Ride the Lightning
Cybersecurity and Future of Law Practice Blog
by Sharon D. Nelson Esq., President of Sensei Enterprises, Inc.
Wikileaks: Inside the World's Most Secure Data Center
November 11, 2010
Wikileaks, while controversial, has carved quite a niche for itself as a whistleblower, continually proving what we all know – that policians and the military sell the public fairy tales. Having provided many a dose of gritty reality, Wikileaks often asssumes heroic stature and seems composed of a league of digital superheroes.
I've developed quite an admiration for most of what Wikileaks does, much as I am an ardent admirer of Anderson Cooper's "keeping them honest" tagline. While not without flaws, Wikileaks provides a way for dissidents and whistleblowers throughout the world to document truths that might otherwise remain unknown.
So I was very interested to read (yes, in print) a piece in Forbes proclaiming that the Swedish broadband carrier Bahnhof had confirmed that some Wikileaks servers are now hosted in its Pionen data center, converted from an underground Cold War era nuclear bunker in downtown Stockholm.
The server farm, carved out of a 100-foot-tall granite hill, has just one entrance protected by 20-inch- steel doors. The backup generators were originally desinged for German submaries. The room now holdng Bahnhof's NOC was originally intended to serve as Stockholm's civil defense center during a nuclear winter.
Would the 8,000 servers at Pionen survive a nuclear attack?
Bahnhof Chairman Jon Karlung says "I'm not sure about the people, but the machines would survive." He also says that the facility communicates this message to clients – your data is safe from all intrusions, physical or legal. "Any resemblance to a James Bond setting is purely intentional."
Which reference will inspire tonight's libation – a martini please, shaken, not stirred.
Listen to the Podcast
