U.S. Military Drones Infected With Mysterious Computer Virus

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A fleet of U.S. military drones on a Nevada Air Force base has been infected by a keylogger virus that tracks every key and button their pilots press, Wired.com reported Friday -- and top Air Force sources strongly contested.

The virus was first noticed by officials at Creech Air Force Base nearly two weeks ago using the base's security system. It logged every keystroke of the pilots in the control room on the base as they remotely flew Predator and Reaper drones on missions over Afghanistan and other battle zones.

There has been no confirmation of information being lost or sent to an outside source, but the virus has been resistant to military efforts to clear it from the system.

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The Tampa police were going to get a couple of loaner drones for the 2012 GOP con. But then they decided against it.

I'm kinda bummed about that.

Probably for the best, really. I'm pretty sure if you take an infrared image of Tampa in August, the sensor just prints out an error message telling you to move somewhere else.

quote:

Originally posted by editengine:
The Tampa police were going to get a couple of loaner drones for the 2012 GOP con.

Because there'll be enough drones in the Tea Party brigade, right? Right?

quote:

Originally posted by BlueShift:
Probably for the best, really. I'm pretty sure if you take an infrared image of Tampa in August, the sensor just prints out an error message telling you to move somewhere else.

I was thinking of using either a cheap rc plane or a long range paintball gun to take them out, just to see if I could.

quote:

Originally posted by oddmanrush:
U.S. Military Drones Infected With Mysterious Computer Virus

I don't think this comes as a surprise to anyone familiar with the DoD's information security efforts. Thousands of users with typical (read: none) computer security knowledge with access to systems containing critical data. It's a nightmare.

"Why is everyone so upset that I plugged my iPod into a SIPRNet machine? I didn't download anything, I just needed to charge it with the USB."

"Whadda ya mean I can't use this thumb drive from home into a stand alone mission planning system? It's only this once, it won't hurt anything. I just want to put my music on here so I can listen to it while I'm at work and use this picture of my baby cousin as my desktop. Isn't she so KYOOOT?!"

quote:

Originally posted by editengine:
I was thinking of using either a cheap rc plane or a long range paintball gun to take them out, just to see if I could.

1) Neither one would have anything close to the range you would need.

2) Do you really want to take potshots at something that can be armed with Hellfire missiles for an extra $150,000?

These were little observation drones, 20 minutes of battery power is all.

Underwater Drone Wars

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According to some of the military's top counterintelligence analysts, in recent years there has been a significant increase in both old school spying and cyber operations, especially by unnamed East Asian nations, directed at gaining classified information on America's autonomous underwater vehicles (AUVs) in hopes of undercutting the U.S.'s "underseas battlespace dominance."

"The technology base of the United States is under constant attack," a new report by the Counterintelligence Directorate of the Pentagon's Defense Security Service says. "This pervasive and enduring threat is like the weather: ever-present, yet ever changing."

The maritime drones, which have been stalking the world's oceans for more than a decade for the U.S. Navy, are capable of a variety of missions including enemy craft and port surveillance, anti-mine operations and even "payload delivery", according to the Navy.

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This message has been edited. Last edited by: oddmanrush,

So indifferent that apparently the project couldn't attract any cartoonists who can actually, you know, draw cartoons. That's a shame.

You mean that's not Humpty-Dumpty?

So I guess the idea is that we shouldn't drop bombs because people might get hurt?

No, no, no... Obviously we need to ban meetings about the impact of violence, and imprison any and all attendees in the manner of extraordinary rendition.

Especially if they're teenagers.

...With cousins.

Code word for Crips, right there.

If it was 1864 Sherman would have marched through Pakistan already, burning, killing, or starving everything in his path while camp followers stole and raped anything left over.

I'd say drones have a few advantages. I'll be happier when they can be used for a better purpose, like getting me topless pics of a certain Pippa Middleton for TMZ.

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Y'know, Rush, when you say

quote:

I don't think anyone here is disparaging drone operators. I know I'm not.

it doesn't really jive with saying

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Live and play in Las Vegas during the week, kill people seven thousand miles away remotely with Predator Drones on your weekends.
God bless America.
Brave New War.

and

quote:

quote:

Originally posted by lithos:
Killing brown people by day, whores and poker by night.
Is that the American Dream I've heard so much of?

Sadly Lithos, yes. I think it represents the ultimate wet dream for far too many in American society.

or posting misleading, inflammatory bullshit like “Drone Kill Culture Grows at Home as U.S. Playstations Eye the Skies.”

First, let's play a quick game of “count the inaccuracies,” so we can judge how little effort and research went into that video.
-The aircraft pictured at 0:04-0:23, 1:06-1:10 and 1:24 (among all the explosions) is a RQ-4 Global Hawk. It's completely unarmed, and even the laziest of Google searches would have told them that.
-I'm pretty sure all the black and white footage in that video is from attack helicopters and strike fighter targeting pods pulled from YouTube, not predator video.
-The drone at 2:04-2:13 is an IAI Heron. It's not manufactured in the United States, it's never been used by the United States in Afghanistan, and I'm pretty sure the only connection it has with America is that the Navy bought one or two to evaluate for counter-drug surveillance.

On to less technical subjects:
I'm endlessly amused by the effort made to paint the Pakistanis as innocent victims in all this, especially the notion that we're conducting the drone campaign against the wishes of their government. The Pakistani government is more than happy to pass us information on militants to we can plan our strikes. Unless it's the militants who are on their payroll, who they notify of impeding strikes. The Pakistani Air Force flies (American-made) F-16 air superiority fighters that could easily shoot down a slow-moving drone, so if they weren't totally complicit they could easily enforce the sovereignty of their airspace. I'll address the bit where they trot out an injured Pakistani without any context whatsoever and the incredibly unlikely “50 non-targeted persons for each intended target” claim in a later post.

Then we have the tired and insulting bit about how drone strikes are carried out by amoral sociopaths sitting behind TV screens in America, who feel absolutely nothing but glee about the blips they snuff and then take the rest of the day off to sit around the barbeque bragging about how many brown children they slaughtered. I also like the implication that this is all somehow unfair to the Pakistani militants.

First off, let me bring up an equivalent case. We've been using strategic bombers since the beginning of the campaign in Afghanistan. These bombers fly out of bases hundreds of miles away from Afghanistan, often on the other side of a large body of water. In terms of the insurgents' ability to stop them or harm their crews, they may as well be based in the United States, or the Moon for that matter. When they get to Afghanistan, a bombardier in the belly of the plane looks at a TV monitor showing a feed from a targeting pod outside the jet and pulls a trigger to drop the bombs on the target. (Sound familiar?) When they get back to base, there may even be beer and barbeque. Someone please tell me why this is no different from a Predator, yet no one seems to have a problem with it.

Next, let's talk about the “video game war” accusation that keeps getting thrown around. I'm pretty sure I've talked about it in this very thread, but here it goes again: Predator strikes, far more than many other kinds of warfare, give the crews close psychological proximity to their actions. It is the exact opposite of “remote control” isolation. I know it's bad form to argue from personal anecdotes, but I'm going to anyway. I've watched predator imagery. It's very sharp and very clear, much more so than the videos the Air Force releases for public consumption. Some of my friends, people I went to school with, are flying predators right now. Predator pilots see the people they're about to kill, they see the missiles hit, and they often stay afterward to assess the attack. It isn't always insurgents getting killed, either. Predators provide security convoys, and they see Americans get blown apart by IEDs in vivid clarity, listen to their comrades call for help on the radio. Every single Predator pilot I've spoken to is incredibly aware of the consequences of their actions, of the deaths they cause. On the other side of the coin, Army artillery can wipe out a village dozens of miles away without ever leaving their base, but no one accuses artillerymen of being too far removed from the battle. Does it not count unless you're emptying sand out of your boots at the end of the day?

Of course, no one complains about it when our enemies do it. I've yet to see a major news exposé of the immoral practice of using roadside bombs. Whether victim-operated or triggered by insurgents using civilians for cover, they have caused thousands of casualties among the civilian population, are a flagrant violation of LOAC, and be used with little risk to the operators.

Also:

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“One of the things the United States kind of pretends is that we are 'morally superior,' we are better able to judge what is good for other people and that therefore we are entitled to inflict our judgement on them on them and we presume they will be grateful to us for it.”
...
“While issues of international law and sovereignty trigger little interest among Americans, the prospect of having surveilence drones spying all across the U.S. itself surely does.”

What does this have to do with anything, other than demonstrating the broadcaster's bais and stereotypical view of Americans?

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“While America continues developing this Playstation mentality to killing and intelligence gathering, in Pakistan, people live in fear that at any time they could become a target in someone's deadly video game.”

That's it. I'm done. Lady, get bent, and not to go all tu quoque, but the fact that a Russian channel is lecturing Americans about targeted killing and civilian casualties is fucking hilarious.

Frivolous post here, but I'm thinking drones are an easy target in the media, because there's just something about a plane with no windows -- the psychological ick factor of some blind thing that can see you anyway. It's actually surprising they're called Predators instead of Aliens, btw [and H. R. Giger knew exactly what he was doing when he didn't put eyes on *those* things].

I wonder if painting some windows on them, or actually installing some, would be good for PR... Or maybe some WWII nose art, to give them a little more personality.





Cheers,

Patrick.

Drone tractors that operate without a farmer behind the wheel could hit farm fields as early as next spring, a development that could ultimately lead to fundamental changes in the nature of farming.

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