Hot spies apparently make lousy geeks

By | July 12, 2010, 7:23am PDT

Summary: Apparently, being an ultra-hot superspy doesn’t automatically provide you with mad geek hacking skilz.

Frédéric Filloux and the great Jean-Louis Gassée are back again with another very interesting blog entry. Their Monday Note blog is rapidly becoming mandatory reading, which begs the question: if you’re male and French, are you by definition a metrosexual?

I know this is yet another article about the hot Anna Chapman and her spying ways. But wouldn’t you rather read about her than yet another diatribe about Steve Jobs’ Pinky and the Brain-style plans to take over the world or some dry story about Congressional oversight? Sure. I knew you would.

See also: Video: Ultra-hot Russian superspy talks Internet entrepreneurship

See also: The Cold War just got hotter. Deep undercover with a sexy Russian spy.

Monsieur Filloux seems to have the same level of fascination we all do about the lovely Anna and her band of suburban commandos, even after most have them have been traded back to Russia for a bunch of wheezing old counter-spies, too sick to make it on the New York society party circuit.

Filloux went ahead and dug up the actual Department of Justice Complaint vs. the Russian spies and set himself to reading the legal-speak version of a spy novel.

What he discovered about Anna and her Montclair mafia was almost disappointing. Apparently, being an ultra-hot superspy doesn’t automatically provide you with mad geek hacking skilz.

Filloux describes practices that involved the use of unchanging MAC addresses, passwords left out in the open, easy-to-detect steganography, easy-to-intercept point-to-point WiFi links, and more.

With all the prurient, gossip-laden joy that we in the chattering class have been able to extract from this story, it’s even okay that the Vice President couldn’t get Dmitry Medvedev to take Rush Limbaugh in trade. After all, if we had to give the Russians ten spies including a hotty in trade for four western spies, we probably would have had to send over the Playmate of the Year to get them to take Rush, even for a week.

Oh, don’t get your knickers all in a bunch! I like Rush. I don’t know if I’d want him to visit my home before I locked up all the meds in the house, but he’s certainly entertaining.

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Topics

David Gewirtz, Distinguished Lecturer at CBS Interactive, is an author, U.S. policy advisor, and computer scientist. He is featured in The History Channel special The President's Book of Secrets.

Disclosure

David Gewirtz

At various times during his adult life, David has voted for both Democrats and Republicans, and has been disappointed by both. He is deeply disturbed by how partisanship has come before patriotism in America, which gives him the freedom to pick on both sides.

David is a frequent guest on TV and radio stations across America and can usually be heard or seen on-the-air at least once a week. He writes weekly commentary and analysis for CNN’s Anderson Cooper 360 and has been interviewed by Fox News, CNN, various ABC and NBC affiliates, and Canada’s Global TV. He has been a featured guest on National Public Radio and has also been featured on Voice of America, Radio Free Europe, and Radio Liberty where his commentaries on technology, industry, and emerging nations have been broadcast into 46 countries (all in their own unique translations).

David is the executive director of U.S. Strategic Perspective Institute, a nonprofit research and policy organization. He is the Cyberterrorism Advisor for the International Association for Counterterrorism & Security Professionals, a columnist for The Journal of Counterterrorism and Homeland Security and a special contributor to Frontline Security Magazine. He is a member of the FBI’s InfraGard program, the security partnership between the FBI and industry. David is also a member of the U.S. Naval Institute and the National Defense Industrial Association, the leading defense industry association promoting national security.

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Biography

David Gewirtz

In addition to hosting the ZDNet Government and ZDNet DIY-IT blogs, CBS Interactive's Distinguished Lecturer David Gewirtz is an author, U.S. policy advisor, and computer scientist. He is featured in The History Channel special The President's Book of Secrets, is one of America's foremost cyber-security experts, and is a top expert on saving and creating jobs. He is also director of the U.S. Strategic Perspective Institute as well as the founder of ZATZ Publishing.

David is a member of FBI InfraGard, the Cyberwarfare Advisor for the International Association for Counterterrorism & Security Professionals, a columnist for The Journal of Counterterrorism and Homeland Security, and has been a regular CNN contributor, and a guest commentator for the Nieman Watchdog of the Nieman Foundation for Journalism at Harvard University. He is the author of Where Have All the Emails Gone?, the definitive study of email in the White House, as well as How To Save Jobs and The Flexible Enterprise, the classic book that served as a foundation for today's agile business movement.

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RE: Hot spies apparently make lousy geeks
seandogue 2nd Sep 2010
idk, I kinda like reading about Lord Pinky and his smug, well-to-do fanboi minions.
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Ran out of content at paragraph 6, so to make the word count (and up the click-count) you had to take a tangential detour to attack someone completely uninvolved? Really? Kinda pathetic.

A more appropriate detour might have been the disparity in the head-count of the trade (10 of theirs for 4 of ours), a far more germane question.
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Ditto!
caspianhiro 12th Jul 2010
@chipbeef ok, I agree with you, it was like I was reading along then (bam) wtf? You had to go political? Why can't my web browser have a spam filter to help me avoid editorialists and bloggers I don't care for?
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Contributr
RE: Hot spies apparently make lousy geeks
David Gewirtz 12th Jul 2010
@chipbeef Ah, but it is totally relevant:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100710/ap_on_en_tv/us_leno_biden_9

I couldn't make this stuff up!
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RE: Hot spies apparently make lousy geeks
law_n_disorder 12th Jul 2010
@David Gewirtz
I agree Biden is a joke!
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First off, while she isn't bad looking she certainly isn't 'Ultra Hot' and secondly (and perhaps more importantly), she is far from a 'superspy'. What secrets did she pass on? How to use the wifi at a coffeshop?

What a lame story...
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Yeah, pretty lame
tangentjohn@... 12th Jul 2010
@rpadin@...and about "chipbeef"s 10 for 4? We got a REALLY good deal! Like tradeing 10 plugged nickles for 4 silver dollars.
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@rpadin@... lame story perhaps, but until you show us photos of your wife or girlfriend, your opinion on the level of hotness is no more relevant than the blogger
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The hot quality is what makes her lousy at geeking?
Fat bearded journalists makes for lousy logic.
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Ultra hot??? You're kidding right. You must be ultra lonely.
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Wha??
klumper 12th Jul 2010
Ultra hot??? You're kidding right.

I'll still bet you the farm she comes without sporting plastic (er, of the imbedded kind). So yes, that makes her HOT ENOUGH by comparison to all those leaking boob Matilda types on the western front. wink
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Its not that there aren't female geeks with great bodies, its more how a geek approaches getting out of bed and what to do next.

Waking Up
"Female Geek": Damn, it feels like I just went to bed. double-damn, its nine AM; I did.

"Super-hot": Gee I hope I didn't smeer my face cream last night on my silk pillow.

"Female geek": And I gotta stop falling asleep face-down on my keyboard. I am seriously going to have a permanent tattoo of;
tyu
ghjk
bn

backwards on my forehead.

On second thought that may be beyond cool.

"Super-hot": Better hurry or I'll be late to my spinning group!!!

"Female geek": Gotta check my blog...I wonder if I can get another day outta these jeans???
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RE: Hot spies apparently make lousy geeks
Craigmeister68 13th Jul 2010
@gpronger
LOL
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The evolution challenged people who take up for Rush must like smelling the farts that come out of his mouth.
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You misused "begs the question"
cambric 12th Jul 2010
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What the article failed to mention ..
stillgolfing 12th Jul 2010
is she did "special Ops" training. She can snap your neck and you will die in 7 seconds. So, if you are out at a restauraunt having breakfast with her, remember - just order the toast!:)
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What about the missing ring-leader?
snberk341 12th Jul 2010
How come no one is doing any stories on what happened to the ring-leader, caught in Cyprus - mysteriously given bail (who applied that pressure?) - skipped the country (do you know how hard that is to do on an island?) - and has not been heard from since. How come the FBI are not talking about him? How come the Russians aren't talking about him?

Everyone is focussing on the "babe factor", at the expense of the truly interesting twist to the story.

I think the ring-leader had been turned by the Americans, had shopped his agents to the FBI, and was supposed to make it back to Russia, with nothing more than the shirt on his back, to work for the Americans as a double agent.
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It was not her computer skills that she was using in her work as a spy,they would not have got her close to the people that she wanted to get information from....passing that information on would be less of a risk by by writing it down & leaving it in a "dead letter box" which was checked when she made a phone call from a payphone or whatever. simple old tried methods that have been used for years are the best.PP J.Bond Esquire (no relation)
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RE: Hot spies apparently make lousy geeks
MBRIANT@... 12th Jul 2010
I read today that because all 10 of the "spies" were so ineffective and sloppy, some think they were deliberately put out there as decoys to use up U.S. surveillance resources and take the heat off of the real Russian spies.
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Apparently most readers miss the real truth going on behind the scenes. The Russian and American intelligence services aren't this sloppy. What triggered the cell round up is speculation. Both services use agents, sleeper cells, and misinformation as tools. Something else is going on. Even though we get a laugh about it, the CIA, NSA, DIA, Naval and FBI services know alot more than is ever said. This is the nature of the spy business. While the chick is not homely, her skills in sex would have to be spectacular for her to be effective. Given the randomness of the male sexual appetite, I rather doubt her hotiness as a lure. Got to be something else going on here. SOmething we will never know about. Needless to say that American Intelligence knew and used her to our advantage. THe RUskies do the same.
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Hot spy stories make for some pretty funny comments.
It's been a while I've been laughing at those in geekland...;)
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RE: Hot spies apparently make lousy geeks
johnpall@... 12th Jul 2010
Ahh the Made up Communist theory that they will somehow take over the world hahahaha
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Don't let them /?r?f?l/ you Dave . It's was a good story,I chuckled @ lock up your meds
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Sheeesh you guys are so literal
haz113k 13th Jul 2010
The point the blogger made was that, while she was hot (only a purist porn hound would disagree), how big of a threat as a spy could she really be if she didn't even follow the simplest of methods to avoid detection when communicating. And for crying out loud, all of you should grow a funny bone. The comment about Rush, taken from Leno and Biden, was funny, regardless of your political affiliation.
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" I like Rush."
BlueBerry Pick'n 19th Jul 2010
that's all I needed to hear.

wow.
that clarifies a LOT about ZDNet writing & 'analysis'.
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idk, I kinda like reading about Lord Pinky and his smug, well-to-do fanboi minions.

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