Go Facebook Go and Take Android with You

Posted on April 5, 2018April 5, 2018 by Denise Simon

Primer: Amendment IV

The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized. Does this only apply to the Federal government or State government?

Humm read on….

The Mark Zuckerberg apology tour continues. There was the 87 million compromised accounts where privacy was ignored. Then there was the fact that Facebook employees track communications in the private message feature. But why would Facebook contact hospitals asking for patient information? Sheesh, really?

Facebook asked hospitals for anonymized data about their patients for a proposed research project, CNBC reported on Thursday.

The social media platform reportedly intended to compare the data, which included prescription information and illnesses, with its own data that it collected from users, in order to flag users that may need hospital care.

The proposal was paused after Facebook revealed that Cambridge Analytica improperly took data from 50 million of its users’ profiles, and reportedly never made it beyond initial planning stages.

“This work has not progressed past the planning phase, and we have not received, shared, or analyzed anyone’s data,” a Facebook spokesperson told CNBC.

The social media company discussed its plan with organizations including Stanford Medical School and American College of Cardiology.

The data the company would have collected would have been completely anonymous and only available for medical research, according to the report.

Cathleen Gates, the interim CEO of the American College of Cardiology, said in a statement provided to CNBC that Facebook’s proposed data project could help medical research.

“As part of its mission to transform cardiovascular care and improve heart health, the American College of Cardiology has been engaged in discussions with Facebook around the use of anonymized Facebook data, coupled with anonymized ACC data, to further scientific research on the ways social media can aid in the prevention and treatment of heart disease—the #1 cause of death in the world,” she said.

News of the proposed medical data collection comes amid scrutiny over how a British research firm hired by the Trump campaign, Cambridge Analytica, improperly took user data through Facebook.

Controversy over matter has sparked an outcry about Facebook’s data collection and privacy practices.

Lawmakers have been particularly vocal on the issue. Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg is set to testify before them on Capitol Hill in hearing on Tuesday and Wednesday during Senate and House hearings about data privacy.

*** Gonna be some interesting hearings on The Hill right? Perhaps Android should be included….

A software developer — who didn’t want to be identified — told News.com.au the social media giant should be the least of our worries, saying Android apps available on Google Play are often “saturated by spyware.”

“Google has given apps a wide open ‘side-door’ to collect personal info to all apps if users simply download and accept the listed permissions,” he said. “Of course, if you notice, the permissions are actually hard to find and Google downplays what they can do.”

He pointed to third-party keyboards as an example.

“Third-party keyboards not only have access to all dangerous permissions, but they also have access to all keystrokes — including account names and passwords,” he said.

We’ve already seen evidence of this blowing up in recent months.

In December, the popular virtual keyboard app AI.type leaked the personal data of over 31 million customers online.

Security researchers at the Kromtech Security Center said the server wasn’t password-protected, allowing anyone to access the company’s massive database.

The app stated that any text entered on its keyboard stays “encrypted and private.”

But researchers found users must allow “Full Access” to all of their data stored on the iPhone, including all keyboard data.

This meant the app would theoretically have access to all your secure usernames and passwords.

photo

“If you look at all the top Android keyboards and look at their requested permissions, it is alarming,” the developer said. “They often can run at start-up, prevent the device from sleeping, and have access to an extensive amount of a user’s personal data.

“They can send encrypted data anywhere in the world without scrutiny.”

A ZDNet investigation into AI.type found the company kept complete records on the device’s IMSI and IMEI number, the device’s make and model, its screen resolution, and the device’s specific Android version.

It also included the user’s phone number, the name of their mobile phone provider, and in some cases their IP address and internet provider.

As the app developer said, third-party keyboards can access the highest level of Android permissions, including personal data like passwords and credit card numbers.

According to ZDNet, one table contained more than 8.6 million entries of text that had been entered using the keyboard, which included phone numbers, email addresses and corresponding passwords, and web search terms.

It found that — for apps that contained a paid and free version, the latter was more concerning; a free version would be more likely to collect data than the paid, which the company would use to monetize with advertising.

“Other keyboards have also been found to have been collecting unsettling data, while none have been removed from Google Play,” he said.

Both the free and paid versions of AI.type are still available on Google Play.

“What is most disturbing to me is that Google apparently blindly ignores this problem, and has built in this open ‘side door’ to facilitate their won apps that collect lots of data on us. If they shut this down, they would shut down their own intrusive apps.”

‘Trading privacy for profits’

Cybersecurity expert, professor Nigel Phair, from the University of Canberra in Australia, shared several of these concerns.

He said it’s surprisingly difficult to log out of a Google service, which explains how they can store your data consecutively over many years.

“What concerns me most is that we’re not making informed decisions,” he told News.com.au. “We get free email, free apps, free directions … but people aren’t consciously making informed consent. It’s not just Google. Apple [does] the same thing.”

But he said Android users were particularly at risk. “If you go into the Facebook app on your Android device and look at the permissions, it’s broader than that of Apple devices, and can include text messages and phone calls. Android is a completely uncurated, open-sourced platform.”

This explains why Android phones were the subject of Facebook’s recent phone-scraping scandal.

So how is it that apps logging your keyboard entries and other data haven’t been shut down yet?

Phair stressed that it comes down to the open permissions laid out in the terms and conditions — which, let’s face it, very few people read. The sheer impracticality of doing so may well be the apps’ strategy.

“There’s nothing illegal about collecting data,” said Phair. “Take Facebook. By signing up, you’re basically agreeing to the terms and conditions, which are basically ‘we can do whatever we want with your data.’ That’s the get-out-of-jail-free card. If you’re going to use our servers, we’re going to collect and sell your data to third-party affiliates.”

In a recent interview, Facebook chief executive Mark Zuckerberg said Facebook’s current problems were partly because the company was so focused on connecting people during its first decade and that it didn’t pay enough attention to potential consequences around privacy.

Last week, technical consultant and web developer Dylan Curran posted a thread on Google and Facebook’s data storing that quickly went viral.

Curran posted photos of the personal data collected by Google (which users are able to download). The file was 5.5 gigabytes — the equivalent of about three million Word documents.

He said it included “every email I’ve ever sent, that’s been sent to me, including the ones I deleted or were categorized as spam.”

“Every image I’ve ever searched for and saved, every location I’ve searched for or clicked on, every news article I’ve ever searched for or read, and EVERY SINGLE Google search I’ve made since 2009.”

He found Google was storing his location every time he turned on his phone, his search history (even if he deleted this), every app and extension he used, his YouTube history, calendar, hangout sessions and the music he listened to.

Spooky stuff.

INDEED!

Operation Disarray – FBI

Posted on April 3, 2018April 3, 2018 by Denise Simon

The opioid crisis kills 155 people in the United States each day. In 2016, there were 64,000 drug overdoses and related deaths to fentanyl and fentanyl analogs.

President Trump has authorized a very aggressive program to stop this catastrophe.

A nationwide law enforcement action aimed at shining a light on those who use the dark web to buy and sell illegal opiates has resulted in hundreds of interactions and arrests of individuals who may have considered their seemingly anonymous online transactions beyond the reach of authorities.

The FBI-led enforcement action last week, named Operation Disarray, is part of a recently launched Department of Justice initiative to disrupt the sale of opioids online and was the first operation of its kind to occur simultaneously in all 50 states.

“The point of Operation Disarray,” said Special Agent Chris Brest, who helped organize the effort from FBI Headquarters, “is to put drug traffickers on notice: Law enforcement is watching when people buy and sell drugs online. For those who think the Darknet provides anonymity,” he explained, “you are mistaken.”

Darknet marketplaces resemble legitimate e-commerce sites, complete with shopping carts, thousands of products, sales promotions, and customer reviews. But the Darknet sites’ drop-down menus direct customers to cocaine, heroin, fentanyl, and other illegal drugs.

The marketplaces are accessed through a type of software that claims to make the buyer and seller anonymous. Drug users anywhere in the world can sit in front of a computer screen and, with a click of the mouse, buy narcotics without having to risk a face-to-face interaction. “Drug trafficking is changing,” Brest said. “The environment is moving from real-world to the virtual realm, and it’s on the rise.”

Such unfettered access to illegal drugs, said Special Agent Eric Yingling, who specializes in Darknet investigations from the FBI’s Pittsburgh Division, “can accelerate someone’s addiction because the drugs are so easy to obtain. It also facilitates a low barrier of entry to becoming a trafficker,” he explained. “We see a number of individuals go from consuming to becoming distributors because they’ve become comfortable using the marketplaces. Anyone who owns a computer could potentially be involved in this type of activity.”

But there are risks with the Darknet, Yingling pointed out. Buyers might get more than they bargained for. Opiates laced with fentanyl, for example, have resulted in deadly overdoses throughout the country. And there is the very real risk of arrest and prosecution because specially trained investigators can use a variety of techniques to infiltrate the marketplaces.

Operation Disarray was designed, in part, to highlight those risks for buyers and sellers. Hundreds of FBI agents and federal partners—including personnel from the Drug Enforcement Administration, U.S. Customs and Border Protection, Internal Revenue Service, Department of Homeland Security, and U.S. Postal Inspection Service—conducted searches, made arrests, and carried out “knock and talks” with more than 160 individuals known to have bought or sold drugs through the marketplaces. Leads from the investigation identified 19 overdose deaths of persons of interest.

“We wanted to get the word out about the potential dangers of the drugs people are purchasing,” Yingling said, “and to remind them that law enforcement is very cognizant of this activity.”

“Education of what these drugs can do is one of the first steps to curbing the opioid epidemic,” Brest said. “People may be under the assumption that they won’t be the one that gets addicted, or that these drugs can’t ruin your life.”

Law enforcement personnel participating in Operation Disarray handed out brochures that included information on medical steps to take in the event of an overdose and where individuals or family members can get help for issues related to drug addiction.

In January 2018, the Department of Justice announced the Joint Criminal Opioid Darknet Enforcement (J-CODE) team, an FBI-led initiative that brings together a variety of federal agencies to disrupt illicit opioid sales online.

As part of the effort, the FBI is training hundreds of agents, as well as local and state law enforcement partners, about the increasing use of Darknet marketplaces to facilitate the sale of opiates.

“The FBI has made the J-CODE a priority, and we are bringing together significant resources to strategically attack this crime problem.” Brest said. Operation Disarray was the first major J-CODE action, and, he continued, “we will consider the operation a success if our actions prevented one more person from overdosing on illegal narcotics.”

Attorney General Jeff Sessions Announces Results of J-CODE’s First Law Enforcement Operation Targeting Opioid Trafficking on the Darknet

Foreign Espionage Spying on Cell Phones in Washington DC

Posted on April 3, 2018April 3, 2018 by Denise Simon

There was an investigation and the report is complete…but who has it, where is it? Between the FBI, Secret Service, DHS, Capitol Police as well as other agencies…why the suspense? Why is it still going on?

Mysterious unidentified spying cell towers found across ...

In related reading, this site published in November of 2017: Surveillance: China’s Big Brother, America’s Also?

U.S. Suspects Cellphone Spying Devices in Washington

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS (FRANK BAJAK)

(AP) — For the first time, the U.S. government has publicly acknowledged the existence in Washington of what appear to be rogue devices that foreign spies and criminals could be using to track individual cellphones and intercept calls and messages.

The use of what are known as cellphone-site simulators by foreign powers has long been a concern, but American intelligence and law enforcement agencies — which use such eavesdropping equipment themselves — have been silent on the issue until now.

In a March 26 letter to Oregon Sen. Ron Wyden, the Department of Homeland Security acknowledged that last year it identified suspected unauthorized cell-site simulators in the nation’s capital. The agency said it had not determined the type of devices in use or who might have been operating them. Nor did it say how many it detected or where.

The agency’s response, obtained by The Associated Press from Wyden’s office, suggests little has been done about such equipment, known popularly as Stingrays after a brand common among U.S. police departments. The Federal Communications Commission, which regulates the nation’s airwaves, formed a task force on the subject four years ago, but it never produced a report and no longer meets regularly.

The devices work by tricking mobile devices into locking onto them instead of legitimate cell towers, revealing the exact location of a particular cellphone. More sophisticated versions can eavesdrop on calls by forcing phones to step down to older, unencrypted 2G wireless technology. Some attempt to plant malware.

They can cost anywhere from $1,000 to about $200,000. They are commonly the size of a briefcase; some are as small as a cellphone. They can be placed in a car next to a government building. The most powerful can be deployed in low-flying aircraft.

Thousands of members of the military, the NSA, the CIA, the FBI and the rest of the national-security apparatus live and work in the Washington area. The surveillance-savvy among them encrypt their phone and data communications and employ electronic countermeasures. But unsuspecting citizens could fall prey.

Wyden, a Democrat, wrote DHS in November requesting information about unauthorized use of the cell-site simulators.

The reply from DHS official Christopher Krebs noted that DHS had observed “anomalous activity” consistent with Stingrays in the Washington area. A DHS official who spoke on condition of anonymity because the letter has not been publicly released added that the devices were detected in a 90-day trial that began in January 2017 with equipment from a Las Vegas-based DHS contractor, ESD America .

Krebs, the top official in the department’s National Protection and Programs Directorate, noted in the letter that DHS lacks the equipment and funding to detect Stingrays even though their use by foreign governments “may threaten U.S. national and economic security.” The department did report its findings to “federal partners” Krebs did not name. That presumably includes the FBI.

The CEO of ESD America, Les Goldsmith, said his company has a relationship with DHS but would not comment further.

Legislators have been raising alarms about the use of Stingrays in the capital since at least 2014, when Goldsmith and other security-company researchers conducted public sweeps that located suspected unauthorized devices near the White House, the Supreme Court, the Commerce Department and the Pentagon, among other locations.

The executive branch, however, has shied away from even discussing the subject.

Aaron Turner, president of the mobile security consultancy Integricell, was among the experts who conducted the 2014 sweeps, in part to try to drum up business. Little has changed since, he said.

Like other major world capitals, he said, Washington is awash in unauthorized interception devices. Foreign embassies have free rein because they are on sovereign soil.

Every embassy “worth their salt” has a cell tower simulator installed, Turner said. They use them “to track interesting people that come toward their embassies.” The Russians’ equipment is so powerful it can track targets a mile away, he said.

Shutting down rogue Stingrays is an expensive proposition that would require wireless network upgrades the industry has been loath to pay for, security experts say. It could also lead to conflict with U.S. intelligence and law enforcement.

In addition to federal agencies, police departments use them in at least 25 states and the District of Columbia, according to the American Civil Liberties Union.

Wyden said in a statement Tuesday that “leaving security to the phone companies has proven to be disastrous.” He added that the FCC has refused to hold the industry accountable “despite repeated warnings and clear evidence that our phone networks are being exploited by foreign governments and hackers.”

After the 2014 news reports about Stingrays in Washington, Rep. Alan Grayson, D-Fla, wrote the FCC in alarm. In a reply, then-FCC chairman Tom Wheeler said the agency had created a task force to combat illicit and unauthorized use of the devices. In that letter, the FCC did not say it had identified such use itself, but cited media reports of the security sweeps.

That task force appears to have accomplished little. A former adviser to Wheeler, Gigi Sohn, said there was no political will to tackle the issue against opposition from the intelligence community and local police forces that were using the devices “willy-nilly.”

“To the extent that there is a major problem here, it’s largely due to the FCC not doing its job,” said Laura Moy of the Center on Privacy and Technology at Georgetown University. The agency, she said, should be requiring wireless carriers to protect their networks from such security threats and “ensuring that anyone transmitting over licensed spectrum actually has a license to do it.”

FCC spokesman Neil Grace, however, said the agency’s only role is “certifying” such devices to ensure they don’t interfere with other wireless communications, much the way it does with phones and Wi-Fi routers.

___

Links:

DHS letter to Sen. Ron Wyden: http://apne.ws/eJ7JipM

DHS enclosure in letter to Sen. Ron Wyden: http://apne.ws/dBMPqWw

China and Russia Military Collaboration Against the West

Posted on April 2, 2018April 2, 2018 by Denise Simon

Imagine the conversations in meetings between respective military officers of these two countries. As the United States has very little in the way of remote espionage in China and due to the expulsion of U.S. diplomatic personnel from Russia, the U.S. has even less intelligence officers in and around Russia….so, what could be coming that we may soon miss?

CHINA’S EVOLVING OVERSEAS ACCESS

China is expanding its access to foreign ports to pre-position the necessary logistics support to regularize and sustain deployments in the “far seas,” waters as distant as the Indian Ocean, Mediterranean Sea, and Atlantic Ocean. In late November, China publicly confirmed its intention to build military supporting facilities in Djibouti “to help the navy and army further participate in United Nations peacekeeping operations (PKO), carry out escort missions in the waters near Somalia and the Gulf of Aden, and provide humanitarian assistance.” This Chinese initiative both reflects and amplifies China’s growing geopolitical clout, extending the reach of its influence and armed forces.

China’s expanding international economic interests are increasing demands for the PLAN to operate

in more distant seas to protect Chinese citizens, investments, and critical sea lines of communication

(SLOC).

China most likely will seek to establish additional naval logistics hubs in countries with which it has a

longstanding friendly relationship and similar strategic interests, such as Pakistan, and a precedent for hosting foreign militaries. China’s overseas naval logistics aspiration may be constrained

by the willingness of countries to support a PLAN presence in one of their ports.

So far, China has not constructed U.S. – style overseas military bases in the Indian Ocean. China’s leaders may judge instead that a mixture of preferred access to overseas commercial ports and a limited number of exclusive PLAN logistic facilities—probably collocated with commercial ports—

most closely aligns with China’s future overseas logistics needs to support its evolving naval requirements.

Preferred access would give the PLAN favored status in using a commercial port for resupply,

replenishment, and maintenance purposes. A logistics facility would represent an arrangement in

which China leases out portions of a commercial port solely for PLAN logistics operations.

Such a logistics presence may support both civilian and military operations. China’s current naval logistics footprint in the Indian Ocean is unable to support major combat operations in South Asia. A greater overseas naval logistics footprint would better position the PLAN to expand its participation in non-war military missions, such as non-combatant evacuation operations (NEO), search-and-rescue (SAR), humanitarian assistance/disaster relief (HA/DR), and sea lines of communication (SLOC) security. To some extent, a more robust overseas logistics presence may also enable China to expand its support to PKO, force protection missions, and counterterrorism initiatives.

For example, in 2015, the PLAN’s naval escort task forces performing counterpiracy escort duties in the Gulf of Aden were able to utilize Djibouti and Oman for basic resupply and replenishment. The 156 page report is here.

***

http://www.combataircraft.net/wp-content/uploads/sites/5/2016/03/CA-Mar-12-Pic-12-1.jpg

Electronic attack J-16
A dedicated electronic warfare (EW) version of the Shenyang J-16 fighter completed its maiden flight on December 18 last year. The first images of the aircraft — sometimes described as the J-16D or even J-16G — reveal several changes compared to the standard J-16 fighter-bomber: most obviously, two large EW pods on the wingtips that are very similar in appearance to the AN/ALQ-218 tactical jamming receivers used by the Boeing EA-18G Growler. The aircraft also features a new, shorter radome and the standard 30mm cannon and the optical sensor in front of the starboard side of the windshield have been removed. In addition, several conformal dielectric EW arrays can be seen around the fuselage, front section (behind the radome), and intakes. Photo

In the wake of Russia’s demonstrations of advanced electromagnetic spectrum and communications jamming capabilities, most recently displayed in their incursion into Ukraine, China also is upping its game in this space, demonstrating similar capabilities in the Pacific.

The U.S. Department of Defense, in an annual report to Congress on China’s military and security developments, assessed that the country is placing greater importance upon EW, on par with traditional domains of warfare such as air, ground and maritime.

“The [People’s Liberation Army] sees EW as an important force multiplier, and would likely employ it in support of all combat arms and services during a conflict,” the 2016 report asserts. “The PLA’s EW units have conducted jamming and anti-jamming operations, testing the military’s understanding of EW weapons, equipment, and performance. This helped improve the military’s confidence in conducting force-on-force, real-equipment confrontation operations in simulated EW environments.”

According to the report, China’s EW weapons include “jamming equipment against multiple communication and radar systems and GPS satellite systems. EW systems are also being deployed with other sea- and air-based platforms intended for both offensive and defensive operations.”More here.

***

Collaboration on Satellites

….uh huh…. Joint military operation locations:

Before Russia and China began their recent series of bilateral exercises, the key tie between Moscow and Beijing was arms sales and military technology cooperation — totaling about $26 billion from 1992 to 2006 — according to estimates cited in the report.

Moscow sold Beijing, “export versions of the Su-27 and Su-30 fighter, the S-300 SAM defense system, Sovermennyy-class guided missile destroyer, and Kilo-class diesel-electric submarine,” the report said, citing data from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute.
Fears of China copying Russian systems led to a drop off in arms sales between the two countries – especially higher end weapon systems. Chinese arms manufactures are notorious for taking, modifying and reproducing weapon designs. More here.

Russia and China are planning to merge their satellite tracking systems, RT.com is reporting.

The giant system will be able to cover most of an area including China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, India and Pakistan. according to RT, the Russian-funded news outlet.

The two nations will reportedly negotiate terms of the merger in May during a conference in China.

Russia and China will be able to share data on positions of navigation satellite groups and to improve efficiency in a real-time environment, RT reported.

The merger was initiated by Chinese officials.

“If the project is implemented, it will allow for an improvement in accuracy for both systems,” a spokesman for the Russian Federal Space Agency, Roscosmos was quoted.

Japan and India are getting set for their own regional navigation satellite systems, RT reported. The system is expected to be operational by the end of the year.

Schiff Never Complained when Obama Normalized Relations with Putin

Posted on April 2, 2018April 2, 2018 by Denise Simon

Remember, under the Obama administration, rogue nations such as Iran and Cuba were placed as among the world’s good actors. Hillary went to Russia with a ‘reset button’ and gave Moscow more authority and power in regions of major conflict. Yet it is Congressman Adam Schiff and his friendly democrat friends that are continuing to whine about Trump’s interactions with Russia or Russians.

So, Obama set the table on the friendly approach to Medvedev and Putin and Russian aggression around the world has more than threatened equilibrium, it is deadly.

Have you wondered why Bashir al Assad has not been brought before a global tribunal for war crimes?

UNITED NATIONS – Russia and China on Thursday vetoed a U.N. Security Council resolution referring the Syrian crisis to the International Criminal Court for investigation of possible war crimes, prompting angry responses from the proposal’s supporters who said the two countries should be ashamed.

This is the fourth time Russia and China have used their veto power as permanent council members to deflect action against the government of President Bashar Assad. The 13 other council members voted in favor of the resolution.

More than 60 countries signed on to support the French-drafted measure, in a dramatic demonstration of international backing for justice in the conflict which has sent millions fleeing and killed more than 160,000, according to activists. More here.

*** That is right, Russia has veto power and they have used it since at least 2014. Does it even make sense that Russia is part of the Security Council in the first place? Nope…

As the United States continues to fight against the Taliban in Afghanistan, who has been supplying the Taliban with weapons? Yup…Russia. You see, Russia has training operations with real fighting equipment and when the training is complete, they leave the high tech equipment behind and tell the Taliban to come get it.

Did Adam Schiff or Maxine Waters get on TV and demand impeachment over Obama’s relationship with Moscow? Nah….

While not a fan at all of MSNBC, Richard Engle however did an exceptional reporting piece on Putin including who else was to be assassinated by poison, including Christopher Steele of the Trump dossier.

So, in solidarity with Britain, the Trump administration took aggressive action in expelling several Russian diplomats (read spies) as did at least almost three dozen other countries. Trump also closed the Russian diplomatic post in Seattle. What was going on there was terrifying and it is questionable on why Obama did not order it closed in December of 2016. Read below for what the FBI knew and yet was unable to take action due to the Obama White House.

Escalating tit for tat, US orders Russian consulate closed ... Russian post in Seattle

Among the 27 countries that have retaliated for what is believed to be a Kremlin-ordered chemical-weapon attack on an ex-Russian intelligence officer and his daughter in Britain earlier this month, the United States took by far the most dramatic steps: ousting 60 diplomats in total, including 15 suspected intelligence operatives based at Russia’s United Nations Mission alone—the most significant action of its type since the Reagan administration. (The move prompted Russia, on Thursday, to announce the expulsion of 60 U.S. diplomats and the closure of the U.S. consulate in Saint Petersburg.) But it was the Trump administration’s announcement of the shuttering of Russia’s consulate in Seattle that turned heads. Why Seattle? What was going on there? Would the closure matter?

While Seattle is an important city for Russian intelligence collection efforts domestically, its consulate’s profile has generally been quieter than San Francisco’s or New York’s, according to two former U.S. intelligence officials who asked to remain anonymous but have knowledge of Russian activities in these areas. But the closure of the consulate is noteworthy nonetheless: Along with the administration’s shuttering of the San Francisco consulate in 2017, Russia will now lack a diplomatic facility west of Houston, or any diplomatic presence on the West Coast for the first time since 1971. Russian intelligence officers—at least those under diplomatic cover—will no longer operate in easy proximity to America’s two great tech capitals. Indeed, at least in Seattle, suspected Russia spies have already been caught attempting to infiltrate local tech companies.

“Certainly, there were enough issues that were important to the Russians in Seattle—the naval bases, Microsoft, Boeing, Amazon,” says John Sipher, a former CIA officer who worked closely with the FBI on counterespionage issues. “There was always nervousness within the national security agencies that the sheer number of ethnic Russians in these industries was something the Russians could take advantage of. I don’t know if closing Seattle was a strategic choice; nonetheless, the concentration of high-tech and military resources makes it a sensible target.”

After the closure of the Russian consulate in San Francisco, former senior U.S. intel officials told me that facility had, for decades, functioned as the primary hub for Russian intelligence-gathering in the Western United States. It featured key classified communications systems, and was a crucial collection center in Russia’s long-running effort to map out America’s fiber-optic cable network.

One of the two anonymous former intelligence officials I spoke with called Seattle a top-five U.S. city for Russian counterintelligence work, but a “smaller operation” than San Francisco. Seattle did not have the same type of communications facilities as San Francisco, the two former officials said. In fact, Russian diplomats used to regularly drive a van with protected diplomatic information from San Francisco to Seattle, said a second official, though the frequency of those trips decreased over time, when U.S. officials suspected the Russians had begun to move their communications to encrypted channels online.

Still, the Seattle area has some rich espionage targets. Firms like Boeing and Microsoft have long been of interest to Russian operatives, the former intel officials said. So have the many military bases in the area, including, pre-eminently, Naval Base Kitsap, located just across the Puget Sound from Seattle and home to eight nuclear-armed submarines. Administration officials have openly cited the Seattle consulate’s proximity to Boeing, and sensitive military bases, as reasons for its closure.

Because there is a seven-hour float from Kitsap to these nuclear-armed submarines’ dive point, the two former officials said, there are numerous opportunities to track the subs’ movements—a longstanding concern for U.S. intelligence and military officials. Knowing when a submarine is headed out to sea or how many submarines are running patrols at a given time, and potentially identifying new technologies on these vessels, are all valuable pieces of intelligence, these officials said. Moreover, U.S. intel officials have worried that in a worst-case-scenario—actual armed hostilities between the two countries—information gleaned from Russian operatives in the Pacific Northwest could be used to identify “choke points.” For instance, they might know the ideal places to fire a rocket-propelled grenade at a fishing boat in a narrow channel, which could prevent military vessels from deploying.

In the past, suspected intel operatives based at Russia’s Seattle consulate were observed engaging in the same sorts of behavior as their counterparts in San Francisco, the two former intel officials said, including tracking down potential fiber-optic nodes (as part of Russia’s long-term effort to map where data were being transferred), or Cold War-era intelligence-collection sites, in Northwestern forests. U.S. officials also believed Russian operatives were traveling to remote beaches in the area in order to “signal,” or cryptically transmit and receive data, with interlocutors offshore. (There was a specific beach in Oregon these individuals would favor, the two former officials said.)

More recently, however, these activities appeared to die down, these individuals said, an event one of the former intel officials attributes to Edward Snowden’s 2013 disclosures, which some in the intelligence community believe led Russia to overhaul its strategies for domestic intelligence-gathering. Generally, this person said, Seattle seemed like a “proving ground” for junior Russian intelligence officers, a place to send less-experienced operatives to acclimate them to the United States. After Snowden, U.S. intel officials started seeing more “travelers” in the Seattle area—suspected intelligence operatives working under both diplomatic and nonofficial cover—flying in remotely to meet with individuals, the two former officials said.

The biggest Russia-related concern in Seattle was “cyber-related activities,” which were separate from the consulate, the two former officials said—including those of the local Kaspersky Labs affiliate. In July 2017, U.S. officials banned Moscow-based Kaspersky, which produces anti-virus software, from being used on any government computers, over fears about the company’s connections to Russian intelligence. U.S. counterintelligence officials were concerned that Kaspersky was being used as a tool for Russian covert communications, the two former officials said, and were also examining whether individuals affiliated with Kaspersky were actual engaging in cyber-espionage domestically. “As a private company, Kaspersky Lab does not have inappropriate ties to any government, including Russia, and the company has never helped, nor will help, any government in the world with its cyber espionage efforts,” a spokesperson for Kaspersky said. “The U.S. government actions against Kaspersky Lab lack sufficient basis, are unconstitutional, have been taken without any evidence of wrongdoing by the company, and rely upon subjective, non-technical public sources, such as uncorroborated and often anonymously sourced media reports, related claims, and rumors, which is why the company has challenged the validity of these actions in federal court.“

“Was Kaspersky looking at Microsoft or Boeing as opportunities to exploit? Was it just business development? Or were they actually engaged in trying to penetrate these enterprises?” asked one of the former officials. “The suspicions on Kaspersky have pretty much been borne out … when you look at the recent U.S. government decision, and what has been publicly reported on what the Israelis have been able to find out.” In 2017 the New York Times reported that Israeli intelligence had hacked into a Russian espionage operation, observing Russian operatives using back doors in Kaspersky software to scan for, and purloin, U.S. intelligence documents.

Russia’s interest in Microsoft is also well-documented. In 2010, U.S. officials deported Alexey Karetnikov, a 23-year-old Russian national, from the Seattle area, where he had been working at Microsoft as a software tester. U.S. officials believed he was actually a Russian intelligence officer, and linked him to the ring of 10 “illegals”—Russian deep-cover operatives who had been living in the United States—that U.S. officials had arrested and deported earlier that year. Two of those undercover operatives, Michael Zottoli and Patricia Mills (whose real names are Mikhail Kutsik and Natalia Pereverzeva), had lived in Seattle for years, even starting a family there. In Seattle, Kutsik worked at a telecommunications firm, and both operatives took finance classes at the University of Washington. In a 2017 article in Seattle Met Magazine, Kutsik and Pereverzeva’s former investments professor said he believed the Russians were interested in his class because many of his students went on to work for Amazon, Boeing or Microsoft. Kutsik, Pereverzeva and Karetnikov were not known to have been coordinating their activities with the Seattle consulate, one of the former officials said.

Even as Russian espionage continues to migrate outside consular facilities—to travelers, and individuals working locally under nonofficial cover—it is “no coincidence” that both shuttered diplomatic outposts were on the West Coast, said one of the former officials. No matter when—or if—these two consulates are reopened, Russian interest in the West Coast is likely to continue far into the foreseeable future.

Where is Adam Schiff now?