By Aaron Kesel
WikiLeaks Vault 7 has provided great insight into the CIA’s hacking capabilities. So far we have learned they can hack into various electronic devices such as smartphones, TVs, and computers. Some of the CIA’s tech revealed by Vault 7 is outdated and over-hyped, but the latest revelation called project Elsa seems frightening.
Elsa is the code name for the CIA’s geo-location malware for WiFi-enabled devices like laptops running the Microsoft Windows operating systems according to WikiLeaks.
RELEASE: CIA ‘ELSA’ malware can geolocate your Windows laptop or desktop by listening to surrounding WiFi signals https://t.co/XjyyXIqXAz pic.twitter.com/WCw6dgF9ql
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) June 28, 2017
One of the scariest things about Elsa WikiLeaks notes is that once CIA malware is installed on a target’s system, it doesn’t even need to be connected to the Internet to function.
“Once persistently installed on a target machine using separate CIA exploits, the malware scans visible WiFi access points and records the ESS identifier, MAC address and signal strength at regular intervals. To perform the data collection the target machine does not have to be online or connected to an access point; it only needs to be running with an enabled WiFi device,” WikiLeaks wrote.
If the system is connected to the Internet, it then proceeds to log the geo-location of the target using databases from Google or Microsoft. The malware then stores the longitude and latitude data along with a timestamp for when the information was collected in an encrypted location on the user’s hard drive.
Further, WikiLeaks has showcased that Elsa doesn’t phone home to the CIA; the data has to be extracted by a CIA agent using separate CIA exploits and backdoors or air gapping it out using a computer’s hard drive LED light.
The latter sounds like science fiction, but if the computer was infected with malware a drone could then exfiltrate the data if the drone were able to get close enough to see the computer’s light according to Wired.
With the revelation of this type of hacking technique, it begs the question, why would this method be used? The answer is almost certainly for targeting hackers and terrorists such as the CIA’s mad experiment in the Middle East, ISIS. With the geological location data of a target, it would make droning a target easy peasy lemon squeezy.
Aaron Kesel writes for Activist Post. Follow us at Twitter and Steemit. This article is Creative Commons and can be republished in full with attribution.
Wikileaks is controlled opposition; one need only watch what it releases and then how the government reacts to it, not to mention how the public reacts to it, to see this. Nothing the government is really doing behind the curtain is ever released, it’s all cleverly crafted propaganda deployed intentionally. And choosing words like “frightening” and “scariest” are words used to incite emotion and/or an emotional reaction, better known as fear-porn or fear- and trauma-based mass manipulation. This stuff is getting easier and easier to recognize and expose which makes me sad because I do love a good challenge. It’s sort of like knowing where all of the opposing player’s battleships are before the game even starts. “The best way to control the opposition is to lead it ourselves.” ~Lenin
“The best way to control the opposition is to lead it ourselves.” ~Lenin
That’s just the thing. In a world of lies and deception, chaos and confusion makes it very difficult to see how many facets of our society have become corrupted. How deep does it go?
Who or what can we trust? There was an agent in the main alphabet org that said, “when everything the American people believe is false, we will know our programming has been successful”
There are too many people who will go along to get along, out of fear, greed, or just willful ignorance.
There are no signs of the people taking real action to counter the deceit and corruption. We just keep hiding our heads in entertainment as a form of escapism.
This self delusion will lead to only one thing. A complete breakdown of society just as Rome did.
I’m certain we will continue to lie to ourselves to escape responsibility until the time comes when we run out of room to hide. And then when everything falls apart we will whine and cry about being victims.
All that is necessary for evil to triumph is for good men and women to do nothing.
Use shielded Ethernet cabling.
If you can, wrap your home in Mylar before installing the plasterboard / drywall IF you’re remodelling or building new!
Use double-paned windows, and put some reflective tint on the inside (breaks-up laser listening devices).
& invest in RF dampening curtain material.
Above all, stop using cordless FM phones; go with a phone line w/ a tap detector.
Be sure to wear your tin foil hat when doing your remodeling too.
the world’s global drug smugglers, murderers, and con artists are some of the world’s most thorough penetrators of your privacies. Whooda thunk?