History of US Information Warfare
An interesting history.
Comments
Bodyguard of Dois • March 16, 2017 6:50 PM
Then there’s Chinese information operations,
http://english.chinamil.com.cn/view/2017-03/09/content_7520838.htm
which use the diabolical trick or reading documents that Americans are too brainwashed to look at,
http://www.ohchr.org/EN/Countries/LACRegion/Pages/USIndex.aspx
Nicola • March 17, 2017 12:55 AM
NSA, GCHQ, CIA, FBI denied ever wiretapping Donald Trump. So do Prism, Echelon and the rest magically exclude only Trump?
— leaked NSA code —
if name = “Donald Trump”
send to: dev/null;
else
…
— end of leak —
Herman • March 17, 2017 2:06 AM
Hmm, it looks like info warfare is now done mostly by the top politicians – just like in the goid old bad old days, the rabble rousers are back with a vengence.
Wesley Parish • March 17, 2017 5:07 AM
To quote a Russian saying during the Cold War, “The truth is not news, the news is not the truth”, punning on two major Soviet newspapers, Pravda – Truth, Izvestia – News.
If it wasn’t for the fact that this is most likely new to practically everybody in the United States, I’d say, “Move on, nothing new to see here.”
@Nicola,
It wasn’t them, it was AI Pharber.
It isn’t a denial when it’s only a partial truth, “we didn’t order it, the computer tapped him pro-bono.”
We didn’t tap him, we added a selector. We held control and piqued a selection.
They listen for keywords, we listen for keyed words.
Clive Robinson • March 17, 2017 8:29 AM
@ Nicola,
NSA, GCHQ, CIA, FBI denied ever wiretapping Donald Trump. So do Prism, Echelon and the rest magically exclude only Trump?
Look carefully at the words both sides use and what they mean to each side and this how they differ.
The expression “wiretap” has a specific meaning to the agencies and this they did not in their view do (remember the double talk on “reading” / “collect” etc peoples emails).
We know because Obama chose to make it so that the NSA listened in on US politicos talking to Israeli citizens, which caused a certain degree of consternation for various Republicans.
Likewise GCHQ chose to admit the “Wilson doctrine” was neither law or respected by GCHQ.
As for Obama asking GCHQ to listen in on Trump, no he would not have been abke to do that. However he was quite pally pally with UK Priminister David Cameron who could ask and get results. In fact as Donald Trump has major assets in Scotland and was known to cosy up to Alex Salmond then head of the Scotish National Party and their had been considerable polotical noise over Trumps plans that it was highly likely Donald Trumps communications were not just collected, recorded, analysed and passed not just to a human analyst in GCHQ but several other places including the UK Cabinet Office as they would be “National Security” issues.
Thus if you turn things around a little, it would have been quite possible both Obama and Cameran discused Trump at various points as he was seen as a “National Security” issue on both sides of the puddle. In fact quite likely, thus the question of “asking” may never have come up, or it might have started with Cameron asking Obama…
Thus who asked who and the coresponding denials is realy not relevant and thus squabling about it a smoke screen.
My money would be that Obama was getting updates on Donald Trump over the “Birther” issue and onwards, further that Obama occasionaly embarising Trump in public infront of the whole nation was very far from being just petty points scoring. More as they used to say at Bletchly Park during WWII “gardening”, where they in effect created “known plain text” that could be found in some expected communications (Dockyard cipher) to cause the info to also appear in other communications (stronger ciphers like submarine enigma) to become apparent thus either of use or to show a hand.
It’s just another varient of “finessing” that you occasionaly get to hear about, as are the out of charecter denials.
Clive Robinson • March 17, 2017 11:04 AM
It’s funny that the authors Erick Waage and David V. Gioe fail to mention a few historical facts.
The supposed “Bloody Massacre in King-Street” outside the billets started off as a friendly snowball fight with the Bostonians in the afternoon, that Paul Revere and his “Sons of Liberty” friends decided to capitalise on by first puting stones in the snowballs then going in with heavier weapons… Oh and don’t forget the “Boston tea party” where the “Son’s of Liberty” perpetrators dressed up asMohawks or Narragansett native American Indians… Where there is disparity in reports. It was later said that the Sons of Liberty “dressed poorly” so that they would not be mistaken for “real” native Americans. Well that’s very far from the way it was reported at the time. Some historians think the idea was to sow distrust between the British and the Native Americans who were quite vocaly not liked by some of the Sons of Liberty who wanted rid of the native Americans.
Secondly the actions of the French, boy oh boy was that a big item to leave out… Shame there’s not enough room to go into it even just at the surface.
So I give the piece three out of ten for honesty and eight out of ten for continuing the propaganda work of Paul Rever and the Sons of Liberty hundreds of years later…
tyr • March 17, 2017 8:40 PM
The US army started listening in the day
after the first telegraph line was made.
There was a certain amount of nervousness
about it over the illegality problem but
that was soon smoothed away by politicians.
That should be a familiar story these days.
If the spooks say they aren’t doing some
act it just means they aren’t going to
admit it. They suffer from politicians
disease (if their lips are moving they are
lying to you).
The whole current news fakery cycle looks
like a badly played card game of Illuminati
as each revelation spirals off into fantasy
or new weirdnesses.
If the Russians are so omnipotent, maybe USA
should surrender before it is too late. The
Fakenews boys seem to think there are more
Rus running things than there are rational
humans around. Popcorn stocks are up as the
fans of the clusterf**k gaze on in amazement.
Riddle me this, if Turkey and Holland go to
war which side of NATO are the rest to be
on? In theory any NATO menber who is attacked
will have the others come to their aid.
My Info • March 18, 2017 9:00 AM
From the article:
Targeting Confidence in Government Institutions
…
In conflicts hot or cold, targeting the confidence of individuals in the integrity of their governmental institutions is a timeless strategy. Russia’s recent, but not unprecedented, information warfare campaign seemed to inspire* some doubt in a portion of the American population to the integrity of its political process.
…
* https://www.dni.gov/index.php/newsroom/press-releases/215-press-releases-2016/1460-statement-on-requests-for-additional-information-on-russian-interference-in-the-2016-presidential-election
These people are idiots. Blind trust in government institutions has never been a characteristic of a democracy or democratic republic or any other government of a free people. Why do we have “checks and balances” between the branches of government in the U.S. Constitution? Why do we have so many safeguards for the rights of the accused in criminal proceedings laid out in the same Constitution?
The people’s TRUST AND CONFIDENCE MUST BE EARNED, and our government has most assuredly NOT earned our trust and confidence lately. Consider the practice of psychiatry in U.S. courthouses today. The same PRACTICES OF PSYCHIATRY AT LAW which, for example, sanctioned, allowed, and permitted the conspired and premeditated MURDER, in all but provable fact, of Rosemary Kennedy,** that is, the planned, willful, and intentional deprivation and termination of her conscious brain function, with malice aforethought, CONTINUE UNABATED AND HAVE NOT BEEN REFORMED TO THIS DAY.
Consider the 46 U.S. attorneys who were fired the other weekend. Are the people satisfied that these attorneys are armed, endowed with false identities, and loose on the streets? The same attorneys who so willfully and intentionally conspired, with malice aforethought, to disregard the rights of the people at large and especially the rights of those accused of crimes, knowingly in direct and open defiance of the plain words of the Constitution of the United States of America?
To any court of the United States: Be INFORMED, by the people of the United States of America, that such willful, direct, and open defiance of the Constitution will not be tolerated, that this conduct is HIGH TREASON and will be charged as such. These attorneys are the same ones who created such a state of constant warfare and public danger, with their disregard of the Constitution that would be reckless were it not part of such malicious, willful, and intentional warfare against the human rights and civil rights of the people of the United States.
Subscribe to comments on this entry
Leave a comment
Sidebar photo of Bruce Schneier by Joe MacInnis.
Ross Snider • March 16, 2017 1:02 PM
Great review. Quick plug on the information warfare authorities of the US in order:
Foreign Information Service (1941-42)
Office of War Information (1942-45)
Office of International Information & Cultural Affairs (1945-48)
Office of International Information (1948-50)
Office of International Information & of the Assistant Secretary of State for Public Affairs (1950-52)
International Information Administration (1952-53)
United States Information Agency (1953-77)
International Communication Agency (1978-82)
United States Information Agency (1983-98)
International Public Information Core Group (1998-2001)
Office of Strategic Influence (2001-02)
Office of Global Communications (2002-05)
Bureau of International Information Programs (2005-2017)