Slashdot Mirror
US Mining Data Directly From 9 Silicon Valley Companies
Rick Zeman writes "Hot on the heels of Verizon's massive data dump to NSA comes news of 'PRISM' where The National Security Agency and the FBI are tapping directly into the central servers of nine leading U.S. Internet companies, extracting audio, video, photographs, e-mails, documents and connection logs that enable analysts to track a person's movements and contacts over time. This program, established in 2007, includes major companies such as Apple, Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook...and more."
is anyone really that surprised by this, though?
....from last paragraph:
Firsthand experience with these systems, and horror at their capabilities, is what drove a career intelligence officer to provide PowerPoint slides about PRISM and supporting materials to The Washington Post in order to expose what he believes to be a gross intrusion on privacy. “They quite literally can watch your ideas form as you type,” the officer said.
Tinfoil hat brigade says "we did tell you so"
From TFA:
Dropbox, the cloud storage and synchronization service, is described as “coming soon.”
I'm very dependent on Dropbox but I just might have to cancel it. As I type this, I'm already cancelling GoogleDrive, and MS SkyDrive.
My life and my family's lives are more important than whatever privacy I had on these sites.
...says the anonymous coward? Am I missing some Soviet Russia joke here?
If this doesn't make you angry, upset and outraged, what will? Most of you will have relatives that fought and died to fight the evil of fascism in the Second World War. What was that all about, if you are just allowing the same thing on your own doorstep by stealth? Don't tell me about Godwin's Law, that's just a way to stifle debate. Call out this fascism for what it is. This is beyond the wildest dreams of the STASI or Stalin, because they didn't have the technology. The NSA and the CIA are rogue states within the state, they are beyond control and are not acting for you, or in your best interests. This should upset you. If there are not huge, mass protests on the streets of your state capitols all over the nation in the coming weeks, you should be ashamed of yourselves. The Orwellian state is not inevitable, but it takes actual action to stop this. Cynical tut-tutting will not do. This has to be shut down now, and proper protest is what it's going to take. Over to you.
Do you believe that, for example, google search prediction-as-you-type is using a keylogger? It is keylogging, it's just that it's server-side.
My next sig will be ready soon, but subscribers can beat the rush
Suddenly, I don't feel like the FBI agent from this slashdot article was just exaggerating claims to drum up interest for in a book he wanted to release....
Demented But Determined.
Now reports that it's not just Verizon, AT&T, Sprint, ISPs, and credit card companies are involved as well. Harry Reid said, "Everyone should just calm down and understand this isn't anything that is brand new,'' which I'm sure makes everyone feel better.
Diane Feinstein is ok with the program because she personally gets to approve it, as part of her committee position. Remember Obama voted for this before he ever got elected president, so if any of this surprises anyone, they are naive.
"First they came for the slanderers and i said nothing."
Its a good thing your ancestors had a little more guts and a lot more principal. They were willing to die, if necessary, first to free America from being ruled by Kings and then to fight other countries who wished to force their ideologies onto the rest of the world.
Meanwhile, all that most of us from this generation had to do was not screw it up. Which it looks like we are. Hopefully these disclosures will remind everyone that the reason we have a national security apparatus is to protect our liberty.
tag: "bomb" in user name.
tag: threatening antisocial activities.
ELEVATE WATCH STATUS
This issue is a bit more complicated than you think.
This data poses a significant risk to a free market economy reliant on technology. Business is no longer demarcated from personal life, so spying on people means spying on business.
Would you start a new business if the government had access to all it's communications? Would you trust them not to share that information with others, or exploit it for their own benefit?
Unless there's checks and balances, like the recently neutered STOCK Act, there will be temptation to exploit this data for unimaginable gain.
NSA reporting increasingly relies on PRISM” as its leading source of raw material, accounting for nearly 1 in 7 intelligence reports.
But are those reports anything useful? Data is cheap, especially these days. Finding useful information is as difficult as ever, perhaps more so because of the flood of data. It wasn't a lack of data that kept 9/11 from being prevented, it was the failure of FBI headquarters to listen to their own field offices.
My prediction is that, even though these programs are now being widely reported on, there will be crickets chirping after it's asked what useful information they have obtained. I won't believe it's because that information is sensitive, as government never fails to crow about the wonderful things they've done.
Just to make my position clear, I don't think these programs are justifiable no matter what useful information is collected. However, a failure to collect useful information adds insult to injury, and renders moot any debate about whether this is an acceptable tradeoff.
If you remember aaaalll the way back to 2005, a whistleblower at AT&T in San Francisco made public the NSA's secret wiretapping program. Despite ongoing lawsuits brought on by the EFF, it doesn't seem like the majority of the public really cared at all.
Seems like most people simply don't give a shit about their rights. The government could announce a plan to cut every man's dick off, and few would complain. Well, some cranky newspaper columnists might complain about the "hippie protesters," but that's it.
There's no -1 for "I don't get it."
The Internet needs to be policed. There are bad men and evildoers actively plotting to do us harm. These nefarious activities now are increasingly being planned and coordinated using the Internet. I don't think this is so bad that the authorities are mining and searching and seeking out these dastardly terrorists.
Are you sure you're ok with the US Government scrutinizing your private life?
Right now there are so many laws and regulations in the USA that not even the US Government can tell you how many there are (criminal law alone is 23,000 pages across 50 volumes, and that doesn't include thousands of federal regulations that you're expected to abide by). Every day you probably break dozens of laws without knowing it.
How will you feel if the government starts mining your data and issuing violations automatically: "Citizen: on June 3, 2013 you told your aunt that you fixed your backyard fence. We found no record of a proper building permit, therefore you must tear down your fence and build it again" "Citizen: On September 9, 2013 your daughter said she planted a dandelion in front of your house. That plant has been determined to be a noxious weed, we will be sending a drone to eradicate your front yard". "Citizen: In Jan 10th, 2003 you had lunch with a Tea Party leader. The Tea Party has been determined to be a terrorist organization. Come quietly and we'll go easy on your family".
Even if you trust the current administration with the data, do you trust all future administrations since the data will likely be retained beyond your lifetime? How would you feel if they selling profiles about yourself to private corporations? (first to the credit rating agencies, then maybe to insurance companies, then to anyone that wants to buy a profile on you).
My life and my family's lives are more important than whatever privacy I had on these sites. I know Apple, Google, Facebook have the data anyway, so I see know harm on giving this up so that I feel safer. Just my two cents, I know its not the majority viewpoint in this current uproar.
Why do you assume that you have to give up all privacy to ensure the safety of your family? Do you think terrorism is something new that can only be stopped by scrutinizing the personal lives of everyone?
If you're so open with your privacy, why post as Anonymous Coward? Why not post your Facebook Profile, LinkedIn Profile, Twitter name, etc here for us all to see? What are you trying to hide?
You know, I (and everyone else) should be outraged at what is not only an invasion of privacy (citizens or not), but also a use of taxpayer money.
And, yet, all I can do is sigh. PRISM, Verizon, NSA, TSA, IRS, HLS, I just find it all overwhelming and disheartening. Sure, I could e-mail/call/mail my congressman or representative, but the cynicism I've gained over this past decade of political bullshit just tells me that my Congressman is already well aware of whatever is happening and is quite happy with the situation, no matter their party. (I see lots of scrutiny from the GOP, but not a single bill from the "we've voted to repeal Obamacare 37 times" House trying to rein in the President's actions or the actions of the various 3-letter organizations.) I'll do research every time I go to vote but I know that I'm in the minority that does so, while the voting population at large will blindly follow that D or R regardless of the candidates' viability, platforms, or intelligence, so it all seems for naught. I encourage my relatives to vote third party, but none of them heed my pleas to actually research who they vote for. (I have no circle of friends in which to do the same.) For all the abuse and impropriety of this, I just can't see a way to affect change.
I'm not even mad about this, though I should be. I'm just depressed. Circus and bread, indeed.
(Actually, if I adjust my tin-foil hat slightly, I wonder if all of this isn't coming out at the same time to be just that: overwhelming, numbing the average American, so that they just give up and don't raise hell about it.)
Don't use these services I guess...
Those are the services you know of.
Will you also stop using your bank, email, IM, your credit card, etc? The government can (and probably is) monitoring everything you do that has an electronic trail.
Parse their words. They are denying a very pointed question that wasn't asked. They are all saying, "We don't allow the government direct access to our servers"
This isn't the denial you think it is.
My life and my family's lives are more important than whatever privacy I had on these sites.
...says the anonymous coward? Am I missing some Soviet Russia joke here?
Just to please you... In NSA America social networks join you!
You are a fool for trying to turn this into a partisan argument. Both parties are happily wiping their asses with the Constitution, and it's hard to find anyone here who doesn't understand that. Your partisan nonsense is exactly the sort of diversion that these politicians find useful.
There are so many laws, one breaks one or two everyday without realization. With so many laws there can be no equality before the law, because law enforcement can arbitrarily select whether it will enforce a law or not on whomever it pleases.
A Good Troll is better than a Bad Human.
I hope most US slashdotters are not too rankled by this reality because this is what they voted for. Bush and Nixon, two presidents modern leftists love to vilify, HAVE NOTHING on the monster currently in office...NOTHING.
Before you try to pin this on the left, take a look at who voted for the Patriot Act:
2001:
Senate: 98 voted for the act, a single democrat voted against
House: 357 voted for the act, 66 voted against (62 democrats, 3 republicans)
2006: Patriot act renewal
Senate: 89 voted for the act, 10 against (9 democrats, 0 republicans)
House: 280 voted for the act, 138 against (124 democrat, 13 republican)
2011: Patriot act renewal
Senate: 72 Yes, 23 against (18 democrat, 4 republican)
House: 275 Yes, 144 no (117 democrat, 27 republican)
If the leftist monster in the whitehouse is solely responsible for this, then why didn't our republican saviors in Congress do anything to stop it, not even back before Obama was even in office?
Sources:
http://educate-yourself.org/cn/patriotact20012006senatevote.shtml
http://politics.nytimes.com/congress/votes/112/senate/1/84
http://clerk.house.gov/evs/2011/roll036.xml
Forget the "bad guys" for a second. Your entire life and those of your family and friends is being monitored in detail regarding daily activities to attempt to incriminate you for being a child pornographer or terrorist. Any little off-color humor, flippant statements, random private discussions, outbursts, travel plans, purchasing decisions, etc, all can contribute to increasing that terrorist/child porn indicator for your personal life, regardless of your actual innocence, with no human judgment involved.
This is complete insanity, and it is the implicit condemnation of every single US citizen as being a terrorism suspect. You are complicit in subjecting yourself as a suspected terrorist, instead of demanding to live your life as a regular, upstanding citizen with no charges held against you.
I know Apple, Google, Facebook have the data anyway, so I see know harm on giving this up so that I feel safer.
Sure, you "feel" safer. But you are not safer. You are a suspect now, and are more at risk of having your life destroyed by the authorities, regardless of innocence, than before.
Hopefully these disclosures will remind everyone that the reason we have a national security apparatus is to protect our liberty.
Best comment here...by far.
no comment
I accidentally deleted an email. Do you think I can get it from the NSA?
http://yro.slashdot.org/comments.pl?sid=2290782&threshold=0&commentsort=0&mode=thread&cid=36643606
Interesting AC reply there to my post. Think of it this way. Our posts now are essentially programming an AI that will likely exist in a few decades emerging from all this collected surveillance data. What do we want to teach this sentient creature by our words and deeds? Thus my sig on the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity. As well as my other writings.
A 21st century issue: the irony of technologies of abundance in the hands of those still thinking in terms of scarcity.
I call BS on that. Give us some examples of dozens of laws that a normal person might break every day.
Some obvious ones are:
1. Exceeding the speed limit, even by a small amount, even only for a second
2. Turning without using signals
3. Not stopping before the limit line painted on intersections
4. Jaywalking between intersections or stepping into an intersection before the walk signal is on, or after "don't walk" has started flashing even if you know you'll clear the intersection before the don't walk signal is on
5. Connecting to an open Wifi network without permission of the owner
6. Playing music loudly enough for others to hear (that's a public performance and needs to be licensed)
7. Signing on a website with a fake identity and/or various TOS violations
8. Private gambling (office football pools, betting a friend that you can run down the block faster than him, etc)
9. Riding transit with a "wide" marker (sometimes only if you're underage)
10. Possessing "child erotica" - scantily clothed children (i.e. a Sears catalog showing children in bathing suits)
11. Letting oil from your car drip on your driveway and wash into the storm drains
12. letting trash accidentally blow from your car (or fall from your pocket), even pocket lint or an apple seed
13. Eating or drinking while driving or other distracting activity
14. Taking a pen or paperclip from the office for use at home
15. Finding a penny on the ground and keeping it instead of turning it in
16. Drinking alcohol outside of your home in some jurisdictions
17. Moving prescription medications from the prescription bottle to another bottle or container
And those are only the ones I can think of off the top of my head.
There are somewhere between 10,000 and 300,000 federal regulations that you can violate, no one can possibly know them all.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304319804576389601079728920.html?mod=googlenews_wsj
"There is no one in the United States over the age of 18 who cannot be indicted for some federal crime," said John Baker, a retired Louisiana State University law professor who has also tried counting the number of new federal crimes created in recent years. "That is not an exaggeration."