Return-Path: <sentto-279987-3315-1003850453-fc=all.net@returns.onelist.com> Delivered-To: fc@all.net Received: from 204.181.12.215 [204.181.12.215] by localhost with POP3 (fetchmail-5.7.4) for fc@localhost (single-drop); Tue, 23 Oct 2001 08:22:08 -0700 (PDT) Received: (qmail 20129 invoked by uid 510); 23 Oct 2001 15:20:23 -0000 Received: from n7.groups.yahoo.com (216.115.96.57) by 204.181.12.215 with SMTP; 23 Oct 2001 15:20:23 -0000 X-eGroups-Return: sentto-279987-3315-1003850453-fc=all.net@returns.onelist.com Received: from [10.1.4.52] by n7.groups.yahoo.com with NNFMP; 23 Oct 2001 15:20:54 -0000 X-Sender: fc@red.all.net X-Apparently-To: iwar@onelist.com Received: (EGP: mail-8_0_0_1); 23 Oct 2001 15:20:53 -0000 Received: (qmail 60664 invoked from network); 23 Oct 2001 15:20:52 -0000 Received: from unknown (10.1.10.26) by m8.onelist.org with QMQP; 23 Oct 2001 15:20:52 -0000 Received: from unknown (HELO red.all.net) (65.0.156.78) by mta1 with SMTP; 23 Oct 2001 15:20:52 -0000 Received: (from fc@localhost) by red.all.net (8.11.2/8.11.2) id f9NFLEm21352 for iwar@onelist.com; Tue, 23 Oct 2001 08:21:14 -0700 Message-Id: <200110231521.f9NFLEm21352@red.all.net> To: iwar@onelist.com (Information Warfare Mailing List) Organization: I'm not allowed to say X-Mailer: don't even ask X-Mailer: ELM [version 2.5 PL3] From: Fred Cohen <fc@all.net> X-Yahoo-Profile: fcallnet Mailing-List: list iwar@yahoogroups.com; contact iwar-owner@yahoogroups.com Delivered-To: mailing list iwar@yahoogroups.com Precedence: bulk List-Unsubscribe: <mailto:iwar-unsubscribe@yahoogroups.com> Date: Tue, 23 Oct 2001 08:21:14 -0700 (PDT) Reply-To: iwar@yahoogroups.com Subject: [iwar] [fc:Pentagon.Denies.GPS.to.Taliban] Content-Type: text/plain; charset=US-ASCII Content-Transfer-Encoding: 7bit Pentagon Denies GPS to Taliban By Declan McCullagh, Wired News, 10/23/2001 <a href="http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,47739,00.html">http://www.wired.com/news/print/0,1294,47739,00.html> [FC - Were they heavily dependent on it?] WASHINGTON -- The Pentagon said on Friday that it won't limit the accuracy of positioning information that's beamed to civilian global positioning system (GPS) receivers. In fact, the military says in its new standard that it's boosting civilian GPS quality. The government claims it "now provides civil users a horizontal positioning accuracy of 36 meters, compared to 100-meter accuracy" in the 1995 standard. But as the military campaign against Afghanistan enters its third week, the Defense Department could take steps to limit the usefulness of GPS receivers in the hands of Taliban forces. GPS units receive signals from orbiting satellites and compute their location and what time it is. "We have demonstrated the ability to selectively deny GPS signals on a regional basis, particularly ... when our national security is threatened," said Lt. Jeremy Eggers, a spokesman at Schriever Air Force Base in Colorado. That's home to the 50th Space Wing, which oversees GPS. That would mean only military GPS receivers -- in planes, ships and in the hands of U.S. special forces -- would work within the targeted area. Eggers wouldn't say if a selective denial would be precise enough to hit just Afghanistan, or if neighboring nations like Pakistan and Uzbekistan would be affected too. He'd only say that the "region can be very well defined." Selective availability (SA), which globally degraded the quality of GPS available to civilians, has been turned off since a May 2000 executive order signed by President Clinton. It's been replaced by selective deniability, which allows the military to geographically pinpoint areas should it choose to degrade GPS quality. Pete Brumbaugh, a spokesman for Garmin, a leading manufacturer of civilian GPS devices, said he believed the signal in Afghanistan has already been degraded. "There is probably a significant dithering of the signal over Afghanistan and other areas where there are military operations," Brumbaugh said. But he's found no effects in North America: "We have been monitoring the situation closely to see if there's any fluctuation in the signal and we haven't found any. It shouldn't have any repercussions on areas that aren't affected by the military operations around the world." Even if the United States would change its mind and globally limit the quality of GPS signals, GPS experts say it would have little effect on commercial airliners that use the technology in their navigation systems. Nancy Glass, a spokeswoman for Rockwell Collins, which sells commercial air navigation systems, said: "There would be no consequence if SA was turned on. The separations that are required between aircraft are higher than the difference between SA on and SA off. SA is only 100 meters. The required separation between aircraft is much higher than that -- it's miles." Do not eavesdrop after 2005: Attorney General John Ashcroft has endorsed a new version of anti-terrorism legislation crafted by Capitol Hill negotiators. On Thursday, Ashcroft said: "I can state unequivocally that this legislation, once passed and signed into law, will immediately increase our capacity to detect, to disrupt and to prevent acts of terrorism." The bill, a revised version of the USA Act (PDF), would ease limits on police wiretapping and Internet monitoring. At first, the Senate version of the USA Act did not include an expiration date and the House version expired in two years. This week, legislators said they reached a compromise: A four-year expiration date. FOI not so free: Journalists and researchers who rely on the Freedom of Information Act to ferret documents out of government agencies soon will be out of luck. The Justice Department has released new FOIA guidelines that tell agencies to stay as mum as possible. According to the guidelines sent to agencies, the government should withhold information whenever there is a "sound legal basis" for doing so. You've been fired: UCLA has banned its library staff from forwarding "patriotic" e-mail messages. No, it's no joke. It's the university library's new policy following the Sept. 11 attacks. Says the university in an e-mail memo to managers: "Please remind your staff that sending unsolicited e-mails containing political, religious or even patriotic messages to groups such as units, departments or other library lists is an unacceptable use of library e-mail. This is true for messages which are original, forwarded and responses to other messages." Bert is truly evil: Remember how the Sesame Street character Bert appeared on a poster next to Osama bin Laden? According to one fellow named Robert Koontz, who says he's a former National Security Agency instructor, that was a coded message intended to set off biochemical attacks on the United States. We don't know whether Koontz is a well-briefed military analyst or just plain wacky, but you can read his investigation into this unusual topic at bringmenews.com. Ben Polen contributed to this report. ------------------------ Yahoo! Groups Sponsor ---------------------~--> Get your FREE VeriSign guide to security solutions for your web site: encrypting transactions, securing intranets, and more! http://us.click.yahoo.com/UnN2wB/m5_CAA/yigFAA/kgFolB/TM ---------------------------------------------------------------------~-> ------------------ http://all.net/ Your use of Yahoo! Groups is subject to http://docs.yahoo.com/info/terms/
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.2 : 2001-12-31 20:59:56 PST