TalkTalk tracking you, phorm?

[Rchivist]

http://cn.linkedin.com/pub/eric-wang/11/405/a9a
former HuaweiSymantec employee now with Phorm in China

and the Huawei BTA/malware detection value added combo here (again clearly linking Phorm and HuaweiSymantec in the diagrams):

http://www.huawei.com/products/datac...log.do?id=3596 - Greennet - the Malware protection bit (the respectable carrot for the consumer)
http://www.huawei.com/products/datac...log.do?id=3576 - The Value Added bit (to keep the ICO happy)
http://www.huawei.com/products/datac...log.do?id=3597 - The much less visible BTA bit (where the money is for the ISP)

Oh yes- and to complete the set - the priveliged access to government essential for anyone wanting to monetise the consumer base
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/c...investors.html

I do hope someone in regulatory oversight, at least asks TalkTalk whether the Huawei hardware/programming has any links at all with the Phorm stuff.

Given the history of both Phorm and TalkTalk in terms of covert behaviour, and the material in the public realm about what both companies are up to, it seems a reasonable rather than a paranoid question. Tinfoil hat not necessary, just a decent pair of reading glasses and a good memory.

With trust levels for our ISPs at an all time low (Phorm, STalkSTalk, ACS unencrypted spreadsheets), I suggest we are sceptical about what they tell us, and what they do (and more often don't) tell the regulators.

The point about Feeva/Cisco is well made but I and others were aware of that one back in August 2008, so it's a bit stale. Along with Kindsight, Experian, Hitwise, etc etc etc. Yes - we know.

Originally Posted by bluecar1

the thing is, from what i am reading TT appear to ge using the Huawei GREENET solution for the anti-malware service, the BTA solution appears to be a simple bolt-on or upgrade to that service

so is that where the income is going to come from to pay for the green net system, as i can't see TT paying for it out of the kindness of their hearts

as to the Feeva code on cisco routers, that operates in a totally diferent way from my understanding the last time i looked at it, as it did not appear to build a profile as such but was providing a form of location tag

but i will go back and revisit to confirm if it has changed

Could the business case be based on prevention is cheaper than cure? (it costs more to clean up the mess and additional problems caused by malware than it does to prevent it).

That's how I sell the business cases for company-wide virus checkers, firewalls, antimalware, filtering, etc......

[Ignitionnet]

Originally Posted by Rchivist

I do hope someone in regulatory oversight, at least asks TalkTalk whether the Huawei hardware/programming has any links at all with the Phorm stuff.

You could get Dephormation to do an FoI request to the Home Office and ask if any information on this has been requested.

Oh wait...

---------- Post added at 13:06 ---------- Previous post was at 12:58 ----------

Originally Posted by Rchivist

With trust levels for our ISPs at an all time low (Phorm, STalkSTalk, ACS unencrypted spreadsheets), I suggest we are sceptical about what they tell us, and what they do (and more often don't) tell the regulators.

The point about Feeva/Cisco is well made but I and others were aware of that one back in August 2008, so it's a bit stale. Along with Kindsight, Experian, Hitwise, etc etc etc. Yes - we know.

I am sceptical of any commercial organisation. However I have, unlike it would appear any of those who are vocal about such things, worked for large ISPs. While they are always after money they tend to avoid doing things that are blatantly illegal - tends to lead to messy court cases, loss of goodwill, etc. Phorm being the exception to this, presumably due to some idiot lawyer telling the rest of BT it was quite acceptable.

Noteworthy incidentally in the Huawei documentation is the mention that the system for integration to Phorm is opt-in.

Regarding the previous information yes it's old - the point being that no-one really cared about Kindsight, Experian, etc. Didn't make headline news, no-one beyond an incredibly vocal minority is actually that bothered by it.

Many of our day to day actions are subject to far closer scrutiny, analysis and profiling than our usage of our Internet connections.

---------- Post added at 13:15 ---------- Previous post was at 13:06 ----------

Originally Posted by Rchivist

Oh yes- and to complete the set - the priveliged access to government essential for anyone wanting to monetise the consumer base
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/c...investors.html

Well, essential for making Britain a more attractive target for the foreign investment we so badly need as a nation. It's doing nothing more than making the previously used 'back channels' official. Foreign investors have lines into pretty much every major government. We may hate the Chinese but we do need to take some money off them for a change

Do you really think this stuff forms any major part of Huawei's interests in the UK?

Who is supplying the hardware for BT's super-fast fibre optic deployment in the UK? They are using Huawei MSANs in the cabinets and Huawei modems. They are using Huawei optics for Fibre To The Home, both in exchange and on people's walls to terminate it, and they are using Huawei hardware within the exchanges to terminate fibre from the cabinets.

This is a network that will cover over 2/3rds of the UK and involve the purchase of 10s of thousands of cabinet MSANs and millions of modems.

Who is supplying BT Wholesale's 21CN MSANs for the exchanges? That would be Huawei.

Whose hardware is Opal's entire network built with? That would be Huawei.

Clearly the most pressing thing on their minds is a single cluster of servers and software, 6 figures at most.

[Rchivist]

The legislative situation is about to change
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/30/eu_phorm/

so we will see.

[Ignitionnet]

Originally Posted by Rchivist

The legislative situation is about to change
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/30/eu_phorm/

so we will see.

Indeed! Hopefully uk.gov will tell Europe to mind their own business and take a running jump, then stop feeding their interventionist, socialist, undemocratic, imperialistic and self-serving bureaucracy with money.

It is offensive to me that anyone apart from UK citizens are in any position to demand changes to our laws, and even more offensive that the majority of the laws we abide by in this country are sourced from Brussels.

There are a number of current flashpoints with Europe and it will be interesting to see if even the Euro-phile Lib Dems can justify remaining beholden to the EU given their utter disrespect for their member states' sovereignty.

[bluecar1]

Originally Posted by Ignitionnet

Indeed! Hopefully uk.gov will tell Europe to mind their own business and take a running jump, then stop feeding their interventionist, socialist, undemocratic, imperialistic and self-serving bureaucracy with money.

It is offensive to me that anyone apart from UK citizens are in any position to demand changes to our laws, and even more offensive that the majority of the laws we abide by in this country are sourced from Brussels.

There are a number of current flashpoints with Europe and it will be interesting to see if even the Euro-phile Lib Dems can justify remaining beholden to the EU given their utter disrespect for their member states' sovereignty.

i dislike their rules about foods etc, but they also happen to be the only people willing to give the man in the street a right to privacy and stop all this snooping by big business

HMGov knew what it was signing up to and as they say if you can't do the time, don't do the crime. HM Gov is clearly in breach for failing to uphold our rights now they will be forced to do something about it at last

from the article about the EU action

"European law says consent for interception must be "freely given, specific and informed indication of a person's wishes". BT did not obtain such consent to include customers' internet traffic in its testing."

so where does this leave TT with it's stalk stalk service which they trialed without permission and intercepted customers browsing to strip the FULL URL to give to a third party so they could look at the page?

seems the EU need to look at both at the same time to save us tax payers some cash and knock these spy systems on the head once and for all

Originally Posted by bluecar1

i dislike their rules about foods etc, but they also happen to be the only people willing to give the man in the street a right to privacy and stop all this snooping by big business

HMGov knew what it was signing up to and as they say if you can't do the time, don't do the crime. HM Gov is clearly in breach for failing to uphold our rights now they will be forced to do something about it at last

from the article about the EU action


so where does this leave TT with it's stalk stalk service which they trialed without permission and intercepted customers browsing to strip the FULL URL to give to a third party so they could look at the page?

seems the EU need to look at both at the same time to save us tax payers some cash and knock these spy systems on the head once and for all

I'm sorry - I didn't realise a verdict had been already pronounced by the ECJ.

[Sirius]

Originally Posted by Rchivist

The legislative situation is about to change
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/09/30/eu_phorm/

so we will see.

I hope that has a side affect with an other certain piece of DPI kit

[Ravenheart]

Originally Posted by Sirius

I hope that has a side affect with an other certain piece of DPI kit

If you mean CView then it may have already

Virgin Media's plan to trial technology to inspect users' internet traffic for illegal or pirated content has been put on hold, ZDNet UK can reveal.

http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security...353/?s_cid=938

Wonder if it was the EU announcement or the ACS:Law storm.

[Ignitionnet]

Or none of the above given VM announced they had put the trial on hold 2 months ago and ZD are recycling old news with a new press release.

[Ytrewq]

Hi

Another link

http://www.ispreview.co.uk/story/201...e-sharing.html

[Rchivist]

I see the ZDNet article mentions the January 2010 EU announcement
http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security...ance-40004190/
about its intentions to "monitor" the VM trial very closely.

So the calendar seems to be
Nov 2009 - CView trial announced by VM, due to go live "within days" (executive director of broadband, Jon James) - (was equipment installed at that point?)

Two months later:
Jan 2010 - EU announce that they will "monitor it closely".
http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security...ance-40004190/

Announcement (no link or date) "two months ago" that it will go on hold.

Confirmation from VM - in yesterdays ZDNet article - 30 September 2010 15.46hrs
http://www.zdnet.co.uk/news/security...353/?s_cid=938
including statement made to ZDNet on Thursday this week, by "a spokesman for VM"

On Thursday a spokesman for the company told ZDNet UK that the trial of the CView technology — made by BAe subsidiary Detica — has been put on hold. CView analyses data travelling over a network with the intent of spotting unlicensed content transfers.
"There is no Detica or CView equipment in our network", nor is there any equipment or software currently plugged in that has similar functionality, the spokesman told ZDNet UK.

Just so the chronology is clear.

[Rchivist]

A brief update.
According to correspondence from one police force, looking at TalkTalk's malware monitoring program over the summer, on behalf of a complainant, the police claimed that TT were operating under a "green light" from the ICO. When asked about this, the ICO were very quick to say they had not issued any such "green light" and are in fact still investigating the STalkSTalk case.

So either TT have misrepresented the situation to an investigating polie officer, or the police have somehow misunderstood something TalkTalk legal guys have said. Or perhaps the police were the ones who thought the "green light from the ICO" thing up?

The "green light" scenario claimed by the police, and denied by the ICO, is still being investigated.

Also, attempts are being made via parliamentary questions to find out a bit more about what meetings TalkTalk had or didn't have with govt. prior to doing their covert trial of STalkSTalk. Home Office seem peculiarly reluctant to discuss the matter at all, despite there being a number of precedents for govt departments disclosing their discussions with such ISPs in the past when claims about legal compliance statements from government have been incorrectly made by those companies.

I see that from yesterday's Westminster Hall debate on internet privacy that the govt now regard it as necessary for internet companies to check compliance issues with gov/ICO PRIOR to deployment of their various exciting schemes. (See Ed Vaizey's closing remarks as Minister for Culture Media and Sport, responding to the debate). It is indeed strange that it is proving so hard to find out if such compliance discussions took place prior to the covert deployment of TalkTalk's customer monitoring and tracking and website scanning programme this summer. We already know that they did NOT talk to the ICO, but what is proving impossible to determine, is whether they had any chats with the Home Office.

Certainly no "notes" have been posted on cryptome.org this time!

Interesting.

Do you have any links to anything substantiating the allegations that "the police claimed that TT were operating under a "green light" from the ICO" and "the ICO were very quick to say they had not issued any such "green light" and are in fact still investigating the STalkSTalk case", as that would be very helpful?

[bluecar1]

Originally Posted by Hugh

Interesting.

Do you have any links to anything substantiating the allegations that "the police claimed that TT were operating under a "green light" from the ICO" and "the ICO were very quick to say they had not issued any such "green light" and are in fact still investigating the STalkSTalk case", as that would be very helpful?

the quote for the ico, is in the form of the answer to a FoI request

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/reques...ncoming-117695

and

http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/reques..._with_talk_tal

in those they confirm they were not told of the trial before it took place and the second in the the ICO was still investigating, i think there was also a similar article in "theregister" as well

i have seen the referenced material (the police response) but it was via a PM from the person who recieved the response, so i am not at liberty to disclose the exact content, but i can verify the comment