latest Snowden docs show NSA intercepts all Google and Yahoo DC-to-DC traffic

Fri Nov 1 04:43:58 UTC 2013

Hey expanoit,

There was a small part that jumped out at me when I read the article
earlier:

"In recent years, both of them are said to have bought
or leased thousands of miles of fiber-optic cables for their own exclusive
use. They had reason to think, insiders said, that their private, internal
networks were safe from prying eyes."

It seems as if both Yahoo and Google assumed that since they were private
circuits that they didn't have to encrypt. This would've added cost in
engineering, hardware, and in the end, overall throughput; I would assume
they saw it as a low possibility that anyone would (a) have knowledge of
the their traffic inter-site and (b) would have the ability to not only
accomplish the task but not get caught as well.

This is just my take on the situation and I'm sure there are others more
experienced that could offer a more detailed perspective with much less
speculation. Thanks.

Sincerely,

Anthony R Junk
Network Engineer
(410) 929-1838
anthonyrjunk at gmail.com

On Thu, Oct 31, 2013 at 10:48 PM, explanoit
<explanoit.nanog at explanoit.com>wrote:

> As a top-posting IT generalist pleb, can someone explain why Google/Yahoo
> did not already encrypt their data between DCs?
> Why is my data encrypted over the internet from my computer to theirs, but
> they don't encrypt the data when it goes outside their building and all the
> fancy access controls they like to talk about?
>
> Thank you for your feedback,
> explanoit
>
> On 2013-10-30 13:46, Jacque O'Lantern wrote:
>
>> http://www.washingtonpost.com/**world/national-security/nsa-**
>> infiltrates-links-to-yahoo-**google-data-centers-worldwide-**
>> snowden-documents-say/2013/10/**30/e51d661e-4166-11e3-8b74-**
>> d89d714ca4dd_story.html<http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/national-security/nsa-infiltrates-links-to-yahoo-google-data-centers-worldwide-snowden-documents-say/2013/10/30/e51d661e-4166-11e3-8b74-d89d714ca4dd_story.html>
>>
>
>