[AusNOG] RISK - IT Industry - Concern Over Equipment Being, Installed in Data Centre Facilities - Further Replies

Tue Sep 27 12:47:53 EST 2016

Mr Slattery,

I agree on points 1-3 - for most purposes the discussion on this point is probably pointless from a business perspective.
I'm not sure I can support point 4 though - there seems to be a current of "don't discuss these kinds of security matters in public" from some list participants which baffles me greatly. I can't see why this topic shouldn't be discussed in this forum (assuming relevance can be established)

Thanks,
-Nathanael Bettridge

From: AusNOG [mailto:ausnog-bounces at lists.ausnog.net] On Behalf Of Bevan Slattery
Sent: Tuesday, 27 September 2016 12:13 PM
To: chrismacko80 <chrismacko80 at gmail.com>
Cc: <ausnog at lists.ausnog.net> <ausnog at lists.ausnog.net>
Subject: Re: [AusNOG] RISK - IT Industry - Concern Over Equipment Being, Installed in Data Centre Facilities - Further Replies

Chris + Ausnog,

Seriously guys.  This thread should stop because frankly it's stupid.

1.  If you think the greatest (or significant) risk to network disruption is the vector you are suggesting, then you lack real imagination
2.  If you don't operate your business without physical separation in your business continuity plans then you are negligent (read 1)
3.  If you want to keep banging the drum on this specific vector then you are damaging your credibility (read 1 and 2)
4.  If you, or anyone on this list actually operates infrastructure that is critical in nature then we chat about these things in responsible forums - and guess what?  It's not Ausnog.

Move on people - please moderators.  Kill thread.

[b]

On 27 September 2016 at 11:50, chrismacko80 <chrismacko80 at gmail.com<mailto:chrismacko80 at gmail.com>> wrote:
Hi Mark et alii,

I'm unsure if I follow what you mean "You're still over estimating how
easy these materials are to get in the volumes necessary for the
attack to be effective". If I read it the way it comes across, I think
you're saying it's much harder to get the volumes for the attack to be
effective/pose an issue rather than a threat. To outline a few items,
I recall times of assisting clients with server installations, at
times, an individual piece of specialised equipment would weigh up to
600kgs, this equipment was never reviewed or checked, it was only
approximately 10RU in size. This was in the same building as one of
the ASX data centres located in Melbourne. In addition, in other
locations, fully populated racks were allowed to be wheeled into
facilities, again without any checks or scrutiny.

I've seen many gaps of a physical nature in many industries, even the
lack of physical security even in our agriculture. I was stunned to
see a water shed around 100m when I stayed in the Barossa Valley at a
cottage for a weeks' retreat and saw a pesticide shed that added
chemicals to their dam for what appeared to be the supply of water to
their grapes and was stunned when the person working that day left the
door open to the shed, and rarely came back. Councils will not allow
residents to plant fruit trees in council lands (including verge
policies) for risk of someone poisoning an individual fruit tree and
the follow on effect of this, and yet our fruit producers have their
product available in most cases without fence, it is a little
surprising.

Itt appears that our agriculture is also a concern, in particular as
some countries are indeed motivated to affect our liberties and
somewhat free ways of life. See
http://medicalfuturist.com/disruptive-technologies-bioterrorism/?ct=t(Newsletter_2014_07_177_17_2014).
Going somewhat off topic, there's even gaps in the physical security
to the gas supply to the Adelaide AGL power plant, where the two gas
pipelines leading up to the power plant are clearly visible at points
and are not monitored via CCTV, the above ground points are not even
contained within a secure shed. You drive through the roads and if
you're motivated to find out where the gas pipeline runs, it's not
that hard to see. You have direct access to the pipeline under the
bridge to Torrens Island, Adelaide, someone has cut the security mesh
on the underside of the bridge many years ago, and no one at AGL cared
that I contacted, I did contact their security office, employees that
were contacts with us at the time, and also the gas contractor who
didn't seem to be too bothered about any risks existing. Who really is
assessing the potential risks of others to damage assets of our
country? I certainly don't believe they're doing it to a sufficient
degree given just how in the open things appear to be, and I'm sorry
for saying this, it may offend some.

On some good news, I came across this article in methods of explosive
detection which outlines possible ways of achieving scanning
capabilities, including;

    1.1 Colorimetrics & Automated Colorimetrics
    1.2 Dogs
    1.3 Honey bees
    1.4 Mechanical scent detection
    1.5 Spectrometry
    1.6 X-ray machines
    1.7 Neutron activation
    1.8 Silicon nanowires for trace detection of explosives

If you're interested to see more, please see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Explosive_detection.

Overnight, I woke up with a thought and decided to go back to bed
think a little more about it. Is it possible the Syrian group I
mentioned yesterday may also be working on strategies to influence
programmers in particular in regard to installing filters into an
individuals mind - as programmers if we see something unusual or
different, we generally inspect the source code, what if that had
something harmful present for our mind? If that slush fund is as high
as has been advised, they certainly have ways of being funded to
challenge the status quo with developing new potentially harmful
technology, what other ways could they use the money to influence or
disrupt other countries? What if source code was written in a way that
interfaces with our mind to install filters? I don't know if this is
possible, it's certainly not my area of expertise, however
programming, hosting, software, risk assessment and security are. Are
there certain governments that have invested into placing filters into
our own minds through technological means? We are a massive biological
computer, has someone or a group found how to interface with it on a
low level and are testing by trial and error how to interface at a
higher level? I do understand that this is getting beyond the realms
of most, and indeed it is beyond my own current knowledge.

Thanks for everyone that replied off list and phone conversations -
some comments were raised including specialist security meetings on
this topic and others in government areas of decision making - there's
lots of invaluable data that you've shared and I can understand why
you wouldn't want this to be made public - I can see that the issue is
much larger than I first envisaged.

Chris Macko.

On Tue, Sep 27, 2016 at 8:55 AM, Mark Smith <markzzzsmith at gmail.com<mailto:markzzzsmith at gmail.com>> wrote:
> On 26 September 2016 at 23:33, chrismacko80 <chrismacko80 at gmail.com<mailto:chrismacko80 at gmail.com>> wrote:
>> Still seem to be getting some emails being blocked via gmail, so have
>> initiated a seperate thread in replies to all that have been received
>> to date;
>>
>> Thomas Jackson - Thanks for your reply. I find it somewhat odd that we
>> have bulletproof glass considered at the front entry foyer yet no
>> process for checking for such harmful substances being wheeled in.
>> Which poses a more significant threat and likelihood - a data centre
>> isn't somewhere that you hold up as it doesn't contain any cash in
>> most cases!
>>
>
> You're still over estimating how easy these materials are to get in
> the volumes necessary for the attack to be effective. I have some
> insights as I have a close relative who is licensed by the government
> to acquire and use these sorts of materials, and I've been present
> when they've been used.
>
> This is not a significant threat.
>
> <snip>
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