7 ms·

Russian Invasion of Ukraine Is ‘Almost Certain,' Cyber Expert Says

38 points by zola 5y ago

wicharek 5y ago
The person is said to be an "expert is cyber security", however, his arguments go way beyond his area of expertise. In fact they barely touch cyber security at all. He might end up being right of course (like anyone else). But at the moment his reasoning is a mere speculation of a person, who is maybe marginally better informed than an average commentator on the matter.
- antifa 5y ago
  Doesn't matter if he's right, we just need to run the headlines and continue overfunding the military!
mercy_dude 5y ago
How much of this is Washington’s drumming for defence contractors to get rich? And if Russia does invade Ukraine, why do we care? Specifically as a US citizen how does it affect me? Honest question. I either don’t understand geopolitics or there is something seriously wrong with our government and media trying to get us into pointless conflict.
- deleted 5y ago
  [deleted]
- zola 5y ago
  If it does happen, whatever the result will be, it'll be a part of your next presidential election.
- _abox 5y ago
  Crowdstrike is one the best and most expensive EDR systems on the market. I doubt he'd put their name in jeopardy with misinformation. Personally as a European I wouldn't mind if Eastern Ukraine (Donbas in particular) rejoins Russia. The people in the region sure want it, and that's what freedom is about, making your own choices. If they don't it'll be an unstable area of insurgency for decades anyway. It's been a warzone for years. However an invasion would cause instability in itself. It would increase tensions and cause NATO to build up forces. I hope they come to a diplomatic solution but I agree that Russia's public demand are completely ridiculous and designed to fail. I don't really understand why they view us and NATO as such a threat. We'd never invade Russia.. Nobody would ever want to. And Ukraine and Azerbaijan etc they allowed to separate years ago. It was their own choice.
  - pomdapi 5y ago
    While I agree with most of your comment, one sentence triggered me. > I doubt he'd put their name in jeopardy with misinformation. His company's top officers lied to the public during the campaign in 2016 (and ever since) that the DNC servers was hacked by the Russian Government [1], but then, when asked about it in a court of law in 2017, retractied themselves that any data trace even existed [2]. However the testimony was kept classified. Nevertheless, they continued to tell the same false story in public when asked until the testimony was unclassified in 2020 [3]. This was outright disinformation, and lies, not misinformation. As the saying goes, the first victim in war is truth. And this war is being prepared since 2014. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/us/politics/russia-hack-election-dnc.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/us/politics/russia-hack-e... [2] https://mate.substack.com/p/indicted-clinton-lawyer-hired-crowdstrike https://mate.substack.com/p/indicted-clinton-lawyer-hired-cr..., see trial transcripts in the middle of the article [3] https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2020/05/13/hidden_over_2_years_dem_cyber-firms_sworn_testimony_it_had_no_proof_of_russian_hack_of_dnc_123596.html https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2020/05/13/...
    - ryanlol 5y ago
      None of your sources support the claims you made regarding Crowdstrike.
      - pomdapi 5y ago
        I gave the specifics in another answer at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29671485 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29671485 .
        ryanlol 5y ago
        Yeah a variety of clowns keep posting this same conspiracy theory over and over, but the fact is that the House testimony does not in any way support your claim > His company's top officers lied to the public during the campaign in 2016 (and ever since) that the DNC servers was hacked by the Russian Government The only real takeaway from your links is that crowdstrike does not have pcaps showing data exfiltration.
- sschueller 5y ago
  It's about nordstream 2. The US doesn't want it to be finished and I am quite sure it will end up as part of new sanctions against Russia after a small incident on the border. I agree with you, having the US in play and the US president negotiating is out of place. Imagine the US was building up troops at the Mexican border and Russia was objecting saying the US will invade Tijuana. They have done it before with New Mexico. Putin would be meeting with the US president instead of the Mexican president. At the same time Germany would be objecting to the new pipeline Mexico is building to Canada and even have people in the parlement trying to force a vote on it (some people in the US congress wanted to vote on nordstream 2, wtf)
  - PhantomGremlin 5y ago
    They have done it before with New Mexico. Talk about grasping at straws. The Mexican-American War ended in 1848, and the USA bought the rest of New Mexico in 1854. Maybe we should discuss instead when Joe Stalin starved millions of Ukrainians to death in the Holodomor[1]. Or maybe that was just an "internal matter"? Or perhaps just Western propaganda? There is quite the history of wrongdoing by all countries since 1854. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
    - a0-prw 5y ago
      Of course, you know Stalin was Georgian, right? You know also that Russia is not the USSR, right?
disabled 5y ago
This is obvious. Plus, Russia announced in the past 1-2 days that it was going to legalise mass graves. See Radio Free Europe publication: https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-mass-burials-regulations/31619324.html https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-mass-burials-regulations/3161... In recent history (past 30 years), the vast majority of usage cases for mass graves pretty much have been for genocide. Pay attention people and use your critical thinking skills. Stay off of social media: Russian propaganda is making claims that this is for COVID-19 which is pure BS! In addition to this RT (Russia Today) along with Sputnik News apps need to be removed from app stores!
- null4bl3 5y ago
  Radio Free Europe is a CIA funded propaganda outlet. No different than RT.
  - disabled 5y ago
    Russia Today (RT) has been sanctioned as a propaganda service by international journalism organisations for years. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty does not have this reputation unlike Russia Today.
    - pomdapi 5y ago
      > Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty does not have this reputation unlike Russia Today. Wholly untrue and easily disproven. RFE used to be one of the more important propaganda tool of the US against the Soviets. It was directly managed by the CIA until 1973. If you look at their wikipedia page [1], you'll even see several references to it that used to be in their own "history" page. Strangely enough, all Wayback machine version now point to the current version since last year. Nevertheless, at this point it's even been the subject of academic works [2]. RFE is now nominally financed by the US Congress, and overseen by a governmental agency called the Broadcasting Board of Governors, who are all directly named by the US president. The organisation it belongs to used to be called the United States Information Agency [3] until the 90's, and were the explicit international propaganda arm of the US. Trump changed the name and internal organistaion to the US Agency for Global Media [5]. It might not be an outright CIA shop anymore, but it is still following the editorial line of the US government at least as late as 2016 [6]. They also "coincidentally" often open subsidiary offices generally in the year before a conflict in the country next to said conflict (Kosovo in 1999, Afghanistan and Iraq in 2002). Same for anti-communist revolutions, where RFE was instrumental for example in spreading the Romanian orphan story which led to the fall of Ceaucescu [7]. [1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Free_Europe/Radio_Liberty#Radio_Free_Europe https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Free_Europe/Radio_Libert... [2] https://www.jstor.org/stable/43134017 https://www.jstor.org/stable/43134017 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Information_Agency?oldid=530598033 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Information_Agen... [4] https://www.csmonitor.com/1983/0620/062048.html https://www.csmonitor.com/1983/0620/062048.html [5] https://www.usagm.gov/ https://www.usagm.gov/ [6] https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R43521 https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R43521 [7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_orphans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_orphans
D-Coder 5y ago
This is scary. What has dissuaded Putin from this kind of thing in the past (if anything)?
- Reichhardt 5y ago
  A more confident America and Europe. Keep in mind that Russia has a history of corrupting Western politicians, on a strategic and multi-decade basis, for example Gerhard Shroder, ex-Chancellor of Germany. He initiated the nuclear shutdown, and now serves as Chairman of Rosneft: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/gerhard-schr%C3%B6der-s-russian-oil-links-leave-a-bad-taste-1.3189869 https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/gerhard-schr%C3... The message to Europe is presumably: intervene in Ukraine this time, and we'll completely shut off your Winter gas.
  - sschueller 5y ago
    That makes no sense. Russia is building a pipeline directly to Germany and the ones opposed to it is the US. Russia doesn't want to support the Ukraine with gas but it want to sell it to Europe.
    - Reichhardt 5y ago
      The purpose of the pipeline is precisely to bypass Ukraine and connect into Germany directly. That way Russia can declare war on Ukraine whilst gas connectivity is maintained. Nordstream also avoids going through Polish territory. Its basically the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact all over again.
a0-prw 5y ago
deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
PhantomGremlin 5y ago
The biggest thing that puzzles me about this (and about many recent geopolitical events) is the elephant in the room. Nobody mentions it: The United Nations Why isn't this issue being discussed there, prominently? If it's not possible to even discuss the behavior of the 5 permanent Security Council members (5 of the most powerful countries in the world), then screw it! Let's just get rid of the UN entirely.
- unionpivo 5y ago
  Because that's not what UN is. UN is not a world government. UN for all it's glory, is just a permanent place for countries to to talk to each other. Think of it as an expo/trade conference for governments that is always running. The issue here is that Russia doesn't seem to want to talk to anyone (except their demand for 1on1 with USA), and can veto anything on the security council, so UN has little role to play. > If it's not possible to even discuss the behavior of the 5 permanent Security Council members (5 of the most powerful countries in the world) Sure you can discuss it, but to what gain ? Just to further piss some of them off ? > then screw it! Let's just get rid of the UN entirely. UN is a tool, but unlike a hammer can't always be used. That doesn't mean its useless. > 5 of the most powerful countries in the world This is a fantasy people live in that world is a fair place. It's not and it has never been. In private life we have come far, and you could say that at least in most developed countries rule of law works to a degree (it's not perfect, but its better than at any point in the past.) But on the international stage it's still pretty much that countries with the biggest sticks get their way. Most of the big countries regularly bully smaller ones, and there is little small countries can do, except to maybe appeal to big countries population in hopes they will restrain their own government. Unless we get some kind of global government that has it's own teeth (army/police) this wont change. But UN is still useful.
  - runjake 5y ago
    > Unless we get some kind of global government that has it's own teeth (army/police) this wont change. Having been a part of a UN “peace-keeping” military force, under UN command authority, I find this part — and your whole comment odd.

38 points by zola 5y ago

The person is said to be an "expert is cyber security", however, his arguments go way beyond his area of expertise. In fact they barely touch cyber security at all. He might end up being right of course (like anyone else). But at the moment his reasoning is a mere speculation of a person, who is maybe marginally better informed than an average commentator on the matter.

antifa 5y ago
Doesn't matter if he's right, we just need to run the headlines and continue overfunding the military!

mercy_dude 5y ago

How much of this is Washington’s drumming for defence contractors to get rich? And if Russia does invade Ukraine, why do we care? Specifically as a US citizen how does it affect me? Honest question. I either don’t understand geopolitics or there is something seriously wrong with our government and media trying to get us into pointless conflict.

deleted 5y ago
[deleted]
zola 5y ago
If it does happen, whatever the result will be, it'll be a part of your next presidential election.
_abox 5y ago
Crowdstrike is one the best and most expensive EDR systems on the market. I doubt he'd put their name in jeopardy with misinformation. Personally as a European I wouldn't mind if Eastern Ukraine (Donbas in particular) rejoins Russia. The people in the region sure want it, and that's what freedom is about, making your own choices. If they don't it'll be an unstable area of insurgency for decades anyway. It's been a warzone for years. However an invasion would cause instability in itself. It would increase tensions and cause NATO to build up forces. I hope they come to a diplomatic solution but I agree that Russia's public demand are completely ridiculous and designed to fail. I don't really understand why they view us and NATO as such a threat. We'd never invade Russia.. Nobody would ever want to. And Ukraine and Azerbaijan etc they allowed to separate years ago. It was their own choice.
- pomdapi 5y ago
  While I agree with most of your comment, one sentence triggered me. > I doubt he'd put their name in jeopardy with misinformation. His company's top officers lied to the public during the campaign in 2016 (and ever since) that the DNC servers was hacked by the Russian Government [1], but then, when asked about it in a court of law in 2017, retractied themselves that any data trace even existed [2]. However the testimony was kept classified. Nevertheless, they continued to tell the same false story in public when asked until the testimony was unclassified in 2020 [3]. This was outright disinformation, and lies, not misinformation. As the saying goes, the first victim in war is truth. And this war is being prepared since 2014. [1] https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/us/politics/russia-hack-election-dnc.html https://www.nytimes.com/2016/12/13/us/politics/russia-hack-e... [2] https://mate.substack.com/p/indicted-clinton-lawyer-hired-crowdstrike https://mate.substack.com/p/indicted-clinton-lawyer-hired-cr..., see trial transcripts in the middle of the article [3] https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2020/05/13/hidden_over_2_years_dem_cyber-firms_sworn_testimony_it_had_no_proof_of_russian_hack_of_dnc_123596.html https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2020/05/13/...
  - ryanlol 5y ago
    None of your sources support the claims you made regarding Crowdstrike.
    - pomdapi 5y ago
      I gave the specifics in another answer at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29671485 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29671485 .
      - ryanlol 5y ago
        Yeah a variety of clowns keep posting this same conspiracy theory over and over, but the fact is that the House testimony does not in any way support your claim > His company's top officers lied to the public during the campaign in 2016 (and ever since) that the DNC servers was hacked by the Russian Government The only real takeaway from your links is that crowdstrike does not have pcaps showing data exfiltration.
sschueller 5y ago
It's about nordstream 2. The US doesn't want it to be finished and I am quite sure it will end up as part of new sanctions against Russia after a small incident on the border. I agree with you, having the US in play and the US president negotiating is out of place. Imagine the US was building up troops at the Mexican border and Russia was objecting saying the US will invade Tijuana. They have done it before with New Mexico. Putin would be meeting with the US president instead of the Mexican president. At the same time Germany would be objecting to the new pipeline Mexico is building to Canada and even have people in the parlement trying to force a vote on it (some people in the US congress wanted to vote on nordstream 2, wtf)
- PhantomGremlin 5y ago
  They have done it before with New Mexico. Talk about grasping at straws. The Mexican-American War ended in 1848, and the USA bought the rest of New Mexico in 1854. Maybe we should discuss instead when Joe Stalin starved millions of Ukrainians to death in the Holodomor[1]. Or maybe that was just an "internal matter"? Or perhaps just Western propaganda? There is quite the history of wrongdoing by all countries since 1854. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holodomor
  - a0-prw 5y ago
    Of course, you know Stalin was Georgian, right? You know also that Russia is not the USSR, right?

disabled 5y ago

This is obvious. Plus, Russia announced in the past 1-2 days that it was going to legalise mass graves. See Radio Free Europe publication: https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-mass-burials-regulations/31619324.html https://www.rferl.org/a/russia-mass-burials-regulations/3161... In recent history (past 30 years), the vast majority of usage cases for mass graves pretty much have been for genocide. Pay attention people and use your critical thinking skills. Stay off of social media: Russian propaganda is making claims that this is for COVID-19 which is pure BS! In addition to this RT (Russia Today) along with Sputnik News apps need to be removed from app stores!

null4bl3 5y ago
Radio Free Europe is a CIA funded propaganda outlet. No different than RT.
- disabled 5y ago
  Russia Today (RT) has been sanctioned as a propaganda service by international journalism organisations for years. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty does not have this reputation unlike Russia Today.
  - pomdapi 5y ago
    > Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty does not have this reputation unlike Russia Today. Wholly untrue and easily disproven. RFE used to be one of the more important propaganda tool of the US against the Soviets. It was directly managed by the CIA until 1973. If you look at their wikipedia page [1], you'll even see several references to it that used to be in their own "history" page. Strangely enough, all Wayback machine version now point to the current version since last year. Nevertheless, at this point it's even been the subject of academic works [2]. RFE is now nominally financed by the US Congress, and overseen by a governmental agency called the Broadcasting Board of Governors, who are all directly named by the US president. The organisation it belongs to used to be called the United States Information Agency [3] until the 90's, and were the explicit international propaganda arm of the US. Trump changed the name and internal organistaion to the US Agency for Global Media [5]. It might not be an outright CIA shop anymore, but it is still following the editorial line of the US government at least as late as 2016 [6]. They also "coincidentally" often open subsidiary offices generally in the year before a conflict in the country next to said conflict (Kosovo in 1999, Afghanistan and Iraq in 2002). Same for anti-communist revolutions, where RFE was instrumental for example in spreading the Romanian orphan story which led to the fall of Ceaucescu [7]. [1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Free_Europe/Radio_Liberty#Radio_Free_Europe https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radio_Free_Europe/Radio_Libert... [2] https://www.jstor.org/stable/43134017 https://www.jstor.org/stable/43134017 [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Information_Agency?oldid=530598033 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_Information_Agen... [4] https://www.csmonitor.com/1983/0620/062048.html https://www.csmonitor.com/1983/0620/062048.html [5] https://www.usagm.gov/ https://www.usagm.gov/ [6] https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R43521 https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/R/R43521 [7] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_orphans https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Romanian_orphans

D-Coder 5y ago

This is scary. What has dissuaded Putin from this kind of thing in the past (if anything)?

Reichhardt 5y ago
A more confident America and Europe. Keep in mind that Russia has a history of corrupting Western politicians, on a strategic and multi-decade basis, for example Gerhard Shroder, ex-Chancellor of Germany. He initiated the nuclear shutdown, and now serves as Chairman of Rosneft: https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/gerhard-schr%C3%B6der-s-russian-oil-links-leave-a-bad-taste-1.3189869 https://www.irishtimes.com/news/world/europe/gerhard-schr%C3... The message to Europe is presumably: intervene in Ukraine this time, and we'll completely shut off your Winter gas.
- sschueller 5y ago
  That makes no sense. Russia is building a pipeline directly to Germany and the ones opposed to it is the US. Russia doesn't want to support the Ukraine with gas but it want to sell it to Europe.
  - Reichhardt 5y ago
    The purpose of the pipeline is precisely to bypass Ukraine and connect into Germany directly. That way Russia can declare war on Ukraine whilst gas connectivity is maintained. Nordstream also avoids going through Polish territory. Its basically the Molotov-Ribbentrop pact all over again.

a0-prw 5y ago

deleted 5y ago

[deleted]

PhantomGremlin 5y ago

The biggest thing that puzzles me about this (and about many recent geopolitical events) is the elephant in the room. Nobody mentions it: The United Nations Why isn't this issue being discussed there, prominently? If it's not possible to even discuss the behavior of the 5 permanent Security Council members (5 of the most powerful countries in the world), then screw it! Let's just get rid of the UN entirely.

unionpivo 5y ago
Because that's not what UN is. UN is not a world government. UN for all it's glory, is just a permanent place for countries to to talk to each other. Think of it as an expo/trade conference for governments that is always running. The issue here is that Russia doesn't seem to want to talk to anyone (except their demand for 1on1 with USA), and can veto anything on the security council, so UN has little role to play. > If it's not possible to even discuss the behavior of the 5 permanent Security Council members (5 of the most powerful countries in the world) Sure you can discuss it, but to what gain ? Just to further piss some of them off ? > then screw it! Let's just get rid of the UN entirely. UN is a tool, but unlike a hammer can't always be used. That doesn't mean its useless. > 5 of the most powerful countries in the world This is a fantasy people live in that world is a fair place. It's not and it has never been. In private life we have come far, and you could say that at least in most developed countries rule of law works to a degree (it's not perfect, but its better than at any point in the past.) But on the international stage it's still pretty much that countries with the biggest sticks get their way. Most of the big countries regularly bully smaller ones, and there is little small countries can do, except to maybe appeal to big countries population in hopes they will restrain their own government. Unless we get some kind of global government that has it's own teeth (army/police) this wont change. But UN is still useful.
- runjake 5y ago
  > Unless we get some kind of global government that has it's own teeth (army/police) this wont change. Having been a part of a UN “peace-keeping” military force, under UN command authority, I find this part — and your whole comment odd.