The U.S. government quietly began requesting that select foreign visitors provide their Facebook, Twitter and other social media accounts upon arriving in the country, a move designed to spot potential terrorist threats that drew months of opposition from tech giants and privacy hawks alike.
Politico: U.S. government begins asking foreign travelers about social media »
GCHQ and the NSA have spied on air passengers using in-flight GSM mobile services for years, newly-published documents originally obtained by Edward Snowden reveal.
Ars Technica: Snowden leaks reveal GCHQ and NSA snooped on in-flight mobile calls »
Democracy and civil rights. It would be difficult to find anyone in the western world who does not subscribe to these principles. At least in public.
Yet, we are steadily moving away from these values.
It is being done in many small steps. Always justified with the best of intentions – like security, fighting serious crime, child protection, the war on drugs, copyright protection and combating hate speech. Just to mention a few.
Nevertheless – without a doubt – we are limiting privacy, free speech, rule of law and equal rights. It seems to be a non-reversible process. And sooner or later, the many small steps will end up being a giant leap.
Democracy and civil rights can only be curtailed so many times before the consequences will be dire.
»We have to strike a balance between fundamental rights and security« politicians say. And every time that is being done, civil rights are hollowed out. When you repeat this process time and time again – fundamental rights will be reduced to empty words.
This is extremely serious. But nobody really seems to care.
One day we will wake up to a society where you cannot speak your mind, where everything you do is observed and scrutinized, where courts no longer is a guarantee for fair trials, and where it doesn’t matter if you are innocent or guilty – you will have everything to fear.
You will have to be blind not to see the writing on the wall.
Please, do not trust politicians with upholding our fundamental rights. They have a different agenda. They are the ones limiting them.
Our civil rights can only be upheld, protected and won back by the people. It is in no one else’s interest.
/ HAX
Britain has passed the ‘most extreme surveillance law ever passed in a democracy’.
The law forces UK internet providers to store browsing histories — including domains visited — for one year, in case of police investigations.
Suddenly, after the US presidential election, people seems to realize that mass surveillance is a problem.
Time Magazine: President Obama Should Shut Down the NSA’s Mass Spying Before It’s Too Late »
Well, yes. But…
Isn’t mass surveillance a problem, regardless of who is in power?
Isn’t it naive to assume that others will not and do not misuse the surveillance apparatus?
Time writes:
During the Obama administration, warrantless spying programs have vastly expanded, giving the government more power than ever before to constantly monitor all of us by collecting our emails, texts, phone records, chats, real-time locations, purchases, and other private information en masse. This indiscriminate spying isn’t just happening in some National Security Agency bunker. It has reportedly spread throughout dozens of agencies, from local police departments to the Drug Enforcement Administration, Internal Revenue Service, and more.
Trump has repeatedly called for more government surveillance. And he has made it very clear exactly how he would use such powers: to target Muslims, immigrant families, marginalized communities, political dissidents, and journalists.
This describes pretty well what the problem is and who is responsible.
The danger of all of this one day falling into the »wrong« hands ought to have been obvious from the very beginning.
It’s naive to claim that Big Brotherism is a problem in just some cases, used by some political forces, with some specific justifications. Mass surveillance is a problem by its very nature and to its core – regardless who is in power. Always.
Naturally, the mass surveillance apparatus in the hands of Donald Trump is a deeply disturbing notion.
But you should have considered such a risk from the very beginning. You were warned. Repeatedly.
/ HAX
According to a report by Big Brother Watch, “classroom management software” is running on over 800,000 computers, laptops, and mobile phones found in 1,000 secondary schools across England and Wales. (…)
Classroom management software allows the screens of an entire class to be monitored from a teacher’s desktop, and for both the historical and real-time Web activity of a pupil to be accessed. Keystrokes can be watched, and alerts created to flag up “inappropriate” words. More generally, the systems can try to spot “bad” behaviour online, including signs of “extremism and radicalisation.”
Ars Technica: Spyware routinely installed by UK schools to snoop on kids’ Web habits »
The Economist: Left unchecked, the growing maze of barriers on the internet will damage economies and hamper political freedom »
Rick Falkvinge:
As mass surveillance was introduced, we were promised it was only for combating terrorism and violent uprisings. Then, it was used mostly to combat illegal drug trade. As the surveillance is outsourced to private actors, and they’re seeking additional revenue streams, it’s now an option on the table – today – for insurance companies to access mass surveillance data to price a car insurance.
The browser plug-in WOT (Web of Trust) is supposed to warn users about unsafe web pages. But now it turns out that it puts users privacy at serious risk.
From the WOT web page “Secure a simple and safe browsing experience. Our add-on doesn’t slow your browser, it’s easy to use and free.”
As per usual when something is free, it is likely to turn out that you are the product.
WOT collects data from your web sessions (like your surf history) and sends it – allegedly anonymized – to their server. Then this data is sold to e.g. the advertising industry.
Today, German media have more or less exploded with reports of such data for sale not being properly anonymized.
Investigative reporters have gained access to a WOT database where individual users can be identified. In the reports, there are mentions of police officers, judges, journalists, business leaders, and others – and their surf history e.g. when it comes to medical matters, prostitutes, drugs and esoteric erotic pleasures.
On Chrome alone, WOT has some 1.5 million users.
NDR: Nackt im Netz: Millionen Nutzer ausgespäht »
/ HAX
The EU was warned not to hasten when replacing the fallen “Safe Harbour” agreement with the US with a new agreement to protect European personal data. But the EU Commission did. And it did a poor work.
The new agreement – the EU-US Privacy Shield – suffers much the same problems as its predecessor. Immediately here were warnings that if it is to be sent to court, it will meet the same fate as the previous agreement: Invalidation.
And here we go…
Privacy Shield legal spat puts EU-US data flows at risk again »
