Navy Chiefs Conspired To Get Themselves Illegal Warship Wi-Fi (navytimes.com) 194
During a 2023 deployment, senior enlisted leaders aboard the Navy ship USS Manchester secretly installed a Starlink Wi-Fi network, allowing them exclusive internet access in violation of Navy regulations. "Unauthorized Wi-Fi systems like the one [then-Command Senior Chief Grisel Marrero] set up are a massive no-no for a deployed Navy ship, and Marrero's crime occurred as the ship was deploying to the West Pacific, where such security concerns become even more paramount among heightened tensions with the Chinese," reports Navy Times. From the report: As the ship prepared for a West Pacific deployment in April 2023, the enlisted leader onboard conspired with the ship's chiefs to install the secret, unauthorized network aboard the ship, for use exclusively by them. So while rank-and-file sailors lived without the level of internet connectivity they enjoyed ashore, the chiefs installed a Starlink satellite internet dish on the top of the ship and used a Wi-Fi network they dubbed "STINKY" to check sports scores, text home and stream movies. The enjoyment of those wireless creature comforts by enlisted leaders aboard the ship carried serious repercussions for the security of the ship and its crew. "The danger such systems pose to the crew, the ship and the Navy cannot be understated," the investigation notes.
Led by the senior enlisted leader of the ship's gold crew, then-Command Senior Chief Grisel Marrero, the effort roped in the entire chiefs mess by the time it was uncovered a few months later. Marrero was relieved in late 2023 after repeatedly misleading and lying to her ship's command about the Wi-Fi network, and she was convicted at court-martial this spring in connection to the scheme. She was sentenced to a reduction in rank to E-7 after the trial and did not respond to requests for comment for this report. The Navy has yet to release the entirety of the Manchester investigation file to Navy Times, including supplemental enclosures. Such records generally include statements or interview transcripts with the accused.
But records released so far show the probe, which wrapped in November, found that the entire chiefs mess knew about the secret system, and those who didn't buy into it were nonetheless culpable for not reporting the misconduct. Those chiefs and senior chiefs who used, paid for, helped hide or knew about the system were given administrative nonjudicial punishment at commodore's mast, according to the investigation. All told, more than 15 Manchester chiefs were in cahoots with Marrero to purchase, install and use the Starlink system aboard the ship. "This agreement was a criminal conspiracy, supported by the overt act of bringing the purchased Starlink onboard USS MANCHESTER," the investigation said. "Any new member of the CPO Mess which then paid into the services joined that conspiracy following the system's operational status."
Records obtained by Navy Times via a Freedom of Information Act request reveal a months-long effort by Marrero to obtain, install and then conceal the chiefs Wi-Fi network from superiors, including the covert installation of a Starlink satellite dish on the outside of the Manchester. When superiors became suspicious about the existence of the network and confronted her about it, Marrero failed to come clean on multiple occasions and provided falsified documents to further mislead Manchester's commanding officer, the investigation states. "The installation and usage of Starlink, without the approval of higher headquarters, poses a serious risk to mission, operational security, and information security," the investigation states.
Led by the senior enlisted leader of the ship's gold crew, then-Command Senior Chief Grisel Marrero, the effort roped in the entire chiefs mess by the time it was uncovered a few months later. Marrero was relieved in late 2023 after repeatedly misleading and lying to her ship's command about the Wi-Fi network, and she was convicted at court-martial this spring in connection to the scheme. She was sentenced to a reduction in rank to E-7 after the trial and did not respond to requests for comment for this report. The Navy has yet to release the entirety of the Manchester investigation file to Navy Times, including supplemental enclosures. Such records generally include statements or interview transcripts with the accused.
But records released so far show the probe, which wrapped in November, found that the entire chiefs mess knew about the secret system, and those who didn't buy into it were nonetheless culpable for not reporting the misconduct. Those chiefs and senior chiefs who used, paid for, helped hide or knew about the system were given administrative nonjudicial punishment at commodore's mast, according to the investigation. All told, more than 15 Manchester chiefs were in cahoots with Marrero to purchase, install and use the Starlink system aboard the ship. "This agreement was a criminal conspiracy, supported by the overt act of bringing the purchased Starlink onboard USS MANCHESTER," the investigation said. "Any new member of the CPO Mess which then paid into the services joined that conspiracy following the system's operational status."
Records obtained by Navy Times via a Freedom of Information Act request reveal a months-long effort by Marrero to obtain, install and then conceal the chiefs Wi-Fi network from superiors, including the covert installation of a Starlink satellite dish on the outside of the Manchester. When superiors became suspicious about the existence of the network and confronted her about it, Marrero failed to come clean on multiple occasions and provided falsified documents to further mislead Manchester's commanding officer, the investigation states. "The installation and usage of Starlink, without the approval of higher headquarters, poses a serious risk to mission, operational security, and information security," the investigation states.
Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Informative)
If I installed my own Wifi network, at where ever it is that I work, I would be immediately fired, lose my clearance, and could possible face criminal charges.
They are luck they were only demoted or had minor punishment, although, this will have torpedoed their careers as promotion will be drastically slowed down for them for now on. This will have a knock on effect for them later in life as the military pension is based on your leaving rank.
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2)
Especially when US Navy are installing Starlink on some of the ships, but with additional hardware encryption on top of the commercial layer.
Re: (Score:2)
Don't forget something like "On the official checklists to be turned off if battle stations or emissions control is called for".
Re: Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:2)
Heh. If they had given senior officers the WiFi password, they probably wouldn't be in this mess. Never try to buck the hierarchy. Sure, it's an opsec risk (in the same way that having a cell phone turned on is a risk, and we know *everybody* stows their phones or uses airplane mode underway, right?), but everybody who cares, and certainly anyone with the resources to geolocate a satellite transmission, already knows where surface ships are all the time anyway. Surface ships are not stealthy. They trie
Re: (Score:2)
The bigger the screwup the lighter the punishment. Thats how its usually gone. Theyre sweeping it under the rug and making it go away. Unofficial punishment is still on the docket. They will eventually take their first exit ramp which might be the 20yr retirement.
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Informative)
Yes, electronic intelligence absolutely looks at side lobes of directed beams.
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Informative)
Not to mention that your personal devices, once connected to the internet, are phoning home to a dozen or more places, depending on what apps you have installed. Your data is only as secure as the weakest link.
Re: (Score:2)
not to mention the use of personal devices which may or may not be already compromised in close proximity to other systems that may be legacy.
Re: (Score:2)
Not to mention that your personal devices, once connected to the internet, are phoning home to a dozen or more places, depending on what apps you have installed. Your data is only as secure as the weakest link.
Thing is, this is a warship we're talking about, not a submarine. It's clearly visible from space. Hell, I can look on Google Maps and see my car parked in front of my house. Granted, the imagery is years out-of-date, but I'm sure China has access to slightly better tech than Google Maps.
Re: Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:3)
Sounds like there was an active Internet connection on almost all of the enlisted officers' phones on that boat!
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:4, Informative)
The only risk would be if you posted your geo-coordinates to tellthechinesewheretobomb.com or something like that?
Or more realistically, scroll TikTok on a device with weak location permissions.
Given past breaches where US military personnel posted their run routes around secret military bases on Strava, I wouldn't be surprised if governments (foreign and domestic) were mining social media data of people they believe to be associated with foreign militaries. Doesn't take a rocket scientist to draw conclusions if you see one of your targets moving through the pacific ocean at surface vessel cruising speed.
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Insightful)
As someone with a career of over 40 years in networking I can authoritatively state... You're an idiot.
If it WAS operating "standalone" it would have no connectivity and be pointless. The article makes clear it was not standalone.
Connected to the internet, the potential to reveal the ships location was enormous and made it an incredible security breach regardless of it's connection to ships systems.
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Insightful)
A Starlink router in stand-alone mode, not networked to the ships main network, accessed only by personal devices like phones, I don't understand why that would be a risk at all. The transmission signals of a wifi router are absolutely not going to give the ship away.
I think you are conflating two problems. 1) A Starlink uplink absolutely gives the ship's position to the Starlink network. 2) Installing unauthorized equipment like a civilian Wifi router network is not allowed for a number of reasons like electrical hazard, electronic interference, etc.
Re: (Score:2, Funny)
Hay, I'm just going to stick this satellite dish on the side of a military vessel, what could go wrong? Besides, my military training consisted of watching Pirate's of the Carribean where it was stated that rules are more like guidelines really...
Morale of the junior enlisted (Score:3)
3) the senior enlisted personnel are enjoying something among themselves that is kept secret from the junior enlisted.
On the "it's no big deal angle", OK, I "get" that Starlink is not 4G, and these accounts are anecdotal, but there are many stories in the Ukraine war about especially Russian soldiers who ended up dead because the UAF electronic warfare geeks geo-located them.
You're forgetting another problem (Score:3)
1) A Starlink uplink absolutely gives the ship's position to the Starlink network. ...Which is owned and accessed by a man who has been more than cozy with the world's autocrats.
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Informative)
Also just the implications of unauthorized communications while potentially in a war zone. Not implying any of our sailors would intentionally leak sensitive information, but inadvertently doing it is very much feasible. As much as I worry about shadow IT in my organization and all the security ramifications that can happen bypassing all the controls we have in place, shadow IT in a war zone brings the concern to a whole other level.
Re: (Score:2)
100%. There are a bunch of situations where it's pretty clear Russia has killed Ukrainian soldiers based on their cell phones or even just photos taken and released with geo tags still in place.
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:4, Interesting)
Radiation, emission of any unwanted or un-intended RF, is to be avoided at all times, for lots of reasons. Having said that....
What if there was a commie spy on board? He now has an unfiltered network where he can transmit all sorts of restricted information. Anything you can think of, screen shots of military procedures, crew details, pics of hardware, when the captain is off the bridge. If it's not public knowledge, then it should not be known. Pieces of information that by themselves may not appear to have intelligence value, but put together do.
Remember those wrist tracking devices people had for jogging? Turns out, you can map military bases with them, so they were all banned in all US military installations.
Re:Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:5, Insightful)
If you think the Patriot Act and National Security Letters exist as a concept only in the US, that's your first failure. You can just as easily assume that Starlink itself has hostile employees that are working in the US on a visa. Or you should at least just assume it to be compromised as a matter of procedure.
Even with no technical skill, an employee with the right access could figure out that the satellite is on a ship. They could also probably figure out from looking up the owner's name on social media that user is in the military. Wouldn't take long to work out which ship. Knowing the position and heading of military ships is valuable information - and something that is certainly already tracked by satellite also. But the ocean is one of the places where GPS or radio-beacon based locating would be far more accurate without waiting on the satellite to loop around again.
If you have enough access to upload custom firmware to the end user equipment, you could track relative position/activity of devices connected to the WiFi, intercept all non-encrypted communication, log DNS queries, and a lot more.
I'm not really using my imagination here or finding the worst possible threats.
Re: (Score:2)
If the Starlink signal were so weak that it doesn't get through to the satellites, then why would anyone use it?
TFA claims they got it working well enough to get internet access (for checking sports scores and streaming video), which means they were successful at putting a bug onto a warship which tells Starlink where the warship is.
Re: (Score:2)
There were reports a while back of Russian using Starlink radio emissions to find and target Ukrainian units. I would think that anything that can contact a satellite like that using known, civilian signals would be pretty visible adversarial navies in the area..
Re: (Score:2)
You need to keep up on the news a little more. The Russians have demonstrated the ability to detect Starlink signals and trace them back to the operator on the ground. They can then send a love note to the ground crew in the form of artillery, missles, coordinated attacks, etc.
There is certainly network infosec issues here with an unauthorized network connection on the ship. But you're ignoring a whole different set of problems this poses to the detectability of the vessel.
Re: (Score:2)
I don't understand why that would be a risk at all. The transmission signals of a wifi router are absolutely not going to give the ship away.
It's not about intercepting signals, although that is also a possibility (your understanding of radio is faulty).
Starlink knows where the ship is.
Nobody is supposed to know where the ship is.
It is a safe bet that enemy countries have access to the Starlink records. Probably in real-time, but even analyzing them many months later can give away where the ship was. The routes and maneuvering pattern of the ship need to be forever secret.
Re: (Score:2)
They have military experience and they've demonstrated an ability to creatively conspire, lie, break laws, and cover up.
The government has a job for them.
It might be in DoD but more likely an outside Agency.
Re: Lucky outcome for them, could have been wose. (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Yvan eht nioj!
Re: (Score:2)
this will have torpedoed their careers as promotion will be drastically slowed down for them for now on. This will have a knock on effect for them later in life as the military pension is based on your leaving rank.
On the upside, maybe this could help them get jobs at Starlink doing shipboard/mobile installations. :-)
Re: (Score:2)
If they got defrocked below E-7 then yes. At E-7 and above its a congressional appointment which is entirely a different mechanism for advancement. Likely zero chance getting back into the chiefs club. If these chiefs had their SWS (surface warfare specialist) cert for this ship (or any for that matter) they should have realized that even if they installed an air-gapped network completely isolated, it still gives the potential to track the location of that vessel and track their movements. Thats not at all
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Boggles the mind (Score:2)
It's amazing that they thought they could keep a wireless network secret.
"But, but, the SSID was hidden!" they said...
Have and ensign check the masts ... (Score:2)
It's amazing that they thought they could keep a wireless network secret.
"But, but, the SSID was hidden!" they said...
Let alone a physical Starling antenna mounted on the ship. Maintenance techs had to have noticed, but guess who they would report it to, a Chief.
I guess CO/XO need to send out an Ensign periodically to check the ship and masts for unauthorized equipment to protect the ship and crew and their careers.
Re: (Score:2)
"But, but, the SSID was hidden!" they said...
With the funny twist on that being every single personal device broadcasting the network name when out of range.
Not surprising (Score:5, Interesting)
When I served in the Navy (not the US one) more than 30 years ago, the ship officers had a PC/XT clone with some special software that was assigned to them to perform tasks related to combat readiness, personnel training and so on. It was supposed to be kept secret. However, they regularly brought unapproved floppies with pirated games and abused the computer. The sh!t did hit the fan when they accidentally (?) brought a virus that deleted their special software and everything else, and I as a seaman with considerable computing skills had to cover up the incident to their superiors and recover the files with considerable effort.
Some things never change, I guess.
Re:Not surprising (Score:5, Insightful)
It's no vindication but I'm curious how directed the Starlink transceiver is. It's a phased array so certainly it is highly directional. Due to Ukraine's operational use of Starlink there has probably been a huge evolution in pinpointing them on Russia's part.
Re: (Score:3)
Even the most sophisticated phased array will have side lobes. (Starlink radiation pattern [google.com]) And the further off-axis the phased array is "pointing", the worse the leakage will be. Sure, the side lobes may be 20-30 dB down from the main peak, but that could still be plenty.
Starlink antennas have built-in GPS (Score:2)
Why does Starlink need GPS?
From https://olegkutkov.me/2023/11/... [olegkutkov.me].
To successfully communicate with satellites, the Starlink terminal requires the position of each satellite with the ability to predict this position. The Starlink antenna is not moving much but uses a phased array to steer a narrow RF beam electronically and point to the required satellite in the sky.
It’s relatively easy to calculate a given satellite position with TLE data. You only need the latest TLE data, station coordinates, and pr
Stupidity on an advanced level (Score:5, Insightful)
Impressive. "Nice set of active targeting beacons you have installed there, chief...".
Question is were these people too uneducated to be able to understand what they are doing or did they not stop to think?
Re: (Score:2)
That was my first question too, how directional is a Starlink uplink to the satellite? Were they broadcasting to the entire sky?
Re: (Score:2)
A phased array is very directional. Or at least the convergence is. The rest would be too weak to reach very far. But they basically broadcast location coordinates back and forth so they can calculate that beam angle.
Re: (Score:2)
But for an antiship missile: the signal would get stronger the closer it came.
Re: (Score:2)
There will be overspill and there is the wireless connection on the other side of the base-station. I would assume a radar-seeking missile can be tuned to both.
This has happened before ... (Score:3)
Question is were these people too uneducated to be able to understand what they are doing or did they not stop to think?
From reading various serious books from WW2 vets, there seemed to be a common suspicion of peacetime officers and NCOs. Some were good, but too many were hopelessly stuck in "peacetime" thinking that was often self-indulgent, careless, it's just a job/lifestyle mentality. Lives were lost as these were weeded out early in the war.
Re: (Score:3)
Question is were these people too uneducated to be able to understand what they are doing or did they not stop to think?
Never underestimate the desperation of a Millennial suddenly deprived of their Instagram...
Re: (Score:2)
Millennials are the thirtysomething generation now. These are Gen Z, and it's probably more TikTok than Instagram.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Question is were these people too uneducated to be able to understand what they are doing or did they not stop to think?
They probably thought that they would not be noticed by the Navy or the rest of the world. I mean if I was spying on US Navy ships, I would not have thought to check if any one of them had a Starlink network I could possibly track.
Streaming (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
well the licensing fees may be to high for the good ones or has like disney greed of we need like $1-5/mo (1 year min) per navy sailor (fleet wide) for access to our new movies
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Since this event, the Navy has been adding Starlink to ships.
And I would hope they come up with better security options. The uplink should be less chatty and even be allowed to be disabled for a time without blocking the downlink for stealth. For TCP, they could buffer data at the ground station while also transmitting and have both ends pretend they are sending/receiving ACK packets when they're really not. Instead of waiting on retransmits, unused bandwidth could be used to send tagged second copies of packets to use as an alternate. In addition, even when the u
Re: (Score:2)
Since this event, the Navy has been adding Starlink to ships.
No. The Navy might have been experimenting with adding satellite communications. It has not said it WILL add positively add Starlink. First of all, that cost surely will need approval from Congress. Second, there probably needs to be a lot more security added on top of the existing network before deploying it to the fleet.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The same reasons that this one wasn't allowed.
Interference, ensuring it's off, cost, network security, not giving away ship's locations (even in peacetime) to a random US corporation known to be supportive of certain regimes, etc. etc. etc.
And do you really want your crew phoning home all the time, or suffer the cost of having to secure and sanitise that network 24 hours a day?
The modern military has major problems with the ubiquity of technology like this - you can discern training routes for entire swathe
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
The bigger problem wasn't that they were receiving internet from outer space ot stream. It was because they set up their own network on board that did NOT have the high level of scrutiny required of a navy ship. My guess is that those boats hard wire most things, and then they turn the wifi power down as low as possible to get the job done. Starlink is going to jack the power up to reach as far as possible. Take that boat in to a port and a lot of people on shore can see you.
Re:Streaming (Score:4, Informative)
Re: (Score:2)
Physical media is still alive and this is one of the remaining use cases.
The bandwidth requirements of a whole ship's crew is going to need them to drag along an undersea cable. Only the higher-ups were in on this scheme or they would risk having a slow connection.
now if they just had an satellite tv system hacked (Score:3)
now if they just had an satellite tv system hacked or not. How much of an issue would of that been?
Re: (Score:2)
now if they just had an satellite tv system hacked or not. How much of an issue would of that been?
It is still an issue. Someone installed unauthorized equipment on a Navy vessel. For instance, how did they power the device? This is a Navy ship; they cannot just add electrical outlets where they want. Did they run power cables through different places of the ship possibly breaching water tight compartments? Modern satellite TV is mostly one way but not exclusively. The receiver still has to talk to the network for many things like periodic validation that the receiver is authorized on the network. If yo
satellite tv system does not need to phone (Score:2)
satellite tv system does not need to phone in for auth that comes over sat.
Re: (Score:2)
satellite tv system does not need to phone in for auth that comes over sat.
And where did I say a phone was needed? The network knows which receivers are allowed to have which content. How does it accomplish that?
Re: (Score:2)
carrier pigeon, but i guess that only works if you are a carrier filled with pigeons.
Re: (Score:2)
carrier pigeon, but i guess that only works if you are a carrier filled with pigeons.
Carrier pigeons is new fangled 1800s technology. Signal fires are much more reliable.
Re: (Score:2)
well i did think about shield signaling but you know i am modernist.
Re: (Score:2)
Passive reception can't be that much of an issue - the RF output and reflective surface of a satellite dish can't be significant compared to an entire warship.
Anything two-way opens risks of giving away your position. Internet access is the worst because you can also risk revealing personnel details or having messages intercepted.
It's like the saying goes (Score:5, Funny)
Loose Starlinks sink ships.
...submarine story... (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Culpable for not reporting the misconduct (Score:2)
This is the right framework for military discipline but the punishment is so light the net effect will be to encourage such behavior.
Should have been fired (Score:2)
They deliberately broke rules. Rules that at their level, they should understand how it was risking the lives of everyone on board. And the ring leader got knocked down one level? She'll be promoted right back up to that level shortly. And I'm shocked we're compensating someone so much, especially after this...
From G:
The estimated total pay for a E7 Army Sergeant First Class is $169,574 per year, with an average salary of $103,398 per year. These numbers represent the median, which is the midpoint of th
Because it is an actively transmitting beacon! (Score:2)
Do you have any idea how easy it would be for China and Russia, who each have their own satellite networks, to pinpoint and monitor where all the US vessels were if they were known to be using Starlink? All they would need to do is find the active transmitters at sea and then look at them, then once they know the current location, they would just need to follow it around...
Knowing where all of ones naval assets are physically located at any given time is a HUGE security issue, regardless of at "peace time"
Re: (Score:2)
Re: Because it is an actively transmitting beacon! (Score:2)
It would be a simple matter of comparing Starlink positions to AIS [marinetraffic.com] data and examining the positions where no AIS or a suspect position appeared.
Re: (Score:2)
Re: (Score:2)
Navy should respond (Score:2, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Insightful)
No matter how diligently they lock down the network, if the crew are browsing to anything interesting on personal devices it will leak GPS location data to all kinds of parties who should not have that info on a deployed Navy ship.
Re: Navy should respond (Score:2)
youngsters are gonna pretty much demand internet access of some sort.
And yet submarine crews exist.
Given the number of instances of autistic little shits in the military with secret clearances who just can't resist bragging on social media, perhaps the "No Wi-Fi, no social media, no on-line games" would dissuade them from joining up. Which would be a good thing.
Re: (Score:2)
Any halfway civilized workplace is gonna have internet access.
Ummmm. You do know this is a military workspace right?
Does the Navy really think that they can keep attracting hordes of capable 18-25 year olds, stash them on floating cans for months on end, and keep them isolated from wifi?
What do you think a military enlistment entails? When an enlisted person joins the US military, the first few months is stashing them isolated on bases for basic training. Everyone in the US military volunteered for this.
When the bullets and missiles are actually flying, it's a different story. But for the months/years that no real action is happening, youngsters are gonna pretty much demand internet access of some sort.
You do know countries do not start espionage after a war has started, right?
Re: (Score:2)
Any halfway civilized workplace is gonna have internet access. Does the Navy really think that they can keep attracting hordes of capable 18-25 year olds, stash them on floating cans for months on end, and keep them isolated from wifi? When the bullets and missiles are actually flying, it's a different story.
Thing is, sometimes when those bullets and missiles start flying, it's a surprise! And while those 18-25-year-olds may think "it's worth that risk" they don't get to make that call. The mission is to provide an effective, survivable naval force for the US.
There's the old list of steps to not die: "Don’t be seen. If you are seen, don’t be targeted. If you are targeted, don’t be hit. If you are hit, don’t be penetrated. If you are penetrated, don’t be killed."
Operating a radio ne
Re: (Score:2)
The system must adapt. Times have changed. You can't give youngsters a paper copy of "garfield" and expect them to be entertained on their time off.
Then don't join the Navy.
The Navy goes to sea. That's their job. Secrecy is built in to what they do. Security is built into what they do. Joining that life means putting up not only with long periods at sea, but the sacrifices that such deployments involve. That means you don't get the comforts and conveniences that you have on shore. That means that for 6-9 months, you're basically isolated from the world back home. If you can't handle that, find a different profession.
Re: (Score:2)
Google giving the game away again (Score:2)
Folks getting all excited about satcom EM radiation being detected (or not) by the bad guys overlook the real problem - Google maps location tracking.
Presuming that the offenders were using smartphones to connect to the Starlink enabled WiFi then those handsets would be reporting their GPS location to google just as all those Russians invading Ukraine inadvertently reported that they were stuck in traffic jams of military vehicles to very OSINT analyst on the planet.
SSDD. (Score:2)
After all, one of the values we instill in our fighting men and women is that nothing matters but getting the job done - whether the job is given by those appointed over you or if you and your buddies decided the ladies are ready for a little tailhook action, whatever it takes to get the job done is okay. Rest assured, the officers that are about to do the Schultz "I know nothing!" knew plenty. They were probably quite proud of the personnel who came up with this innovative solution to what I'm sure they
Practical implications? (Score:2)
I struggle to understand how this is so serious a problem. A rule violation, sure, but the Manchester is a 400 foot long ship. This is not 1945 - Russia and China (and many other countries) know where all US warships are at all times via satellite optical and sigint surveillance. (Just as the US knows where it's adversaries' warships are.)
And if personal devices (smartphones, etc.) are allowed on the ship at all, they can capture classified info at any time that's could be uploaded by a spy when the spy-sai
Re: (Score:2)
If you accidentally take a personal device into a SCIF, the normal procedure is that the device stays in the SCIF and can't leave. It will be inspected to determine if there was any malicious use and then it will be disposed as it if contained classified data.
For land-based SCIFs, there is a check-in and check-out procedure wi
Who watches the watchers (Score:2)
What a fool she was.
Two Things... (Score:2)
Two observations about this:
1) The XO was apparently involuntarily relieved while this was happening but for an different unrelated reason!
2) The only people who were probably skilled enough to do a proper sweep/investigation were in fact the very same senior NCO's who were in on it.
happens in companies too (Score:2)
I find this interesting. It's a problem for security organizations in large companies, but I didn't think it might be a problem in the military as well. It makes sense, especially with Starlink being commonly available and affordable.
In corporations it's usually a semi-knowledgeable person setting up their own unprotected wifi hotspot, providing a vector into the intranet. I guess surreptitiously mounting a starlink dish is the next logical step.
I think the argument could be made that the starlink networ
Cannot be understated (Score:2)
"The danger such systems pose to the crew, the ship and the Navy cannot be understated,"
Should that not be "cannot be overstated"?
Re: (Score:2)
What's wrong with that?
We can't say anything that would be considered to be adequate enough to describe the situation.
Re: (Score:2)
What's wrong with that?
We can't say anything that would be considered to be adequate enough to describe the situation.
Then saying there was absolutely no risk at all would not be an understatement. It should, of course, be "cannot be overstated".
Re: (Score:2)
So anything you might say would understate the situation?
Re: (Score:3)
If a droll character in a book said "my admiration for you cannot be understated," it would be a backhanded compliment that literally means they have no admiration whatsoever.