Tag Archives: surveillance state

I don't have a big problem with this, which may surprise some since I self-identify as a libertarian of the left. How can this be consistent with personal freedom? The reason I don't have a big problem with it is three-fold. First, new technology will be used. End of discussion. The second reason is related to this. China is up-front about it and the West is not. There is virtually "total information awareness" in the West in the newly emerging surveillance state owing to the...

Happy Independence Day as America celebrates with a military parade in the capital city.If vigilance is the price of freedom, Americans need to wake up and stand up as the vise jaws close.This Can't Be HappeningUS is a Classic Empire and Is Becoming a Repressive Police State at Home Dave LindorffSee alsoThe Rutherford InsitituteIt’s Time to Declare Your Independence from Tyranny, America John W. WhiteheadAlsoAlterNetTrue patriots are rebels, not bootlickers Meteor Blades

NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden said Thursday that people in systems of power have exploited the human desire to connect in order to create systems of mass surveillance. Snowden appeared at Dalhousie University in Halifax, Nova Scotia via livestream from Moscow to give a keynote address for the Canadian university's Open Dialogue Series.Right now, he said, humanity is in a sort of "atomic moment" in the field of computer science. "We're in the midst of the greatest redistribution of...

A majority of the American public believe that the U.S. government engages in widespread monitoring of its own citizens and worry that the U.S. government could be invading their own privacy. The Monmouth University Poll also finds a large bipartisan majority who feel that national policy is being manipulated or directed by a “Deep State” of unelected government officials. Americans of color on the center and left and NRA members on the right are among those most worried about the reach of...

In addition to Assange’s assertion that government secrecy has far less to do with national security than political security (a claim he has made before which seems to be proving correct time and time again), there’s the jarring question posed by Republican Congressman Thomas Massie: “who made the decision to withhold evidence of FISA abuse until after Congress voted to renew FISA program?” Whoa, Nelly. Hang on. What is he talking about? It would be understandable if you were unaware of...

The USA Patriot Act, passed hurriedly after 9/11, taught us that rushing a surveillance bill through Congress is a bad idea, producing complicated statutes ripe for abuse. Yet the leadership of the House Intelligence Committee is taking a page out of President George W. Bush’s playbook and trying to do just that. Tomorrow, the committee will debate a bill that dramatically expands NSA surveillance authorities, including one that is scheduled to expire at the end of the year. The bill was...

Another "oops."Ars TechnicaPentagon contractor leaves social media spy archive wide open on AmazonDan Goodin | Security Editor

The nitty-gritty behind William Binney's claims.Washington's BlogHow to Instantly Prove (Or Disprove) Russian Hacking of U.S. Election

In its summary of the cache of mostly Russian-language documents, Wikileaks claims they show how a long-established Russian company which supplies software to telcos is also installing infrastructure - with the government's blessing - that enables Russian state agencies to tap into, search and spy on citizens’ digital activity, suggesting a similar state-funded mass surveillance program to the one utilized by the U.S.’s NSA or by GCHQ in the U.K. (both of which were detailed in the 2013...

US Attorney General Jeff Sessions and National Intelligence Director Daniel Coats want the US Congress to permanently empower the federal government to carry out warrantless surveillance of foreign targets, according to a letter they sent to lawmakers. "We are writing to urge that the Congress promptly reauthorize, in clean and permanent form, Title VII of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), enacted by the FISA Amendments Act of 2008 (FAA)," Sessions and Coats wrote in...