Dept. of Defense Claims Wireless Could Kill Soldiers:

here's a scary story about building into military computers the ability to
remotely silence 802.11b and "can disable any wireless, wired or modem
traffic in dangerous areas." it's only for military right now, but the
idea of "dangerous areas" extending into other areas is a bit worrisome.

the part i don't understand is how 2.4 GHz radio communications would
interfere with DoD communications (which would be on different bandwidths)
-- can anyone speak to this?  is the military actually using radio
frequencies that can be jammed by removing the wire mesh on the front of a
microwave oven?

anyone?

--sascha

***

from: http://gcn.com/vol1_no1/daily-updates/25371-1.html

03/23/04

Rugged notebook, software brew up a STORM

By Susan M. Menke
GCN Staff

When users early last year began buying notebook PCs with the Intel
Centrino wireless processor, they didn't anticipate the fast rise of
wireless hacking or the Defense Department's imminent need for radio
silence in war zones.

"DOD was violent: they said, 'Just get it out of there,' " Panasonic
Computer Solutions Corp. national sales director Jan O'Hara said today at
FOSE 2004 in Washington.

"Intel Corp. hadn't considered" that soldiers' lives might depend on
silencing IEEE 802.llb radio frequency communications. Instead of simply
unplugging a USB wireless fidelity add-on or PC Card, Centrino users would
have to return their notebooks to the factory to remove the chip.

To silence Centrino via software, Panasonic today announced a partnership
with Senforce Technologies Inc. of Orem, Utah, and reseller GTSI Corp. of
Chantilly, Va., to bundle Toughbook Centrino notebooks with Senforce's
Enterprise Mobile Security Manager 2.5 application.

EMSM can enforce use of a virtual private network for wireless connections
and disable USB ports and Centrino for wired ones. It also mitigates
denial-of-service attacks and radio interference, Senforce officials said.

The Secure, Tough, Online/Offline, Reliable, Mobile bundle, or STORM,
sells "for about 1.5 times as much. as a semirugged notebook, O' Hara
said.

The EMSM security policy, set by an administrator and downloaded to client
systems at selected intervals, can disable any wireless, wired or modem
traffic in dangerous areas, Senforce technical marketing director Kip
Meacham said.

The network-aware EMSM "binds the hardware below the application layer" of
Microsoft Windows 2000 and XP notebooks so that wiping the disk and
reinstalling the operating system cannot circumvent the protection, he
said.

-- 
Sascha Meinrath
Project Manager & President      *      Project Manager
Acorn Active Media Foundation   ***     Eggplant Active Media
www.acornactivemedia.com         *      www.eggplantmedia.com
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