Endgame, Inc: Inside The Company Inside Your Cell Phone

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Endgame, Inc: Inside The Company Inside Your Cell Phone
By: DSWright Tuesday July 2, 2013 10:30 am

The contractor the NSA pays to help hack your cell phone has an interesting history woven within the larger story of the explosive growth of cyberwarfare companies in the Post 9/11 era. The massive growth of the cyberweapons industry has been driven by governments, principally the United States, who in the name of defense have instigated an arms race for offensive weapons.

The start of Engame begins at Internet Security Systems (ISS) which was started in 1994 and acquired by IBM in 2006 for $1.3 billion. ISS developed an array of products perhaps most notably a highly successful systems scanner that performs a vulnerability assessment on a computer system. In 2010 former executives from ISS and former executives at the CIA started Endgame, Inc. with investments from Bessemer Venture Partners, Columbia Capital, Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers, and TechOperators totaling $29 million.

In 2011 the company was, due to a hack by Anonymous, revealed to be selling vulnerabilities to systems unknown even to the manufacturer or “zero-day exploits” – a business of questionable legality.

In an early email to [HB Gary CEO] Aaron Barr, Endgame Systems made it clear that they had “been very careful NOT to have public face on our company”. The CEO of Endgame Systems was clear: “Please let HBgary know we don’t ever want to see our name in a press release.”

So what exactly do the secretive Endgame Systems do? The company started by ex ISS and CIA executives promises (in private) “to provide our customers with the highest quality offensive CNA/CNE (Computer Network Attack/Computer Network Exploitation) software in the world”.

Notice the term offensive. The hundreds of billions of dollars that have flowed into the cybersecurity sector from the federal government – that Endgame gets a piece of – were supposed to be for defensive purposes. But it is not hard to understand why Endgame has such a belligerent and nefarious strategy when you look at who runs the company.

The Endgame Board of Directors is led by Christopher Darby of CIA backed In-Q-Tel and includes the former Director of the NSA, Kevin Minihan. Quite a well connected team. Methinks they may know a few people in the intelligence community who make recommendations for federal contracts.

Endgame is part of the new wave of cyberweapons firms making ridiculous amounts of money off the taxpayers while helping to instigate a war where they stand to benefit from increased business. Palantir Technologies is another firm doing well taking federal money to datamine the internet, though it recently expanded its operations to helping create license plate tracking technology. Due to the Anonymous hacking scandal HB Gary is now part of ManTech International, a firm that received a $300 million federal contract to support US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan. Business is good.

While the government is secretly interpreting the Patriot Act it is also outsourcing some of its lawbreaking to private firms – cashing in on their government connections with government contracts. What could go wrong?

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US ISP Can Monitor File-Sharing Traffic
Added: Friday, July 5th, 2013

At the moment, there are quite a few BitTorrent traffic monitoring firms and systems out there, but AT&T seems to make a premiere as the first Internet service provider to get a patent under which the company is allowed to monitor file-sharing traffic.



The innovative system is supposed to be used by AT&T to predict monitor network congestion before occurring. However, another possible use of it is to check out what material is very popular with pirates on file-sharing portals.

Recently, AT&T has adopted a “six-strikes” anti-piracy program which means that an Internet subscriber alleged of downloading copyrighted content gets 6 warnings before having their Internet connection terminated.

Industry observers have created a chart which allows to better understand how the new system works. According to it, AT&T will maintain RSS feeds of torrents that it could end up downloading and then search through. Although the names of the files will play a huge role in what the system detects as illegal content, it will still go one step further and dig into the file to make sure it is really what it says it is, because everyone knows there can be just a virus hiding under the latest Hollywood blockbuster name.

Apparently, the ISP’s technology will appeal to rights holders because of its possibilities and that they will be able to “convince” the broadband provider (if necessary) to use it as a method to reduce Internet piracy.

By:
SaM
July 5th,2013

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WikiLeaks Volunteer Appeared FBI Spook
Added: Thursday, July 4th, 2013

WikiLeaks worker known as “Siggi” Thordarson has recently outted himself as a double agent for the FBI. Media reports said that Thordarson was a long time volunteer for the whistleblowing service having direct access to Assange and a key organizer. Siggi had the role of double agent for 3 months, while earning $5,000 for his trouble, because the FBI flew him internationally 4 times for debriefings.

The guy was only 17 when he joined WikiLeaks three years ago. Thordarson joined after the service published internal bank documents connected to the local financial crisis. So, when the local staff revolted over what they considered Assange’s self-promotion, Julian put Thordarson in charge of the WikiLeaks chat room, making him the initial point of contact for new volunteers, journalists, potential sources, and outside groups.

Thordarson was also the intermediary in the negotiations with the Bradley Manning Defense Fund which led to WikiLeaks donating $15,000 to the defense of its alleged prime source. Two years ago, Thordarson was implicated in a political scandal where a laptop with spying gear was found running unattended in an empty office of the Parliament.

It was reported that Julian Assange promised to back Thordarson in return for total loyalty, and the latter visited Ellingham Hall where Assange was under house arrest while fighting extradition to Sweden. Thordarson is known for his attempts to get Lulzsec to hack Iceland’s government systems. He created and uploaded a 40-second mobile phone video which opened on the IRC screen with the chat in progress and floated across the room to show Assange at work with an associate.

FBI got this video right after they arrested Lulzsec’s leader, Hector Xavier Monsegur (also known as Sabu). The Bureau warned Iceland, and its own huge team came to the country, asking for help of authorities. Although they failed to catch Thordarson, he approached the FBI in two months.

In the interview, he said that he cooperated because he didn’t want to be a part of Anonymous and Lulzsec hack for WikiLeaks. However, the press admitted that the more likely reason was the adventure. In order to prove that he did have an adventure, he showed emails between him and the FBI, flight records for his travels, and an FBI receipt proving that he gave them 8 hard drives.

By:
SaM
July 4th,2013