back to article Germany seeks malware 'specialists' to bug terrorists

The German government has reportedly started hiring coders to develop "white hat" malware capable of covertly hacking into terrorists' PCs. The recruitment push signals that the German government is going ahead with controversial plans, yet to be legally approved, to develop "remote forensic software" (AKA a law enforcement …

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  1. Vladimir Plouzhnikov

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    Presumably, the terror suspects cannot resist this kind of approach and will promptly proceed to infect their computers with the latest version of Stasi trojan...

  2. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Err...

    Didn't they just make owning and/or developing ANY hacking tools illigal?

    Breaking the law to enforce the law, doesn't have good precidents.

  3. Brian Miller

    Linux is salvation?

    So you think that Linux is the easy way out? I don't think so, unless you mean running Linux from a LiveCD distro.

    Maybe the German government will offshore the work to Russia to avoid breaking their own laws.

  4. amanfromMars Silver badge
    Mars

    Crack Code Controllers ... C+++

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  5. Anonymous Coward
    Happy

    Alternative options

    Another option is to use open source anti-viral software such as ClawWin.

    Or software written outside Germany such as AVG (Czech), or Kaspersky (Russia).

    Personally, I prefer to use the Incognito Live CD (http://www.patdouble.com/), for all my Al-Qaeda terrorism related hobbies!!

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Amanfrommars...

    ... is on a roll today, aparently. he must be on a cafeine high.

  7. Ole Juul
    Paris Hilton

    Brains and politics

    For this to work as planned they need to pass a law that terroists are only allowed to use Windows. (Better still: that only terroists are allowed to use Windows.)

    I remember in Denmark during the war there used to be a lot of German jokes remeniscent of this theme and here we have the same thing, except this is reality... sigh. Thankfully, there are a lot of smart Germans too. Unfortunately, brains and politics don't mix too well.

  8. Chris G

    Watch that space!

    A trojan like this is probably already on the Christmas want list for the UK and USA gov's and that is if they haven't already got them. Such a thing if it becomes a legal tool for police forces to use in the guise of anti terrorism is just another item ready for abuse when the police feel like doing a bit of fishing, something which before 9/11 was never usable in a court of law. Let's face it, not all terrorists are as stupid as the lot that tried to burn Glasgow Airport and if they are keeping sensitive info on file it is going to be encrypted and protected by firewalls and anti spyware and even commonsense.

    Increasingly it seems it is not too difficult to keep ahead of police thinking if this is an example of how they rise to the challenges of the internet age.Terrorists only have to maintain their normal security protocols to avoid this kind of attack but individuals are at risk if this kind of attack can be incorporated into genuine government communications to them such as income tax or VAT offices' inquiries.

  9. Sceptical Bastard

    Leopards? Spots?

    Remind you of anything? The Gestapo? The Stasi?

    They've got form, those Germans...

  10. Will Godfrey Silver badge
    Black Helicopters

    Man + Dog

    I can't remember the story (it was a 1960s SciFi) but the line that stuck in my head was.

    "If time is not the essence, a man walking his dog can carry a message far more securely than any science."

    I would suggests that an extreme jihad terrorist group would not be too bothered about timing.

  11. Anonymous Coward
    Thumb Up

    heh

    this should be fun to watch possibly no one here sees the comic possibilities but I do and I would bet anything so do those jailed Vxers.

  12. amanfromMars Silver badge
    Mars

    Above the Law doesn't keep you Clear of IT

    "this should be fun to watch possibly no one here sees the comic possibilities but I do and I would bet anything so do those jailed Vxers."

    Which will be cold comfort to them, AC, in their jails. Definitely blown possibilities there.

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  13. BitTwister

    @Brian Miller

    > So you think that Linux is the easy way out? I don't think so, unless you mean running Linux from a LiveCD distro.

    So you think that Linux is as insecure as Windows, and can catch a cold just as easily? I don't think so, unless you have no idea what you're on about.

  14. Britt Johnston
    Unhappy

    Not funny

    The German interior department is indeed serious about its Bundestrojan, It has been aired for nearly a year, and appears to be waiting for resignation to kick in.

    However, I don't find it so funny, as they will be reading from all PC's, not just terrorists, and they don't know how to make it stop at the borders - I'm vulnerable, living in Basel, as I use a German Ebay account for instance.

    As far as I know the Stasi argument has not been much used - well spotted @ sceptical bastard - and might have some success in MEP circles - EU, do us all a favour, please.

    You may recall a DDR game of trying to feed the Stasi with false information. Could a friendly counter-hacker come up with a Misleading Info Generator (MIG) - a Norton plug-in perhaps?

    Is this incitement to international terrorism (IT)? Will IT trip the CIA trawlers?

    Or, more likely, as someone comes up with yet another nasty, he finally convinces me to stay off-line with my working machine.

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