Snowden files unveil US attempt to control Internet

The world-shocking global surveillance by the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) is just the beginning of the spook organization's sprawling efforts to control the Internet, show new revelations attributed to NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden.

The NSA is "planning for wars of the future in which the Internet will play a critical role" and seeking the ability to destroy enemy infrastructure remotely, German magazine Der Spiegel revealed in a recent report, citing "top-secret documents" from Snowden's archive it has seen exclusively.

POLITERAIN, NOT SO POLITE

The Spiegel disclosure highlighted an NSA project code-named "Politerain," which is operated by digital snipers with Tailored Access Operations, the department responsible for breaking into computers.

In its job posting, the program says it is "looking for interns who want to break things."

On the basis of hacking into third-party computers, interns are also told to formulate plans to "remotely degrade or destroy opponent computers, routers, servers and network-enabled devices by attacking the hardware."

Politerain spies, according to the leaked documents, have various programs for specific purposes. For example, Passionatepolka can be used to "remotely brick network cards," Berserkr to implant "persistent backdoors" and "parasitic drivers," and Barnfire to "erase the BIOS on a brand of servers that act as a backbone to many rival governments."

Ultimately, the goal of the internship program was "developing an attacker's mindset," noted the German magazine.

SPYING IS JUST "PHASE 0"

Internal NSA documents, Der Spiegel said, indicate that surveillance of the Internet is merely "Phase 0" in the U.S. digital war strategy.

The aim of the surveillance is to detect vulnerabilities in enemy systems, which is "the prerequisite for everything that follows," the German magazine added, citing the files.

Once "stealthy implants" have been placed to infiltrate enemy systems, thus allowing "permanent accesses," then Phase 3 has been achieved -- a phase headed by the word "dominate" in the documents.

At that stage, according to the report, NSA spooks can control and destroy "at will through pre-positioned accesses" critical systems and networks, which include anything important in keeping a society running: energy, communications and transportation.