Saturday, November 23, 2013
edward snowden trador or patroit?
Thursday, November 21, 2013
The issues of the NSA
PRISM; the top secret NSA 20 million dollar per year surveillance program, stresses to the public that they do not go beyond what they are forced to do under law in handing over user data.
What isn't expressed to the public is the PRISM program has access that is granted to various records such as emails, chat conversations, voice calls, documents and more.
PRISM has direct access to providers such as Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Paltalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube and Apple.
The problem is that NSA collects this data without the companies knowledge in most cases. Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, and Yahoo, all claim that they do not provide the government with direct access to their servers, unless it is directed by court orders.
When executives from these companies found out about the claims in NSA documents they claimed to be very confused. Basically, PRISM can get around any security system.
On the other hand companies like Skype are working with PRISM. They enable PRISM to easily collect Video and Audio conversations. At the same time Skype claims to there users that they are unable to perform wiretaps.
Companies such as Microsoft claim to protect their systems from the government. In reality they are helping the NSA to get through encryption so they can intercept web chats on the new outlook.com portal. Before Microsoft's help the NSA was already able to access emails on Outlook.com.
Companies such as Yahoo and Facebook are pushing for the right to be allowed to publish the number of requests they receive from the NSA. These companies are forbidden by law to disclose how much data the NSA provides. When founder of facebook and CEO of Yahoo tried to fight off NSA surveillance they were threatened to face jail time. Yahoo has previously even unsuccessfully sued the FISA court that provides the framework for the NSA surveillance
What isn't expressed to the public is the PRISM program has access that is granted to various records such as emails, chat conversations, voice calls, documents and more.
PRISM has direct access to providers such as Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, Paltalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube and Apple.
The problem is that NSA collects this data without the companies knowledge in most cases. Apple, Microsoft, Facebook, Google, and Yahoo, all claim that they do not provide the government with direct access to their servers, unless it is directed by court orders.
When executives from these companies found out about the claims in NSA documents they claimed to be very confused. Basically, PRISM can get around any security system.
On the other hand companies like Skype are working with PRISM. They enable PRISM to easily collect Video and Audio conversations. At the same time Skype claims to there users that they are unable to perform wiretaps.
Companies such as Microsoft claim to protect their systems from the government. In reality they are helping the NSA to get through encryption so they can intercept web chats on the new outlook.com portal. Before Microsoft's help the NSA was already able to access emails on Outlook.com.
Companies such as Yahoo and Facebook are pushing for the right to be allowed to publish the number of requests they receive from the NSA. These companies are forbidden by law to disclose how much data the NSA provides. When founder of facebook and CEO of Yahoo tried to fight off NSA surveillance they were threatened to face jail time. Yahoo has previously even unsuccessfully sued the FISA court that provides the framework for the NSA surveillance
Tuesday, November 19, 2013
Digital Story Annotated Bibliography
"National
Security Agency / Central Security Service - Top Banner." The NSA/CSS
Mission. N.p., n.d. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
The National Security Agency’s mission statement
“The
National Security Agency/Central Security Service (NSA/CSS) leads the U.S.
Government in cryptology that encompasses both Signals Intelligence (SIGINT)
and Information Assurance (IA) products and services, and enables Computer
Network Operations (CNO) in order to gain a decision advantage for the Nation
and our allies under all circumstances.”
When the NSA was
initially formed on December 4th of 1998 The roles of this
organization where;
1. “Collect
(including through clandestine means), process, analyze, produce, and
disseminate signals intelligence information and data for foreign intelligence
and counterintelligence purposes to support national and departmental missions;”
2. “Act
as the National Manager for National Security Systems as established in law and
policy, and in this capacity be responsible to the Secretary of Defense and to
the Director, National Intelligence;”
3. “Prescribe
security regulations covering operating practices, including the transmission,
handling, and distribution of signals intelligence and communications security
material within and among the elements under control of the Director of the
National Security Agency, and exercise the necessary supervisory control to
ensure compliance with the regulations.”
IN 2008 on July 31st the NSA was granted the
rights by the government to;
1. “Align
EO12333 with the Intelligence Reform and Terrorism Prevention Act of 2004;”
2. “Implement
additional recommendations of the 9/11 and WMD Commissions;”
3. “Further
integrate the Intelligence Community and clarify and strengthen the role of the
DNI as the head of the Community;”
4. “Maintain
or strengthen privacy and civil liberties protections”
I chose to copy and paste this information directly
from the NSA website because I want to exactly show what the NSA claims to be.
I will start my digital story off including this information, most likely word
for word. To give viewers who don’t have an education on what the NSA is an
idea of what they are all about and what they claim to be. After my audience
has an idea of the jobs the NSA are supposed to peruse I will then move into
issues that people have with NSA spying.
"Three
Leaks, Three Weeks, and What We've Learned About the US Government's Other
Spying Authority: Executive Order 12333 | Electronic Frontier Foundation."
Electronic Frontier Foundation. N.p., n.d. Web. 19 Nov. 2013.
·
The changes made to the Executive Order In
2008 allows the National Security Agency to secretly steal data from companies
such as Yahoo and google. This also includes fiber optic connections between
company servers at various parts around the world. This allows the NSA to
obtain millions of records each month including personal data such as audio,
video, text and pictures. Even if the user has a block or a password on the
information and is secured by the website, the NSA can still hack their
information.
·
The NSA uses the excuse of protecting us
from foreign threats by collecting our address books, buddy lists, calling
records, phone calls, emails, and storing everything in a database that can be
viewed by the NSA. They can get away with this because they twist the rights of
the Executive Order 12333. This order relies on the Executive oversight, the
problem is that the Congress isn’t concerned about overseeing the actions of
the NSA.
·
The NSA uses the “supposed authority the order grants to collect information”
act in the EO12333 to hack into data center links, Americans address books and
contacts. They can do this because they can consider this information foreign
data. The definition of this act is
incredibly broad and can easily be twisted.
·
The guidelines for “Supplemental
Procedures and Guidelines for Governing Metadata Analysis” allows the NSA to
create secret guidelines without the approval of congress, for when and how the
NSA can use Americans information outside of the oversight of the FISA court.
The NSA uses metadata to create a social network of Americans for the “foreign
intelligence purpose”. There are no restrictions on the use of this data.
·
The foreign intelligence definition
is loose and allows the NSA to create any limit they would like on collecting
internal data from Google and Yahoo. Since databases such as Google and yahoo
take place overseas the NSA believes that they are entitled to presume
communications through them as foreign.
Through this information I wish to give my audience revelations
they can put together to show them that NSA can collect any and all data that
they wish to. I wish to express to them that even innocent Americans
information can be hacked by NSA without reasoning. I hope that it shows my
audience that this needs to be stopped and make them wonder what else they have
collected. I wish to show my audience how the NSA uses laws policies and
procedures to get around the constitution.
Press, The
Associated. "N.H.L. ROUNDUP; Flyers Win Their Third in a Row." The
New York Times. The New York Times, 31 Dec. 2007. Web. 18 Nov. 2013.
I want to inform my viewer that hacking into
personal information can tell the government a lot about a person thinks like;
·
Phone and email logs
o
allow analysts to identify peoples friends and
associates
o
Detect where they were at certain times
o
Gives clues to religious and political affiliations
o
Pick up sensitive information
§ Calls
to a psychologist
§ Late-night
messages to a spouse or partner
I want to make my audience realize that mediadata
can be very revealing.
""We
Don’t Live in a Free Country": Jacob Appelbaum on Being Target of
Widespread Gov’t Surveillance." Democracy Now! N.p., n.d. Web. 19
Nov. 2013.
This video and article shows a real life experience
of someone who was targeted by the NSA I hope to display it to show my audience
a real life experience of NSA hacking.
Basically Jacob Applebaulm life became difficult due
to NSA hacking, he has been target and detained several times at airports,
sometimes met at the jetway by men with guns. He was interrogated by men that
wanted to know his political views. They didn’t care about terrorism or drugs
which would be valid reasons for interrogation.
Friday, November 15, 2013
Thursday, November 7, 2013
Digital Story Proposal
The theme of my digital story is NSA spying. The storyline of my digital story is going to initially show pictures of people doing everyday things using technology.
I would include
cartoons
·
Someone talking on the phone
·
Someone sending a text message
·
Someone sending a picture message
·
Someone sending an email
·
Someone skyping
·
Someone typing something into a google search
bar
From there each link will take you
to a different story or cartoon strip of the NSA getting a hold of that
personal information and storing it some even making fun of it.
A typical person may think that they
have nothing to hide from the government. Most Americans aren’t terrorists or
criminals. The majority of our country may not even realize that the NSA may be
hacking their personal information with no criminalistics reasoning at all? Why
would the situation of the NSA spying on an innocent citizen even occur? What is so private that individuals may not
want the NSA to see? Why would innocent citizens have anything to hide from the
NSA?
According to David Cole “the latest
revelations make it clear that we all have something to fear when government
officials are authorized to intercept our most private forms of communication without
the safeguards of a judicial warrant based on individualized suspicion of
wrongdoing.” You may ask yourself why would the government be interested in private
forms of communication, which are not in suspicion of wrongdoing? The truth is,
in fact, people working for the government are only human. Just because someone
works for the NSA doesn’t mean, they are primarily worried about national
security. Some of these works find a twisted humor in individual’s private
lives. They hack into private conversations primarily for amusement.
Imagine the scenario of your
significant other working for the International Red Cross. They have been
overseas, away from home for a long period of time. You both remain faithful to
each other, but soon gain strong sexual urges for the other. What do many
people in these types of situations do? Communicate sexually through electronic
forms of communication. Wouldn’t you be horrified if you were in this situation
and realized that NSA spie’s were hacking into your conversations, listening,
and making fun of something so personal, that you wouldn’t want to share with
anyone but your significant other?
In July of 2008 Congress amended “FISA
to authorize the NSA to conduct massive electronic surveillance with no
individualized suspicion or warrant.” So long as the surveillance is “targeted
at people or organizations believed to be located abroad” The purpose of this
bill “is to gather foreign intelligence” The problem is “Gathering foreign
intelligence” can be sickly twisted. The NSA can get around hacking basically
any organization or person believed to be located abroad for any reason. The
bill does not restrict the collection and sharing of private “pillow talk” by
Americans overseas. It is perfectly lawful for a NSA member to hack into a
private conversation for personal amusement. I believe there needs to be some
sort of limitation implied when tagging and passing around conversations. If
the call has nothing to do with endangering our country, it should be
restricted from being tagged and passed along.
Until more restrictions are applied
the NSA is able to hack into private conversations of American’s abroad. Major victims
of this privacy violation are employers of the American Red cross and Doctors
without borders. An anonymous linguist with the army reserves assigned to NSA
told of “listening in on hundreds Americans abroad”. David Murfee Faulk, a
former Arab linguist for the Navy, admits to having conversations with fellow army
reserves assigned to NSA such as; “Hey,
check this out, there’s good phone sex…pull up this call, it’s really funny, go
check it out.” They would then check it out and the phone call would consist of
“some colonel making pillow talk” afterwards statements such as ‘Wow, this was
crazy.’” Would be made, judging the private affairs of colonials. As you could
imagine this would be very embarrassing to the American’s abroad that are being
hacked. Situations like this are personal, and aren’t business of the government.
This doesn’t just happen on rare occasions
either. A News story based on independent accounts of two former military
intercept officers with the National Security Agency reported “that the NSA
surveillance program routinely intercepted extremely private calls of Americans
abroad having more to do with sex than security” This interaction gives information
sharing a new meaning. The story tells how “officers would tag the conversations
and pass them around to their fellow intelligence officers” It may be one thing
for a NSA spy to accidently intercept a private call having nothing to do with terrorism,
but the moral thing to do would be to immediately disconnect the call. As Cole
says “Privacy is an invaluable aspect of our everyday lives, not just a tool
for those committing or planning crimes.” Innocent rights should not be
violated. “Pillow talk” becomes something that is no longer between lovers but
also between whichever NSA members decide to get a laugh out of their private lives.
Vincent, Michael. "Phone Sex and National Security." Ed. Hayden. Nation.
Electrical Contractors and Other Wiring Installation Contractors, 3 Nov. 2008.
Web. 7 Nov. 2013.
Say that you aren’t communicating in
a way that you feel should be private. Do
you still have nothing to hide? “A few months ago, the Guardian showed how NSA
servers can archive ‘nearly everything a user does on the internet’” Take into
consideration some people search for self-identity through the internet. Remember
the speaker Joyce Dunce, the self-identification process of her life was very
private. She mentioned how she attempted to commit suicide multiple times
because she just hated who she was and had no support. If she knew that
everything she did on the internet was monitored and stored in files, if she didn’t
feel private and safe using the internet, she may have successfully committed suicide.
To think that NSA spying could lead to death.
Do you have any embarrassing photos
or videos stored on your computer? Just think, they have probably been transferred
into a government database. These private videos and photos could have been
viewed and shared by members of the NSA. More recently, the New York Times
reported that the agency ‘has been exploiting its huge collections of data to create
sophisticated graphs of some Americans’ social connections that can identify
their associates, their locations at certain times, their travelling
companions, and other personal information’. Why does the government need all
this information? Is it truly a necessity? It’s not
Engler, Mark. Editorial. New Internationalist
Nov. 2013, 467th ed.: 33. Ebsco Host. Nov. 2013. Web. 7 Nov. 2013.
Friday, November 1, 2013
Lit Reveiw Individual: Updated
In 1952 the NSA was formed as a product of the Cold war, to
protect our national security. To some extent I believe that NSA is a good
thing however there is a point where a line needs to be drawn between
protecting America’s security and respecting the privacy our constitutional
rights gives us. More innocent American’s have their privacy tapered with then criminals.
I believe that most people to some extent know what NSA spying is, I just think
most people are unaware of how far privacy violations are taken. Restrictions
and limitations need to be implemented on the NSA. Most people might think, I
have nothing to hide, so why should I worry about the government tapping into
my emails, phone calls, or text messages. I must admit I do fall into this
category. Even if NSA spying doesn’t concern you first-hand, it still needs to
be considered as an ethical problem. We are all born equal so we need to
consider those individuals that may have something to hide, and I don’t mean
hiding something such as breaking the law. Use the speaking who came in just
last week. She had no support in the “real world” therefore she had to figure
herself out using the virtual world. She had mentioned how she was careful to
find safe sites to express her identity with, to meet new people, and figure
herself out. As, you can imagine this stage of her life must have been very embarrassing
for her, she was afraid of who she really was and wasn’t ready to reveal her
identity to the entire world. People, who are in situations such as her, completely
innocent people are the ones I am referring to. I am positive she would be
mortified if she had found out the government was tapping into her personal
emails while she was going through this stage of life, something like this
would be very embarrassing for a person which is why restrictions need to be
put on NSA spying. Emails, private social media information, even things such
as google searches should not be sent and stored by the government with just
anyone, there needs to be some kind of lead or history for the government to
hack into individuals information like this. I understand to save lives
sometimes action needs to be taken quickly to find and catch criminals, there isn’t
always time to go through proper documentations and filing warrants. There just
needs to be a better system to getting into private information when needed.
Privacy shouldn’t be monitored of individuals who have no lead.
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