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What to expect after the Brussels attacks. And why it will not work.

By on March 22, 2016 in Big Brother, Intelligence, Police state, Privacy, surveillance, War on Terror

Once again terrorists have struck.

No doubt, this will be followed by new calls for mass surveillance.

But mass surveillance doesn’t really work. It’s rather draining the police and intelligence services of resources – making us all less safe.

Not even a system with 99% accuracy would be useful. It would give 10,000 false positives per million people’s communications scanned. That’s simply not workable. (And it would lead to dramatic consequences for totally innocent people.) Also, there are no systems even close to being 99% accurate.

After the Paris attacks Waldemar Ingdahl wrote in Spiked:

And yet, despite the vast array of new powers granted to security agencies over the past 15 years, they still find it difficult to connect the dots in the lead-up to a terrorist attack. In fact, the Madrid train bombings in 2004 and the London bombings in 2005 were undertaken despite the fact that some of the perpetrators were already under surveillance.

What we need is more traditional police and intelligence work — not security bureaucrats behind computer screens, trying to find suspicious patterns in ordinary people’s communications.

Human intelligence is hard, often dangerous and expensive. But that is what it takes. Everything else is part of a counter-productive security theatre.

But then again, fighting terrorism might just be a pretext for mass surveillance of the general public.

/ HAX

Spiked, November 2015: Why mass surveillance misses terrorists »

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The mass surveillance tipping point

By on December 16, 2015 in Big Brother, Big Government, Human rights, Police state, Privacy, surveillance

Mass surveillance is getting more and more widespread, intrusive and extensive.

If we look at the bigger picture — the resemblance with totalitarian societies is getting rather obvious.

So, when will enough be enough? When will all of this become dangerous for real? Or is it already?

The entire notion of mass surveillance is dangerously close to the fascist concept: The all-embracing state controlling the lives of the people — in which citizens are not regarded as individuals, but are subordinate to the state.

A central problem is that the public is not allowed to know how mass surveillance is being used. Is it “only” a rather ineffective way to protect the people from real or imaginary dangers? Or is it being used to “collect it all” for the purpose of strengthening the government’s control and power over us? It seems politicians are not really that interested in telling us, are they?

Regardless, mass surveillance is a tool in the hands of the ruling political and bureaucratic class. And we know nothing about who those people will be tomorrow. Can we be sure that they will be somewhat democratic and fair people — forever? If not, we will have a very real problem on our hands.

But even with friendly, honest and democratic people in power — you can only have so much surveillance before it becomes dangerous, intolerable and unacceptable. Even with the best of intentions.

There is a tipping point somewhere between no surveillance and total surveillance. It might be in the future. Or we might already have passed it.

That is where the public debate on mass surveillance should be. But it’s not.

/ HAX

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We are all under surveillance: Re-group. Re-think.

By on November 23, 2015 in Big Brother, Big Government, Democracy, Human rights, Police state, Privacy, surveillance, War on Terror

After the Paris attacks politicians, police and the intelligence community are tumbling over each other eager to introduce even more mass surveillance.

This will direct resources away from regular police and intelligence work. It will not protect us, but could rather make us all less safe. But then again, mass surveillance isn’t really about terrorism. Obviously, it’s about control.

Terrorism (plus serious crime, drug trade, trafficking, child protection and the copyright legal framework) is being used as a pretext for doing what politicians cannot openly admit.

But facts are straight forward: We are all under surveillance.

The fight for people’s right to privacy must and will go on. But we also must recognize the fact that we are already living in a Big Brother society. It might be about time to re-group and re-think. Where do we take the fight for a free and open society from here?

There is the political road. Defending human and civil rights, you can punch over your weight. It all boils down to principles about democracy, rule of law and the relation between citizens and the government. In that context, most politicians cannot afford to appear as if they don’t care. Not in public.

And there is the technical road. Let’s start with something reasonable: Could anybody please make strong e-mail encryption really, really user-friendly? It shouldn’t be impossible. Or let’s take a wider approach: Can the entire internet protocol be replaced with something new and more privacy friendly?

The fight will go on. And you can be certain of one thing: Regardless of how much surveillance we have, the ruling political and bureaucratic classes will always find reasons to introduce more.

/ HAX

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EU centre-right group using Paris tragedy to try to kill data protection directive

By on November 18, 2015 in Big Brother, Civil liberties, Data Protection, EU, Police state, surveillance, Uncategorized, War on Terror

Since the Paris attacks politicians, police and intelligence agencies have pushed for more mass surveillance. And now, it seems they are also trying to undermine the new EU framework for data protection.

The EU data protection directive has been under massive fire from special interests and member states in the council. But the European Parliament has been firm in insisting on a clear and meaningful framework to protect citizens private data.

Now the centre-right group in the parliament, the EPP, is trying to suspend these negotiations.

“In the aftermath of the cruel attacks in Paris on Friday, Axel Voss MEP, in his capacity as EPP Group Shadow Rapporteur for the Data Protection Directive, has called for the immediate suspension of the Data Protection Directive trialogues and a review of the mandate to identify the impact of the draft text on law enforcement capacity to exchange information.” (…)

“According to Axel Voss, the text stipulates major bureaucratic burdens to law enforcement and security entities and would basically transform them into data protection officers when processing personal data for the purpose of prevention, investigation, detection or prosecution of criminal offences and terrorist activities.”

What this is all about, is the EPP trying to use the tragedy in Paris to undermine the demands for authorities to use citizens personal data in a responsible way. But there should and must be rules for authorities as well.

Data protection is more important today than ever before. Especially when authorities are riding on a wave of fear, trying to advance their positions when it comes to surveillance and data mining.

Link: Data Protection Directive trialogue should be suspended »

/ HAX

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Anonymous declares war on the Thai junta

By on October 23, 2015 in Anonymous, Big Brother, Censorship, Democracy, Global Politics, Human rights, Internet, Police state, surveillance

This is interesting. In strong language, Anonymous Asia declares war against the military Thai government. Carefully avoiding to mention the Royals.

So what brings Anonymous back to life?

Government of the Kingdom of Thailand, it has come to our attention that you have decided to disregard your citizens, the people of this country, and have persisted to project an unique Gateway to the Internet, in running a system which only benefits yourselves and the giant corporate bodies operating.

Internet mass surveillance, in other words. Leading to…

The latest project of the Thai military government is to deploy a single gateway in order to control, intercept and arrest any persons not willing to follow the Junta orders and your so called moral.

And it gets personal…

We will not only fight against the single gateway project but will expose your incompetence to the world, where depravity and personal interests prevail.

Copy to kill for.

So what is all this? Let’s pick an online article, of many: Big Brother is watching Thailand »

Apparently it is not just about censorship any longer, but total mass surveillance. Including HTTPS.

The words ending the Anonymous Asia message are strong and brave, for addressing a military junta…

Together we stand against the injustice of your Government, tomorrow you will pay the price of your oppression against your own people.
You can arrest us, but you can’t arrest an idea.

Thailand is now on our radar.

Anonymous Asias proclamation, as published on Pastebin »

/ HAX

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Mass surveillance creates a suspicious society

By on July 26, 2015 in Big Brother, Police state, Privacy, surveillance, War on Terror

Society is getting more and more complex. The number of rules and laws is enormous, beyond the point where you reasonably can be expected have a grasp of what you may and may not do. And far from all rules are reasonable or intuitive. There are laws based on very subjective moral grounds, laws that creates crimes without victims and laws that are there for no apparent reason at all.

Most likely most of us are unknowingly breaking some laws every day. (And some knowingly.)

And where you have rules, you always have smug and self-righteous people acting as some sort of sentinels — telling others how to behave and ratting on people.

This happens in all sorts of groups and societies. But it has been especially noticeable in authoritarian societies. Ratting on others is perceived to prove to people in power that you are on their side — and it shifts focus away from looking closer at you and your behaviour. Sadly, this is a rather rational behaviour under certain circumstances.

So, what happens when you add mass surveillance to the equation? Everyone has something to hide. And when the authorities are able to scrutinise the lives, communications and actions of everybody — there are even stronger incentives for people to sell out others (by the same reasons as mentioned above).

Mass surveillance creates a suspicious society, where you cannot trust other people.

It’s easy for governments to exploit the publics fear of terrorism and crime — and rather difficult to get people to understand the dangers of a society where trust between people is being eroded.

/ HAX

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Enemies of the State, unite!

By on July 10, 2015 in Big Brother, Civil liberties, Democracy, Police state, Privacy, surveillance

Have you noticed that they kill people based on meta data? Not in the US and Europe. But people far away. With drones, the targets selected from among other things: meta data from telecommunications.

So… what phone calls did you make yesterday? Last week?

They can. They do. Maybe not where you live. But it is only a matter of time.

But you have nothing to hide — and for that reason nothing to fear, right? (Really? Nothing?)

First of all, it may be up to a machine to decide on that. Without involvement of human reason. Doesn’t your communication patterns appear to be a little… odd?

Frankly, everyones communication patterns look odd — if you look into them in detail and add this with information from other social charts. You almost certainly are only a few common friends away from some seriously bad people. (Phone books are gold mines for people who draw lines between the dots.)

And there are plenty of laws around to make something stick to you. You don’t have to be guilty. But legal trouble can incapacitate you for years and drain all your money away. (The wars on terrorism, drugs and “piracy” can be very useful for the government, in this regard.)

In the US, apparently the Obama administration use the IRS to make life hell for anti-Obama activists. (Link») Captivating.

But it dosen’t have to be party political. You can become an Enemy of the State just by telling the people what their governments and officials really are up to. (Manning, Assange, Snowden, Brown & Co.)

This perverted system is already connected to the killing machines. I sure hope all our leaders are wise, honest and fair people. Always.

/ HAX

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