Dual-use technology [Deep Dives challenge #6]

in #deepdives6 years ago

Deep Dives #6 cryptome.org

This post is part of the Deep Dives challenge


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My article for Deep Dives #6

Dual-use technology

And I will focus on 1997 specifically as this is where it all started for 'the rest of us'.

OK here we go,

Dual-use technology


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Dual-use cell-phones

What the hell is dual use technology ?

Dual use technology is everything that can be used in both peaceful and in military manner
In this day and age this concerns A LOT of things.

As an example to get an idea what dual use is:

The internet for instance is based on Military ARPA/DARPA technology, the ARPAnet, that everyone under the sun is using to be entertained . While the military use it to collect all our personal data and they criminalize innocent people as a result. And we all sponsor the war effort.

A TV is a 'peaceful' entertainment machine that also can be used by the military as a propaganda / fake news machine.

The cellphone networks (yes networks, there are MANY)The Roaming Network / Interconnection Network, this are all the networks that we all use today. SS7, GRX, GPRS, EDGE, GSM, UTMS, HSPA, GSM, LTE, WiMAX, all of this are separate networks that interconnect. And all of this is also used by Military players, again to spy on us. And we all sponsor the war effort.

GPS, Global Positioning System is another Military use technology, that is rolled out for domestic use, that again makes domestic users pay for military tech. It is o so handy, lets all buy a TomTom and sponsor the war effort.

This is an all you can eat data networks that the military use for 'Target Localization', they simply hunt you down on the network no matter where you are on the planet. 70% of the drone strikes are said to be based on this target localization. So if you ever get bombed by a drone, it could be that someone illegally used one of your devices by the use of backdoors that where placed in your device by a security agency. Yes, it is really that bad. This actually makes it Triple-use technology...

Now that you have a general idea of how Dual-use Technology lives in your pocket we can dive deeper. The actual dual use goes much further then all these gadgets and convenience technology. It goes as far as natural resources and how much of a given 'suff' has been imported by a certain country. Aluminium can for instance be used to make pots and pans, foil, machined parts, harddrives, etc. But it can also be used to build a military aircraft.
If a certain amount of a certain resource is imported by a certain country. Then a in the USA people start to get nervous, and make themselves illusions about weapons of mass destruction. And use that to start a war based on their own illusions to hunt for proof of something that never even existed.


image.png
every day these factories make insane amounts of bullets,
makes one wonder how many people get slaugtered every
single day to keep these factories running

This is the stuff that I found on cryptome.org about dual-use technology and resources.

And this is limited to the OLDEST documents on the subject in the cryptome.org database from 1995 to 1997


In December 1995 there was an agreement reached on this Dual-use technology during a meeting at Wittenburg Castle, in Wassenaar, The Hague in The Netherlands. And it goes by the name of The Wassenaar Arrangement (or Agreement)
It deals with "Export Controls for Conventional Arms and Dual-Use Goods and Technologies"

This Arrangement deals with:

Category 1 – Special Materials and Related Equipment
Category 2 – Materials Processing
Category 3 – Electronics
Category 4 – Computers
Category 5 – Part 1 – Telecommunications
Category 5 – Part 2 – Information Security
Category 6 – Sensors and Lasers
Category 7 – Navigation and Avionics
Category 8 – Marine
Category 9 – Aerospace and Propulsion

As you can see, the introduction of this article merely looked at Telecommunications.

Lets have a look at the Cryptome.org documents if we can find a bit more on the subject.


The oldest Document is instantly interesting:

The sentence that pops out is: "At the Vancouver Summit in 1993, Presidents Clinton and Yeltsin agreed that the regime should be replaced with a new, non-discriminatory arrangement, to be joined by Russia." And this seems to have resulted in the Wassenaar meeting.

It's striking how this document has a section: " Preventing Destabilizing Accumulations of Arms " Now that we know how John McCain gave destabilizing amounts of arms to for instance the Ukraine. to fight against Russia when Hillary Clinton was secretary of state.


Then there is a short 1997 document on Crypto Regulations It doesn't say a lot, but that they wanted to regulate back in 1997 and that this is linked to the Dual-use technology in a way tells us a lot. As regulating encryption makes it hard for domestic users to maintain privacy. While state actors can use powerful encryption to hide all their 'work'. But the document is too limited to know what was discussed. O, and of course, cryptology is a dual use good as well.

Then there is another 1997 document

I. Purposes

  1. The Wassenaar Arrangement has been established in order to contribute to regional and international security and stability, by promoting transparency and greater responsibility in transfers of conventional arms and dual-use goods and technologies, thus preventing destabilizing accumulations. Participating states will seek, through their national policies, to ensure that transfers of these items do not contribute to the development or enhancement of military capabilities which undermine these goals, and are not diverted to support such capabilities.
  2. It will complement and reinforce, without duplication, the existing control regimes for weapons of mass destruction and their delivery systems, as well as other internationally recognized measures designed to promote transparency and greater responsibility, by focusing on the threats to international and regional peace and security which may arise from transfers of armaments and sensitive dual-use goods and technologies where the risks are judged greatest.
  3. This arrangement is also intended to enhance cooperation to prevent the acquisition of armaments and sensitive dual-use items for military end-uses, if the situation in a region or the behavior of a state is, or becomes, a cause for serious concern to the participating states.
  4. This arrangement will not be directed against any state or group of states and will not impede bona fide civil transactions. Nor will it interfere with the rights of states to acquire legitimate means with which to defend themselves pursuant to Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations.

This document seems to focus mainly on real arms, and not on dual-use.

It doesn't sound all that bad, yet we now know that Iraq was accused of heaving 'Weapons of mass destruction'. That makes you wonder if they used the Wassenaar 'idea' of dual-use technology to estimate what technology Iraq imported and then estimate how much could have been used and from there do a witch hunt to find that technology.
Sure this sounds like a conspiracy theory. Let's leave it at that.

The intentions look OK, but as we all know good intentions are not real life solutions.
As some people have the intention to give you a dollar, but instead they smack you in the face. Well, that's how politics often work.


The [next document] is another short document about cryptography.

5.A.2. Exceptions
5.A.2.a.1. Designed or modified to use "cryptography" employing digital techniques to ensure "Information security";
5.A.2.a.6. Designed or modified to provide certified or certifiable "multilevel security" or user isolation at a level exceeding Class B2 of the Trusted Computer System Evaluation Criteria (TCSEC) or equivalent;
5.A.2.a.e. Designed or modified for only copy protection.
5.A.2.a.f. Designed or modified to keep access control materials of personal identification number (PIN) etc, and to block access to facilities without authentication, and [..] does not allow encryption for file or text.
5.A.2.a.g. Designed or modified to provide message authentication code [..].
5.A.2.a.h. [..] designed and limited for banking or money transactions [..].

Aha, so here the banks are the domestic dual-use of military technology!

interesting is how this document refers to:

http://www.barrier-free.co.jp/a2z/c/CRYPTON/box1996/19960821-1-wassenaar.html
(written in Japanese)
http://www.sipri.se/projects/armstrade/wass_initialelements.html

Yet both of these pages are no longer available.


Then there is a longer document about crypto regulations.

This goes deeper into Telecommunications pushing the boundaries of high frequency devices and the need to be able to withstand gamma, neutron or ion radiation.

This high frequency encrypted communication concerns:

  1. Wire (line);
  1. Coaxial cable;
  2. Optical fiber cable;
  3. Electromagnetic radiation; or
  4. Underwater acoustic wave propagation.

That last one could be a bit unfriendly to our whales. But nobody seems to care about that

That however makes all communications useful as military dual-use


The next document is a list of Dual-use goods.

Unfortunately cryptome.org does not link all of this correctly.

LIST OF DUAL-USE GOODS AND TECHNOLOGIES
General Technology and General Software Notes
Category 1 Advanced Materials (42K)
Category 2 Materials Processing (59K)
Category 3 Electronics (36K)
Category 4 Computers (29K)
Category 5 - Part 1 Telecommunications (17K)
Category 5 - Part 2 "Information Security" (8K)
Category 6 Sensors and "Lasers" (61K)
Category 7 Navigation and Avionics (16K)
Category 8 Marine (20K)
Category 9 Propulsion (24K)
Annex 1 (32K)
Annex 2 (14K)

MUNITIONS LIST (61K)
General Technology Note
Items 1 to 22
DEFINITIONS OF TERMS USED IN THESE LISTS (62K)
ACRONYMS AND ABBREVIATIONS USED IN THESE LISTS (7K)
STATEMENTS OF UNDERSTANDING AND VALIDITY NOTES (9K)

That together makes a 150 page document of dual-use technologies.

So whatever we use, we are helping somebodies war.


Depending on how the next document is interpreted it looks more of a guide on how to waste time and money then to actually do something useful.

In order of the Paperwork Reduction act this document creates A LOT of paperwork, as all of the Wassenaar Arrangements must have record keeping.

Method of Collection
The information will be collected in electronic and written form.

Today data centers at the size of a small city kill more trees then classic paperwork ever did.

But all will be documented, that's the scope of that document.


And the last 1997 document on Dual-use.
Is a very short one about the implementation.

This wraps it up for me for now.
The 1997 Cryptome.org docs on Dual-use


If you are curious about what is considered dual-use technology in 2018 then you can find the latest list @ Wassenaar.org


As a last note I'd like to add my personal opinion.

When you put butter on your bread with a use of a knife, then you may not realize that that knife can also be used to kill someone. But does that justify that your rich neighbor bully is keeping an eye on all the metals that enter your home?

Now, it is clear that certain resources, like for instance uranium, pose a real risk. But keep in mind that the big bully neighbor has his house STACKED with those resources and actually makes the weapons, and manages to sell them to other neighbor who are on their turn killing lots of people with those weapons.

So the bully neighbor is allowed to stuff his wallet, the other neighbor who is at war is also allowed to BUY those weapons from the bully . And the money justifies everything.

People still get killed, the bully neighbor even sells his own army to fight in those wars, and again for personal gain.

But you may not be allowed to have your knife that you actually need to prepare the food that you need every single day to be able to survive.

Have a closer look at the materials described in the documents above, and ask yourself if this isn't going a bit too far. Specially as the actual aggressor is the one who is gaining most from all of this.

If the goal is peace, then don't sell weapons.



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Very nice work here @bifilarcoil. I can see a lot of hard work and research went into digging all these facts 😉

Posted using Partiko Android

thats why I focussed on the early leaks. There is 20 more years of dual-use related data but the early doc's show how things where build up.
The dual-se is more about the resources, yet the examples i used (networks, and devices) make things more easy to grapsp, I hope. And in the end all we consume is a dual-use corporate throw away product.
I may need to do a separate article on that to explain what i see, but can not prove, how the dual-use works on one layer ahead of all these documents.
The goal seems to be one layer Pre-1995 and all this dual-use then becomes a repression tool for everyone (including europe) and a tool for the MIC to funnel recourses under the radar TROUGH dual-use. Very hard to explain... as non of this is written IN these docs. But the dots of the elephant are hidden in the way these rules are 'configured'.
Smoke and mirrors + magic Look at one hand while the other hand slips 'resources into the pocket'.

I found this deep dive very interesting Bif. It's crazy to think this information is from '97. I'm hesitant to see what this has developed into over the last 10 years,, especially with technology itself evolving at the speed it has (to the "public eye") god knows what is taking place behind closed doors.. anyways, I think you did a great job on this one! I really like how you tied it all into the war machine and the ending line is the nail in the coffin.
round of applause

Thank you, there you touch on something important @amariespeaks.
Many people are aware of some of this stuff, but nobody reacts to it. And that is how they keep moving ahead. Turning up the heat in every round that follows. It's their job to find ever more details and add more dual-use stuff to the already extensive list.

Nothing of this makes it to the news, but they do publish it. So only the people in the know look at it, and the everage man on the street wouldn't even know what to do with the information even if they happen to read some of it.

It takes some time to see how consumer products are being used as a part of the war machine eco-system.

you're welcome @bifilarcoil - you're very right; they are inching their way deeper and deeper.. like the metaphor of throwing a frog into boiling water.. it will hop right out if the water is already boiling.. but drop it in comfortable water and slowly turn the temp up - it will stay and boil alive.
And the boiling point is fast approaching..

it sure is... the problem is that we are not able to jump off this planet...

Thats how far it is....

Fantastic post!

Dual-use is an idea I had never really considered. I have read about it through the years but never really let the idea percolate. The most obvious dual-use infrastructure in the USA is the highways system. People use it every day as if it was put in place to support the public's interests, when in fact the highways system is a military asset.

Thanks for this eye opening #DeepDives

Interesting post, thanks for the research. I echo others comments in that it's amazing and unfortunate that these events started 20 years ago now. The sad truth is that pretty much everything we have is a hand-me-down of the military industrial complex. They come up with something and then several years or decades later when they feel like it, they pass it along to the peons. I think that blockchain, as much as I like the technology, is also just another hand-me-down from them.

you are welcome, in fact this dive was very educational for me as as well.
i just published an appendix that illustrates an example of dual use in a very basic manner. not the best example as the big picture is a bit different but it shows how soda can aluminium is turned into the key part of a gun.
https://staging.busy.org/@bifilarcoil/dual-use-is-paid-by-us-two-times-or-more

Oh cool thanks I’ll check it out.
I haven’t signed up for busy but that’s a good point. We use so much disposable stuff it’s terrible. People get annoyed when they see the multi use and glass stuff that I use. Cool research!

more people should look into this. ... and break it down into smaller parts.
This topic is HUGE.
And the one product we SHOULD recycle we are not, and that's polluting our oceans..
plastic..

I wrote a little appendix to this article. You can find it here:

https://staging.busy.org/@bifilarcoil/dual-use-is-paid-by-us-two-times-or-more

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