Wiretaps and satellite traps, radio transmissions and Internet permissions – the NSA has always excelled at the soft arts of code cracking and message parsing. Everything about the agency, from its Darthian headquarters in Ft. Meade, Maryland to its massive server complex in the wilds of Utah, suggests quiet and studious types pouring over reams of telephone intercepts looking for patterns. But now the NY Times reports that the NSA is also a little bit like a utility-belted cable guy  rummaging around in your basement. Seems the Puzzle Palace likes to mess  with hardware, too.

“The technology, which the agency has used since at least 2008, relies on a covert channel of radio waves that can be transmitted from tiny circuit boards and USB cards inserted surreptitiously into the computers. In some cases, they are sent to a briefcase-size relay station that intelligence agencies can set up miles away from the target.”

So, not only are the digital bits of your computer unreliable, subject to scooping up by black box routers and compromised network access points, but now you can’t even trust the silicon and copper you bought with your own money – not only is the NSA listening to your computer’s babbling, it has also reached in and attached a “tiny circuit board” or two to your beloved machine – like a secret vasectomy you knew nothing about. Computer virility is wilting all over the world.

It was only a matter of time before we learned that the NSA has managed to thwart much of the encryption that protects telephone and online communication, but new revelations show the extent to which the agency, and Britain’s GCHQ, have gone to systematically undermine encryption.

Without the ability to actually crack the strongest algorithms that protect data, the intelligence agencies have systematically worked to thwart or bypass encryption using a variety of underhanded methods, according to revelations published by the New York Times and Guardian newspapers and the journalism non-profit ProPublica, based on documents leaked by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.

These methods, part of a highly secret program codenamed Bullrun, have included pressuring vendors to install backdoors in their products to allow intelligence agencies to access data, and obtaining encryption keys by pressuring vendors to hand them over or hacking into systems and stealing them.

Most surprising, however, is the revelation that the agency has worked to covertly undermine the encryption standards developers rely upon to build secure products. Undermining standards and installing backdoors don’t just allow the government to spy on data but create fundamental insecurities in systems that would allow others to spy on the data as well.

Read more at Wired.

Black Flagged is the first book in Steve Konkoly’s Black Flagged series (the sequels being Black Flagged Redux and Black Flagged Apex). In this first book Konkoly introduces us to a complex, high-energy world of special ops and intelligence personnel engaged in a chess game that often plays out in bloody mayhem. Two things immediately stand out about Black Flagged.

The first is that Konkoly doesn’t make this an easy, bad guys versus good guys morality play. There are plenty of questionable motives and devious maneuvering to go around and, initially at least, we have to pay close attention to discern who the real heavies are in the book. This approach by Konkoly not only cleverly underlines the dangers of this special ops world but also treats the reader as a partner in the process of unwrapping the story. Nothing is simple black and white here.

The second intriguing element of Black Flagged is Konkoly’s main character Daniel Petrovich. The larger sense of moral quicksand is crystallized in Petrovich. He is a man with a heavy history who is reluctantly drawn back into his former murderous profession — a profession he excels at — by larger forces. But once Petrovich is back in, he is in with a furious vengeance. As a writer, Konkoly has the confidence to give us a guy who we respect, but who clearly is a resident of the black ops swamp. Konkoly doesn’t try too hard to make the reader like Petrovich. He has faith that once we get to know Petrovich better, we’ll understand his demons and his motivations. And we do. By the end of Black Flagged I had a deep appreciation for Petrovich as a maestro of special ops violence but also saw the wounded human side of the character under the tactical vest.

And for lovers of “thriller procedurals” Black Flagged doesn’t disappoint. Konkoly, a former U.S. Navy officer, knows his weapons and his tradecraft inside and out. The details are plentiful and fascinating. From edged weapons to submachine guns to grenade “specials”, there is plenty of gear and great action to keep the hardcore thriller fan turning pages.

My only quibble with the book is the flip side of the complex world Konkoly presents: there are enough characters that I was challenged a few times to keep track of who was who (Konkoly does provide a helpful cast of characters list). Overall, however, this is a rousing tale with great action and a well woven plot that will keep you on the hook to the end. I look forward to the next books in the Black Flagged series.

Black Flagged is available on Amazon.com 

View all my reviews on Goodreads.