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Wiretapping the Web Easier Than Ever
theodp writes "All the trends are toward easier to tap, says an EFF attorney in MSNBC's recap of last week's 5-0 FCC vote to require broadband and VoIP providers to provide Uncle Sam with wiretapping backdoors and a recent Court decision that stored e-mail is not protected under a strict reading of wiretap laws. Civil-liberties concerns aside, MSNBC notes the FCC is also exploring its Internet regulatory options, including placing tariffs on online newspapers and requiring e-tailers to process 911 calls."
How did I know the submitter was an AOL user before even doing a mouse over of their name...
I recommend everyone look into it, install it, and use it. All emails go
plain text without encryption, so it's the least you can do to enhance your privacy.
As for VoIP, I don't know.
http://www.gnupg.org/
I'll see you all in Canada.
if you use verizons voicemail service, they store the calls, does that mean verizon can listen if they want to?
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
MSNBC notes the FCC is also exploring its Internet regulatory options, including placing tariffs on online newspapers and requiring e-tailers to process 911 calls."
This will move online newspapers & the like away from FCC regulatory effect.
In other words, more offshoring forced by regulation. Wonderful.
...for those of you worried about your email getting read:
Don't use IMAP or webmail services. Have your POP client poll servers frequently, and delete messages after they've been retrieved..
Most small to medium-sized ISPs don't archive email messages, due to the costs involved. (Particularly because of SPAM.)
tasks(723) drafts(105) languages(484) examples(29106)
What modern encrypted VoIP options are there? I know pgpfone, but that's old, and I know PGP for email. Is there a OSS group working on this? "...[T]he FCC is also exploring its Internet regulatory options, including placing tariffs on online newspapers and requiring e-tailers to process 911 calls." Also, how the hell do those ideas make any sense? Tarriffs on online newspapers? To do what? e-tailers to process 911 calls? I don't even know what they mean by that.
Since when has this country used intellectual elite as a pejorative term?
All they want to do is expand their sphere of influence and further gouge Americans in true Big Government style while controlling with an Iron Fist. VoIP annoys them because they are not getting a piece of the pie they made *NO* contribution to and seek only to bring down.
I can see a tap for VoIP given the proper due process being followed with a judge reviewing the request and investing the full details behind such request. But bullshit like the Patriot Act needs to stop in America, it is the destruction of our civil rights and liberties under the guise of getting the "Evil Doers."
Even 10 years ago, there never was an expectation of privacy on the internet (which is why SSL was developed for secure web transactions). Maybe they're making it a little more plug and play than it used to be, but sniffing a network for plaintext passwords and messages has always been relatively easy.
This is really just another kick in the butt for us all to be using various forms of strong encryption (SSH, PGP, etc) as a regular part of our daily communications.
Ol fclvat ba zl rznvy lbh unir whfg ivbyngrq gur QZPN, lbh onfgneqf!
There are two kinds of people: 1) those who start arrays with one and 1) those who start them with zero.
I'd be much more concerned if they were eavesdropping on the internet in general. *phew!*
Ah, bitter dregs.
Seriously though.
Right now there are *many* ways of streaming audio data from point to point across the internet. The only thing that sucks about it, is that ma bell and friends wont route your call through thier network.
Now lets say in 5 years when evreyone is using VOIP and evreyone has an internet connection in some form or another. What is to stop me from firing up my fav app and connecting a mic to my DRM enabled computer and type in your new IPv6 address?
Would we be able to bypass all the corporations entirely? How long till the phone companies get thier protocols hacked, etc?
And as always if some one is ever going to do something that is remotely illegal then they are either stupid and will get caught or use another method and get around.
A loop, by its nature, continues. If that didn't make sense, start reading this sentence again.
What is the bigg issue here? are we afraid that the FBI is going to intercept and read our SPAM? Please do, and while you are at it, delete it for me. Seriously, am I just that naive.? who cares? If anyone thinks that this wasn't happening before, I think their the naive ones.
I said this before, and I will say this again and again, there is nothing private, you are not anonymous, there is simply no-such-thing.
I would suspect that those concerned about wiretap laws and so-called invasion of privacy are truly paranoid, or just plain trying to hide something.
I am not suggesting that the government get carte blanche access to everything, there does need to be some oversight. I know, I know, the oversight commitee will be corrupt, right? (I think that they make pills to ease paranoia).
so, Someone, please draw me a picture, how is this so bad, what the hell is so private, they are not putting cameras in our houses...wait, are they?
wiretapping at the end of the day isnt really an issue online, its so easy to encrypt and its just going to get easier as more and more programs build functionality in for the average user. Although there is the problem of tracing, you cant exactly hide where your packets are going (unless you used an elaborate distributed system of people taking your packets and secretly passing them on while generating random traffic to other places) and you could also have a man-in-the-middle attack if you have no other communications channel to send keys. The point is, if everyone enctrypts, key-word flagging will be out and wiretapping will only be used in cases where its absolutely needed because only those cases will have the resources to spend time cracking encryption or tracing things or waiting for a new key to be given. Still it doesnt mean it should be a green light for tapping, but it already is, the patriot act sorted that out years ago.
This comment does not represent the views or opinions of the user.
Even after all the news surrounding the recent VoIP problems, wiretapping, TOS agreements, etc I still just signed up for Vonage, the $30/month for unlimited local and long distance was to good to pass up (Not to mention my great dislike for my current telco and the fact that I can't get another one unless I lived on the other side of the street).
My question though about wiretapping is: Is it that big of a deal? From what I've read the same rules apply, so they can't just tap into you for no reason at all. So it just seems sort of like a moot point to scream and yell about VoIP tapping, since landlines have already had that for quite some time. Where's the "This is bad because" deal? Are we worried that because now that there's a wiretapping rule in place that it means that there's the potential for hackers to exploit it? Something else?
Looking for hardware (Currently need: Large Etch-a-Sketch) Have one? See my journal!
- 1989(in russian accent) -- Due to recent budged constraints, this call is not being surreptitiously recorded....
- 1999 -- Hi. You've reached the phone number of Stephen and Regan. Our answering machine is broken -- but that's OK. Because our line is being tapped.
The shocking thing about the second message is the number of people who took it seriously. Regan's mother, left a very motherly message ("Just who do you have for roommates, and are you sure you can trust them???) that had me rolling on the floor laughing.Please leave name and phone number for future reference.
Please speak clearly and we'll get the transcript from our lawyers.
Free Software: Like love, it grows best when given away.
As I have said before on my site, there is ample reason to believe that the police are the "standing army" that our founders warned us of. Let's look at what our founders worried about, what the police and military are today
Standing army of our founders' day and age:
The police of our day and age:
No knock raids, unprecedented surveillance, military grade equipment, they are a paramilitary, not "peace officers" anymore. Don't ever, ever make the mistake of assuming that they are peace officers anymore. Between their militarization in tactics/armament, and the legal powers that put us at a distinct disadvantage, they are closer to an occupying army than what they were originally created to be.
If you think that gun control is "common sense" yet you are worried about issues like police powers then ask yourself who you would really trust with a gun. The police, many of whom are neurotic, egotistical control freaks (that's why they are attracted to positions of power, surprise, surprise....) or your neighbor? How about your own family and friends. People you can trust.
See I trust the latter, because I come from a law enforcement family that has former law enforcement from both the state and federal agencies. I have seen many more law enforcement officers in personal settings than the average person so I have a good idea of what the personality types are. Trust me, people, especially those who think gun control is a good idea, these are often some of the last people that deserve a state sanction to abridge your liberties while carrying a firearm.
The best thing that could happen to our civil liberties would be for the average citizen to be able to own any weapon that the cops can use, for the government to not be able to register those weapons and for the people to have a right to use force to resist unlawful arrest. Oh wait, unlawful arrest basically doesn't exist anymore because who are you to tell a cop that they don't have a legitimate reason to detain your unconvicted (probably felon) ass? See my point?
Click here or a puppy gets stomped!
As soon as the government governs without the consent of the people, and the people say NO MORE then the government legally has no power
That's a real good joke. Ideally, you're right. Now, back to reality, when the people say "NO MORE" that's when they become inmates.
+++ATHZ 99:5:80
I know I'm paranoid, but that doesn't mean they're not out to get me. I sometimes wonder about the delays with IPv6. It's got built-in point to point encryption that can be enabled by default at the IP level, rather than having to support it at the application level. It would make any point-to-point connections secure, and I'm afraid we'll start seeing government mandated proxies so that wiretapping can be insured. Unfortunately, as soon as that happend, we will have lost...
Whoever modded the above as off topic clearly hasn't heard of ROT13. Who doesn't have ROT13 for their webbrowser and mail/usenet client?
it's rarely a question of whether they have the ability to, but more about the manpower. Even if they can listen to your messages, but unless you are attracting attention from them, they probably aren't. It's the same idea as with MS reading my hotmail account's email: sure, they COULD, but out of their tens (hundreds?) of thousands of accounts, why yours?
I think that it's becoming more clear every day that the U.S. is headed in the direction of becoming a police state. The threat of "terrorism" is being used by the governemnt to expand its police powers in the name of "defending liberty." This is as good an example of double-speak as I can think of. Every step the government has taken since 9/11 has seen a reduction in the liberty of Americans to have privacy, be free from unwarranted intrusions and searches, etc.
Unfortunately, I do not think that John Kerry, if elected, will stop this trend. He has not made protection of civil liberties, except for abortion, a major issue in his campaign. He voted for PATRIOT and, AFAIK, has made no calls for it to be repealed, re-examined, sunsetted, etc. He has given me no reason to vote for him.
On the other hand, the Libertarian candidate, Michael Badnarik http://www.badnarik.org/index.php is calling for a halt to the expansion of the government's police powers. I intend to vote for him as I don't accept that a vote for a third party candidate is a wasted vote. I urge anyone concerned about the growth and misuse of governemnt power to consider a vote for Badnarik.
Just my $.02,
Ron
Impeach Barack Obama for violating the Constitutional requirement to be a "natural born" citizen to hold the office of P
1) You cannot place a tariff on a newspaper. That would be one of the most obvious violations of the first ammendment I've ever seen. "Oh, you can criticize the government, but there is a tariff on that." riiiiggghhht....
2) Online retailers process 911 calls? Huh?
3) The last one is the scariest part. The US government has basically found a way to get around the constitution. They don't have the power to do something, but they can set up an agency that claims the power. But this agency can bite them back by doing things the congress doesn't want.
Does the charter for the FCC state what it can and cannot do? The FCC is the greatest example of a regulatory agency that expands it's own powers based on it's own decisions. I begin to think that the entire purpose of the FCC should begin to be questioned, and maybe the charter that established it should be rewritten.
Um, guys, doesn't IPv6 require encryption? So as IPv6 is rolled out, and IPsec becomes the default way to go (certainly for business use), what exactly is the FCC-mandated access going to buy them?
Of course, with an administration opposed to science, it might be a small step to also oppose foundational technology like IPv6. But can they do that without creating a lot bigger fuss - what with that leaving our infrastructure open to terrorists and hackers, and impeding sale of already-engineered American products?
"with their freedom lost all virtue lose" - Milton
Well, in my case, it would be worth Microsoft's time to read email from my hotmail account. I, unlike most people, get many unique offers: