Archive for the 'Surveillance' Category
You Know Who Else Collected Metadata? The Stasi.
February 13th, 2014Via: ProPublica: The East German secret police, known as the Stasi, were an infamously intrusive secret police force. They amassed dossiers on about one quarter of the population of the country during the Communist regime. But their spycraft — while incredibly invasive — was also technologically primitive by today’s standards. While researching my book Dragnet […]
Careto: Complex Malware Has Been Targeting High Intelligence Value Individuals Since 2007
February 12th, 2014Via: Vice: A surprisingly sophisticated malware named Careto has been infecting computers globally since at least 2007, a new report from security firm Kaspersky revealed today. While the virus, also known as The Mask, appears to have originated in a Spanish-speaking country—careto, a Spanish slang term for an ugly face, was found in the code—it’s […]
We Track ‘Em, You Whack ‘Em
February 11th, 2014Via: First Look: The National Security Agency is using complex analysis of electronic surveillance, rather than human intelligence, as the primary method to locate targets for lethal drone strikes – an unreliable tactic that results in the deaths of innocent or unidentified people. According to a former drone operator for the military’s Joint Special Operations […]
The Terrifying Surveillance Case of Brandon Mayfield
February 9th, 2014Via: Al Jazeera: During a live Web chat in late January, National Security Agency whistle-blower Edward Snowden explained one of the least discussed dangers of bulk collection. By indiscriminately sweeping up the call records and the international communications of Americans, the government has the ability to engage in retroactive investigation, or mining the historical data […]
NDR Interview with Edward Snowden
February 8th, 2014Via: NDR: One of the major programmes that faces abuse in the National Security Agency is what’s called “XKeyscore”. It’s a front end search engine that allows them to look through all of the records they collect worldwide every day. What could you do if you would sit so to speak in their place with […]
Professor Tyrone Hayes, Atrazine and Syngenta
February 5th, 2014That atrazine is dangerous is just the opener. The PSYOP that Syngenta is running against Hayes is incredible. Via: The New Yorker: Hayes published his atrazine work in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences a year and a half after quitting the panel. He wrote that what he called “hermaphroditism” was induced in […]
The First Congressman to Battle the NSA Is Dead
February 5th, 2014Via: PandoDaily: Last month, former Congressman Otis Pike died, and no one seemed to notice or care. That’s scary, because Pike led the House’s most intensive and threatening hearings into US intelligence community abuses, far more radical and revealing than the better-known Church Committee’s Senate hearings that took place at the same time. That Pike […]
DEA Tactic More Secret Than “Parallel Construction”
February 5th, 2014Via: MuckRock: To reiterate, the DEA redacted the name of a method its trainers and legal auditors deemed not only constitutional but also palatable to the public. As its position on the list suggests, this shielded tactic is “tips and leads paradigm” that is the “primary methodology for protecting [intelligence community] information that is shared […]
Chaos Computer Club Files Criminal Complaint Against the German Government
February 4th, 2014Via: Chaos Computer Club: On Monday, the Chaos Computer Club (CCC) and the International League for Human Rights (ILMR), have filed a criminal complaint with the Federal Prosecutor General’s office. The complaint is directed against the German federal government, the presidents of the German secret services, namely Bundesnachrichtendienst, Militärischer Abschirmdienst, Bundesamt für Verfassungschutz, and others. […]
Google: Lots of Android Phones Taking Video in the Same Area—Alert the Cops?
January 30th, 2014Via: Phandroid: Excerpt from US Patent #20140025755 “When there are at least a given number of video clips with similar time stamps and geolocation stamps uploaded to a repository, it is inferred that an event of interest has likely occurred, and a notification signal is transmitted (e.g., to a law enforcement agency, to a news […]
