Topic: Killing with Keyboards

[milnews.ca]

A bit of an update from the University of Haifa:

Hackers invading databases is just the tip of the iceberg in online terrorist activity: International terrorist organizations have shifted their Internet activity focus to social networks and today a number of Facebook groups are asking users to join and support Hezbollah, Hamas and other armed groups that have been included in the West’s list of declared terror organizations. This has been shown in a new study conducted by Prof. Gabriel Weimann of the University of Haifa. “Today, about 90% of organized terrorism on the Internet is being carried out through the social media. By using these tools, the organizations are able to be active in recruiting new friends without geographical limitations,” says Prof. Weimann.

Over the past ten years, Prof. Weimann has been conducting a study of encoded and public Internet sites of international terror organizations, groups supporting these organizations, forums, video clips, and whatever information relating to global terrorism is running through the network.

According to Prof. Weimann, the shift to social media, and especially Facebook and Twitter, has not bypassed the terrorist organizations, who are keenly interested in recruiting new support in the new media’s various arenas - Facebook, chat rooms, YouTube, Myspace, and more. “The social media is enabling the terror organizations to take initiatives by making ‘Friend’ requests, uploading video clips, and the like, and they no longer have to make do with the passive tools available on regular websites,” he notes.

Facebook’s popularity is being utilized by the terror organizations, and besides recruiting new friends, they use this platform as a resource for gathering intelligence. A statement originating from Lebanon has reported that Hezbollah is searching for material on the Israeli army’s Facebook activity, while many countries such as the USA, Canada and the UK have instructed their soldiers to remove personal information from this network as a precaution in case Al Qaeda is monitoring it. “Facebook has become a great place to obtain intelligence. Many users don’t even bother finding out who they are confirming as ‘Friend’ and to whom they are providing access to a large amount of information on their personal life. The terrorists themselves, in parallel, are able to create false profiles that enable them to get into highly visible groups,” he says ....

U of Haifa info-machine blog, 8 Jan 12

Can't find the study ref'ed in the blog post/news release, but will share when I do.

[milnews.ca]

As promised, here's the paper referred to in the above-mentioned news release - enjoy!

[George Wallace]

Some people have been having some PERSEC concerns lately.  Perhaps they should be reminded by the points in this topic and that the material that they post on the internet is there forever.  It does not disappear.  People will quote what you say, they may save your post in their files, whole websites are archived on other databases, people print off articles they find of interest, and a whole myriad of other methods are used to retrieve and save information that someone may be looking for. 

Think before you hit that POST button.  Would you say what you intend to post in front of your mother?  If not; perhaps it is a good sign that you should not post it.

[milnews.ca]

Here, reproduced under the Fair Dealing provisions of the Copyright Act from the Ottawa Citizen is a pertinent article:

That Facebook ‘friend’ could be a foreign spy

By Vito Pilieci, The Ottawa Citizen

November 15, 2011

OTTAWA — Hackers are becoming so targeted with their attacks that they are mining Facebook profiles for personal information that could help them steal sensitive data.

Security expert Michel Juneau-Katsuya says a Department of National Defence employee told investigators he received an email from someone pretending to be a co-worker who said he had seen the employee at his daughter’s soccer game over the weekend. The hacker claimed to have been added to the employee’s work team, which was assembling sensitive information, and asked for a copy of the work done so far ....

Taking this meme a step further ....

TALIBAN insurgents are posing as "attractive women" on Facebook to befriend coalition soldiers and gather intelligence about operations.

Australian soldiers are given pre-deployment briefings about enemies creating fake profiles to spy on troops.

Personnel are also being warned that geo-tagging - a function of many websites that secretly logs the location from where a post is made or a photo is uploaded - is a significant danger.

Family and friends of soldiers are inadvertently jeopardising missions by sharing confidential information online, the report warns.

Three Australian soldiers were this month murdered inside their base, allegedly by an Afghan Army trainee.

The dangers of social media are revealed in a federal government review of social media and defence, which was finalised in March but has not been acted upon, Defence sources say.

The review found an "overt reliance" on privacy settings had led to "a false sense of security" among personnel.

The review warns troops to beware of "fake profiles - media personnel and enemies create fake profiles to gather information. For example, the Taliban have used pictures of attractive women as the front of their Facebook profiles and have befriended soldiers."

Many of the 1577 Defence members surveyed for the review had no awareness of the risk, it said, adding 58 per cent of Defence staff had no social media training.

Surveyed troops said social media open "a whole can of worms when it comes to operational, personnel and physical security".

"Many individuals who use social media are extremely trusting," the review said.

"Most did not recognise that people using fake profiles, perhaps masquerading as school friends, could capture information and movements. Few consider the possibilities of data mining and how patterns of behaviour can be identified over time." ....

Sydney Daily Telegraph, 9 Sept 12

[ModlrMike]

In light of recent events, and the directives that followed them, all of us have a responsibility to ensure our social media profiles are secure. To that end, I post the following two articles:

5 Things Sailors Need to Know About Social Media, Phishing, Security


Mark Cuban: The Big Mistake You Don't Know You're Making on Social Media

While Mr Cuban's comments are generally about commerce and employment, they make a good case for the importance of PERSEC.