Iran Nukes

[phil_in_cs]

The "why" of what the Secretary said is pretty well documented by him. Reporting what he said is news, getting into is he correct in believing this or that is politics, and we don't discuss politics here.

If makes no difference to us if he and President Obama are correct in this course of action or not. Our issues are how to deal with the fallout (possibly literal fallout) of actions they might take.

[pirro]

The "why" of what the Secretary said is pretty well documented by him. Reporting what he said is news, getting into is he correct in believing this or that is politics, and we don't discuss politics here.

If makes no difference to us if he and President Obama are correct in this course of action or not. Our issues are how to deal with the fallout (possibly literal fallout) of actions they might take.

Ok, im gona drop this. But Didnt they say something similar to the weapons of mass destruction in iraq??

[crypto]

Ok, im gona drop this. But Didnt they say something similar to the weapons of mass destruction in iraq??

This is why Zombie Squad can't have nice things.

[ei8htx]

If Iran is allowed to build nukes, then I'm certain we'll eventually see one over here.

That's worth preparing for.

[Doctorr Fabulous]

If Iran is allowed to build nukes, then I'm certain we'll eventually see one over here.

That's worth preparing for.

What, like on antiques roadshow?

[ei8htx]

If Iran is allowed to build nukes, then I'm certain we'll eventually see one over here.

That's worth preparing for.

What, like on antiques roadshow?

How much damage would Little Boy do in down town New York?

[jnathan]

There are at least some on-line publications carrying stories of official requests for the UAV to be returned. So we may safely assume that it is in-fact an actual UAV and not a mock-up. There's a lot of speculation in the information security community that the UAV was in-fact compromised and flown to ground safely, just as the Iranians claim. This claim is bolstered by information that suggests more than one defense contractor has been paid to do vulnerability analysis of UAVs to determine whether or not what the Iranian government described is possible. Colleagues have suggested that it's more than possible.

As Phil already mentioned, the Iranian government has been reporting deaths of Physicists for some time, claiming that scientists who are part of their nuclear weapons program are being assassinated.

There's a lot of good analysis on Stuxnet out there and it was non-trivial to develop, primarily because of the zero-day vulnerability exploits it contained as well as the target of the attack: SCADA systems that aren't exactly common or cheap.

-Jeff

[crypto]

How much damage would Little Boy do in down town New York?

My off-the-cuff estimate is that it would result in the glassification of a 50mi radius around the center of Tehran.


Which is why it wont happen.

[phil_in_cs]

There are at least some on-line publications carrying stories of official requests for the UAV to be returned. So we may safely assume that it is in-fact an actual UAV and not a mock-up. There's a lot of speculation in the information security community that the UAV was in-fact compromised and flown to ground safely, just as the Iranians claim. This claim is bolstered by information that suggests more than one defense contractor has been paid to do vulnerability analysis of UAVs to determine whether or not what the Iranian government described is possible. Colleagues have suggested that it's more than possible.

As Phil already mentioned, the Iranian government has been reporting deaths of Physicists for some time, claiming that scientists who are part of their nuclear weapons program are being assassinated.

There's a lot of good analysis on Stuxnet out there and it was non-trivial to develop, primarily because of the zero-day vulnerability exploits it contained as well as the target of the attack: SCADA systems that aren't exactly common or cheap.

-Jeff

Bruce Schneier says there's a chance the Iranians spoofed the GPS signals so when it was told to fly home, it landed in Iran. He's a really smart guy, and knows other really smart guys. If he says it is possible, then it is possible.

[crypto]

spoofing military GPS is exceedingly difficult, though, to the point of being almost impossible.

Military GPS is running on a separate frequency range that surrounds civilian GPS on either side, plus the signal is secured by type-1 encryption of the same sort that secures the control link. The amount of 'things going wrong' that would have to precede a successful mil-band GPS spoof to work are really, really remote.

They would either have had to recover a valid comsec key from a captured military GPS (unlikely in the extreme), re-key their spoofers in a way that wouldnt have tipped off the whole constellation that something wacky was going on, and then spoof it.

I suppose its more likely that they might selectively jam both ranges of the military signal and then spoof the cleartext signal, which is unlikely, but plausible. I dont even know if the GPS receiver in the Sentinel listens for the civilian signal.

[chills1994]

Why is the bottom half of the drone in the video covered by banners?

Because it is a mockup sitting on sawhorses.

Why is it sitting on a gym floor?

Because it is a mockup made by University of Tehran engineering students.

Even the most basic of engineering students understand trigonometry enough to realize that if I were to video tape 3 points on a floor say like where the wheels would meet the floor it would be easy enough to take a still of the video and to scale or "blueprint" their landing gear locations/angles/distances and see how that jibes against the actual blueprints of the real thing.

My other guess is that there are not enough pics of a real drone out in the public domain that show both the landing gear and their doors. Again, wheel sizes are really easy to scale. From what I have seen from the B2 and F-117 is that at least one edge of the landing gear doors has a sawtooth design... I reckon for stealthy radar evading purposes.

If you look closely at the video you will see a bunch of dust on the gym floor. It appears to be the same color as the drone's skin... Which if you look closely at the shading/lighting appears to be sculpted/ sanded/ rasped styrofoam.


It is a feel good propaganda film/psy ops and the targeted audience is the 100% of the Muslims watching Al Jazerra.

S.c.a.m.e

Source

Content

Audience

Medium

Effects

[Doctorr Fabulous]

spoofing military GPS is exceedingly difficult, though, to the point of being almost impossible.

Military GPS is running on a separate frequency range that surrounds civilian GPS on either side, plus the signal is secured by type-1 encryption of the same sort that secures the control link. The amount of 'things going wrong' that would have to precede a successful mil-band GPS spoof to work are really, really remote.

They would either have had to recover a valid comsec key from a captured military GPS (unlikely in the extreme), re-key their spoofers in a way that wouldnt have tipped off the whole constellation that something wacky was going on, and then spoof it.

I suppose its more likely that they might selectively jam both ranges of the military signal and then spoof the cleartext signal, which is unlikely, but plausible. I dont even know if the GPS receiver in the Sentinel listens for the civilian signal.

OR they did what I would do.

"Achmad! Shoot down that abomination. Oh shit, it's mostly intact!"

Option B:

"Tech Sergeant Valderez, you've been asleep for 20 minutes at the helm! You lost a drone to Iran!"
"Cocaine's a hell of a drug!"

[chills1994]

I guess if I was really bored I could figure what the average brick length is for gyms in Iran. Transfer where the wingtips would touch the wall. Then count how many bricks there are between the wingtips. Multiply that by the length of a brick. Then see how that jibes up with a real drone's wingspan.

[Doctorr Fabulous]

I guess if I was really bored I could figure what the average brick length is for gyms in Iran. Transfer where the wingtips would touch the wall. Then count how many bricks there are between the wingtips. Multiply that by the length of a brick. Then see how that jibes up with a real drone's wingspan.

I'd suggest a hobby, instead...

[crypto]

We needed sawtooth edges on doors 30 years ago, but not anymore.

And is that enough detail for you?

[Doctorr Fabulous]

PIC OF DRONE
And is that enough detail for you?

Wait...

[ei8htx]

How much damage would Little Boy do in down town New York?

My off-the-cuff estimate is that it would result in the glassification of a 50mi radius around the center of Tehran.

Which is why it wont happen.

You're right. Mutually self assured destruction will protect us. I don't know why our gov't even bothered with NBC gear and fallout shelters during the Cold War.

What does martyrdom mean again?

[chills1994]

We needed sawtooth edges on doors 30 years ago, but not anymore.

And is that enough detail for you?

go to this link here:

http://aerowiki.blogspot.com/2009/12/rq ... dahar.html

granted there are probably different evolutions of the aircraft, but just at that link alone there are two different landing gear/landing gear door configurations.

[chills1994]

I guess if I was really bored I could figure what the average brick length is for gyms in Iran. Transfer where the wingtips would touch the wall. Then count how many bricks there are between the wingtips. Multiply that by the length of a brick. Then see how that jibes up with a real drone's wingspan.

I'd suggest a hobby, instead...

I was thinking about maybe getting into guns, maybe shooting some competitions, maybe even reloading my own ammo.

That or spinning my dog's air into yarn and then knitting sweaters with it. I can't decide which. (shrugs shoulders)

[chills1994]

Well, NOW!

things are getting interesting...the Finns find U.S. Patriot missiles on a ship bound for China:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16292244

jeesh...at this rate, I'll be able to pick up an M1A1 Abrams tank or an F-15 fighter jet at the flea market on Saturday.

[jnathan]

I'm not sure your link supports your argument. Providing more examples of publicly available images seems to suggest that there's no reason to hide a nonexistent landing gear on a fabricated UAV fake.

However all of this is relatively moot given that there would be very little point to making a publicized request for a nonexistent UAV. No people were captured, it's just a piece of hardware. We're not going to engage in a special op to recapture a UAV.

-Jeff

go to this link here:

http://aerowiki.blogspot.com/2009/12/rq ... dahar.html

granted there are probably different evolutions of the aircraft, but just at that link alone there are two different landing gear/landing gear door configurations.

[jnathan]

Bruce is a very smart and insightful guy, but the complexities of GPS may make it far more likely that vulnerable command and control systems were attacked rather than spoofing GPS. My point about vuln research previously may have been a red herring as doing that sort of research assumes you have a UAV to start your research.

Mea culpa

-Jeff

Bruce Schneier says there's a chance the Iranians spoofed the GPS signals so when it was told to fly home, it landed in Iran. He's a really smart guy, and knows other really smart guys. If he says it is possible, then it is possible.

[TC]

I know little of the technical side of these sorts of things but thought I'd remind everyone of this story from a few months ago:

Exclusive: Computer Virus Hits U.S. Drone Fleet

A computer virus has infected the cockpits of America’s Predator and Reaper drones, logging pilots’ every keystroke as they remotely fly missions over Afghanistan and other warzones.

The virus, first detected nearly two weeks ago by the military’s Host-Based Security System, has not prevented pilots at Creech Air Force Base in Nevada from flying their missions overseas. Nor have there been any confirmed incidents of classified information being lost or sent to an outside source. But the virus has resisted multiple efforts to remove it from Creech’s computers, network security specialists say. And the infection underscores the ongoing security risks in what has become the U.S. military’s most important weapons system.

“We keep wiping it off, and it keeps coming back,” says a source familiar with the network infection, one of three that told Danger Room about the virus. “We think it’s benign. But we just don’t know.”

Military network security specialists aren’t sure whether the virus and its so-called “keylogger” payload were introduced intentionally or by accident; it may be a common piece of malware that just happened to make its way into these sensitive networks. The specialists don’t know exactly how far the virus has spread. But they’re sure that the infection has hit both classified and unclassified machines at Creech. That raises the possibility, at least, that secret data may have been captured by the keylogger, and then transmitted over the public internet to someone outside the military chain of command...(continued at link)

[ei8htx]

I know little of the technical side of these sorts of things but thought I'd remind everyone of this story from a few months ago:

Exclusive: Computer Virus Hits U.S. Drone Fleet

That's good, I completely forgot about that story.

things are getting interesting...the Finns find U.S. Patriot missiles on a ship bound for China:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-16292244

Less prominently featured in the story was that the ship was scheduled for a stop in South Korea first. My guess is that's where the missiles were headed; quietly and discretely... well, not anymore.