UK PM's Aide Loses BlackBerry In Chinese Honeytrap 260
longacre writes "The Times of London is today reporting a January incident in which a top aide to Prime Minister Gordon Brown discovered his BlackBerry missing from his hotel room after spending the night with an attractive woman who approached him in a Shanghai disco. Seems this was a run-of-the-mill BlackBerry without any encryption, only a simple password lock. The greatest fear is that, even if the device did not contain any sensitive messages at the time, there was likely enough information on board for a hostile intelligence service to snake its way deep into Downing Street's email servers. The aide was 'informally reprimanded.'"
Had it been a slashdotter... (Score:5, Funny)
Would he have reported the loss of his virginity?
What they aren't telling us (Score:4, Funny)
They aren't telling us that Scotland Yard did this deliberately just to see how the Chinese would react.
What the Chinese aren't telling us is they knew this was a trap and reacted accordingly.
What Scotland Yard also isn't telling us is that they knew the Chinese would see the trap and were counting on them to react accordingly.
What the Chinese also aren't telling us ....
oooh my head hurts.
Does PM Brown have any open positions? (Score:5, Funny)
I promise not to carry anything sensitive, and I'll distract the attractive Chinese women for him so his secrets will remain safe!
Re:What they aren't telling us (Score:5, Funny)
oooh my head hurts.
which was part of the plan all along.
And the cover up (Score:4, Funny)
The woman was not really attractive, he was just desperate.
Seriously, is the woman's attractiveness really pertinent to what happened, and was her attractiveness fact-checked? Or is "attractive Shanghai woman" a British idiom for "prostitute"?
Re:This seems to be a recurring problem. (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Had it been a slashdotter... (Score:4, Funny)
Oh no! (Score:3, Funny)
Brown trouser time!
So the article is trouser snake meets honeypot - but it's a trap! Snap! Ow, Blackberries.
If you can lose a blackberry... (Score:5, Funny)
Ew, if you could lose a blackberry in that
Chinese Honeypot, I wouldn't stick around.
-AI
Here's how they knew it was a honeytrap operation: (Score:5, Funny)
They know what the aide looks like.
ba-dump *tsssh*!
What was not reported..... (Score:2, Funny)
Re:technology savvy should be a job requirement (Score:5, Funny)
Of course. Then the aide will be so busy playing with his blackberry that he won't notice the attractive woman. Of course if he did notice her he'd still be too shy to talk to her.
I like your plan; it's sound.
Let me get this straight. (Score:5, Funny)
His Blackberry got shanghaied [wikipedia.org] in Shanghai?
He forgot to secure the client-side (Score:5, Funny)
Tsktsk.
He should get instructions on how to safely do Penetration Testing of the Chinese secret service. Clearly he forgot to secure the client side properly. Except for that, the article is a tad vague on whether the testing itself went smoothly and he found some holes.
*Ahem*
Re:This seems to be a recurring problem. (Score:5, Funny)
My country doesn't have the attractive women, frankly. I'm Canadian.
There, fixed that for you.
Re:This seems to be a recurring problem. (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Honeytrap? Proof? (Score:1, Funny)
You are so prejudiced. The Chinese don't just copy everything.
Re:If you can lose a blackberry... (Score:3, Funny)
Use your Blackberry's light to find our way out?
Hell, let's use your Blackberry's light to find my keys, and we'll drive our way out.
Re:This seems to be a recurring problem. (Score:5, Funny)
Members of the British Government will now be expecting an increased amount of spam and unsolicited phone salesmen calling to offer V1agra and other products.
Will that be because of the data inside the phone or because of the chinese lady's detailed report?
Re:Honeytrap? Proof? (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah, he should have just kept it in his own hands.
Re:And the cover up (Score:3, Funny)
Maybe she came into the club as a 2, and he drank her up to an 8.
Aide?? - Sebastian? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:xenophobia (Score:3, Funny)
Re:How foolish (Score:5, Funny)
You've clearly never been to Asia. Rest assured you can see many examples of exactly this happening all over Asia
And so begins the great stampede of slashdot readers heading for asia.. ;)
Subject (Score:3, Funny)
"The aide was 'informally reprimanded.'"
Translation: "Dammit, Nigel, keep it in your bloody shorts next time!"
Re:He forgot to secure the client-side (Score:3, Funny)
Thinking a little bit more about it, I also hope he remembered to use a proper firewall/virus scanner to prevent malware infections. The article also forgets to mention whether he has signed a non-compete agreement when it comes to Penetration Testing - in case he might lose his current contract, for a one night consulting-job.
Re:This seems to be a recurring problem. (Score:3, Funny)
I'm glad to be wrong, for your sake. Links to pics build Karma, so I'm told :)
Re:Simple Theft (Score:3, Funny)
Hungover aide comes in: "It may look like I got drunk, shagged some girl I just met and lost the Blackberry - but really I am the honest victim of an intelligence operation of such genius and cunning that it could happen to anyone".
Re:This seems to be a recurring problem. (Score:1, Funny)
My country doesn't have the attractive women, frankly. I'm Canadian.
There, fixed that for you.
I just moved to downtown Toronto. I can assure you that you're wrong. Although perhaps we're stockpiling them.
The trouble is, for 9 months of the year, you really can't tell whether they're attractive or not under all that insulation.
Re:This seems to be a recurring problem. (Score:3, Funny)
Shut up you hoser! They will find out about our stockpiles of attractive WMDs (women of mass distraction) and our plans to release hordes of them to achieve world domination.
Oh, wait, aren't the Blackberry servers already in Canada? Maybe we'll just keep those stockpiles...
Re:Had it been a slashdotter... (Score:3, Funny)
Would he have reported the loss of his virginity?
No, the Chinese media would have misreported it and made it into a sex scandal.
"Gordon Brown aide loses blackberry"
will be translated in Engrish as
"Gordon blown, has aids, loses cherry".