[Cryptography] Signal chat fallout.

[Bill Stewart]

On 3/28/2025 11:59 AM, Ray Dillinger wrote:
> The thing that pisses me off most about cell phones is, no matter how 
> secure you personally may have your own set up, when you set up a 
> supposedly secure chat, if ANYBODY on the list has accidentally 
> downloaded some snoopy software that includes a screen grabber, then 
> EVERYBODY's discussion gets harvested
Yeah, they definitely need a locked-down phone-like device
with only NSA-approved apps, including one similar to Signal,
perhaps with better authorization of contacts before adding them.

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> That's why Hegseth's comment about "clean OPSEC" was complete 
> irresponsible bullshit - not only had he not secured all the endpoints, 
> he had no way to secure the endpoints.  He had no control over the OPSEC 
> of all the individual devices controlled by the people involved in 
> this.  Least of all Jeffrey Goldberg's.
Not only did he have no way to secure the endpoints, NOBODY on the call
except Jeffrey Goldberg looked at the list of participants and said
"who's this JG?"

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> It is almost certain that the Russians and the Chinese read this in 
> realtime, and declined to warn the Houthi because they didn't want to 
> confirm that they have penetrated one or more of these officials' phones.
IMHO, that's unlikely, especially because a warning to the Houthis
wouldn't have to be "We eavesdropped on the high-level comms",
it could be a simple "Our spies found out the bombing starts in 2 hours"
and the existence of Russian spies spying on US military is no secret.