Slashdot Mirror
Internet Monitoring: Who Watches the Watchers?
wiredmikey writes "Here's an interesting take on the IT security industry and tools being sold and used by to monitor internet users. It's no secret that many states and nations are censoring and monitoring the Internet. Many of these governments are considered authoritarian regimes, often times with trade restrictions and other sanctions against them. Most of these censorship systems are based on proprietary, enterprise hardware and solutions. Unfortunately, those who decide where these tools end up are often torn between conflicting interests. How many services and devices are actually being used by people whom we prefer would not have access to them? How long until they are used against us, even if indirectly? At which point do we have to stop looking at Information Security as a market, and begin viewing it as a matter of defense and (inter)national security?"
on why they permit sales outside of the country followed quickly by asking yourself this, why do we expect to hold a corporation to a standard that we do not expect to hold our government too?
By that I mean, it sure is SAFE and EASY to go after a company to uphold values you hold dear but damn if anyone wants to stand up to their own government when it maintains relationships one way or another with the same regimes.
Then top it off with multinationals, to whom are they beholden. If you have offices in the US, Germany, Russia, and China, whose laws take precedence? What if your further incorporated on some tiny island for tax purposes?
Yes its a bad thing what these countries do, but guess what, they always have and will, hoping to limit the damage by limiting the software available won't get much relief to the oppressed. That change happens at home by getting the right people in government who actually stand behind the words they use on the campaign trail.
* Winners compare their achievements to their goals, losers compare theirs to that of others.
At which point do we have to stop looking at Information Security as a market, and begin viewing it as a matter of defense and (inter)national security?"
I believe all the governments of the world are unanimous in saying they don't like the influence that people in other countries have on their citizens. Thus, the internet is a threat to all governments, everywhere, and the solutions will be varying degrees of censorship and control of critical infrastructure until access to the internet in its present form is impossible and is instead subsumed by a global network which mirrors the geographical and sociolpolitical needs of those governments.
#fuckbeta #iamslashdot #dicemustdie
I don't follow.
How does a rant on the inability of the government to stop corporate attacks on itself refute a claim that the government is coordinating attacks on the public?
Hudson, you'll note, says the solution is for we, the people, to get back in control and apply the laws we have.
Being able to look in on the banks' internet communications would be one of our, the people's, tools.
As for this entire scare-fest, I will repeat what I always say in this situation:
THE INTERNET IS NOT SECURE
Nor is it private. No more than using a megaphone to do your telecommunications. I know some people want to front the idea that there's a "reasonable expectation of privacy," but those people are blatantly ignorant of the origins and construction of the Internet. Or else they're well aware of them, and are trying to make the proles believe that the Internet dosn't pass every packet of your data along a sequence of loosely-related public and private linkages, any of which has every right to read and laugh at the data flowing through its equipment.