Moscow Raves About Rock As 'Miracle' Spying Gadget
Russia's federal secret service filmed four alleged British agents downloading data wirelessly from a computer inside this fake rock.
(Rtr Tv Image Via Associated Press)
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Friday, January 27, 2006
MOSCOW, Jan. 26 -- Drop it from a ninth-story window, and it survives the fall. Submerge it in water for a long period of time? It drip-dries.
On Thursday, Russia's federal security service, the FSB, extolled the "space technology" powers of the fake rock, discovered in a Moscow park, that led Russian agents to an alleged British spy ring. A spokesman for the Russian agency, the KGB's domestic successor, said that the "miracle of a device" no doubt cost tens of millions of dollars.
"You could throw this rock from the ninth floor, it can survive a long period in water," said a breathless Sergei Ignatchenko in televised remarks that elaborated on the counterespionage operation. James Bond's gadget guy, known as Q, would no doubt be quietly thrilled at the rave reviews in Moscow for the latest variation on the dead-letter drop.
Four men said to be British diplomats were secretly filmed by the FSB allegedly downloading data wirelessly from a computer inside the rock, which was about the size of a football. The diplomats used it to get information left for them by a Russian agent who has since been arrested, according to the FSB.
Footage of the operation was broadcast on Russian television Sunday night.
The rock in the FSB's possession was one of two being used by the British for espionage last fall, the agency said, adding that the British took one away before the Russians could seize it.
"It has several different kinds of defenses," Ignatchenko said of the rock. "You could only create this technological wonder in laboratory conditions."
The fact that one alleged spy was seen on television kicking the thing, apparently to get it to work, went unexplained.
