DO ALL OF US NEED
AN ENCRYPTED PHONE? UNHACKABLE?ra
nslate
With phone
tapping becoming a big issue, this might just be the best solution
FIRST LET’S create the
right amount of high-pitch melodrama required to set the right tone for a
column like this. Your phone can be hacked into, microphone switched on and
your conversation recorded without you having any idea that it’s being done.
Think of all the conversations you have with people while your phone is lying
right next to you. Think of all the phone conversations you have in a day.
Think of someone who has recordings of all of that.
HACK ATTACK These days your phone can be hacked into, information
and data accessed and your location discovered even when it is switched off
Your data can be sucked
out, information accessed, your location discovered and all your photos and
documents accessed – even when your phone is in airplane mode or turned off
(usually done with spyware that activates the phone in stealth mode without
your knowledge). Your phone can also be tricked into joining a fake rogue
network that masquerades as your network service provider. Once your phone
joins that network, it starts to upload everything on your phone lock, stock
and barrel. Think of everything you have on your phone, all the passwords, all
the data, all your emails, all your messages, all the private stuff. Think of someone
sitting and reading through all of that every day.
Irrespective of whether
you just gasped or simply dismissed the above as surveillance sensationalism,
it’s an established fact that phone tapping by government agencies, marketeers,
social media companies, app makers, private sniffers and hackers is at an
all-time high. The phone is such a treasure trove of information and data, that
it makes sense to concentrate on just that one device for it all. Thus, the
case for an all-encrypted phone that tells you in real time what data or voice
information is being sent out and to whom, starts to make a lot of sense.
This got a serious boost
when it was announced that Edward Snowden was working with Andrew Bunnie Huang
to create a fully encrypted, completely unhackable phone.
SO WHO ARE THESE TWO GUYS?
Embarrassing question,
because you really should know these two guys. Snowden is the poster boy of
whistle blowers, a former Central Intelligence Agency employee who copied and
leaked classified information from the National Security Agency that proved
that multiple governments all over the world were spying on citizens on a
global scale. He leaked all that information to some journalists and very
famously asked the journalists to take out the battery of their phones and put
them in a refrigerator. Huang is an infamous reverse engineering hacker of
consumer products and his book Hacking the Xbox, got him into serious trouble
with Microsoft and an army of other organisations. When these two get serious
about an encrypted unhackable phone – we should all listen.
HOW WOULD IT WORK?
It’s not really a phone.
Right now it’s a prototype for a case for iPhones. It will consist of probes
and sensors that monitor all signal transmission. A display on the outside of
the case along with audible alarms informs users of the phone’s status. If
someone’s hacking in, listening in or even trying to – it can inform you and
also cut them off. It can even make you and your phone go ‘dark’ (love that
term), essentially making you disappear off the grid of any tracking mechanism.
It’s called the introspection engine and is aimed at journalists working in
conflict countries, dissidents in authoritarian countries and average citizens
who want to prevent governments and others from snooping on their private
lives. Thus, pretty much everyone!
WHAT ABOUT ANDROID?
If they will have one for
iOS, they will obviously have one for Android too. But one such phone already
exists. It’s called the Blackphone 2 and is claimed to be the world’s most
secure and private phone. It has an operating system called Silent OS that
encrypts everything including voice calls and data as well as controls which
app gets to access what data. It costs about $799 but it’s a nice-looking phone
with good specs too.
ISN’T THIS JUST OVERKILL FOR A NORMAL CITIZEN WHO HAS NOTHING TO
HIDE?
Well, every time I have
someone who comes up to me and says “but I have nothing to hide”, I always ask
them to unlock their phones and hand it over to me for an hour. I am yet to
have someone give it over. It’s not about things to hide, it’s about the
privacy of our lives – something that must be respected at all levels.
In the future, encrypted
and unhackable phones shouldn’t be something special but a standard default
from all phone manufacturers. It’s going to be a tough task though, as this
isn’t something any government will encourage or ask brands to do. Yet, the
first seeds have been sown – hopefully it’ll bloom into a full-blown
revolution.
·
Rajiv Makhni Rajiv Makhni is managing editor,
Technology, NDTV, and the anchor of Gadget Guru, Cell Guru and Newsnet3
·
HT 31 Jul 2016
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