Not Being Clever

Today a business associate told me that he did not wish to speak about certain matters on the phone to me. He said, 'Mr Syed I am certain that your phone is bugged.' 

I wont be surprised if my phone is bugged. But I just dont know what anyone would get from listening in to my phone conversations or reading my smses. I only have two smses that I have not deleted. Here is one of them : "Sorry Sir, I will come in the afternoon tomorrow". To which I replied, "Ok tq". 

I have an easy way to overcome people bugging my phone. I just Blog it !! That way everyone can know what I am thinking. Ha ha ha. 

Last nite I was watching Zero Dark Thirty - a movie about the CIA woman who tracked down Osama bin Laden. I think that woman is a fake too. Anyway in the movie they are able to track down the location of any cellular phone anywhere in the world. This part is real. 

Security agencies anywhere in the world can track cellular phones to within 10 metres of the person using it. And they can listen to your phone conversation. There is no way you can hide anything. Which I think is a very good thing. I am in full support of the ISA. 

However I am totally against significant portions of the Sedition Act. I think in the long run parts of the Sedition Act threaten the security of the nation. How? By keeping people stupid, feudalistic and feeble. Too many stupid, feudalistic and feeble minded people are very bad for the security of any country. Just look at all the Islamic countries who are in the Club of Doom. Are they populated by clever people or not so clever people? 

Deemed to insult "the royals" - sedition. 

Deemed to insult "the religion" - sedition. 

Deemed to question "imaginary unicorns" - sedition. 

These are all "thought" crimes. You did not commit any real crime. You just "thought' about something inside your head. Then you made your thoughts become known to the public - by writing an article, a Facebook posting, a Twitter message. Instantly it becomes sedition. Sikit-sikit sedition. Haprak betul.  Those parts of the Sedition Act are clearly designed to keep you in a mentally deficient state. That is why the Sedition Act is a threat to the security of the nation.  Khusus untuk memperbodohkan orang sahaja.

Back to the ISA, ordinary people like you and me do not need to worry about the ISA. We are the good guys.

But we do need the ISA. What if there is a suicide bomber ostat, religious fanatic or religious psycho plotting something bad in the country? Or the family of the Bossman's wife, children, children's close associates etc plotting to abscond with billions of our taxpayers' money? That is when you want the government machinery to be able to listen in to their phone conversations. Because in both cases the security of the nation is at stake. 

Or what if there is a low intelligence Cabinet Minister who decides to manipulate religious hatred for his personal political purposes?  I heard from Someone (directly face to face, not on the phone ha ha ha) that our boys in blue are absolutely not in favour of that low intelligence Cabinet Minister rising any higher up in the hierarchy. I think the boys in blue see him as a threat to the security of the nation.  These Ministers and crooks are the sort of people who should be watched closely by the ISA.

Back to the topic - many years ago a friend told me that there was a "British" researcher doing research at our Survey Department HQ in Jalan Semarak. The British "researcher" had access to all sorts of security information, including the load capacities of every single bridge in the country. (I think the Army was planning to buy tanks at that time.) 

The locals were just too excited to have an orang putih coming to their office every morning. They helped him access any information he wanted.

In the 90s when the very first private cellular phone was rolled out (Sapura's '017' Adam network) I was surprised to meet a "British expert" who was introduced to me as the "representative of MI6".  The guy became very uncomfortable when I asked him what exactly he did at Sapura? I think he was really from MI6.  On the other hand the happy go lucky Sapura boys were not concerned at all that a Mat Salleh telephone expert was party to the workings of the country's cellular network. (Try putting our telephone experts inside British Telecoms? Or inside SingTel. Get the picture?)

They wanted to penetrate our telephone network so that they can listen in to our phone calls at will.

Until not too long ago, the British Council used to be located right at the base of Bukit Aman - right below our Police Headquarters. The British Council has since moved. If they wanted to they could have easily "listened in" to Bukit Aman. Now it is much easier. They can listen to our telephone conversations from GCHQ in Cheltenham. Or Singapore. Do read on.

Then quite recently we read that America has been using Singapore to spy on Malaysia. Especially to tap our undersea phone cables. For those of you who are aware Singapore also tried to buy a share in Time Telekom, one of our undersea telephone cable operators. 

We came to know this from whistleblower Edward Snowden leaking such information to the public. Here is an interesting picture. But this is old technology.

This is an undersea cable tapping pod. This technology was shared between the US, UK, Australia, Canada and later their allies like Singapore.  This particular pod was attached by an American submarine onto a Russian undersea communication cable off the Kamchatka peninsula. 

Submarines, underwater RPVs (remotely piloted vehicles) and divers would be used to attach one of these devices (about the size of a Kancil car) to the hundreds of undersea communications cables that criss cross the world's oceans. 

I have been interested in this area of defense technology for some time. If you have nothing better to do with your life, you can read this very interesting book which has a detailed description of the "exciting world" of undersea cable tapping.

Here is something else for your Sunday reading pleasure. This is a map of the undersea communications cables in this part of the world. Also known as a 'submarine cable map'.

Note that almost every significant cable that straddles the South China Sea, the Western Pacific, the Straits of Malacca and into the Indian Ocean gets routed through Singapore. This is why Singapore has decided to throw in their lot to help the US and UK tap into all these submarine cables that are routed through the island. 

Not only is Singapore geographically well positioned but geo-politically they have also positioned themselves very well. 

My suggestion is NOT  to fight with Singapore. Lets work with them. We actually have common enemies. Wake up ok. Tapi jangan lah kasi dia masuk rumah kita tanpa perlu apa-apa jenis lesen pun. We have to be clever too.