Schneier on Security

Clive Robinson • April 20, 2011 3:22 PM

Err I can see how the 50Billion guestimate comes about and I can see that 20% uplift to this figure for SAP would have made the prior cost 41.666..Billion but the difference between the two is not 8Billion, it’s actually 333.3..Million more than 8Billion.

That nit picking asside, however I can not see how the need for SAP is 100% or even remotly close to it attributable to APT supposadly originating from China.

Surely for such a stratigic project SAP would have been a defacto requirment very early on probably even pre-dating the current “China APT” bruhar.

Sorry but to me this looks like another “get more funding” put up job.

That being said I do think China is a threat but economicaly not militarily.

As for the APT well I’m sorry if the US military and their contractors cannot figure out the required solution to the problem, well what hope is there for the rest of us?

Sarcasm aside sure APT is a nuisance, but it is not a “world stopping” issue, and there are known methods of dealing with it, nearly all of which have been known for a long time. Sure they might inconveniance a few people but not greatly so.

That being said even if China were a potential military threat, what is known about their current arms and armaments is not exactly exciting reading. With few exceptions their equipment is conventional and changed little from the cold war days. So not the sort of high tech offensive or deffensive armaments that would require ordinary stealth, let alone this next round of “Stealth Plus” (c).

Which raises the question about this half trillion dollars and the “super dupper wizzo stealth pluss” it is supposadly buying, who is the enemy that this technology is a must have for?

The only justification I can think of for it is to preemptivly strike at another Super Powers land based Nuclear capability. [Which if it is for this makes it a dangerous destabalising element, the sort the Rand Corperation identified as being likley to actually cause an early first strike attack by a potential enemy on the “use it or lose it” principle].

Back in old Europe we have one or two high end fighter aircraft that have been jointly developed. Although the more recent designs have had stealth consideration taken during their design they are not anywhere near the level of “stealth” of the US first “Stealth Fighter”.

Why not?.. well it appears that after due consideration by the various European Nations military thinkers and stratagists they considered that stealth at that level was an unnessassary encumbrance to capability (they opted to reduce the radar and IR profiles). Further that the future enemy the aircraft would go up against would not have a sufficiently overwhelming defense capability that might give stealth the advantage over the compramise to the aircrafts payload etc capability…

That was before considering the expense and other problems arising from “stealth”.

If anyone out there knows who this highly advanced and capable enemy is that makes this extra level of “Stealth Pluss” an absolute necessity, I for one would be interested to know.

Finaly some approximate figure to consider,

1) the US military spend is well over twenty times that of the Chinese in almost all areas.

2) The Chinese security spending is such that they spend twice as much on internal security as they do on external security.

3) The US security spending is such that they spend well over twice as much on external security as the do over internal security.

4) China’s aproximate investment in the US economy is 3trillion dollars and it’s rising.

Based on those figures in which area is China more of a threat to the US economic or military?

Clive Robinson • April 21, 2011 6:11 AM

@ GreenSquirrel,

“arent they all?”

Welll… yes but there are degrees.

If you are quoting for a job it’s normal to put in a contingency for inflation of materials. Likewise if the spec is a little loose (and mot are) a contingency for extra man hours at double rate.

On other jobs you would need other contingencies, but importantly you don’t “over egg the pudding” otherwise you could find yourself not getting any work or even paid or worse getting a law suite to fight.

However claiming the 8billion SAP cost is just due to APT is not “over egging the pudding”, it’s burying it under the entire world annual output of chicken 5hit… And it stinks worse than an equivalent quantity of chicken “rag meat” that’s been left out long enough to become a serious health hazard.

Clive Robinson • April 24, 2011 4:59 AM

Another write up on APT that (supposedly) comes from China, this time from Federal Comp Weekly,

http://fcw.com/articles/2011/04/25/buzz-china-cyber-spying.aspx?m=1

It raises (but then fails to answer) questions about the actors, their sponsors, their raison d’etr and indirectly their modus operandi.

Importantly although it mentioned Russia as a state actor who has recently had “agents” deported home from US soil it fails to talk about if they are involved with cyber espionage.

I’m assuming that Russia is involved heavily with cyber espionage which begs the question how come we don’t get to hear about it (except as cyber crime)?

Are we to assume that for some reason the Chinese are sufficiently inept that we are catching their activities and the Russians so good we are not?

Or are we to draw other conclusions as to why the US is focusing so hard on China?