[Clips] NSA granted Net location-tracking patent
R.A. Hettinga
rah at shipwright.com
Thu Sep 22 11:49:29 EDT 2005
--- begin forwarded text
Delivered-To: clips at philodox.com
Date: Thu, 22 Sep 2005 11:47:03 -0400
To: Philodox Clips List <clips at philodox.com>
From: "R.A. Hettinga" <rah at shipwright.com>
Subject: [Clips] NSA granted Net location-tracking patent
Reply-To: rah at philodox.com
Sender: clips-bounces at philodox.com
<http://news.com.com/2102-7348_3-5875953.html?tag=st.util.print>
CNET News
NSA granted Net location-tracking patent
By Declan McCullagh
Story last modified Wed Sep 21 13:49:00 PDT 2005
The National Security Agency has obtained a patent on a method of figuring
out an Internet user's geographic location.
Patent 6,947,978, granted Tuesday, describes a way to discover someone's
physical location by comparing it to a "map" of Internet addresses with
known locations.
The NSA did not respond Wednesday to an interview request, and the patent
description talks only generally about the technology's potential uses. It
says the geographic location of Internet users could be used to "measure
the effectiveness of advertising across geographic regions" or flag a
password that "could be noted or disabled if not used from or near the
appropriate location."
Other applications of the geo-location patent, invented by Stephen Huffman
and Michael Reifer of Maryland, could relate to the NSA's signals
intelligence mission--which is, bluntly put, spying on the communications
of non-U.S. citizens.
"If someone's engaged in a dialogue or frequenting a 'bad' Web site, the
NSA might want to know where they are," said Mike Liebhold, a senior
researcher at the Institute for the Future who has studied geo-location
technology. "It wouldn't give them precision, but it would give them a clue
that they could use to narrow down the location with other intelligence
methods."
The NSA's patent relies on measuring the latency, meaning the time lag
between computers exchanging data, of "numerous" locations on the Internet
and building a "network latency topology map." Then, at least in theory,
the Internet address to be identified can be looked up on the map by
measuring how long it takes known computers to connect to the unknown one.
The technique isn't foolproof. People using a dial-up connection can't be
traced beyond their Internet service provider--which could be in an
different area of the country--and it doesn't account for proxy services
like Anonymizer.
Geo-location, sometimes called "geo-targeting" when used to deliver
advertising, is an increasingly attractive area for Internet businesses.
DoubleClick has licensed geo-location technology to deliver
location-dependent advertising, and Visa has signed a deal to use the
concept to identify possible credit card fraud in online orders.
Digital Envoy holds a patent on geo-location, and Quova, a privately held
firm in Mountain View, Calif., holds three more, one shared with Microsoft.
"It's honestly not clear that there's anything special or technically
advanced about what they're describing," Quova Vice President Gary Jackson
said, referring to the NSA's patent. "I'd have to have our technical guys
read it, but I don't think it impacts us in any way."
--
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
_______________________________________________
Clips mailing list
Clips at philodox.com
http://www.philodox.com/mailman/listinfo/clips
--- end forwarded text
--
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah at ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/>
44 Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA
"... however it may deserve respect for its usefulness and antiquity,
[predicting the end of the world] has not been found agreeable to
experience." -- Edward Gibbon, 'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'
---------------------------------------------------------------------
The Cryptography Mailing List
Unsubscribe by sending "unsubscribe cryptography" to majordomo at metzdowd.com
More information about the cryptography
mailing list