T-Mobile Adds New Encryption to Their Network

T-Mobile seems to have made good on its parent company's (Deutsche Telekom) promise, from last year, to upgrade its 2G networks to a stronger encryption standard 

after the Snowden revelations forced many firms (especially abroad) to take a better look at their security and the security of their customers.

The new encryption standard is called A5/3 and should be much harder to crack, while the old one was called A5/1 and could be cracked even by a single PC back in 1999. In 2008, passive surveillance of the "encrypted" 2G network was already possible.

T-Mobile aims to stop this sort of surveillance with the new A5/3 encryption standard, although it won't be able to stop targeted attacks by IMSI Catchers, which are devices the police, FBI and potential criminals may be using to eavesdrop on phone conversions and texts over a certain local area. (more)