: Silicon.com: European communications 'wide open' to interceptio n

[Owen Blacker]

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> HEADLINE: European communications 'wide open' to interception
> PUBLISHED: 6:30pm on Friday 9th March 2001
> CHANNEL: Ebusiness security
> AUTHOR: Peter Warren
> SERVICE: http://www.silicon.com
> 
> TEXT OF STORY FOLLOWS:
> 
> A leading British code expert has fuelled widespread concerns 
> that Europe's most sensitive electronic communications are 
> open to interception.
> 
> Desmond Perkins, a senior official in the European 
> Commission's cipher unit, has claimed that the superior 
> technology deployed by US authorities means there is little 
> Europe can do to prevent them listening in to its communications. 
> 
> Perkins was speaking at a recent EU hearing into Echelon, the 
> name given to a US monitoring system which is allegedly able 
> to eavesdrop on all European electronic traffic.
> 
> Perkins claimed he showed EU systems to his US counterparts, 
> thanks to his "cordial" relationship with the US National 
> Security Agency (NSA), the organisation widely believed to 
> operate Echelon.
> 
> "You have got to remember the Americans read no matter what 
> is going on inside here. They read everything with their 
> satellites lined up," he said.
> 
> EU officials have since gagged Perkins from making further 
> comments on the issue, and have claimed that his evidence has 
> been misunderstood. They say he only meant to point out that 
> the US had the technology to intercept messages, but could 
> not read them due to encryption.
> 
> They stressed that the EU has been using a Siemens system for 
> secure communications for over a decade.
> 
> But Perkins' claims have been backed up by former 
> high-ranking intelligence sources contacted by silicon.com.
> 
> A former Nato encryption expert, who advised the EU on 
> communications vulnerabilities in 1996, claimed that the 
> Commission had been in the habit of sending completely 
> unencrypted information, throwing into doubt the EU claims 
> that it had been using the Siemens system for a decade.
> 
> "They were worried in the mid 1990s that the US may have been 
> picking up messages, but they did not introduce encryption 
> until 1998," said the expert, who asked to remain anonymous. 
> 
> He added that US intelligence efforts would almost certainly 
> be focussed on acquiring the keys needed to read intercepted 
> messages -- a process the former official hinted may have 
> been made easier due to the long-established UK-US practice 
> of exchanging classified codes.
> 
> This is the kind of practice that could make sense of 
> Perkins' claims of a "cordial" relationship with the US.
> 
> Indeed, Perkins told the EU: "They usually check our systems 
> to see they are being well-looked after and not being misused."
> 
> Perkins' trust in the NSA is almost certainly misplaced, 
> according to one former NSA employee. "I don't doubt it has 
> been going on. I would also be fairly confident that they 
> will have built back doors into any system they have been 
> looking at," he said.
> 
> If you have an opinion on this or any other story on 
> silicon.com then have your say by using our reader comments 
> section below. Remember, the best reader comment this month 
> will win a coveted PlayStation 2.
> 
> For related news, see: 
> One to watch for 2001 -- privacy
> http://www.silicon.com/a42960 
> Private bits - the battle to safeguard data through encryption
> http://www.silicon.com/a41965 
> 
> 
> STORY ENDS
> 
> For more information on silicon.com go to http://www.silicon.com.
> 
> silicon.com - the who, what, when, where and why of ebusiness

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