<html><head></head><body><div class="ydpa280a817yahoo-style-wrap"><div id="ydpa280a817yiv6659108913"><div><div class="ydpa280a817yiv6659108913ydpd7f03159yahoo-style-wrap"><div id="ydpa280a817yiv6659108913ydpd7f03159yiv6919906224"><div><div class="ydpa280a817yiv6659108913ydpd7f03159yiv6919906224ydp4b18dd2cyahoo-style-wrap"><div id="ydpa280a817yiv6659108913ydpd7f03159yiv6919906224ydp4b18dd2cyiv1892623719"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif" style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span style="font-size:16px;">Listers, </span></font><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">US president Donald Trump recently triggered a debate about the (often overlooked) negative aspects of placing high/total reliance on modern, increasingly complex (and increasingly opaque), technology for safety-critical applications like aircrafts.</div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">Some food for thought... (disclaimer: below is shared for information and/or debate only, with respect to cybersecurity policy discussions):<div class="ydpa280a817yiv6659108913ydpd7f03159yiv6919906224ydp4b18dd2cyiv1892623719ydpbc574f04yahoo-style-wrap" style="font-family:Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif;font-size:16px;"></div></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">1. (*2018* article) "<b style="font-size:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-family:Roboto, sans-serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(83, 83, 83);background-color:rgb(246, 246, 246);">Boeing thinks that cyberattacks may be a real threat to flight safety and pilots should be trained to determine and withstand them."</b></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><b style="font-size:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-family:Roboto, sans-serif;vertical-align:baseline;color:rgb(83, 83, 83);background-color:rgb(246, 246, 246);"><br></b></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><span style="margin:0px;padding:0px;border:0px;font-stretch:inherit;line-height:inherit;vertical-align:baseline;background-color:rgb(246, 246, 246);"><font color="#535353" face="Roboto, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><b>https://airlinerwatch.com/boeing-wants-to-train-pilots-against-cyberattacks/</b></span></font><br></span></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;">2. In 2012 researchers reportedly discovered what appeared to be a deliberately engineered (i.e. possibly state mandated) security backdoor in *military grade* chips used for critical functions in aircrafts (e.g. boeing 787) and sensitive military equipment (e.g. drones). The backdoor could be ecploited by sophisticated (state sponsored) attackers to potentially take over sensitive equipment (like a commercial plane). The good intentions behind such backdoors includes anti-hijacking. But the unintended consequence is severely increased vulnerability (ironically to a different form of hijacking) that cannot be hot-fixed.</div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><br></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/military-grade-chips-may-not-be-as-secure-as-we/</span></font><br></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">3. "Five eyes" nations (US, UK, CA, AU, NZ) see themselves as the global "good guys" with infinite wisdom, and who should be allowed (and trusted, without independent oversight or international accountability) to hack any tech device/software for "good" reasons. So they agressively push their tech manufacturers to engineer security backdoors into systems (chips & software). </span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">Again, the unintended consequence, which makes (most) state mandated backdoors a terrible idea, is that there is no way to fully secure such backdoors against exploitation by the "bad guys" (e.g. competing states or organized criminal networks).</span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">Sadly, it means that "five eyes" origin technology (hardware and/or software) should always be considered *insecure by design*. Yet this is the tech most of Africa relies on for literally *everything*. Actually any non-indigenous technology should be considered insecure by default (a key reason to develop strategic indigenous technology capacity).</span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">Could also partially explain why some foreign govs seem to have so much high quality (near real time) information on Africa across all critical spheres (industrial, financial, political, security etc).</span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div><div><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size: 16px;">https://techcrunch.com/2018/09/03/five-eyes-governments-call-on-tech-giants-to-build-encryption-backdoors-or-else/amp/</span><br></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">The floor is open for comments / debate. :-)</span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">Good day.</span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">Patrick.</span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">Patrick A. M. Maina</span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;">[Cross Domain Innovator | Independent Public Policy Analyst - Indigenous Innovations]</span></font></div><div style="font-family: Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif; font-size: 16px;"><font face="Helvetica Neue, Helvetica, Arial, sans-serif"><span style="font-size:16px;"><br></span></font></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></body></html>