wikileaks cracking the password on the NATO file.

I wonder if this story will hit CNN or any of the other MSM news "sources."

Posted via email from thepete's posterous

Almost Fell for an eBay-Related Scam

So, I get this email that looks *just* like it was sent from eBay. It's for me and it says "Did you send my money ? I see you received my item." It also contains an ebay-formatted description of an auction item I had supposedly won.

Confused, as I am only a seller on eBay not a buyer these days, I quickly checked to see what email address they sent this email to. Turns out, it was an old address I haven't used on eBay for years. Being the kind and concerned person I am, I click the link to see what item someone thought I had bought. I get to the above screen. Looks just like the eBay sign-in screen right?

Well, I typed in my info and tried to click the "sign me in all day" box only to find that it wasn't clickable. I then noticed that my password wasn't hiding behind the standard chain of asterisks. Then, I checked the URL:

cghebay.com

Yep--not actually eBay. So, I realize immediately that it's entirely possible that the fake eBay page may have had a key-logging script on it so, quickly I logged into eBay for real and changed my password. Then I looked up that domain to see just who these losers are. Here's the info I got from a WHOIS lookup:

Domain name: cghebay.com

Registrant Contact:
Whois Privacy Protection Service, Inc.
Whois Agent (dqnhxbbm@whoisprivacyprotect.com)
+1.4252740657
Fax: +1.4256960234
PMB 368, 14150 NE 20th St - F1
C/O cghebay.com
Bellevue, WA 98007
US

Isn't that nice?

So, be warned! Don't EVER log into ANYWHERE without checking the URL!

That's the thing about the spam email--the text for the auction link I clicked on made it look like the link led to eBay.com, but that was only the link text. The URL in the code sent me to that other domain.

What's even more scary is that if they had just taken a moment to make that checkbox work, I'd have fallen for it. ME. Mr. Suspicious!!

VERY lame. So, everyone be careful!
Mobile post sent by thepete using Utterz.  Replies.

EDIT: An Internet friend of mine commented on the cross-post of this on Flickr. Cmiper (http://www.flickr.com/photos/cmiper/ ) said:

"Yeah that's a pretty bad one. The other thing that I see sometimes is cgi.ebay.com@845789347897234.dummydomain.com/secure/login.php or something like that. People see the ebay URL in the beginning and don't realize that its a dummy username accessing the dummydomain.com URL.

Oh..and the Whois info that is available behind that privacy screen is likely that of another victim that they conned into falling for their scheme, it becomes a cycle once they get one person's account, they create a new phishing site at the victim's expense, and so on..."

He's got good info there, I think...