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February 07, 2025

Who Else Wants Access To Apple Users' Encrypted Data?

There is, for whatever reason, little online echo so far to this new Washington Post story:

U.K. orders Apple to let it spy on users’ encrypted accounts (archived)
Secret order requires blanket access to protected cloud backups around the world, which if implemented would undermine Apple’s privacy pledge to its users.

Security officials in the United Kingdom have demanded that Apple create a back door allowing them to retrieve all the content any Apple user worldwide has uploaded to the cloud, people familiar with the matter told The Washington Post.

The British government’s undisclosed order, issued last month, requires blanket capability to view fully encrypted material, not merely assistance in cracking a specific account, and has no known precedent in major democracies.

The sole story author, Joseph Menn, is stationed in San Francisco and 'specializing on hacking, privacy and surveillance.' The 'people familiar with the matter' who talk through Menn are likely from the same wider area, i.e. from Apple in Cupertino.

The British demand is of course outrageous and will not be followed. But I wonder why the Brits would even try to go this way.

We know thanks to Edward Snowden's revelations that the British signal intelligence agency GCHQ is a mere offshoot of the U.S. National Security Agency. It may thus be that the real people trying to get access to Apple users' encrypted archives are sitting on the west coast of the Atlantic.

Or is it request coming from other structures?

Cont. reading: Who Else Wants Access To Apple Users' Encrypted Data?

Posted by b at 16:32 UTC | Comments (143)

February 06, 2025

Palestine Open Thread 2025-026

News & views related to the war in Palestine ...

Posted by b at 14:28 UTC | Comments (223)

Ukraine - Intensity Of War Has Decreased

Over the last month the war in Ukraine has become less intense.

The number of daily losses on the Ukrainian side, as provided by the Russia Ministry of Defense, has decreased from an average 2,200 per day in early November 2024 to an average of 1,600 per day in late January 2025.


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Ukraine has acknowledged that the level of violence has decreased (edited machine translation):

Cont. reading: Ukraine - Intensity Of War Has Decreased

Posted by b at 14:19 UTC | Comments (247)

Open (Neither Ukraine Nor Palestine) Thread 2025-025

Department of State @StateDept - 0:36 UTC · Feb 6, 2025

U.S. government vessels can now transit the Panama Canal without charge fees, saving the U.S. government millions of dollars a year.

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Panama Canal authority denies changes to charge fees after US claim - Reuters - 4:30 UTC . Feb 6, 2025

PANAMA CITY, Feb 5 (Reuters) - The Panama Canal Authority said in a statement late on Wednesday that it had not made any changes to charges or rights to cross the canal, after the U.S. State Department said that U.S. government vessels could transit the crossing without being subject to such fees.

"With total responsibility, the Panama Canal Authority, as it has indicated, is willing to establish dialogue with relevant U.S. officials regarding the transit of wartime vessels from said country," the authority said.

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News & views not related to the wars in Ukraine and Palestine ...

Posted by b at 14:18 UTC | Comments (166)

February 05, 2025

Trump Wants To Take Over Gaza, Announces 500,000 Dead

The king of Israel (with a red alpha tie) visited his vassal state in America where real-estate developer Donald Trump (blue beta tie) pushed the chair for his leader and offered him to cleanse the Palestinian population from all land the Zionists desire to take.

Via AP:

President Donald Trump on Tuesday suggested that displaced Palestinians in Gaza be permanently resettled outside the war-torn territory and proposed the U.S. take “ownership” in redeveloping the area into “the Riviera of the Middle East.”
...
The provocative comments came as talks are ramping up this week with the promise of surging humanitarian aid and reconstruction supplies to help the people of Gaza recover after more than 15 months of devastating conflict. Now Trump wants to push roughly 1.8 million people to leave the land they have called home and claim it for the U.S., perhaps with American troops.

“The U.S. will take over the Gaza Strip, and we will do a job with it too,” Trump said at an evening news conference with Netanyahu by his side.

The internationally acknowledged Palestinian Central Bureau of Statistics' count of the population of Gaza in 2023 was 2,226,544. Trump wants to remove all Palestinians from Gaza and gives their number as 1.7 or 1.8 million:

Reporter: How many people are you thinking need to leave Gaza?
Trump: “All of them. Probably a million seven, maybe a million eight. They’ll be settled in areas where they can live a beautiful life.” (video)

This is an acknowledgement, by the president of the United States, that the genocidal Zionists have murdered up to 500,000 people in Gaza.

Despite that toll few in Gaza would move voluntarily:

Cont. reading: Trump Wants To Take Over Gaza, Announces 500,000 Dead

Posted by b at 14:50 UTC | Comments (370)

February 04, 2025

Lavrov vs. Rubio On Multipolarity

I have lauded Marco Rubio's view which declared that the short period of a unipolar world has come to an end.

The new Secretary of State had said:

"So it’s not normal for the world to simply have a unipolar power. That was not – that was an anomaly. It was a product of the end of the Cold War, but eventually you were going to reach back to a point where you had a multipolar world, multi-great powers in different parts of the planet."

If find that a much better concept than the 'rules based order'.

There are however different flavors of multipolarity.

The one Rubio likely thinks of is one in which might makes right. Several 'big dog' countries are sharing the globe, avoiding each other, while a number of small nations must do as they are told by whatever big power that can make them do so.

Witness the recent interactions between the U.S. and Colombia, Panama, Mexico and Canada. The Trump administration has threatened these countries with tariffs and other measures. After it had got what it wanted it pulled back at least a part of the threat (tariff). Unless it meets strong resistance it will repeat doing that again and again.

Another flavor of multi-polarity, one which Russia and China will likely support, is acknowledging that all countries, big or small, have equal rights. This is the base of the United Nations system which was born during allied talks in Yalta and Potsdam at the end of World War II.

Sergei Lavrov, the long term Foreign Minister of the Russian Federation, is arguing for upholding it:

The UN Charter Should Become the Legal Foundation of a Multipolar World - Global Affairs, Feb 4 2025

Cont. reading: Lavrov vs. Rubio On Multipolarity

Posted by b at 16:52 UTC | Comments (180)

February 03, 2025

Thoughts On Musk's Raid Of USAID

Secretary of State Marco Rubio has announced to reconfigure U.S. foreign policy from a unipolar view to a multi-polar concept of strong states.

But, as Brian McDonald warns, that does not mean that the U.S. has given up hope of being the biggest dog in town:

A Washington that stops pretending to rule the world and starts playing smart could be a tougher competitor for Beijing and Moscow than the one we’ve seen desperately clinging to a crumbling 'rules-based order.' The era of unipolarity might be over, but the game is far from done.

'The game is far from done' can also be said about Elon Musk's raid of USAID:

The Trump administration and its allies moved to tighten control of the U.S. Agency for International Development over the weekend, signaling an intent to act forcefully to bring the U.S. foreign policy apparatus in line with the president’s “America First” approach to engaging with the world.
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Over the weekend, Musk repeatedly denigrated USAID without offering evidence that those working there were corrupt. On X, he called the long-standing government agency “evil” and a “viper’s nest of radical-left marxists who hate America.”

“USAID is a criminal organization,” he added. “Time for it to die.”

Established in 1961 by President John F. Kennedy, USAID oversees a vast portfolio of programs designed to provide humanitarian relief, combat poverty, support global health and more.

The rarely spoken of 'and more' part of USAID involves billion of dollars for regime change operations with the help of 'civil society' manipulations via U.S. subsidized media and Non-Government Organizations.

The Trump administration will kill parts of that and reintegrate the rest of USAID into the state department. The CIA offshot National Endowment for Democracy (NED) will likely meet a similar fate.

In their current configuration USAID and NED are under institutionalized congressional oversight. Taking away their independence by putting them under executive control will increase the White House' power. Neither is likely to completely stop their dirty work but it will become more difficult to detect and expose it.

Trump's MAGA is not against doing regime changes in foreign countries. Its main beef with USAID is about its abuse by the Democrats which pushed it to promote their ideologies and to incite foreign societies against Trump.

In a world where the U.S. is no longer trying to be the unilateral power, regime change may not longer be needed that much. In a multi-polar world the U.S. does no longer need to create and confront adversaries but can restrict itself to coerce allies to pay up via tariffs, weapon sales or otherwise. Pax Americana may well become Tax Americana.

Posted by b at 16:46 UTC | Comments (306)

February 02, 2025

Palestine Open Thread 2025-024

News & views related to the war in Palestine ...

Posted by b at 13:56 UTC | Comments (181)

Ukraine Open Thread 2025-023

News & views related to the war in Ukraine ...

Posted by b at 13:56 UTC | Comments (348)

The MoA Week In Review - OT 2025-022

Last week's posts on Moon of Alabama:

Brian McDonald @27khv - 11:31 UTC · Feb 2, 2025

A lot of glee on X over Marco Rubio admitting the US is no longer the unipolar hegemon Of course, accepting the reality of a multipolar world—where powers like China and Russia act in their own interests—could lead to a more peaceful global order.

But here’s the catch: a humbled US that recognizes its limits might actually become more effective. Without the costly burden of maintaining global dominance on every front, it could shift focus to sharper, more calculated moves, like strategic trade wars and targeted alliances.

A Washington that stops pretending to rule the world and starts playing smart could be a tougher competitor for Beijing and Moscow than the one we’ve seen desperately clinging to a crumbling 'rules-based order.' The era of unipolarity might be over, but the game is far from done.

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Other issues:

Cont. reading: The MoA Week In Review - OT 2025-022

Posted by b at 13:54 UTC | Comments (260)