Tempest And Echelon

Seminar

By

Prasanth P.N.

TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org 02/02/2009

 Introduction
Echelon

– Developed by National Security Agency of USA.

– A secret project to spy on people by tracing their messages.
– To find out the terrorist activities across the globe.
– Developed with the highest computing power connected through the
satellites all over the world.
– Sniffing of messages over a network or any transmission media, even wireless.
– Design
• Position intercept stations all over the world to capture all satellite, microwave,
cellular and fiber-optic communications.
• Process this information through the massive computer capabilities of the NSA.
• Use advanced voice recognition and optical character recognition (OCR) programs,
and look for code words or phrases (known as the ECHELON “Dictionary”)

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
Tempest
– Stands for “Transient Electro-Magnetic Pulse Emanation Standard”.
– Main theory
• Any electronic or electrical device emits electromagnetic radiations of specific key when it is
operated.
– Intercept electromagnetic waves over the air.
– It even sniffs signals emanating from computer screens (range of few
Kilometers).
– Captures signals through walls.
– VDUs emits radiations when scanning up on vertical or horizontal range beyond
the screen.

Actual VDU

Tempest receiver

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
Fig 1: A Lab experiment
Need For An Interception System

• To keep track of spies and terrorists for preserving the security of the country.

• Also being used for purposes well outside its original mission.

• For political spying and industrial espionage.

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
 Early Use Of Compromising Emanations

The German army started in 1914 to use valve

amplifiers for listening into ground return signals

of distant British, French and Russian field

telephones across front lines.

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon
www.edutalks.org
Inside TEMPEST

• TEMPEST is a short name referring to investigations and studies of compromising

emanations (CE).
• Compromising Emanations(CE) are defined as unintentional intelligence-bearing
signals.
• CE consist of electrical or acoustical energy unintentionally emitted by a source
• The emanations occur as

– Electromagnetic fields set free by elements of the plaintext processing

equipment or its associated conductors.
– Text-related signals through
• (a) common circuit elements such as grounds and power supplies,
• (b) inductive and capacitive coupling.
– Propagation of sound waves from mechanical or electromechanical devices.

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
 The Forms In Which Compromising Emanations Might
Appear At An Interception Point
lagging
edges

stray signals.

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TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
 Electromagnetic Field Composition

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TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
 Sources Of TEMPEST Signals

a. Functional Sources:

– switching transistors, oscillators, Signal generators, synchronizers, line drivers,

and line relays.

b. Incidental Sources:

– electromechanical switches and brush-type motors

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
 Types Of TEMPEST Signals

• RED Base band Signals

• Modulated Spurious Carriers

• Impulsive Emanations

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
 Conclusion

• Tempest is the technology for spying from electronic equipments with out any
physical contact.

• Echelon is the vast network formed by NSA and its allies all over the world to
intercept the messages sent through any transmission media.

• Nothing can be hidden from the these systems.

• Corporate firms are protecting their companies from the Tempest attacks by use of
software and equipments to prevent the Tempest attacks.

• Unfortunately our India does not have a Tempest equipment developed yet.

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org
 References

• EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT Session document 11 July 2001

• http://www.aclu.org/echelon/index.htm
• http://www.wired.com/news/ehelon.html
• http://cl.cam.ac.uk
• http://cryptome.org/nacsim-5000.htm
• http://lib.utexas.edu
• http://mit.edu
• http://www.eskimo.com

02/02/2009
TEMPEST And Echelon www.edutalks.org