Why You Should More Afraid of Apple than the Feds

I know I suggest this book alot, but you need to read Future Crimes by Marc Goodman. It will absolutely open your eyes to how companies like Apple, Microsoft and the thousands of other Data Brokers out there COLLECT your personal, private information and then treat it as a valuable commodity to be bought and sold on the open market like pork bellies. -SF

As most of you are probably aware, there has been a recent court battle between Apple and the Federal Government. In this letter from Apple, (that can be found here) Apple eloquently explains their side of the story. Apple explains that it has provided everything the FBI has requested regarding the San Bernardino Case but a bigger issue has arisen from this case. Apple then explains how the FBI wants Apple to essentially weaken its security to allow the FBI access to an Apple user’s information without having to ask Apple for help.

In true fashion, Apple has done an excellent job of appearing to be the people’s champion of security and privacy from the Federal Government.

The folks working in Apple’s public relations team have done a remarkable job of showing Apple as the victim of a Federal Case brought against them by the Federal Government who just want easy back door access. And people are rallying behind Apple.

But what are people rallying for?

They are rallying for 4^th amendment rights, and personal privacy that is federally protected from the FBI or any other federal agency collecting personal information without due process or just cause. As an American, that is absolutely something I agree with. There is no reason that anyone’s personal information should be collected without a legitimate reason. And Apple appears to genuinely want to protect its users from outside Federal Agencies collecting on its users. There is only one problem with Apple protecting your information:

If you’re an Apple user, Apple is collecting on you in ways the government could only dream about.

Wait, What? Apple is collecting on you? Just the device information, right?

Apple collects everything it’s able. If you’re using an iPhone or an iPad, Apple collects text messages, contact lists, photos and if you have your GPS enabled, Apple is collecting your location data as well. In a 2014 congressional response, Apple explained how it collects the GPS data and sends it back to Apple every 12 hours via Wi-Fi.

If you’re using Safari, Apple collects every query you make regardless of what search engine you use. Apple also collects the location data of Safari users. This information is collected and sent back to Apple to be stored in its Data Centers. Have you searched for something you would be embarrassed about if someone else knew about it? Well, Siri knows and she is disgusted at you.

Wait, Data Centers? What are Apple Data Centers? And why is Siri judging me?

Apple’s Data Centers are where all of the collected information is stored. In the United States, Apple has 4 active Data centers with its 5^th and largest currently being built in Mesa Arizona. Apples data centers are massive. The 4 data centers have a combined square footage totaling over 967,000 square feet of server space to store your information. By the end of this year, that number should be up to 1,347,000 square feet with the Reno expansion. Currently Apple has invested over $628 million dollars in the United States alone, just for buildings to house its server space. Apple is planning on spending over $2 billion dollars in the next several years to re-outfit the Mesa space, which will bring its server space to over 2.5 million square feet.

Think about that. Apple is currently using almost a million square feet of space to store its servers. Land wise, that is 23 acres of server racks. And it’s only going to double that size in the next few years. While iTunes, the App store, and iCloud likely take up a large portion of that, there is still plenty of room for additional data that Apple has collected. And speaking of iCloud, if you are using iCloud, you are literally uploading your information directly to Apple. Apple doesn’t even have to build a sneaky algorithm to collect it unknowingly to you.

How is this legal?

Remember when you established your Apple ID and you agreed to the Terms of Service? That long document that you probably didn’t read because it was intentionally written to be read painfully? By clicking “I agree” you consented to allowing Apple to collect everything it can about you. And if you think that Apple isn’t analyzing and refining your data, think again. Remember that Apple still needs you to buy their future products and your data gives them insights to the best way to sell to you. Apple is also competing against companies like Facebook and Google for data collection. Because data means big revenue. Apple is even going after Google Earth with itsApple Vans.

Now consider this. In order for the Federal Government to collect your information, it has to go through a very painful process to get to acquire it (Constitutionally or otherwise). Coordination with multiple Government Agencies must be completed, and unfortunately, coordination is not something the Federal Government is known for. The Federal Government has to file for warrants to either get your information from a database, or to physically access your information. Remember that I previously mentioned that Apple collects on you in ways the Federal Government could only dream about? Not only does Apple not have to get a warrant to collect on you, you legally consent to allowing them to do it. And the best part?   You pay them money to do it.

I often wonder if the Federal Government produced a smart phone that had the latest and sleekest technology available, and it became the trendiest phone to have, if the American people would even care if the Government was collecting on them. Because Apple, Facebook, Google and all the other major tech companies are making billions of dollars by collecting as much about you as they can—yet very few people even seem to take notice, or to care.

If you are using the internet, knowingly or unknowingly, you have agreed to allow various companies collect on you. If you’re worried about the Federal Government collecting on you, or even worried about Apple collecting on you—Don’t. Just know one of the two is watching, and ultimately, if you’re not doing anything wrong, you don’t have anything to worry about. I realize that isn’t the response that people on either side of the argument want to read, but it’s the internet, and that’s how this place works.

Read the Original Story at The Havok Journal

Is Putin Really Dr. Moriarty?

An excellent article on understanding how Russian Hybrid Warfare manipulates the current geo-political spectrum. -SF

We know ISIS is bad because it killed people in San Bernardino and Paris. We know Iran is bad because it’s still developing nuclear weapons. We know Russia is bad…because…well, didn’t Charlie Rose once say something about that? Or was it Seth MacFarlane? Either way, as Americans, we know there is a threat from Putin’s Russia, but many of us (including, of course, Donald Trump) aren’t quite sure why.

Don’t feel bad for sleeping on Russia. Thanks to a hybrid of information operations, psychological warfare and espionage, Russia has evaded the scrutiny afforded ISIS, Iran and even North Korea. But while we had little excuse for our blindness to Russia’s actions in 2012, when Barack Obama laughed at Mitt Romney’s assertion that Russia was a preeminent geopolitical threat, we have absolutely no excuse now.

Russia has short-circuited the Syrian peace talks. Their subs are more active than during the Cold War. They have a bad habit ofintercepting American aircraft. And Russia is beginning to dominate deep space.  From partnering with Iran to selling radioactive material to ISIS, Vladimir Putin’s fingerprints are on a lot of bad juju.

You know that moment when James Bond finds out all the bad stuff happening around the globe is because of SPECTRE? Or when Sherlock Holmes suddenly realizes that Dr. Moriarty is the one pulling the strings of seemingly unrelated bad guys all over London?

For lack of a better simplification, Vladimir Putin is Dr. Moriarty. He is SPECTRE. And, like every Bond villain, Putin has given the world a preview of his vision. After trying time and again to make nice, even the Obama administration is starting to see him for what he is.

Here’s what you should know.

Putin knows how to do active measures. Or do you believe the CIA created AIDS to kill black people?

Since the 1980s, everyone from Louis Farrakhan to Spike Lee has run with that myth. According to the Washington Post, as recently as 2005 almost 50% of African-Americans believed either the government or the CIA was behind the creation of AIDS.

The fact that such a fine artifact of Soviet propaganda is still making the rounds in mainstream precincts is a testament to Russia’s historical excellence at disinformation. The Soviets excelled at stirring up discontent and mistrust between the government and Western underclasses, creating incidents, developing narratives and exploiting internal tensions to weaken their geopolitical enemies from within.

In that light, it’s not too surprising that the Kremlin-backed Russia Today RT, was one of the most persistent broadcasters to focus on the Ferguson riots and the major urban unrest that followed them. RT is merely a sequel to the Soviet-era subversion of I.F. Stone and Walter Duranty, dressed up as a news network and hiding in plain sight. Why America has let RT wrap itself in the First Amendment and bullhorn its way into 85 million homes is a question that deserves a better answer than we’ve heard so far.

Bearing the subversively appropriate slogan “Question More,” RT has enlisted names from Larry King to Ed Schultz to front the operation. From Congressman Dana Rohrabacher to Nation editor Katrina vanden Heuvel,RT has shown a knack for attracting guests and contributors from across the political spectrum who are willing to, at least temporarily, hold their nose and give RT the air of legitimacy. Of course, how much nose-holding is going on is a bit of a question. How many Western journalists, academics and talking heads are on Putin’s payroll and how many are simply “useful idiots?” Certain contributors like Alex Jones and Stephen F. Cohen hardly need coaxing to offer pro-Putinist declarations. Others, such as Mike Flynn and Matt Drudge seem to treat RT with a bit more suspicion.

Most Americans seem only to notice the biases of CNN, Fox News and MSNBC, their skepticism evaporating when a network anchor with a foreign accent speaks to the camera. Even when those anchors end up leaving and revealing the intentions of their former employers.

To be fair, RT is hardly the only media outlet at Putin’s disposal. Most people remember the outing of Maxim model Anna Chapman as a Russian spy. Most people don’t remember that Vicky Pelaez was busted as part of the same spy ring. Pelaez was a political columnist for El Diario (the most popular Spanish-language newspaper), where she had been writing for over 20 years, blasting US foreign policy while praising Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez and the Maoist-influenced Shining Path guerillas.

But no Russian-linked media outlet is more notorious than the much-hyped Wikileaks.

Whether Wikileaks has been “infiltrated” by Russian agents or has simply been a creation of Russia from the start is a question that history will have to answer. But even casual news consumers have trouble understanding why a website trying to be an “open-source democratic intelligence agency” seems tunnel-visioned on the West, routinely failing to expose the crimes and foibles of Russia or its allies.

Wikileaks first caught the American imagination with the release of Bradley Manning’s “War Logs.” Whether Manning was recruited by Wikileaks founder Julian Assange to gather information or whether he simply fell into Assange’s lap is a matter of debate. Regardless, his leaks helped Al-Qaeda’s recruiting, made other nations wary of intelligence-sharing with the US and are credited with starting the Arab Spring. (To be sure, Canada’s had its own version of Manning, who had much stronger ties to Russia.)

Regardless of how faint hand Russia may have played in the Manning episode, Manning’s leaks have gone on to benefit Russia as much, if not more, than any other entity; as the Arab Spring weakened US influence in the Middle East, it created a vacuum that Russia has gone on to fill.

Of course, Wikileaks was only getting going.

It’s been speculated that Edward Snowden was first approached by Russian intelligence in Geneva in 2007. There is also reason to believe that he may have been recruited in New Delhi in 2010 (India has a long history of collaboration with Russia). Regardless, at this point, it is an open secret that Snowden was already a Russian agent before he stole over 1 million documents and fled, ultimately, to that bastion of individual freedom, transparency and free speech, Moscow.

It’s hard not to notice that Snowden’s emergence in Moscow has coincided with Russia’s muscular foreign policy moves. From Crimea to Iraq to Japan, Putin has had an uncanny ability to detect the blind spots of his enemies (NATO and the US). Snowden’s intelligence has had the effect of making Putin look like the cunning genius he’s always wanted to be.

Sadly, Putin’s tactics go beyond disinformation and espionage. His ability to manipulate, control and exploit adversaries has been on full display in Russia itself where his own FSB has instigated, facilitated or, in some cases, actually performed terrorist actions in order to ease his political ascension, as infamously seen in Chechnya in 1999. It was not the last time Putin offered himself as a cure to a disease of his own making.

The Mitrokhin documents first opened Western eyes to the possibility of Russian collusion with international terrorists. Since then, Russia’s close partnership with Iran in Syria makes one wonder how close Russia also is to its proxy armies such as Hezbollah.

In that context, the curious ties between Russia and the Boston Marathon bombers leave more questions than answers.

Oh, but there’s so much more. The San Bernardino and Paris attackers both used Telegram, a Russian-developed encryption app designed, in the wake of the Snowden revelations, to work around NSA eavesdropping. Interesting. Maybe coincidental.

But then, coincidences abound in the San Bernardino case. As we now know, the shooters got their weapons from a straw purchaser, Sayed Farook’s friend, Enrique Marquez. Despite reportedly being a, well, slow individual, Marquez was married, to a hot, blond Russian number, Mariya Chernykh. Mariya had a sister, Tatiana who was married to…Sayed Farook’s brother. Both girls are Russian Jews from Western Russia whose parents have emigrated to Israel. Though the words “agent” and “provocateur” come to mind, it may be decades before we find out the truth.

While the number of Russian fingerprints on the San Bernardino attack were curious, they may also be small potatoes. In a revealing interview with a former FSB officer, a Ukranian newspaper tied Russia to the actual formation of ISIS, noting that it was Moscow-trained Baathists who founded the Islamic State.

In response to ISIS’ attacks and the Syrian refugee crisis right-wing, pro-Putinist parties have sprung up in reaction to the reflexively politically correct approach of the EU establishment. Has Putin created a problem that only he could solve? Is Europe in 2016 going to be like the Chechnya of 1999?

As if that wasn’t enough, Russian-backed gangs have been looking for ISIS buyers for enough cesium — a radioactive material — to contaminate several city blocks. Where did the cesium come from? All signs pointed to Russia, but Putin has blocked any attempts to track the cesium back to a Russian reactor.

Putin’s strategy is not one of ad hoc assassinations or big-score arms deals; it is far more encompassing than that. Putin has placed himself at the center of a spiderweb of organized crime, rogue nation states and terrorist groups; Putin has set himself up to be the instigator, middleman and/or even executor of everything from nuclear proliferation to domestic unrest while churning out enough disinformation and propaganda to blur his silhouette.

Dr. Moriarty would be impressed. After all, he never got to talk to Larry King.

Read the Original Article at The Havok Journal

The Average Civilian Pistol Permit Holder is Better with Their Weapon Than Most Cops

This is something I have known for some time, but it is good to see a Sheriff finally saying it. Maybe this will prompt some of the “Dunkin Donut share holders” in Police and Sheriff Depts. across the nation to sell off their shares and hit the range more than once a year. -SF

New York State, with its liberal politics and highly restrictive gun laws, might be the last place you’d expect to have a sheriff who actively encourages private citizens to get trained, licensed, and armed in order to help counter the nation-wide rash of mass shootings.  However, that’s exactly what happened.

Paul Van Blarcum is the Sheriff of Ulster County, New York.    Back in December, The New York Times quoted Sheriff Blarcum as stating,

“In light of recent events that have occurred in the United States and around the world I want to encourage citizens of Ulster County who are licensed to carry a firearm to PLEASE DO SO.”

As one might expect, this common-sense approach to responsible gun ownership generated nation-wide outrage.  How DARE competent and law-abiding citizens assume responsibility for their own lives and safety! Something must be done about Sheriff Blarcum and his outrageous, and dangerous ideas!  …or something.  His advice seemed pretty reasonable to me.

Now Sheriff Blarcum is taking heat yet again for something that he said, but this time it’s related to quotes attributed to him in an article posted in the National Rifle Association’s online magazine, America’s First Freedom.  This is what he had to say:

“I think the people that are out there who do carry concealed right now are at least as proficient with their weapons as police officers are. Actually, my deputies have to qualify with their pistols twice a year and for many of them that’s all the shooting they do; whereas, people who chose to carry are typically into guns, so they shoot more and are probably even better with their weapons than most cops are.”

While a lot of people, especially our readers in the Law Enforcement community, will take issue with Sheriff Blarcum’s statement, I think there is some truth in it.  Police officers have many, many responsibilities, of which firearms proficiency is but one.  The average officer, in a low-crime area, might never have to use his or her weapon, so they spend their time training for the types of activities that they are more likely to encounter during their day to day police work.  In these types of situations, I can envision firearms proficiency becoming, at best, merely a semi-annual requirement.  So, I think that the good sheriff is right.

Well, partially right, anyway.

I think it would be more accurate to say that the average handgun enthusiast is better with a handgun that the average police officer.  While many of my pistol-toting friends are quite good shots, I’ve known many people who have gone out and gotten handgun permits, and did very little with an actual weapon.  In these cases, even if the gun ends up getting carried and doesn’t in up relegated to a dark safe or a tall closet shelf, the only trigger time its owner ever had was in the training course required for the permit.   Even an average police officer shoots more times a year than “never.”

The same thinking holds when it comes to the average member of the military.  Even combat arms troops rarely train with handguns, because to most members of the military, a handgun is just something you use until you can fight your way to a long gun.  I (thankfully) never fired a handgun in combat; that’s what the rifle was for.  In fact the only thing I ever saw get shot with a handgun, in any of my deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan, was the clearing barrel outside of one of the mess halls at Balad Airfield.  Yes, I know a handful of veterans who used handguns at some point, but they were the exception that proved the rule.

I also know plenty of police officers and members of the military who train extensively with handguns and are quite good with them.  But when we’re considering the average non-tactical police officer, or the average non-specialized member of the military, what Sheriff Blarcum says about handgun proficiency is probably true.  What do you think?

Read the Original Article at The Havok Journal

Stolen Valor Fratricide

As a Veteran, I have to second this guy’s plea; we have gone too far in checking these poser idiots when we start attacking our own!! Come on Fellas!  I say enough is enough; follow this guy’s advice if you feel that strongly about it; get the authorities involved.-SF

Tell the truth about what you see and what you do. There is an army depending on us for correct information. You can lie all you please when you tell other folks about the rangers, but don’t never lie to a ranger or officer – Rogers Rangers

 

It is now officially time we all had a talk about this ‘Stolen Valor’ craziness.

Awhile back, I was at the airport in Chicago passing through on business and I had just finished dinner and was standing up in the process of paying my bill.  I was a middle aged guy with a heavy five o’clock shadow, physically fit without looking super athletic, and wearing civilian clothes – honestly, I didn’t much look like a soldier.

As I turned to go, this huge kid reeking of beer and at least a few percentage points over his tape test walked right up on me and blocked me from leaving, ‘10^th MTN, huh?’  It took me a few seconds to register I had a tiny 10^th MTN pin on my backpack which I had forgotten about.  Before I could answer, he jabbed his finger at the pin and got super aggressive, ‘What Battalion were you in?  Who was your Commander?”  I already had my wallet out and I pulled my ID card and held it out and told him to ‘back’ off.  He took a look, apologized and he left.

My encounter ended well for me but this past weekend, it didn’t end so well  for Marine veteran, Michael Deflin.  This Fallujah vet couldn’t produce an active duty CAC card on request from some Air Force dude and therefore he got the crap kicked out of him.  He suffered a broken leg and jaw in the process.  Prior to him and his friend beating Deflin down, the USAF guy accused him of ‘Stolen Valor’.

Congratulations, we have now started conducting fratricide on our own.

Read the Remainder at  Havok Journal

 

The Watermelon Patch: The Bad-Assness of the American Fighting Man!

As Warriors we assume the lineage of those who went before us and only in knowing our lineage can we honor them.  This month we will focus on the Badassness of the American fighting man – along with a few other interesting military obscurities from our collective past.

Let’s start by singing Happy 54^th Birthday to 5th Special Forces Group (Airborne). US Army Special Forces was activated at Fort Bragg in September 1961.

Three weeks to the day later President Kennedy attended a “firepower demonstration” conducted at Ft. Bragg. Members of 5th Group wore unauthorized headgear; a forest green beret. Kennedy liked it and the Green Beret has been the sign of the Quiet Professional ever since.

The American flag was flown in battle for the first time on 3 Sept. 1777 at Cooch’s Bridge and American fighting men have kicked ass all across the globe under that banner ever since… But not all were active duty military.

There were also men like 19 year old Merchant Marine Cadet Edwin O’Hara.

September 27^th 1941 saw the launch of the first Liberty Ship, SS Patrick Henry. Thirteen sister ships were launched the same day. Eight months later SS Stephen Hopkins, the vessel where Cadet O’Hara would make his last stand, was launched and joined the fight.

Read the Remainder at The Havok Journal

**I also Strongly recommend reading Part 1 and Part 2 of the Watermelon Patch series for more amazing stories of Americas Fighting Men who laid it all on the line for US.**