NSA, Snowden, and Surveillance

12/18/13
Harvard
Bruce Schneier

NSA code names are the most fun
Sigat - a tap point
Quantum Cookie forces to release cookies and to "stain" a user for later surveillance
Fox Acid - exploit orchestrator, server that sits on Net that tricks user into visiting it
Egotistic Giraffe - native Firefox exploit
Evil Olive figures out where your cell phone is
NSA has turned the Internet into a giant surveillance platform, a technically and politically robust platform
"Surveillance is the business model of the Internet"
Metadata = surveillance
Snowden's documents show what the NSA does which is also what any other surveillance operation would do
A choice between an Internet vulnerable to attack or protected for everyone
Lesson is the cryptography works but everything around it is insecure
NSA has cryptoanalytic tools to break cyphers but usually uses the weaknesses around it
NSA had no contingency for Snowden's exposure.  That has changed.  Corporations also will change.  When you know that exposure will eventually happen, your actions change.
"Collect everything" has been the modus operandi up till now. No cost benefit analysis on any operations but that may change.
Even when we know something, it may not be actionable for a number of reasons.
"A lot of this is voyeurism"
Generation gap on privacy and surveillance.  Job for life "club feel" is gone.
The goal is to make eavesdropping expensive, make wholesale surveillance expensive and force them back to targeted surveillance.  More encryption by default.  Personal security products (psp) annoy the NSA.  Encrypt your hard drive.  Consolidation makes us less secure.
Transparency, oversight, clarity are the solutions
Make laws that are technologically invariant
And all this affects only NSA - no foreign entities or citizens
"A secure Internet is in everybody's best interest"
Not US versus China but security for everyone
"We have a chance to win the 'tell us what you're doing' argument" not the stop doing it argument
The Balkanization of the Internet is a big problem
NSA has a dual purpose:  to protect our communications and break others'
This problem is bigger than NSA, bigger than security.  It's about data.
Fundamental question of information society is the tension between personal and social uses of data
Q:  no more fruit of the poison tree?  Are we looking at the wrong thing, tech and crypto rather than the law?
Yes

International standards because US businesses have lost trust overseas

Who Stole the American Dream?

10/11/13
Harvard
Hedrick Smith

Banks put prime candidates into subprimes because it made them money and took $6 trillion of housing value and reduced individual equity by over 40% from 1988 to 2008.

401k's will leave the baby boomers in poverty retirement.

During the 50s & 60s nearly all of the growth in efficiency went into wages, 97% productive growth and 95% wage growth.

What changed?  The Powell memo started a rush of business into government with congress of 1978 becoming the "most pivotal" Congress of recent years - 401k's, change in corporate bankruptcy laws from independent control to management control, credit law changes, and many more, and we moved from stakeholder capitalism to shareholder capitalism (thanks Milton Friedman).

Productivity since the 1970s rose 87% and wages rose 10%.  84% of economic gains went to the top 1%.

Have to go back to the citizen activism of the 60s.  "We the people must take action."

Q:  occupy, public benefit corps?
Occupy Wall Street changes the dialogue but no definite demands.
Q: why Americans don't fight now as yesterday?
Boomers are me first. And we've been sold the idea that it's all beyond our control.
Q: entitlement mentality?
Rhetoric but not so much in reality.
Q:  obama's grade?
A- for the first 2 years for his actions but a C for communicating and a pass for the last two years.
Q: media not covering actions?
Maybe but keep at it

Economic Gardening

4/30/12
Harvard
Chris Gibbons, Director, Business/Industry Affairs, Littleton, CO (cgibbons@littletongov.org)

An entrepreneurial approach to economic development
Youreconomy.org - data for each state and town, numbers of commercial establishments and jobs
89-90% of businesses self-employed or ten to one hundred employees for 30% of jobs
another 30% of businesses are mid size and for another 30% of jobs
Large companies have had a net loss of jobs over the last decade
Job growth comes primarily from expansion
"Work with local businesses to create good jobs" is the mission statement from the city gov
Started this process in 1987 after losing 7000 jobs at one large defense contractor
Uses complexity science, systems thinking, network economics, temperament
Complexity theory: mechanical versus biological, riding the edge of chaos
Support system using modern tech:  google adwords, GIS, customer and market info, SEO, on a national and international basis, database research, competitor intelligence, social media strategy with facebook, twitter, linked in...
One local company, ADA-ES, removes mercury from coal power plants
From 1990 to 2010 employment doubled, adding jobs all through the recession
1990-2005 job growth rate of 135%
Now more jobs than the town has workers
Florida has begun this statewide in a 2 year pilot funded for $3.5 million and grew jobs by 3,285 with a $2467 cost per job and an increase of tax revenues of $18 million
GrowFL companies got a net job gain of 7% in the last 3 years
Kansas, Louisiana, Wyoming, Michigan, Missouri, Oregon, Nebraska, Washington and regional projects including Vermont, New York, Indiana
Michigan governor's Rick Snyder's economic development plan is completely economic gardening

Q: What is the level of skill needed by public servants to access this data and what about areas where data isn't too great?
A:  skill level needed is high.  Have a learning center and model is a hub and spoke on a regional basis (for instance, Florida has its data center at univ).
Privacy and availability is different depending upon the country.  US has the most data available.

Q: Secret of success in moving from one town scale to many states?
A:  Most communities in US recruit but now the pool is drying up (overseas export and globalization) and people are looking for something else.
National center (http://nationalcentereg.org) will work with the community and turns info around on three weeks.

Q:  how loyal are the businesses?  How many move?
A:  There is turnover but experience is that there are deep roots locally and few who leave.

Q:  for the first time in thirty years Chinese city of Hsintsin (spelling?) has entered a recession what is your suggestion?
A:  Complexity - punctuated equilibrium, sometime the bottom drops out. It has nothing to do with what you do.  We are riding a wave beyond our control, to a large extent.

Q:  Edge of stability and chaos, how do you keep them on that edge?
A:  Temperament has lot to do with it. Intuitive-thinking-judging personality types on Myers-Briggs personality test are the ones who run companies.  You need a temperament for change and innovation.

Q: Seems to be the same people as before but a different system.  Does that mean everyone can succeed?
A:  Not everyone can succeed, success follows the power law with a long tail and only a few who get most of the goodies.

Q: Building a business ecosystem similar to an industrial ecology?
A:  Need a business ecosystem which may not be available in smaller towns as well as entrepreneurial spirit. Entrepreneurial gene got bred out of industrial midwest due to factory heritage, in great plains Farmers had such thin margins that risk gene is out

Q: Work with start ups?
Failure rate very high but like Little League.  They are more like college ball, candidates having to go through a couple of screens, although they do work with smaller businesses by city council mandate

Q: If you tell everyone your secret won't you build your competition?
A:  Take the moving of jobs out of it and it doesn't really matter.  Every town has its own, different economic garden.

Q: What do you do different from big consulting firm?
A:  Cater to smaller scale businesses and McKinsey has just now stumbled into complexity but they don't use temperament at all and don't use network economics, for instance, Brian Arthur from Stanford on increasing returns and lock in

Q:  If everyone did this isn't the fundamental skill the capacity to network?
A:  Part of the formula.  Any business is either a commodity (product is exactly the same) and price is the only measure (producing a race to the bottom) or innovate (one of a kind) and keep on innovating to stop from becoming a commodity.  Two words based upon 35 years of experience - export innovation, make it new and export outside your community

Q:  How do you structure your service?
A:  National center will do a company for $4000.  Usually a public agency, the city or state, pays.

Q:  How much depends on a high tech work force?
A:  Not high tech per se but innovation instead.  Get out of commodity jobs into skilled and innovative, one of a kind work.

Q: Work force development through community colleges?
A:  Yes, in constant communication with community colleges as to what is needed from education.

800 communities have visited Littleton over the 25 years to learn how they do economic gardening.

Fukushima Nuclear Accident and Roadmap for Decommissioning

12/3/13
Harvard
Kenji Tateiwa, TEPCO, nuclear power programs, Washington DC office 
Tateiwa.kenji@tepco.co.jp

Worked at Fukushima Daini from 1996-2000 and lived in an area that is now uninhabitable.  Also worked on the advanced boiling water reactors of South Texas Project.
US nuclear industry had a team of 10 members in Tokyo for two years through INPO (Institute of Nuclear Power Operations).
Core meltdown in Unit 1
Have now identified the area of leakage in Unit 1
Spent fuel pools at Units 3 and 4
Biggest risk is the molten fuel in the cores, cooled by seawater which is leaking out and ground water is also flowing in.  No water is allowed to be dumped and all is stored on site. Thinking about building a frozen soil wall of about a mile to prevent groundwater inflow.
Seawater contamination only near the plants and offsite radiation has been reduced significantly.

Roadmap:  begin removal of spent fuel, removal of core melt - taking 10 years, decommissioning - taking 30-40 years
Integrated Management of Decommissioning Technologies - IRID established recently

He is extremely serious and committed and looks like he's hurting.  Somber.

Q:  How did TEPCO perform in informing the public?
Didn't hide anything but was perceived to have done so.  Hard to determine core melt although it is likely that three units have experienced it.  Experts never thought that the reactor building would have a hydrogen explosion.

Q:  Reform and breaking up the "nuclear village" with little regulation?
Nuclear safety reform plan from TEPCO issued 3/13 but plan is implemented by people and morale is now low.
Q:  Difficulties of decommissioning and what would it look like?
Cores may have melted to concrete floor outside pressure vessel, Unit 1 most severe.  Debris is mixture of materials from fuel and pressure vessel and needs to be cooled while being removed

MIT Water Summit

This was an event organized by the MIT Water Club (http://waterclub.mit.edu/wp/), a student group, and the first of what they hope will be an annual event.

12/12/13
Kenneth Strzepek, Univ of CO, Boulder2.4% of world's water is fresh with most in glaciers 12.5 cubic km water is available with 5.5 used annually by peopleNot where we want it or economically accessible, variable in space and time70% for irrigation, 20% for industry - mostly thermoelectric cooling, 10% domestic.  Eastern US thermoelectric cooling is not recycled as it is in Western US90 days a year the Yellow River of China goes dry
Franklin Fisher, MITWater Economics Project in the Middle EastFishelson says that water wars will not happen because water has value and the upper bound is cost of desalinization, now 60 cents per cubic cm in Middle EastDisputes over water are cost disputes not life and deathMultiple Year Water Allocation System (MYWAS) is a computer program they've developed for ME water which includes externalities ----------Cambridge water is about 1.6 cents per gallon ---------Who Owns Water?Lawrence Susskind, MITCase by case basis, in practice and water is not priced even to cover environmental uses.  No forum for a conversation on water's value.Not public versus private but a partnershipGreat rivers have national compacts but without any consultation with enviro groups or individuals
Sharmila Murthy, Suffolk UnivWho controls water might be a better questionIn 2010 UN declares a human right to water and sanitation
Leon Awerbach, IDA Desalination AcademyWater is considered free and a human right.
Food-Water NexusDennis McLaughlin, MITVirtual water trading is the water in food transported around the worldBiotech to improve efficiency of water use in plants
Timothy Griffin, TuftsSoil health and food waste are large areas of water lossIn US, ag is now the number 1 source of water pollution
Gabriela Burian, MonsantoGrow Africa program for improving smallholder ag in Africa Developing nations don't have the advantages of the numbers and data that the US has[Oddly enough, Ms Burian of Monsanto was the person who talked about "systems" the most.  Almost all the other speakers were focused on one or two specific technologies or ideas and not addressing systems issues at all.]
Water-Energy Nexus
About 50% of US water goes to power plant cooling
John Rogers, UCS
Power plants withdraw more water than any other use but put most of it back, warmer, into the environment.  Ag draws less but consumes the most.
Kenneth Kimmel, DEP MA
Clean water act, clean air water act are regulatory silos but they affect each other, one reason why MA has put energy into environment
MWRA water demand going down and state encouraging new communities to join to stop groundwater draw.  44 inches of rain per year
Billion kwh per year on waste water treatment, one million pounds of carbon per year. Transferring to renewables and state is underwriting stand alone energy efficiency, guaranteeing savings from year one.
John Lienhard, MIT
Air cooled power plants and closed loop recycling cooling systems are solutions EPRI is working on
Singapore is recycling all water, adding 10% of it to the drinking supply
Emerging Water Contaminants
GAO estimates over 700 new chemicals introduced annually
Herve Buisson, Veolia Water
Health-water nexus
In EU regulation counts oxidation by-products of herbicides and others which changes the way people treated water, moving to absorption rather than oxidation treatment.
France is using tag species (fish, frogs) that show effects after contamination for testing water quality
Absorption, oxidation, reverse osmosis. Reverse osmosis can get everything but leaves concentrates
Ruth Marfil-Vega, American Water
Carol West, DEP MA
To go from guideline to standard, state requires testing every water source in the state.
Green pharmaceuticals - webinar
Public water is tested for 84 compounds.  Bottled water is tested for sodium, not under safe water act, under FDA
Philip Gschwend, MIT
There's no chemical that's ever been made that doesn't get into the environment.  

NSA Bulk Surveillance and the Problem of Freedom

12/4/13
Harvard
Yochai Benkler

Observation as the projection of power
Distinction between transparency and surveillance
Bull Run - intervention on standards through NIST and product design with private companies - not surveillance and not subject to legal oversight
Monitoring cloud - again without legal oversight and with voluntary cooperation or acquiescence of telcos
Classification and secrecy used to end run oversight - no staff or notes for Congresscritters or judges 
FBI has issued over 180,000 national security letters
2006 Mark Klein sues AT&T about federal switch in SF office
Section 215 surveillance can be contested but the subjects of surveillance don't about their surveillance and the companies comply voluntarily and do not contest government requests
Systemic problem but all human systems are imperfect
"Freedom of action is also freedom to threaten"
Organizational imperfections are exacerbated by secrecy
Internalized censorship
Freedom - capacity to plan and execute that life plan.  Autonomy is not yes/no but how much?  And we live within systems, imperfect human systems, and there is a continual tension between open and closed systems.
The claim of completeness is authoritarian
Q: What are the changes of this century that led to this?
Basic imperfection of systems, the solution space of voluntary action has expanded due to technology, but the same technology can increase the power of the state too.
Q:  How to describe Snowden to 8th graders?
He's a person of conscience.

An Open Conversation about Internet Communications Privacy with Ladar Levison

All mistakes are my own.

11/26/13
Harvard
Ladar Levison

Lavabit did not record metadata and stored messages in such a way that only the user, not the service provider, could access their archive.

Does a service provider have the responsibility to provide access to personal data?  According to his case, yes.  In a secret decision.

DOJ lawyers couldn't understand why he had objections to their requests.

"It's a duty of every patriot to protect the citizens from its government" - Thomas Jefferson
[“It is the duty of the patriot to protect his country from its government.” - Thomas Paine]

Next time they're not gonna ask but just take.  The government has abused our trust and, worse, have done it in secret.  CALEA [Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act] requires that telecoms develop tech to tap any individual - but not email.  The judge who ruled on his case served 7 years on the FISA court.

He knows that the government has collected data from other companies because they've reimbursed other companies for the expenses accrued in order to allow surveillance.

Stallman:  the level of surveillance in the US now is more than was in the USSR
http://gnu.org/philosophy/surveillance-vs-democracy.html

TX has a data breach law which requires a service provider to report to users the kind of security breach the Feds were asking him to allow.

Can the random number generators in Intel chips be trusted?  However, even if the Feds have your password they are disallowed by statute to login as the user.  They went after his SSL [Secure Sockets Layer] keys to find out when a user logged in or out, as all the other information would be available over the Net.
He can only talk about the SSL key demand, nothing about FISA court or what else has happened since then

He developed server-based encryption
Working with Phil Zimmerman to make secure email system

NSA collected his data upstream at his provider
Zimmerman believes that Obama did not have the strength to stand up to the generals in a top secret briefing

"I don't think the DoJ had a clue about what the technology is "... And what the FBI was asking for

His appeal will be held in the January session of the 4th district