Radical cleric Abu Hamza guilty of terror offences

Radical cleric Abu Hamza faces life inside a US prison after being found guilty of several terror related charges.

Hamza had tried to portray himself as "a preacher of faith" but a jury was unanimous in its decision that the cleric had been involved in supporting terrorism.

Known as Abu Hamza al-Masri, he was tried under the name Mustafa Kamel Mustafa having been extradited to the United States in 2012 after a long running legal battle by US authorities.

Reacting to the verdict Britain's Home Secretary Theresa May said, "I am pleased that Abu Hamza has finally faced justice. He used every opportunity, over many years, to frustrate and delay the extradition process." The verdict was also welcomed by Prime Minister David Cameron who said he plans to reform Britain's relationship with the European court of human rights to prevent future extradition delays.

Hamza came to prominence following the 2001 terror attacks in the US and was often seen at the Finsbury Park mosque in London where his radical preachings drew significant press attention. Due to his having lost his arms and been blinded in one eye, whilst supposedly tackling a landmine in Afghanistan, much of the UK tabloid press nicknamed him "Hook" in allusion to the fictional pirate Captain Hook.

The truth behind his loss of limbs is open to debate with Hamza himself having changed his story several times. He has claimed he was maimed whilst fighting Soviet forces in Afghanistan. However, during his trial in the United States, Hamza stated that his injuries occurred whilst working with explosives with the Pakistani military in Lahore.

Abu Hamza was arrested in May 2004 on a US arrest warrant and eventually flown from RAF Mildenhall to the US in October 2012.

The 11 charges against him included allegations that he arranged satellite communications for a group of kidnappers in Yemen who carried out a deadly attack in which four hostages were killed [Justice.gov].

He was eventually also found guilty of conspiring in 1999-2000 to establish an al-Qaeda training camp in Bly, Oregon, among other acts. In addition he was convicted of various crimes including hostage taking, conspiring to provide material support to terrorists, and abetting religious war in Afghanistan.

Hamza, who has already served a UK prison sentence for using his sermons at the Finsbury Park Mosque in London to incite murder and racial hatred, is due to be sentenced on the 9th September and could face a life term in a federal prison.

While many people have expressed relief and cheered the successful conviction, there has also been anger that the extradition and trial took so long. Survivors of the Yemen hostage situation were particularly scathing in their criticism. Laurence Whitehouse and his wife Margaret were part of a group of 16 Western tourists ambushed by armed men in December 1998. Margaret and three others, including two more Britons, were shot dead after being held for 26 hours as the Yemeni Army mounted a heavy-handed operation to free them. Whilst pleased at the verdict, Mr Whitehouse told The Telegraph, "This has taken a long time, even though there was evidence of his involvement early on."

Another hostage, Eric Firkins, 70, also expressed concern that the Islamist preacher had been allowed to breed hate on the streets for so long. "I was angry the Government was that sensitive to racial issues that they didn't want to antagonise Muslims by arresting the preacher."

Meanwhile there have been allegations that British security services failed to act on information received about Hamza and his terror activities [Telegraph]. However Anjem Choudary, claimed Abu Hamza was a "victim of the war on terror" and insisted the preacher had a "divine permit" to lie about his role as an alleged MI5 informant. Choudary, a British Muslim social and political activist, often labelled an extremist by the UK press, insisted that much of what had been said about Hamza was propaganda. "Sheikh Abu Hamza is the latest in a long line of Islamic activists and intellectuals who have been targeted by the American and British regimes in the war on Muslims. I believe he will gain paradise," he told the Telegraph.

Sky News / BBC / Guardian / Telegraph / Daily Mail / Mirror / Express / Wikipedia

[Pictured: Abu Hamza al-Masri, also known as Mustafa Kamel Mustafa, and his eldest son Mohammed Mustafa Kamel, at a rally in London in 2002. In 1999 Mohammed Mustafa Kamel (at the time 17 years old), and his stepson, Mohsin Ghalain, were arrested in Yemen. They were convicted of being part of a bomb plot involving eight Britons and two Algerians, and were imprisoned for three years and seven years respectively. The prosecution alleged that Abu Hamza had sent them to Yemen to carry out terrorist attacks. The defence argued that the men had been tortured and called the trial a "travesty of justice" / Read more: BBC / Metro / Telegraph]

tvnewswatch, London, UK

EU ruling that may change history

The EU has ruled that Google and other search engines must delete references and links to data connected to an individual in what has been hailed as a victory for people wanting to be forgotten on the Internet.

However the ruling made by a Spanish court could potentially have far reaching consequences which could ultimately lead to history being rewritten or deleted.

Information in the pre-Internet age

Before the advent of the Internet finding information was down to one's skills in seeking out books at local libraries or articles buried in newspapers stored in underground vaults. Even then one might need an understanding of the Dewey Decimal System and other indexing systems. While sometimes difficult to find, most back editions of a newspapers were readily available and books and encyclopaedias could be thumbed through. Most libraries would stock telephone directories of a given area and by cross referencing the information with that of the electoral register, a journalist or anyone else could dig up all sorts of data about any given individual. With a few pounds in pocket one could even get copies of birth, marriage or death certificates from registry offices, thus creating a detailed dossier on the background of a person one was interested in.

But nowadays digging up such information is less easy and may become all the more difficult. Libraries have streamlined their reference sections. Some no longer stock the electoral register, telephone directories have been discarded long ago, and the encyclopaedias have almost been consigned to history. Indeed the Encyclopaedia Britannica has itself decided to stop printing books in favour of online or digital editions in 2012 [Telegraph].

Disadvantages of online data

There is an advantage of online data. It can be sought out quickly with the aid of computers or search tools. Information in stories or on databases can be updated and mistakes corrected, whilst a printed version without the advantage of foresight cannot. But there are disadvantages too. Pages on the Internet can disappear, be deleted or simply be buried so deeply in the mountain of available information as to become impossible to find.

Whilst some organisations such as the Internet Archive have attempted to preserve some webpages from the past, there are vast amounts of information disappearing everyday that were once easily accessible and in the public domain.

Deletion of online resources

Of course much of this information could be considered junk. When Yahoo shut down Geocities, a popular blogging and webhosting platform many were outraged, especially those who had created pages on the online space. While many pages were undoubtedly the personal ramblings of individuals other pages were in depth explorations into cultural history, conspiracy theories and other musings.

Newspapers and media organisations have also deleted online content. For newspapers the information may still exist in hard copy, buried in the dark recesses of a national library, but for some organisations they have only ever been online. For example many articles published by Fox News at the time of 9/11 are now longer available. Indeed many links older than a few years may be deleted.

This situation is bad in that vast swathes of history, and how it was reported at the time, have been consigned to the digital dustbin.

Repercussions of EU ruling

However the problem could become much worse after one Mario Costeja González sought to have information about him removed from the Internet. The Spanish lawyer complained that entering his name in a Google Search led to the display of legal notices dating back to 1998 and published in the online version of La Vanguardia that detailed his debts and the forced sale of his property [Europa.eu].

The court ruled in his favour and Google must now remove links which lead to the references about González' financial past.

While some have hailed the decision a victory, there are others who believe it could create further problems. The information González sought to have removed was not libellous or defamatory, it was merely historical, even if somewhat uncomfortable for the man in question.

Shooting the messenger

Indeed the ruling does not require the paper to destroy such records or articles, only that Google should not index and deliver search results. But herein lies the problem. Whilst Google, Bing and Yahoo might be obliged to comply, other search engines not doing business in Europe may simply ignore the ruling. Duck Duck Go, Russia's Yandex and China's Baidu could in theory still throw up links to the Spanish lawyer's financial past.

Even where search engines comply it has been likened to the removal of the name of a book within a library's database while the book itself remains on the shelf. Furthermore others have pointed out that Google is only doing what it and other search engines do, that of indexing the Internet and making it searchable. Meanwhile the party that was 'guilty' of producing the offending item is left alone.

Google is nonetheless reeling with at least 1,000 take-down requests having been made according to the Telegraph.

Setting precedents

There is another worrying aspect to the EU ruling. In essence a precedent has been set allowing someone to have data removed from the Internet they don't like, albeit by the fact it becomes unsearchable. While González is one individual whom few may have any real interest [until now], there may be many individuals and organisations who would like to have their data removed, feeling it too is "inadequate, irrelevant or no longer relevant".

Moving down this road could further lead the world into a dystopia envisaged by George Orwell. In his book 1984 he wrote of Memory Holes, a mechanism which allowed the alteration or disappearance of inconvenient or embarrassing documents, photographs, transcripts, or other records, such as from a web site or other archive, particularly as part of an attempt to give the impression that something never happened. Of course Orwell did not foresee the creation of the Internet, but its existence allows the removal of unwanted information much easier.

The scenario also conjures up Ray Bradbury's dark vision of the future from Fahrenheit 451 where all books are illegal and burned. With libraries disappearing and all information shifting to the ephemeral virtual space that is the Internet, there'll be no need to actually ban the books. Nonetheless the Index on Censorship claimed the ruling was a violation of "the fundamental principles of freedom of expression" and "akin to marching into a library and forcing it to pulp books." [IBTimes / Reason] Others have suggested it would be like destroying other indexing systems like Palmers Index which sought to catalogue and cross reference the back editions of The Times from 1790 to 1905 [CBC].

Censorship and Intranets

Another of those opposing the deletion of data is Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales who believes it is a slippery slope that could erode the Internet and lead to greater censorship. Describing the move as "astonishing" Wales said it was "one of the most wide-sweeping internet censorship rulings that I've ever seen" [BBC / IBTimes].

Meanwhile in the Guardian, journalist James Ball described the ruling as "either an eerie parallel with China's domestic censorship of search results, or a huge incentive for tech investment to get the hell out of Europe". Indeed China regularly deletes information deemed unfitting for its 'harmonious society'. Blog posts, tweets, and even news articles disappear into a memory hole. Indeed some information is never published in the first place, thus many in China are ignorant of the Tiananmen Massacre, the great famine in which millions died during the Great Leap Forward, or the destruction of history during the Cultural Revolution.

In addition China also blocks and censors any foreign website that doesn't toe the line. Thus YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, the New York Times and Bloomberg are just some of many platforms which cannot be accessed in the Middle Kingdom.

But what of this ruling. Would companies decide to shift out of Europe in order to avoid having to comply with a mountain of similar complaints. And if they did would such sites be blocked in a China like censorship sweep. Following the revelations over NSA snooping Germany's Angela Merkel has herself talked of a separate European Internet [FT].

Whatever happens as the issue unfurls, it will be painful and confusing for all concerned [NYT / Business Week]

Irony

There is an irony in all this for Mario González. His attempt to delete history and wipe away the past has instead rekindled it. More has now been written about González' past financial history than was ever mentioned previously. Le Vangaudia, can still display the webpage concerned, and while Google may not index it , the link will doubtlessly be posted in many places on the Internet. Indeed the Guardian reprinted the offending article itself on its own webpage.

tvnewswatch, London, UK

China on verge of a War on Terror

At least 6 people have been injured following a knife attack at a railway station in Guangzhou, China. The attack has raised concerns that China is experiencing its own War on Terror.

It was not immediately clear how many people were involved in the attack, but one person was shot and then detained by police. One shopkeeper who witnessed the attack said the perpetrators had sat on steps outside the station for two hours before, at 11am, letting out a shout and launching their attack on passengers with half metre long knives.

Chinese state run media reported that police gunned down one of the attackers, captured a second and said two attackers were still at large. Some reports say the men were wearing "white hats", though it is not clear whether these were taqiyah or kufi often worn by Muslims.

Spate of attacks

And while there was no information on the motivation for the attack, it comes a week after an attack at a station in Urumqi, in the western region in Xinjiang [BBC / Reuters]. At least 3 people were killed and 79 injured after a believed suicide bomber detonated a device [CNN / Daily Mail].

It also follows an attack at Kunming station in March that killed 29 people [Wikipedia / tvnewswatch: Kunming terror attacks leave dozens dead many injured] and a terror attack in October 2013 when a four wheel drive vehicle was deliberately driven into a crowd in Tiananmen Square before bursting into flames [Wikipedia].

Chinese authorities have blamed both these attacks on separatists from the Uighur minority group, which lives in Xinjiang [BBC / VoA / Daily Mail]. China's leaders have vowed to tackle the terrorists head on with president Xi Jinping promising "decisive action" [Xinhua].

However, China may be facing only the beginning of what could become its War on Terror [Wikipedia]. It is a war that may be difficult to win [FT]. The roots of separatist violence goes back many years and there is deeply ingrained suspicions and hostility on both sides [CFR / Foreign Affairs].

Growing backlash

Many Uighurs complain that their language and religion are routinely suppressed. As in Tibet, another restive autonomous region, Beijing has practised a policy of assimilation, flooding Xinjiang with Han Chinese who now comprise 40% of the population.

And while the attacks have been perpetrated by a minority there is a danger that resentment and suspicions will increase tensions. The People's Daily has sensibly called for people to remain calm and not to retaliate. "Don't turn your anger for the terrorists into hostility toward an ethnic group," the paper said.

But there are signs that the situation on the ground is very different. tvnewswatch has learned that students in the middle of their studies were ordered to return to Xinjiang from Yunnan after the Kunming attack.  Uighurs say they are being refused reservations in hotels when they travel outside Xinjiang and recently the district police in Guangxi province, which borders Yunnan, warned, "If anyone discovers people from Xinjiang living, doing business or travelling here, please immediately report them." [NYT Sinosphere].

tvnewswatch, London, UK

Max Clifford jailed for 8 years for sex assaults

Defiant to the end the so-called 'King of Spin' Max Clifford was last night spending his first night in prison after being sentenced to 8 years for indecently assaulting a number of girls and women in what some say would be considered rape should the offences have taken place today [BBC].

No apology

After being found guilty the shamed publicist admitted it was "not the best day" of his life but refused to offer any form of apology to the victims.

Before entering court he merely said that he stood by his previous statements that his accusers were "fantasists" and "liars". Talking to Sky's Tom Parmenter the former PR guru said, "I stand by everything I've said in the past - everything."

Lost everything

For the 71 year old who had everything he will likely lose it all. His high-profile PR business is set to close and he may also find himself without his wife of four years. Last night there was speculation that wife Jo Clifford, formerly Jo Westwood, may file for divorce.

According to the Daily Mail his wife had not been seen sporting her wedding ring and was 'very, very angry" over the whole affair. One friend told the paper she was "just waiting for guilty verdicts and then she's going to divorce him for everything he's got."

Max Clifford's wife had spent the trial well away from the courtroom rather than playing the dutiful wife and standing by her man. However she has declined to comment on the rumours or suggestions she has spoken to top London divorce lawyer Raymond Tooth.

A former PA for the publicist they married in April 2010, seven years after the death of Clifford's first wife, Liz.

Cheers

Clifford's sentencing was cheered not only by his victims in court but by many outside the courtroom who had faced humiliation and embarrassment by the 'King of Spin'.

Former Conservative minister David Mellor said he "exults" in Max Clifford's jailing saying the disgraced PR guru "delighted in humiliating his victims".

Mellor had been one of those victims after Clifford brokered deals with tabloids for kiss-and-tell stories with Antonia de Sancha who reveal details about an affair with the minister. Speaking of the jailing Mellor told the Daily Telegraph it showed "there is a God".

Even those who bought his stories had few good words for the man. Former editor of the Sun newspaper Kelvin MacKenzie described Clifford as a "vile individual" when speaking on the BBC's Any Questions. Despite having bought stories from him and having known him some 30 years added that one "couldn't find anybody who has a good word to say about Max Clifford."

Long fall

Life will now be very different for the man who arguably ruined hundreds of people's lives in order to feather his lavish lifestyle. He will leave behind his large house in  a private road in Hersham for a small prison cell. He will say goodbye to his outdoor heated swimming pool where he used to swim daily, though he may have access to a gym. And of course he'll have no housekeeper as such, indeed he might find himself to be someone else's bitch if prison life is all it's rumoured to be.

For someone who played with and controlled so many people's lives, Clifford has fallen off a very tall cliff indeed. And he's certainly come down with a bump [Guardian / Independent].

tvnewswatch, London, UK

Fire Sale threat from XP, Heartbleed & IE bugs

Only weeks after the Heartbleed bug was discovered and Microsoft stopped support for Windows XP another major security issue has been revealed which may further compound problems for Internet users. The issue is so serious that some have suggested these security holes could allow hackers to initiate a 'Fire Sale' cyberattack.

Microsoft security holes

On Saturday 26th April Microsoft reported that a security hole existed in all versions of Internet Explorer from version 6 through to 11. The issue has been deemed so serious that the US and UK governments issued an unprecedented advisory saying that people avoid using the browser until the hole is patch and instead use Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox of Apple's Safari browser [Daily Mail / Washington Post / CNET].

Microsoft said it was already aware of "limited, targeted attacks" to exploit the security flaw which could enable hackers to gain access and user rights to a computer [BBC]. This could allow hackers to obtain passwords, remove and syphon off user date or insert malware and turn the PC into a botnet.

The discovery is significant given the huge number of people still using the browser. Estimates for Internet Explorer's overall market share range from 27.4% to 54.13%, as of October 2012.

No support for XP

The discovery is all the more worrying given the exploit appears to have been present for at least 12 years since it exists in version 6 of the browser. Furthermore, whilst Microsoft will eventually issue a patch there will be a great many users who will not receive it. Anyone still using Windows XP will not receive any support for their operating system and that includes security updates for Microsoft products such as Internet Explorer.

Again estimates vary, but there are still a significant number of people who continue to use Windows XP. The operating system, originally released in 2001, is still used by many government organisations who have failed to upgrade, often due to cost implications. Windows XP is also used in many ATMs, and while those systems could also be vulnerable to hackers most are in closed systems [ZDNet / Bloomberg / ZDNet].

China threat

While individual users can mitigate risk by using a different browser and operating system, the risks come from those who fail to update their systems. China in particular is a case in point. Windows XP is estimated to run on almost 70% of China's computers, while it's only used by 27% by the rest of the world. And while some security firms such as Qihoo 360 have taken on the task to update users not everybody will receive updates [CIO / EcumenicalNews].

China's users of Windows XP must of course register for the product. However many of China's computer users do not have legitimate products and there is a poor understanding of the importance of updating operating systems and software. According to Microsoft 90% of their software used in China, including Windows XP, is pirated meaning most computers have never been updated & are ripe for exploitation [Engadget].

As such millions of users in China could find their computers being taken over and used for malicious purposes. According to one top white-hat hacker, James Forshaw, a vulnerability researcher for Context Information Security, unsupported Windows XP machines in China could pose a threat to the Internet in general if bot-herders round up significant numbers of them to use as launch pads for malicious exploits [NetworkWorld]. This could spell disaster for millions of people not only in China but around the world.

Security

The problem lies in the fact that most people do not take computer and Internet security seriously enough. While one individual may increase their own layers of security such as installing timely operating system updates, running anti-virus software such as Norton or McAfee, and using password managers, others both in professional and non-professional quarters do not.

Thus data shared between one individual and another might not be secure if the third party has failed to take care of their own security. Even if you don't do Internet banking, the data held on some social networking sites could still be useful to criminals. And while one individual might keep their password safe and secure, another user and 'friend' might not. Following Heartbleed many people failed to update their passwords for compromised services which included Facebook amongst others. Thus a hacker, taking advantage of the Heartbleed bug, could potentially access some users' accounts and use that access to create phishing attacks or sift for information about others.

Patching holes

More worrying is where banking or financial institutions continue to use systems that are vulnerable. For example there are suggestions that Windows XP can put SOX, HIPAA and credit card security-compliance at risk [NetworkWorld].

Some firms and governments have paid Microsoft for continued updates. The British government, for example, has paid the software giant £5.5 million for continued support for one more year [Guardian / Telegraph]. The Dutch government has also paid Microsoft to keep its systems updated [ZDNet]. However these measures are merely a stop-gap and will not address the issue in the long term.

Lack of information

Indeed the publicity and understanding of a security threat can be a major factor in mitigating such security threats. Given the number of people potentially affected by the ending of support for Windows XP, the Heartbleed Bug and the security holes in Internet Explorer, the reportage has been relatively scant. Many companies failed to inform their users and information outside tech websites was often confused and contradictory.

'Fire Sale'

Of course Ukraine, the Korean ferry disaster and European elections are important issues. but the recent security issues are arguably far more significant. Indeed some have suggested these recent holes and exploits could lead to a 'Fire Sale', a term used to describe a hypothetical attack by computer hackers on vital networks [Wired].

The term 'Fire Sale' was first coined in the Die Hard movie "Live Free or Die Hard" in which hackers attempted a cyberwarfare attack that performed a three-stage systematic attack on the United States' computer infrastructure.

The film may well have been fiction, but the shocking truth is that the world's computer systems are vulnerable to attack and common flaws make such attacks easier and more likely.

tvnewswatch, London, UK

Rumours fly after Google+ chief Vic Gundotra quits

There has been wild rumours and speculation after Vic Gundotra announced he was to step down and leave Google for pastures new [BBC].

Gundotra was the main driving force behind Google's social network Google+, and his leaving the company has driven speculation that the search giant may consign the platform to the scrap heap.

The main source for such rumours came from the website TechCrunch which described Google+ as the "Walking Dead" and suggested it would "no longer be considered a product, but a platform" and thus "ending its competition with other social networks like Facebook and Twitter."

Despite the article being widely quoted and shared on social networks, many have dismissed the suggestions.

One prominent voice was Yonatan Zunger, Google+'s Chief Architect, who said the information contained in the TechCrunch article was "BS" [bullshit].

"The TechCrunch article is BS," Zunger said, "Google+ isn't going anywhere, I can promise you."

Killing redundant products

Of course, anyone using Google+ may well have been justifiably concerned that their favourite social network might be consigned to history. Google has "retired" many of its products that it has deemed "redundant".

In the past few years Google has closed countless services which it said had lacked take-up. In 2011 Google dropped property search within its Maps citing lack of use. Google Desktop was also retired the same year and Google Health was shutdown in early 2012. Google Wave's retirement became one of the most talked about closure, especially given the huge publicity surrounding its launch.

Google Wave which started life in 2009 was hung out to dry within 3 months of its public release in May 2010 and by 2012 had been closed down altogether.

Google+ launch

Launched in 2011 Google+ provides a stream of content such as photos and status updates that its users post for their friends. Its original selling points included a way to create groups of contacts, or "circles," to share more specific types of information. Another is Hangouts, a popular messaging tool that enables group video chat.

The sharing of photos is a key part of the platform. Video & pictures may be set to automatically upload from a user's mobile device or even added to Google+ photos from Google Drive. Thereafter a user may select these to share with individuals, circles or even to an email address of a person not yet on Google+. And in recent months Google has added what it calls Google Awesome where automated algorithms put together movies or animated Gifs which may be shared.

Google+ has also been integrated into the sign-in procedure of Google's various services, including Gmail, YouTube and Google Play. Using a single login and password users are obliged to use their real name which also appears on any reviews or comments they post on Google platforms, an effort to reduce spamming and abusive behaviour.

While Google has received some criticism for some of its changes in log-in procedures and real name policies, the social network has grown significantly with a supposed 540 million active users, though remains far smaller than Facebook which claims more than 802 million [WSJ / The Register].

Trust

Killing the social network could prove to be suicidal for Google. While not as popular as Facebook and Twitter, Google+ has gained a large number of loyal users who would be disappointed and angry should the search giant decide to shut the service down.

Its closure would also reduce trust in the company. People would justifiably be concerned about the safety of other services such as Google Drive or GMail.

Certainly Google+ might change from its form, but it is unlikely to be killed off. It must also be noted that one of the authors of the TechCrunch article, Alexia Tsotsis, owns shares in Facebook, Yahoo!, and Twitter, while the other, Matthew Panzarino, is described in his TechCrunch bio as "relentlessly covering Apple and Twitter." Of course this does not explain their information or sources, but it could be partly why they closed the article by comparing Google+ to an "unwelcome hairy spider" whose integration is a form of "grating party crashing." And according to one blog it draws their credibility into question.

TechCrunch has based much of its assertions on anonymous sources which say that staff are being reshuffled. But reassignment is hardly proof of anything in a company which is in constant flux and redevelopment.

Angry beehive

While not completely dismissing the TechCrunch article other tech websites have asserted that Google+ still has a place, providing a particular niche for certain individuals.    

Mashable describes the social network as an "angry beehive" of enthusiastic users. The types of user also tend to be different, often more involved in technology and specialised interests, and according to Mashable's Chris Taylor, a little bit "weird". Indeed there has been an angry response from many users at the suggestion that Google+ could shut shop.

For its part Google has denied the rumours and meanwhile stated that Google+ Vice President of Engineering David Besbris will take command of Google+ [CNET]. The speculation may well continue, but for now the safety and future of the social network is assured.

As for Vic Gundotra, he has only praise for the company he is leaving but left no clue as to where he is heading next, something that is also open to speculation.

tvnewswatch, London, UK

Heartbleed bug gives Internet users massive headache

This week Microsoft ended its support of Windows XP meaning that that up to 25% of Windows users in the world could be vulnerable to increased attacks by hackers. While serious this was nothing compared to the reports that OpenSSL, which is meant to encrypt communications between a user's computer and a web server, had bugs.

Discovery of bug

The bug was independently discovered by a team of security engineers at Codenomicon and Neel Mehta of Google Security, who first reported it to the OpenSSL team. Codenomicon team found the Heartbleed bug while improving the SafeGuard feature in Codenomicon's Defensics security testing tools and reported this bug to the NCSC-FI for vulnerability coordination and reporting to OpenSSL team.

Given the name Heartbleed by the Codenomicon team, it was deemed "a serious vulnerability in the popular OpenSSL cryptographic software library".

This weakness allows stealing the information protected, under normal conditions, by the SSL/TLS encryption used to secure the Internet, the team said. SSL/TLS provides communication security and privacy over the Internet for applications such as web, email, instant messaging (IM) and some virtual private networks (VPNs), the team added, on a special website set up following its discovery.

Catastrophic

Dubbed "the biggest security issues that's faced the Internet to date" by some commentators, others described it as even more serious. Bruce Schneier, an American cryptographer, computer security and privacy specialist, said the discovery was "catastrophic" on his blog.

The bug is not only serious in relation to security but also serves as a wake-up call to how security and passwords are handled both by users and the language of the Internet.

Users have been constantly encouraged to use both strong passwords and individual passwords for every website. Furthermore individuals are encouraged to change passwords frequently. However, even those who might have followed such advice would still have been vulnerable to the so-called Heartbleed bug since it had remained undiscovered for at least two years. This would have made it possible for any group or individual with knowledge of its existence to harvest information from users of websites where OpenSSL was employed.

NSA & espionage

In fact some have suggested that this may have been behind the NSA's supposed ability to monitor individuals' Google or Facebook accounts. Although the NSA could have used the Heartbleed vulnerability to obtain usernames and passwords, as well as so-called session cookies to access online accounts, this would have only allowed them to hijack specific accounts whose data they obtained. For the NSA and other spies, the real value in the vulnerability lies in the private keys used for SSL that it may allow attackers to obtain [Wired / EFF].

Cracking SSL to decrypt Internet traffic has long been on the NSA's wish list and according to the Guardian, in an article published in September 2013, the NSA and Britain's GCHQ had "successfully cracked" much of the online encryption Internet users rely on to secure email and other sensitive transactions and data.

Schneier is one of many who have questioned how such a major issue could have been included in the OpenSSL technology, and suggested that, within the context of the PRISM scandal, intelligence agencies may have played a part. "At this point, the odds are close to one that every target has had its private keys extracted by multiple intelligence agencies," he said.

"The real question is whether or not someone deliberately inserted this bug into OpenSSL and has had two years of unfettered access to everything."

Some of the concerns as regards NSA snooping pre-dates the existence of Heartbleed. Nonetheless, the discovery of Heartbleed raises the issue concerning Internet security and privacy once again.

Reporting & advice

Following its discovery on Friday 4th April, Google immediately patched the gaping security hole, as did other tech companies that were made aware of it before it was finally made public on Monday 7th. Even then news leaked out slowly and with much confusion over what people should do. On Tuesday 8th April the BBC reported the vulnerability but gave no clear advice as to what users might do to remain safe online. Indeed even the BBC later reported the whole issue had brought nothing but confusion. 

Other websites were more forthright and suggested Internet users change all their passwords. Time ran with just such a headline and Tumblr, the photosharing website now owned by Yahoo, suggested users take the day off and revise their password list.

"This might be a good day to call in sick and take some time to change your passwords everywhere — especially your high-security services like email, file storage, and banking, which may have been compromised by this bug," Tumblr wrote on an online post.

Bad advice

Whilst such suggestions seemed good advice on the face of it, following through could have left some people even more exposed than they were already. Should a website or server not made appropriate changes and updated certificates and patches, Internet users may, by changing their password pass this on to third parties. Indeed given the vulnerability was now public there would be a far stronger chance that vulnerable websites would be targeted by hackers looking for such data.

In fact the best advice was in fact to sit back a little and wait. Users were correctly advised by some news outlets to check to see whether a website was vulnerable, and whether it had carried out the necessary updates. Only then should users change passwords.

The Heartbleed website itself helped by providing a tool in order to identify affected sites.

Other independent technology websites helped out by providing lists of affected sites and others which were not. Mashable provided a useful list and some advice alongside, while Github also published an extensive list of vulnerable websites [as of 8th April]. Mainstream media reports were however scant on detail. For example ABC cited only a handful of well known tech companies such as Google, Facebook and Yahoo.

The general advice now was that people should change passwords, with the caveat that the site be checked to see that it had patched the security holes. On Wednesday 8th April the BBC reported that both "tech firms" and "security advisors" were urging people to change all their passwords, advice that was repeated on other news outlets throughout the week [Daily Mail].

But other reports in other media suggested the opposite. On the same day the Guardian wrote that "security experts" were warning people not to update passwords.

Confused reports

But what of the tech firms, banks and websites themselves? It appeared they were just as clueless, confused or simply remained silent over the whole issue.

Few sent emails or posted messages on their websites concerning the bug and as to what their users might do.

Indeed given the possibility that even banks might have been affected there might well have been a sense of panic from many uses of online banking systems. Yet banks were either evasive or non committal.

When contacted by the Daily Mail on the 9th April many of Britain's major banks would not comment on whether passwords should be changed. The HSBC said they were 'monitoring' the situation and a Lloyds spokesman said they would not comment on security issues.

Yet in an article published in the Daily Mirror it reported that Lloyds, NatWest and the Royal Bank of Scotland had said their websites were not vulnerable to attack. On the other side of the Atlantic there was just as much confusion. CBC reported that banks weren't at risk but CNN said they could not verify whether American Express and a number of other financial companies were vulnerable. By Thursday the Telegraph provided some clarification in its list which showed UK banks were unaffected

Meanwhile no major banking organisation made any public statement to their users through their websites, email or letter.

In truth, even if vulnerable to the OpenSSL bug most banks have a second layer of security such as the use of special USB sticks, electronic keypads or interfaces within pages which evade keylogging viruses. Nonetheless the absence of information has left some people who use the Internet confused and worried.

Outside of banking there are things that may also have helped prevent third parties accessing data such as 2-step-verification as used by Google and others. Essentially this requires a mobile phone to which special codes are sent in order to log-in at an unfamiliar location or computer.

No-one safe

Such methods can certainly help to protect users but as Reuters reported on Wednesday there is little most people can do to protect themselves from such bugs.

With OpenSSL used on about two-thirds of all web servers there is much patching to be done. To look at it another way it affects more than 60% of the world's websites and some half a million servers. This will be difficult for the millions of websites and companies involved [PCWorld]. In the meantime hackers will be attempting to exploit the remaining open holes.

And with the cat out of the bag, and with many sites still unpatched it is open season for hackers and phishers. Kurt Baumgartner, a researcher with security software maker Kaspersky Lab, told Reuters his firm uncovered evidence Monday that a few hacking groups believed to be involved in state-sponsored cyber espionage were running scans shortly after news of the bug first surfaced on Monday.

By Tuesday, Kaspersky had identified scans coming from "tens" of actors, and the number increased on Wednesday after Rapid7 released a free tool for conducting such scans. "The problem is insidious," Baumgartner said. "Now it is amateur hour. Everybody is doing it."

The risks go further with Kaspersky Lab's Baumgartner saying that devices besides servers could be vulnerable to attacks because they run software programs with vulnerable OpenSSL code built into them.

Others affected

They include versions of Cisco Systems Inc's AnyConnect for iOS and Desktop Collaboration, Tor, OpenVPN and Viscosity from Spark Labs. The developers of those programs should have either updated their software or published directions for users on how to mitigate potential attacks.

Indeed many have already addressed the issue though many users of such services did not get an update emailed to them [VPNspblog]. Instead updates were often posted on social media such as one by 12VPN on Twitter which stated that their webservers were patched and their VPN methods were not affected. As such many users may well have missed this important message.

Problems were further compounded when Cisco and Juniper revealed their server equipment was also affected by Heartbleed [WSJ]. And while the average user of Facebook of Google changed their passwords, the issues surrounding Cisco and Juniper equipment could be time consuming. According to Jaime Blasco, director of AlienVault Labs, part of AlienVault LLC, it will take longer to fix networking equipment and software because Cisco and Juniper will have to rely on customers applying the patches they push out. "It's more painful to update these kinds of devices," Blasco said. "You have to go one by one." [Business Week]

Juniper and Cisco equipment is widely used around the world including China where it has been employed in the so-called Great Firewall of China. It is unclear if China's censorship machine was or will be affected, but websites across China were in just as much as a panic as the rest of the world to patch up the security holes.

Hackers exploit bug

On Thursday both Xinhua and the People's Daily reported that major websites were "taking steps" to mitigate problems. The People's Daily also said there were signs that some hackers had already taken advantage of the flaw, but did not elaborate further. And according to Wang Minghua with the National Computer Network Emergency Response Technical Team Coordination Center, "a surge in such attacks could be expected soon". The US have also issued warnings saying hackers are already exploiting the bug [BBC]. 

All this was surely enough to give anyone potentially affected by Heartbleed a severe headache. The damage may turn out to be small, but as the Guardian this week discussed, there is a risk such flaws could reoccur in the future. With programmer Robin Seggelmann, who wrote the code for the part of OpenSSL that led to Heartbleed, saying it was an accident, the risk of a human error recurring is a sure bet [Mashable].

tvnewswatch, London, UK

MH370: "Criminal" investigation begins, search widens

Theories on what caused Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 to deviate from its intended flight path from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing have shifted focus with pilot suicide, terrorism & even cyber-hijack cited as possibilities. Meanwhile the search for the missing plane has widened to an area stretching several hundred kilometres and across several countries.

After a week of searching for the missing Boeing 777-200ER new data emerged that confirmed the plane had turned back, headed west and then turned either north or south, travelling for several hours before data was lost.

Investigators are now convinced that someone on the aircraft deliberately took control and flew it on a different route.

Chronology of events

Soon after flight MH370 took off from Kuala Lumpur International Airport the ACARS transmitter was switched off or otherwise disabled. ACARS is used to send various types of data, such as information relating to fuel consumption, engine performance data, aircraft position and occasionally text style messages. The switching off of this data stream may have been overlooked by Malaysian Air Traffic Control however since they raised no concerns and later made the routine call to the plane when it was about to enter Vietnamese airspace.

On being informed to contact Ho Chi Minh ATC in Vietnam there was only the simple audio message response, “All right, roger that” [BBC].
[Note that some media have also reported the pilot returned a response as, “All right, goodnight”] / Timeline: BBC / Washington Post

Deviated

What has now become clear, from studying military radar data, is that the plane made a counter-clockwise turn and headed west back across Malaysia.

Then on Saturday, one week after the disappearance of the Boeing plane, it was revealed that a satellite belonging to Inmarsat had picked up a ‘ping’ from the aircraft [Inmarsat - Press Release].

Analysts had studied this new data and extrapolated the possible route that the plane may have followed. Given only one satellite had picked up the plane, triangulation was not possible. Thus investigators could only determine the plane’s possible trajectory as being within one of two arcs that extended several hundred kilometres.

One one possible route the plane would have headed was south across the Indian Ocean with no possible landing place. The other route would have taken the plane across India, China, and as far north as Kazakhstan.

While the route was approximate, data showed the plane was in the air for several hours, though it has not emerged for exactly how long.

Control

From the newly uncovered data, investigators were now convinced that someone in the cockpit took control of the aircraft. The question was who and why?

Suspicions have focused firstly on the pilots. Plain-clothes detectives have searched the homes of both the captain, 53-year-old Zaharie Ahmad Shah, and co-pilot, 27-year-old Fariq Abdul Hamid.

Neither had, according to authorities, made a request to fly together, something that had been speculated by some media reports. There was some concern expressed by reports that the captain had an elaborate flight simulator installed at his home.

Malaysia's Transport Ministry confirmed that they were examining the flight simulator taken from his home, but did not elaborate further.

Neighbours, speaking to CNN, were sceptical of any suggestion Captain Shah would have endangered his own aircraft or its passengers and said the media were making too many assumptions of his owning a flight simulator.

There are suggestions too that the captain was political fanatic and an ‘obsessive’ supporter of Malaysia’s opposition leader, Anwar Ibrahim [BBC - Profile / Daily Mail].

Possible hijacking

The speed at which ACARS and the transponder were switched off has prompted many investigators to dismiss the possibility of a hijacking.

Flight MH370 departed from Kuala Lumpur International Airport at 00:41 on Saturday [16:41 GMT Friday], and was due to arrive in Beijing at 06:30 [22:30 GMT].

Malaysia Airlines says the plane lost contact at 01:30 [17:30 GMT] 49 minutes after takeoff. However ACARS had been switched off shortly after the aircraft had reached its cruising height of 35 feet at 01:01 [17:01 GMT].

Only on reaching cruising height would seatbelt signs be switched off. Thus terrorists or hijackers would have only a small window in which to launch an attack on the cockpit.

Nonetheless, minutes may be all that was needed.

Terrorism

The possibility of a terrorist attack is raised in several reports. The Sunday Telegraph reported that there was a possible plot being investigated after an Al-Qaeda supergrass told a court that four or five Malaysian men had planned to hijack a passenger airliner.

Giving evidence at the trial in New York of Sulaiman Abu Ghaith, Osama bin Laden’s son-in-law, Saajid Badat, a British-born Muslim from Gloucester, said that he had been instructed at a terrorist training camp in Afghanistan to give a shoe bomb to some Malaysian terrorists. “I gave one of my shoes to the Malaysians. I think it was to access the cockpit,” Badat said.

Badat, who spoke via video link and is in hiding in the UK, said the Malaysian plot was being masterminded by Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, said to be the principal architect of 9/11. The reports have certainly refocused the media spotlight on Al-Qaeda [News.com.au].

Motives

Should terrorists have taken control of Malaysian Airlines flight MH370 there surely must have been a motive.

Several media reports point their suspicions to Uyghur separatists. Indeed such theories do have some credence.

Reuters this week reported that Uyghur rebel Abdullah Mansour had said he was intent on bringing a Holy Fight to China because of its treatment of Muslims in the country.

Speaking from an undisclosed location Pakistan Mansour said, “The fight against China is our Islamic responsibility and we have to fulfil it.”

Interestingly if the plane had turned west from the South China Sea and then turned north-west towards Kazakhstan, it would have taken a direct path over Xinjiang, the Uyghur heartland.

In the Reuter’s report, Mansour said attacking China was the duty of not only his party, but all Muslims. And while he made no mention of the missing Malaysian Airlines plane or a recent terror attack in Kunming, Mansour said there were many operations being planned.

“We have plans for many attacks [against] China,” he told Reuters. “We have a message to China that East Turkestan people and other Muslims have woken up. They cannot suppress us and Islam any more. Muslims will take revenge.”

The Turkestan Islamic Party, which China equates with the East Turkestan Islamic Movement [ETIM], keeps a low profile in Pakistan. Unlike the Taliban, it almost never posts videos promoting its activities or ideology. Its exact size is unknown and some experts dispute its ability to orchestrate attacks in China, or that it exists at all as a cohesive group [Reuters / Guardian Liberty Voice / EuroNews / News.com.au / Daily Mail].

Cyber-hijack

Aside of the obvious theories of a pilot suicide or conventional hijack there has also been the suggestion MH370 was the victim of the first cyber-hijack. Several Sunday newspapers reported that the plane might have been controlled from the ground or even on board the aircraft using something as simple as a mobile phone [CNN].

“It might well be the world’s first cyber hijack,” British anti-terror expert Dr Sally Leivesley said.

Dr Leivesley, a former Home Office scientific adviser, said the hackers could have changed the plane’s speed, altitude and direction by sending radio signals to its flight management system. It could then be landed or made to crash by remote control.

Again both the theory and motive are highly speculative with possible perpetrators cited as being criminal gangs, terrorists or a even a foreign power [Express / Daily Mail].

Wider search

With the search now expanded across a vast stretch of ocean and several countries the hunt for flight MH370 has become all the more complicated.

Many of the countries that the plane may have crossed are particularly sensitive about revealing their defence capabilities. Indeed Indonesia said on Sunday that it would have to take requests for military radar data under advisement though it said it would launch land searches.

Even where countries are prepared to release data this may reveal little. Vast regions are not covered by radar or, according to some reports, operate on an “as needed” basis.

The search now involves 25 countries, from the previous 14 engaged in the multi-national effort. Planes will have to seek special permission to search some territories which may further delay efforts in finding the missing aircraft.

Mystery

What remains a mystery is where the plane might be. Did it crash after running out of fuel? Did the hijackers or pilots land at a remote airfield and if so what has become of the 12 crew members and 227 passengers on board?

If terror related there is the slim possibility they might be planning video executions such as seen throughout the Iraq War. In fact even FBI investigators say the disappearance of MH370 may have been ‘an act of piracy’ with the possibility that hundreds of passengers are being held at an unknown location not being ruled out.

A more likely possibility is a failed 9/11 style plot. However the apparent north-westerly route seems to dismiss this since there are no high profile targets along this trajectory.

If a pilot suicide, this would seem unlikely given the distance covered. Surely any such attempt to commit suicide and destroy the plane would have been conducted as soon as one had control of the aircraft.

A cyber-hijack in some ways makes the most sense. Should someone have taken absolute control of the plane, switching off communications, transponders and sending it on a new course, the pilots may have been unable to do anything but watch as their aircraft flew towards Kazakhstan before finally running out of fuel.

But what would be the purpose? If it was a cyber-hijack it could have been a test run. Finding out how far one could travel undetected or unchallenged. Indeed it does appear that the plane managed to fly without identifying itself for hundreds of kilometres whilst travelling through several countries’ airspace. The only alternative to it running out of fuel or landing is that MH370 was shot down and no country has admitted responsibility.

The shooting down of a civilian aircraft has happened a number of times in the past. There have been more than a dozen such incidents since 1970 many by fighter jets who have downed airliners for violating sovereign airspace and failed to respond to radio transmissions [Wikipedia: List of airliner shootdown incidents].

However much such theories fit, there will be no real way of knowing until the plane, whole or in part, is located.

tvnewswatch, London, UK

The mystery & tragedy of flight MH370

Mystery still surrounds the disappearance of flight MH370, a Boeing 777-200ER which went missing last Saturday [8/3/2014].

Disappeared

Flight MH370 had departed from Kuala Lumpur International Airport in Malaysia at 00:41 on Saturday local time [16:41 GMT Friday], and was due to arrive in Beijing at 06:30. But Air traffic controllers lost contact at 01:30, less than an hour into its flight.

Malaysian officials said that the last verbal communication with the plane came at the boundary between Malaysian and Vietnamese airspace. Malaysia's air traffic control informed the pilot that the flight was about to fly into Vietnamese airspace and told them to contact Ho Chi Minh control. "OK, roger that", was the last radio transmission.

Soon after the aircraft’s transponder went off and there were no further communications from the aircraft.

Terrorism theory

There have been countless theories as to what became of the plane with a strong focus on terrorism, a catastrophic structural failure or even pilot suicide.

Concerns were doubly raised when it was revealed that two passengers had boarded using stolen passports [Telegraph]. Later identified as two Iranians, Delvar Suyed Mohammad Reza & Pouria Nour Mohammad Mehrdad, their involvement in foul play was discounted since both individuals had arranged to meet up with relatives in Frankfurt, Germany.

Nonetheless some government agencies, including the CIA, said they had still not ruled out terrorism. Indeed there is some concern that coming on the heels of a terror attack in Kunming, Yunnan, China, only a week earlier, the disappearance of flight MH370 might have been a terror attack perpetrated by Uyghur separatists.

There is certainly anecdotal evidence supporting such theories. China has claimed several times to have thwarted terror attacks aimed at bringing down planes.

In June 2012 passengers subdued a person who tried to gain access to the cockpit of Tianjin Airlines Flight 7554 which was travelling between Hotan Airport to Urumqi, the regional capital of Xinjiang of Urumqi [ABC].

In 2008 Chinese state news agencies reported that a China Southern Airlines plane was forced to land because "some people were attempting to create an air disaster." The flight had taken off from Urumqi, the capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, and militants had attempted to hijack the plane but were foiled by the flight crew, according to officials. [CNN / LA Times].

Malaysia forcibly returned at least 11 Uyghurs on 6th August 2011. On the same day, the Thai government turned over an ethnic Uyghur, Nur Muhammed, to Chinese diplomats in Bangkok. And on 8th August, Pakistan deported five blindfolded and handcuffed Uyghurs, including a woman and two children, to China, media reports said. It is unclear whether these individuals had any connection to separatist activities, but such deportations certainly raise the finger of suspicion.

Structural failure

One main theory is that there was a catastrophic failure of the aircraft. An FAA [Federal Aviation Administration] had earlier approved an order asking that hundreds of 777s be checked for cracks and corrosion issues. The concern was that should these problems go undetected, they could potentially lead to decompression problems or a "loss of structural integrity of a plane", essentially resulting in a break-up mid-air [CNN].

A sudden depression in the cabin could have resulted in the pilots falling unconscious sending the plane well beyond the current search zone as it flew on autopilot before running out of fuel.

Malaysian authorities dismissed such possibilities saying the aircraft had been inspected in February and given an all-clear. The FAA warning also seemed to reject this possibility. The warning related to the fuselage skin underneath an adapter for the airplane's satellite communications antenna something that was not fitted on the 777-200ER Malaysia Airlines aircraft, and as such was not subject to the FAA order, Boeing said [Reuters].

Suicide

Another theory being discussed is pilot suicide, and there were suggestions that authorities had begun to investigate the backgrounds of the crew. However Malaysian officials denied they had searched the homes of the pilots. Meanwhile, police sources said they had questioned the pilot’s family and were investigating if there were any underlying mental or psychological issues [News.com.au / Daily Mail].

There have also been reports that the co-pilot at the controls of the missing Malaysia Airlines flight MH370 had invited a Melbourne tourist and her friend into the cockpit where he smoked, took photos and entertained the pair during a previous international flight. Fariq Abdul Hamid’s behaviour has certainly raised eyebrows, especially in a post-9/11 world where the integrity of the cockpit is now considered to be off limits to passengers on security and safety grounds [Guardian / News.com.au / Nine MSN]

Confused information

There has been much criticism, especially from China, concerning the information coming from Malaysian officials. Information has been sketchy, confused and contradictory at best.

There have been reports the plane turned back and that military radar had tracked the aircraft to the Malacca Strait, hundreds of kilometres to the west of its last reported position. But these reports were later quashed by another military spokesperson [NBC].

The confusion has resulted in searches being conducted in areas that may not have been necessary. But Malaysian authorities have defended their efforts. “This is a crisis situation... and a complex situation,” a spokesman said Thursday before adding, “We have not done anything to jeopardize this search effort”.

Extensive search

That search effort has been extensive and involved many nations. Much of the search has been conducted conventionally with the use of planes, boats and helicopters. Several nations have sent warships and aircraft to the areas where flight MH370 may have gone down but some 6 days after the plane disappeared there has been no sign of wreckage.

However there are many who believe that the search has been hindered by imprecise, incomplete, and sometimes inaccurate information which have raised doubts about the aircraft's possible location and trajectory.

The searches have also stretched to hi-tech methods. On Wednesday China released satellite images taken on Sunday morning, a full 24 hours after the Malaysian flight disappeared. However, soon after the pictures were posted to the State Administration for Science, Technology and Industry for National Defence (SASTIND) website, the portal became inaccessible for several hours.

Meanwhile news stations poured over the images and debated their veracity, the poor image quality and timing of their release. There were questions over whether the images truly showed wreckage of the missing Boeing 777-200ER. Given the dimensions of the supposed debris some commentators on CNN were sceptical that the images showed parts of an aircraft at all. The estimated size of one piece was 24 metres by 22 metres, too large to be a part of the plane.

There was also a debate over why it had taken more than three days for the Chinese to release the images and a discussion as to why the images were so fuzzy. There was some suggestion that the photographs had been deliberately doctored in order to hide China’s satellite capabilities.

There was a sense that the position of the supposed debris was correct given the last reported position of the aircraft and the prevailing currents. However, by Thursday China said they had released the images by mistake [BBC]. Furthermore, a search in the area concerned proved fruitless.

Crowd-sourcing

There have also been crowd-sourced searches for the missing plane. Digital Globe,  a commercial vendor of space imagery, set up a portal through which Internet users could browse through satellite photographs and mark objects which might show signs of the aircraft [Telegraph].

As well as satellites even the International Space Station has been employed, training cameras on the region, though sifting through all these images can take hundreds of man-hours and even then one could miss any potential evidence.

Wake-up call

While the cause of the disappearance of flight MH370 has yet to be established, the incident should serve as a wake-up call on a number of levels.

In respect to security, there has been a major failure in allowing two individuals to board the plane using stolen documents. These two men should have been stopped and apprehended upon their arrival at Kuala Lumpur airport. However, Malaysia failed to check the passports against a list maintained by Interpol. The number of names is significant, more than 39 million according to Interpol themselves. But the organisation said only a handful of nations, amongst them the UK, USA and UAE, bother even to check names and numbers on a routine basis.

Another concern is the issue surrounding flight data. The main problem surrounding the search for flight MH370 has been determining where it might have gone down. The problem might well have been made much easier should a constant stream of telemetry be broadcast as routine from international flights. While some modern aeroplanes are fitted with such equipment it is not mandatory.

There also needs to be better coordination between different agencies and countries. There have been several erroneous reports concerning what was transmitted from the aircraft and where it was last spotted either by its transponder or radar. Indeed this has led to confusion which may well have impeded search efforts.

Human tragedy

Almost forgotten in the fog of disinformation are the passengers of flight MH370.

There were 227 passengers, including 153 Chinese and 38 Malaysians, according to the manifest. Seven were children. All 12 crew members were Malaysian.

Families have expressed frustration at not receiving enough information and there have been angry scenes at daily press conferences in Beijing where relatives of the 153 Chinese on board the stricken plane have gathered.

In Australia too there have been criticisms coming from family members of seven passengers aboard the plane. The pain and anguish is likely to continue until evidence concerning the whereabouts of the Malaysian aircraft emerges.

Like Air France flight 447 it could take months if not years to find out what happened to the ill-fated flight of Malaysian Airline flight MH370 [BBC]. This delay and the not knowing will only make it harder for those who have lost their loved ones.


tvnewswatch, London, UK

Kunming terror attack leaves dozens dead

An attack on civilians at a train station in China has left at least 30 dead and more than 100 injured. It is the worst single terror attack, believed to have been carried out by Muslim separatists, China has seen in recent history.

The attack occurred at about 9:20 p.m. Beijing time, on Saturday 1st March, which saw at least ten attackers using long-bladed knives to stab and slash passengers.

According to initial reports about twenty had been killed, though the death toll swiftly rose to 33, amongst them four assailants who were said to have been shot by armed police.

State media said the attackers were Xinjiang militants, though there was no immediate claim of responsibility.

Escalation

The attack is an escalation of attacks believed to have been perpetrated by the Turkestan Islamic Party, sometimes referred to or linked with the East Turkestan Islamic Movement. The group, which has claimed responsibility for several attacks in the past, want independence from China.

Xinjiang has seen decades of tension with many people of Uyghur ethnicity having struggled to be an independent country.

A group of Uyghur separatists claim that the region, which they refer to as East Turkestan, is not legally a part of China, but was invaded by the PRC in 1949 and has since been under Chinese occupation. The separatist movement is led by Turkic Islamist militant organizations, most notably the East Turkestan independence movement, against the national government in Beijing.

The group have previously claimed responsibility for bomb attacks in Kunming in 2008 [tvnewswatch: Kunming hit by terror attack / tvnewswatch: Internet access blocked after Kunming attack / tvnewswatch: Islamic terrorism growing in China / tvnewswatch: Kunming bus bomber identified police say] and more recently an incident where a four wheel drive vehicle was deliberately driven into a crowd in Tiananmen Square in October last year [Wikipedia / BBC / SITE Intel Group].

China's 9/11

Given the seriousness of last week’s attack at Kunming station, some Chinese media referred to it as China’s 9/11. While the scale of the attack was much smaller, it was nonetheless significant in that it showed a rise in Islamic inspired terrorism.

The west has often itself been blamed by Chinese media for bringing about the 9/11 attacks through its foreign policy. Even amongst many Chinese there was a sense of excitement on seeing the Twin Towers being struck by planes and subsequently collapsing.

There were reports of people cheering while watching footage of the collapsing towers and some even let off fireworks. Donnie Wang, a project manager from Chongqing, who was 16 at the time, told the state run Global Times of his recollections. He spoke of the reactions of parents and teachers at his school when hearing the news. “Their jaws were flapping all the time and the burst of excitement was quite clear,” he said.

Of course there was a backdrop of resentment that had built over many years. Two years earlier, five American bombs had hit China’s embassy in Belgrade, killing three Chinese. And only months before the 9/11 attacks a US reconnaissance plane had collided with a Chinese fighter jet off the coast of Hainan, killing the Chinese pilot [See also: YouTube / Free Republic / SFGate].

A decade on, those who cheered the attack on America, in which more than 3,000 died, may well feel a sense of shame. Now China is feeling the wrath of Islamic extremists inspired by a similar ideology.

There can be no excuse for such attacks, though there may be some who will feel China has fuelled the fire by its oppression of the Uyghur people.

Reaction

Following 9/11 the Chinese President Jiang Zemin said he was "shocked" and sent his condolences to President Bush, while the Foreign Ministry said China "opposed all manner" of terrorism. And despite some Chinese having celebrated of the attacks, tens of thousands of people visited the US Embassy in Beijing, leaving flowers, cards, funeral wreaths and hand-written notes of condolence on the pavement.

They like many saw, that whatever the policy of the US government, the victims were innocent members of the public.

And so too of the terror attacks in Kunming and elsewhere. While the anger of the Xinjiang separatists might be directed towards the Chinese government, the victims have been ordinary Chinese people going about their everyday business.

Families have been torn apart, some left childless with several children reportedly amongst the victims. Others will be maimed for life, and few will fully understand the reason behind the attacks given how strictly controlled the media is in China. Indeed few will have any real knowledge about Xinjiang and the internal struggles that continue.

Censored news

In fact there will be many in China who may have missed the news of Kunming’s terror attack entirely. Whilst there was some coverage in the regional press with the Kunming Times carrying the story on its front page, for papers outside the region there was scant mention, if any, of the incident.

The Hong Kong based South China Morning Post reported that there was no mention of the attack in Beijing News, Beijing Times or Beijing Youth Daily, and the CCTV evening news did not report the attack. Where news stations did mention the attack it was only briefly referred to. Photos of the attack, many extremely graphic and taken by members of the public, were also swiftly deleted by censors from microblogs and social media.

English language media did report more extensively with the Global Times saying "a nationwide outrage has been stirred... [by] China's '9-11'" Hard to see how a whole nation was outraged, given many may well be oblivious to the attack.

Official response

While the media downplayed the attack, there were nonetheless statements issued by the CPC general secretary Xi Jinping and Premier Li Keqiang who assigned Meng Jianzhu, Secretary of the Central Politics and Law Commission to oversee the investigation. Meanwhile Lü Xinhua, spokesman for the second session of the National Committee of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference denounced the attack as a "serious violent terrorist attack [perpetrated by] terrorist elements from Xinjiang."

Abroad, the attack did make the news, though was much obscured by the growing tensions in the Ukraine.

Surprisingly, there were few public messages of condolence. The UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon strongly condemned the attack and expressed condolences to the bereaved families. Dilxat Rexit, a spokesman for the World Uighur Congress also condemned the attacks, saying he denounced "any form of violence", and urged the Chinese government to "ease systematic repression".

The French also released a statement expressing “solidarity” with the Chinese people, but that was about the extent of a world wide response.

Indeed, there was almost stony silence from the US, most European countries and others. Perhaps that says volumes for how some see the incident; a symptom and reaction to China’s brutal domestic policy.

More reports: Wikipedia / BBC / BBC / BBC/ Sky News / Guardian / Telegraph / Daily Mail / Mirror / FT / WSJ / LATimes / LATimes / China Smack (Graphic) / LiveLeak (Graphic)

tvnewswatch, London, UK