Soviet Russia Bugged an American Embassy’s Typewriters | Hacker News Reader

Soviet Russia Bugged an American Embassy’s Typewriters

spectrum.ieee.org

41 pointsdocdeek16 comments

The Americans, in turn, bugged the Xerox copiers in the Soviet embassy [0]. The copier machines were so complex that even the Soviets bought them from Xerox, instead of trying to make their own clones.

Edit: this link [1] has more details about the story.

[0] https://www.p4photel.com/topic/at-the-height-of-the-cold-war...

[1] https://electricalstrategies.com/about/in-the-news/spies-in-...

What amazes me is that some of these schemes work.

Like a machine that copies official documents. How do you not EXPECT that to be bugged?

I remember reading somewhere that the Soviets _did_ suspect it, but finding the bug was non-trivial due to the mechanical complexity of the machines.

Another, more popular one: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Thing_(listening_device)

Great read.

I do wonder what procedures are now required to display foreign gifts in government buildings. I know its a common courtesy for heads of state to exchange gifts and a few of these get prominently displayed in very secure places.

Just one of many examples is the Resolute desk gifted by the British now sitting in the oval office.

I have a high security crosscut paper shredder that is better than class DIN 66399-2 P-7. I'm wondering: Are there any known cases of bugged paper shredders?

Time to pull out a screwdriver!

It feels like there should be, but nothing jumped out after searches.

On the face of it, a camera right before the blades works sorta make sense, but then you how do you account for multiple pages being shredded as one, be the lack of light, the extremely wide angle needed, and likely a myriad of things not mentioned.

If you find some, please share :)

More details & pictures: https://www.cryptomuseum.com/covert/bugs/selectric/

"This month [Dec.2019] marks the end of an era for IEEE Spectrum. This issue is the last in which Robert W. Lucky’s Reflections column will make a regular appearance."

A good thing coming to an end.

There's been a number of similar articles on HN about different ways the soviet spied on US. I wonder if anything is written about coldwar US spy tech

whilst maybe not entirely what you are after this should be at least somewhat related. https://cryptomuseum.com/covert/bugs/index.htm

Search for "Line X" and/or the Farewell Dossier. Not the truck liners, but disinformation campaign.

"Blind Man's Bluff"

https://www.amazon.com/Blind-Mans-Bluff-Submarine-Espionage/...

covered earlier: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21947924

Reply on news.ycombinator.com