Schneier: Metadata Equals Surveillance

Hugh Pickens DOT Com writes "Bruce Schneier writes that lots of people discount the seriousness of the NSA's actions by saying that it's just metadata — after all the NSA isn't really listening in on everybody's calls — they're just keeping track of who you call. 'Imagine you hired a detective to eavesdrop on someone,' writes Schneier. 'He might plant a bug in their office. He might tap their phone.' That's the data. 'Now imagine you hired that same detective to surveil that person. The result would be details of what he did: where he went, who he talked to, what he looked at, what he purchased — how he spent his day. That's all metadata.' When the government collects metadata on the entire country, they put everyone under surveillance says Schneier. 'Metadata equals surveillance; it's that simple.'"

Comments

Big Data

[Anonymous Coward]

The result would be details of what he did: where he went, who he talked to, what he looked at, what he purchased — how he spent his day.

And with big data hitting the databases of Amazon (and every other retailer you shop), Google, credit cards, banks, credit bureaus, medical information bureau, IRS, .... they can find out just about anything they want about you.

When you turn off Ghostery, NoScript and AdBlock, it's pretty fucking eerie the ads that are placed on pages - and that's JUST the marketing people. Just image what the NSA can do!

Yep! Made fun of the Tin Foil hat wearers all those years and we're RIGHT!

Re:Big Data

[VortexCortex]

I recently opted out of Google targeted ads because of the interests it thought I liked. Among them: Women's Issues, Defense and Aerospace, Arts and Crafts, etc. I'm interested in Men's Issues (90%+ workplace deaths are males, 80%+ homeless are men, 40%+ of domestic abuse victims are male, and women are as violent or more so than men yet there are only "battered womens' shelters" no men's shelters), I don't really care about Defense just Space (why these are linked in their interests might be to fuzz defense nuts as possible space nuts? Maybe cryptography = defense?), I make inde games as a hobby but could give a fuck less about arts and cratfs... The list goes on and on -- over 20 interests, 5 were half right, the rest were just WAY off base.

The shit they know is WRONG. And if this is any indication of the power of "big data" (a new buzword for Analytics) then I'm even more wary of what the NSA thinks they can glean from their aggregate bullshit. With the things I research for my fictional writing & game plots, and my outspoken stance on government accountability, anti-war posts, and patent/copyright reform, etc. they probably think I'm a terrorist, when in reality, I would sooner die than kill another sentient being.

The road to despotism is paved with absolutist notions. Do not try to create absolute security, that is impossible. This complete intolerance for risk is ridiculous and destructive. You have more risk of heart attack or automobile accident than terrorist attack.... The funding should be in tastier health food, not killing brown people and spying on every citizen. Of course the message to the people is one of protection from drummed up threat. The reality is that those doing the spying know their ends can't fit the means; They have completely other set of agendas, and practically have to manufacture offenders to prove they're protecting you. Only thing you could really do with the data on that scale is controlling the world's financial markets. Protip: the CIA and other black-ops are funded not by tax money primarily, but by investments via shell corps...

You don't have anything to fear, citizen, unless you use uncontrollable currencies, like bitcoins, or develop new cryptographic ciphers, or use untrackable data transfers.

Truth is, I live not in fear of terrorists, but in fear of being hit by a bus or disappeared by a black van... I refuse to NOT post things online that could be taken the wrong way. Fuck 'em. Live free or Die, I say, like an American of braver times.

Additionally, my websites know when you're using Ghostery, NoScript, and AdBlock, or user agent spoofers, fingerprint normalizers, etc. Your use of these damn near perfectly profiles the kind of user you are... I just use the data to serve you the page for a downloadable game instead of the WebGL or flash version, but others could do much more...

The USSC has said otherwise

[Anonymous Coward]

In 1979, the US Supreme Court ruled that collection of this metadata did not contitute a search.
  http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Smith_v._Maryland

Re:The USSC has said otherwise

[Anonymous Coward]

The police do not need a search warrant to follow you around.

They don't need a warrant, but they DO need a reason.

while they did say that collecting metadata did not constitute a search

No, that's not what they said. Nowhere was the phrase "metadata" used. What they said was that you did not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in regards to the numbers you dialed, because you told the phone company by dialing them. The term "metadata" is not defined legally anywhere, which is why the politicians keep using it.
You're also ignoring the fact that there are laws specifically dealing with information collected by Telcos. Search the FCC page for "CPNI" if you want specifics, but put simply the phone company is not allowed to disclose your call details to anybody other than you without a warrant or court order.

Not just the NSA

[ThatAblaze]

People seem to be losing sight of the fact that it isn't only the NSA that is doing this tracking. Europe and China are both huge on tracking, they just haven't had this kind of public leak. So, while the question of which US Constitutional Amendment has been breached is a good question, it doesn't address the larger picture question: Where do we, as citizens of whichever country, draw the line and force our governments to stop?

Re:Metadata is the most important data

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't guarantee the general privacy of the masses you don't have freedom of association. In my mind freedom of association is suppose to be that guarantee. Unfortunately the government uses assumptions / suspicions that are not founded on hard evidence to target groups of people. As an example they targeted everybody who accessed services / web sites hosted by Freedom Hosting. If you ask me that was illegal. The same thing can be said about monitoring a group organizing publicly. There is a huge difference between policing a general population and targeting population with surveillance even if many of its members are involved in criminal acts, and then targeting those within, when those within are not themselves necessarily committing illegal acts. You should not assume / suspect me of committing an illegal act simply because I'm associating with a group whose individual members are known to be committing crimes. A few good examples of this would be KKK groups, communist groups, civil rights groups, various African American groups like the Black Panther Party, LGBT groups, pedophilia groups, free software groups (yes, they were targets of the IRS under the Obama administration), etc.

Re:Metadata is the most important data

[icebike]

But if you had bothered to even give those links a cursory look, you would find that they DO CARE what you said, and if the NSA doesn't personally care, they know agencies that do, and they freely share what they learn.

The story is fairly straightforward. A unit of the DEA known as the Special Operations Division has been receiving and distributing vast levels of intelligence from agencies such as the NSA, CIA, and Department of Homeland Security. Upon receiving information about a particular transaction or meeting place, DEA agents go make arrests, using traffic stops as pretext.

There is nothing "beneath them". In order to hold that view, you have to subscriber to the whole "Defenders of America" flag wrapping nonsense. These agencies have ceased working for YOU.

You can't worry about the consequences will have on the people, and ignore the fact that some how, somewhere along the line, this government has taken it upon itself to vet every communication, be party to ever conversation, and monitor every action, and watch every person. Where did that idea of government EVER come from?