BF2S Forums Hacked.

'Hacked' is a misleading word to use for this.  Perhaps 'intercepted video feed' instead?

Edit:  I meant for the news outlet, not the thread.

Last edited by SenorToenails (2009-12-17 07:49:55)

FEOS wrote:

Now you're expecting news outlets to be accurate on things they report?

What color is the sky on your world, bro?

I know, I know!  It's a pet peeve of mine though.  :p

Mekstizzle wrote:

Well you'd think a Military fighting a counter insurgency with hundreds of billions of dollars behind it would think of doing the simple things first and foremost, why the hell isn't the video link encrypted, the insurgents aren't really hacking anything, more like script kiddies

There are many reasons:

1. The video link goes to ground forces, many/most of whom do not carry crypto gear with them
2. Cost/benefit analysis: what's the likelihood of the adversary intercepting it and being able to use it to their purposes (it took 6 years)
3. How much benefit does it really give the bad guys? Jury's still out on that one

It's kind of like the other "hacking" stories in the news: So what? The relevance of the story (to the reporter) is that it happened...the true impact/value of what was taken is never really questioned/investigated by the reporter.

Edit: FEOS' opinion: it should've been encrypted with at least non-mil encryption. By the time the bad guys decrypted it, it wouldn't have any value and the ground forces could use commercially-available IT encryption tools.

Last edited by FEOS (2009-12-17 08:07:50)

FEOS wrote:

Mekstizzle wrote:

Well you'd think a Military fighting a counter insurgency with hundreds of billions of dollars behind it would think of doing the simple things first and foremost, why the hell isn't the video link encrypted, the insurgents aren't really hacking anything, more like script kiddies

There are many reasons:

1. The video link goes to ground forces, many/most of whom do not carry crypto gear with them
2. Cost/benefit analysis: what's the likelihood of the adversary intercepting it and being able to use it to their purposes (it took 6 years)
3. How much benefit does it really give the bad guys? Jury's still out on that one

It's kind of like the other "hacking" stories in the news: So what? The relevance of the story (to the reporter) is that it happened...the true impact/value of what was taken is never really questioned/investigated by the reporter.

Edit: FEOS' opinion: it should've been encrypted with at least non-mil encryption. By the time the bad guys decrypted it, it wouldn't have any value and the ground forces could use commercially-available IT encryption tools.

From what I've read, these UAVs have had unencrypted video streams since the conflict in Bosnia.  The military didn't think the enemies would know that they could or how to intercept the streams.

Perhaps a simple encryption would have been good, but if that was cracked people would be bitching that the military didn't do enough...  oh well!

Especially since the US design everything so that it can be used in a war against someone proper like Russia or China or some shit

Doctor Strangelove wrote:

Mekstizzle wrote:

Well you'd think a Military fighting a counter insurgency with hundreds of billions of dollars behind it would think of doing the simple things first and foremost, why the hell isn't the video link encrypted, the insurgents aren't really hacking anything, more like script kiddies

I guess they thought the Hajis are too poor and dumb to use computers.

I know I did.

How the fuck did hajji get Internet in the first place would be my question.

Why does hajji have garage door openers when hajji doesn't have a garage?

Hurricane2k9 wrote:

Does Raytheon make any of these systems? Wouldn't surprise me. They want to put a fucking battlefield information system on god damned iPhones:

http://www.engadget.com/2009/12/16/rayt … real-time/

General Atomics makes them.

People always talk about fighting a war whilst sitting at home in some stupid leafy suburb, but you can only do it for certain missions anyway. You guys are all familiar with lag and ping, and how it's ok if you're playing RTS with some fag in Australia, but try to play FPS and shit hits the fan... that's why I think you'll never get the idea of sitting at home whilst robots do all the work.

They'll just bomb home instead

Mekstizzle wrote:

People always talk about fighting a war whilst sitting at home in some stupid leafy suburb, but you can only do it for certain missions anyway. You guys are all familiar with lag and ping, and how it's ok if you're playing RTS with some fag in Australia, but try to play FPS and shit hits the fan... that's why I think you'll never get the idea of sitting at home whilst robots do all the work.

They'll just bomb home instead

Eh, we're not talking aerial dogfighting here. We're talking about sitting 10,000 feet above the earth and trolling slowly along. A satellite link is more than sufficient to control the UAV.

Last edited by JohnG@lt (2009-12-17 08:42:37)

JohnG@lt wrote:

Mekstizzle wrote:

People always talk about fighting a war whilst sitting at home in some stupid leafy suburb, but you can only do it for certain missions anyway. You guys are all familiar with lag and ping, and how it's ok if you're playing RTS with some fag in Australia, but try to play FPS and shit hits the fan... that's why I think you'll never get the idea of sitting at home whilst robots do all the work.

They'll just bomb home instead

Eh, we're not talking aerial dogfighting here. We're talking about sitting 10,000 feet above the earth and trolling slowly along. A satellite link is more than sufficient to control the UAV.

Yeah I know, I was just going off on my own stupid tangent

JohnG@lt wrote:

Mekstizzle wrote:

People always talk about fighting a war whilst sitting at home in some stupid leafy suburb, but you can only do it for certain missions anyway. You guys are all familiar with lag and ping, and how it's ok if you're playing RTS with some fag in Australia, but try to play FPS and shit hits the fan... that's why I think you'll never get the idea of sitting at home whilst robots do all the work.

They'll just bomb home instead

Eh, we're not talking aerial dogfighting here. We're talking about sitting 10,000 feet above the earth and trolling slowly along. A satellite link is more than sufficient to control the UAV.

And even then, people nearby have to actually take off and land the things because the latency is far too high for that.

JohnG@lt wrote:

Hurricane2k9 wrote:

Does Raytheon make any of these systems? Wouldn't surprise me. They want to put a fucking battlefield information system on god damned iPhones:

http://www.engadget.com/2009/12/16/rayt … real-time/

edit: THe UAV controllers are in Tampa? Shit sign me up for the USAF now!

They can be anywhere in the world. The UAV's are controlled remotely via satellite.

I know. But Tampa is nais.

Navy would be cool too but then I'd have to be in a ship.