SAS Urban Survival Handbook (65 page)

SAFES/VAULTS

In a concentric security system—consisting of rings of tight security—the innermost ring is the safe, strongroom or vault. It should protect its contents from the actions of thieves, from fire, explosion and flood.

A safe should be totally immovable but, just in case, should withstand being dropped from a great height. Skilled safecrackers use a variety of means, from acids and electronic listening devices to crowbars, high-powered burning equipment and explosive charges to open a safe. Safes are actually graded according to the time it takes a ‘top’ safe-cracker to open them. To be efficient a safe cannot rely on locks, but must withstand all forms of attack.

Vaults must protect their contents, even if the building around them is destroyed, and must also withstand the effects of fire hoses being played upon their heated outer casings. Doors and walls of a vault are usually rated according to the number of hours for which they can withstand fire.

The degree of protection you must seek to achieve should be matched against the importance of the ‘valuables’. Find out exactly what specifications mean on any safe/vault. If there was an explosion, would the contents be totally unaffected? Would documents still be legible?

DOCUMENT SECURITY

Restricting access to documents and keeping them in a secure safe is only the beginning of document security. There are other ways of discovering their content. Rough notes, unwanted research material and all ‘sensitive’ waste MUST be destroyed. Carbon papers carry an impression of everything typed using them, as do typewriter and printer ribbons. They must also be destroyed.

Computer print-outs, however obscure, can provide information – facts and figures can be interpreted or passwords, codes and program structures may be revealed to a skilled interpreter. Sensitive waste should be placed through a slot into locked waste bins and shredded at the end of the day within the secure area.

COUNTERING ESPIONAGE

‘Spying’ isn’t always about selling vital national secrets—it goes on in all areas of business, especially where there is great competition. ANYONE can buy bugging equipment and other ‘toys’ from specialist shops or by mail order.

Modern lenses make it possible to view and photograph images at considerable distances. Listening devices can monitor conversations. Interception of electronic data and even the electromagnetic radiation from computer terminals can provide a source of information. Sensitive material should be protected from ALL such forms of spying.

WARNING

Phone tapping is illegal in most countries. In Britain, you must have a warrant from the Secretary of State or the consent of the person being tapped! You could face a fine or imprisonment. Mere possession of bugging equipment is not illegal, but use could constitute a prosecutable offence.

Cameras

Cameras should obviously be forbidden in areas where secrets are kept, but it is very difficult to identify a camera built into a wristwatch, a briefcase or a cigarette lighter—these are a cliché, but ARE available and DO get used!

Unless you make all staff and visitors change into special clothing and remove all jewellery how can you be sure they do not have a camera? Vigilance for any suspicious activity on the part of all members of staff is necessary. Ask yourself why the visitor keeps looking at his/her wristwatch, or why he/she seems to place his/her briefcase with such care?

Cameras can now be equipped with endoscope attachments which can be inserted through keyholes, though any small aperture drilled through a wall, through ventilation grilles and cabling ducts.

Long-range lens systems allow photographs to be taken from considerable distances. For maximum security never handle documents or place typewriters, printers, or computer screens where they can be seen from a window—at ANY level in the building. Even with fairly amateur equipment, a readable photograph of a document can be obtained at a distance of 90 m (300 ft).

Telephone tapping

Governments may employ telephone tapping as part of surveillance of suspected terrorists, and to provide information about political activists and criminals. SUCH TAPPING HAS TO BE OFFICIALLY AUTHORIZED AND ANY OTHER TAPPING IS ILLEGAL. It does not necessarily involve linkage directly into the main telephone system—bugging individual telephones, for instance, is far too easy and far too common.

Radio telephones, car phones, and cordless phones are even easier to ‘tune in’ on. They should never be used for conversations which need to be kept secret. Even the use of a baby alarm or similar domestic listening device makes it possible for outsiders to eavesdrop more easily.

Dealing with tapping

With a standard telephone system an efficient telephone tap is undetectable to the subject, although many people who suspect tapping of their phones have reported clicks, echoes and an unusually high number of service problems on the line. However, special equipment is available which will indicate the presence of a tape recorder, a telephone transmitter or a direct wire tap.

If you suspect tapping, or wish to protect information, fit a scrambling device. Systems are available on the open market which can offer a choice of 145 billion different codes. If these are continually changed, only chance (or other forms of espionage) will enable the eavesdropper to identify the code. Since the recipient of a call MUST be using a scrambler with the same code, this is only a practical solution for a limited number of regular calls. Portable, less-versatile versions enable scrambled calls to be made from any phone.

A device which works with all calls on the line is a telephone observation neutraliser. This sends a powerful current down the line which will melt transmitter wires—it could also damage the telephone line so its use is NOT permitted by most telephone companies!

Bugs

Microphones with transmitters can be fixed to a telephone or hidden ANYWHERE in a room, allowing others to eavesdrop and/or record everything that is said.

Several kinds of bug detector are available, disguised in many ways, from packets of cigarettes to standard desk accessories and office equipment—so that they can be used in circumstances where a certain amount of subtlety is required.

To defeat any undiscovered bugs, a transmitter can be used to ‘jam’ their transmissions. To avoid having to use elaborate equipment to identify the exact transmitting frequency of the bug, the jamming equipment should constantly sweep through a wide range of frequencies. This will have the effect of swamping the spy signal.

Long-distance listening devices

Highly directional microphones can focus on sounds at very long distances. There are mass-market devices which claim to detect a whisper at 30 metres (100 feet). The advertisements always have phrases such as ‘a boon to the hard-of-hearing’—whereas they are actually a boon to anyone who wants to invade people’s privacy. If sufficiently sensitive, long-range listening devices can ‘read’ a conversation from the vibration of the windows of a room! This is how laser ‘microphones’ work!

Such equipment can be confused by using another sound source—loud music, a noisy computer printer or other machinery close to your conversation point.

More thorough protection, which will interfere with all audio-reception devices, is given by using a device to generate white and pink noise at frequencies which are inaudible to the human ear.

Avoiding bugs

If your security needs are not great enough to warrant investing in special equipment, the best way of avoiding eavesdropping equipment is to carry on sensitive conversations in the open and in very public places where there is plenty of background noise—traffic, fountains, music.

Keep moving so that eavesdroppers continually have to change range and focus. Indoors go into a bathroom and run a shower with a radio playing. Don’t forget the possibility of lip-reading or that either you or the person you are speaking to might be ‘wearing’ a bug.

Strange but true

If you think cameras concealed in lighters and briefcases with secret compartments belong in James Bond movies, think again—the range of security devices currently available is phenomenal, and in many cases, ingenious. Micro technology means that bugs, transmitters, even tape recorders can be reduced to minute proportions and, when concealed in ‘ordinary’ items, are undetectable to the casual observer. A microphone can be reduced to the size of a match and a whole room-monitoring system, complete with camera, can be concealed within a ‘normal’ book.

Entire offices can be kitted out with desk accessories and equipment where nothing is quite what it seems. A desk light can double up as an observation system, with a miniature video camera and recorder installed into the base. This means that the user can secretly see and record the activities in a room without being present. Alternatively, how about a framed print or picture for a conference room wall—again, complete with its own observation system. Even a tropical plant placed decoratively in a corner can house a wireless transmission/reception device, artfully concealed in a bamboo cane!

On the move, an anti-kidnap device is equipped with a quartz pulse-transmitter to help in locating the victim. A jacket button can double up as a microphone, and a handy can of ‘X-ray spray’ makes the contents of sealed envelopes visible. Watches (and lighters!) with secret built-in cameras complete the picture.

COMPUTERS

Computer eavesdropping

Although modern computer terminals emit much less electromagnetic radiation than in the past, it is still possible to use sensitive equipment to pick up radiation from computer terminals. Radiation travels through water pipes and power lines as well as through the air.

The proximity from which this radiation can be detected varies considerably from system to system—the cost of such eavesdropping, especially at any real distance, means that it is only likely to be used if the stakes are high. Tests can be carried out to discover the radiation levels your system emits. It has been reported that certain national military control centres are enclosed in copper-lined vaults to avoid such ‘eavesdropping’.

Computer hacking

Any computer linked to a large network or outside sources, such as the telephone line, is vulnerable to ‘hacking’—unauthorized access to gain information or to alter or corrupt data and programs. Whether the hacker’s aim is to steal secrets, sabotage a competitor’s files or simply to play a malicious joke, the means will be the same.

WARNING

Computer hacking is ILLEGAL. Spreading computer viruses is a ‘joke’ that could land you in jail!

To avoid casual tampering or snooping at your terminal, arrange sensitive files carefully. Name them in ways YOU can recognize but others would not. It is possible on most good computers to arrange ‘partitions’ to hide really sensitive information. If done correctly, no casual ‘spy’ will even spot the partition, let alone be able to breach it without a password. Anyone who can open up the program and interpret it might detect the partition.

Coded access

Codes may be used to prevent unauthorized access to files, parts of files or whole systems. As with all codes, it is possible that other people may be able to decipher them. The more complicated they are and the more stages there are to discover the more difficult this will be, but also the more time it will take for those with authorization to gain entry. Too many codes and the procedure may be too difficult to remember. There would be a temptation to write codes down—which immediately makes them vulnerable.