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The New Cyber-Industrial Complex Spying on Us
WikiLeaks' Spy Files reveal the frightening scale and ambition of the industry now devoted to surveillance of all our daily lives
We live digital lives now, flitting from Facebook to YouTube, checking our iPhones and BlackBerries, and chatting with our loved ones on Skype. Very few of us worry too much about tweeting our personal opinions on politics or chatting with a new social network "friend" on the other side of the world, whom we barely know and often forget in a matter of a few hours or days.
Yet all these interactions have become fodder for a new industry that secretly vacuums up the data and preserves it forever on high-end servers that hold many petabytes (a million gigabytes) of information. This industry offers new tools to search that data and reconstruct our past, and even our real-time movements via our mobile phones, in a way that could well come back to haunt us.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange: 'These companies sell to state intelligence agencies the ability to spy on the entire population at once.' (Photo/Dominic Lipinski/PA)WikiLeaks has just released the Spy Files – a trove of almost 300 documents from these companies that shine a light into this industry. At the Bureau of Investigative Journalism, where I work, we trawled through these documents, and tracked down yet more material which our research team – Matthew Wrigley, David Pegg, Christian Jensen and Jamie Thunder – used to create an online database that will soon cover over 160 companies in some 25 countries.
It's worth spending some time browsing through this material because what this new industry offers to do is nothing short of Orwellian.
"We all aware of traditional spy stories of intelligence agencies like MI5 bugging the phones of one or two people," Julian Assange, the founder of WikiLeaks, told the Bureau. He continued:
"In the last ten years, something else has happened. We now see mass surveillance, where computer systems of an entire country are infected by surveillance programs, where the entire phone calls of a nation can be and are recorded by a company.
"Previously, we had all thought, why would the government be interested in me, my brother? My business is not interesting; I am not a criminal. Now these companies sell to state intelligence agencies the ability to spy on the entire population at once and keep that information permanently. In five or six years' time, if your brother or someone becomes of interest to that company or the government, they can go back in time and look to see what you said or what you emailed."
For example Glimmerglass, a company in Hayward, California, offers "non-intrusive intercepts of any fiber asset" such as "submarine landing stations", which this slide presentation demonstrates. Eric King, a human rights adviser to Privacy International, told me that means that Glimmerglass equipment can help government agencies secretly tap into the undersea cables that convey all the data and phone traffic between continents.
WikiLeaks also released a brochure from SS8 of Milpitas, California, touting its Intellego product that allows security forces to "see what they see, in real time" including a "target's draft-only emails, attached files, pictures and videos".
Yet others, like Blue Coat of Sunnyvale, California, sell web filtering tools that allow countries to block websites "to meet cultural and regulatory requirements" – a tool much sought after by authoritarian governments to make sure that citizens do not access dissident sites. Not too long ago, Syria bought some Bluecoat machines via a reseller in Dubai. (The company is not allowed to sell directly to Syria because of US sanctions.)
Government authorities and the makers of these products argue that there is an urgent need for these tools – to track down criminals and terrorists, to block child pornography and computer viruses – a practice known as "lawful interception". This is big business for i2, a company based in McLean, Virginia, which sells two major products – CopLink and Analyst's Notebook – software that allows law enforcement to make sense of reams of data. Government Computer News ran a story earlier this week about the "Digital Dragnet" – extolling the benefits of data analysis.
The magazine quoted Bob Griffin, the CEO of i2: "When we started this more than ten years ago, we talked about things like information-sharing and gathering as much data as you could," Griffin said. "In those days, people would look at you like you're a green banana. Why would I want to share information? Why would I want to bring information from business licenses or hunting and fishing licenses into the policing environment?"
Police authorities are excited about the potential: Jason Scheiss, analytical services division manager at the Durham police department in North Carolina, told Government Computer News that they were hoping to expand the data-collecting to include data on water and sewage billing, visitor logs from parks and recreation facilities and correlate it with the daily jail list. "So we could say, 'Hey, look here. All of these crimes only occur when this one guy's not in jail,'" he told the magazine.
Therein lies the rub: apart from the massive violation of individual privacy, or the risk of abuse by corrupt officials, these tools could easily allow security agencies to jump to the wrong conclusion. Indeed, these tools have the potential to make computer cables as dangerous as police batons.
"What we are seeing is the militarization of cyberspace. It's like having a tank in your front garden," says Assange.
You have been warned and you have a choice: you can avoid the wonderful world of the internet (unlikely, since you are reading this online) and digital data (virtually impossible if you pay for electricity or go camping) – or you can join the movement to say there need to be limits to how government authorities use our information against us. And if you choose the latter, check out WikiLeaks and Privacy International.
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36 Comments so far
Show AllThese tools are also great ways to collect "data" and finely-tune propaganda to increase public acceptance of corporate schemes. In other words, they can help marketers increase the efficacy of their advertising (brainwashing). This can include marketing "wars," perhaps more effectively than the "war" on Iraq was marketed.
That is absolutely true, I imagine it could also be used to construct an alternate view of world events, after all do we get to witness these things or do we rely on the web? Micro-targeting could take on a whole new meaning very soon.
Absolutely. It's about creating an even bigger web of lies in which to trap us than the one in which we are currently living. There's no use in imprisoning us, but there is use in brainwashing us to believe in the marketed world view and that we need to keep spending. That - living to spend - *is* a prison.
I suppose it's good to keep the paranoia real. I think this article lays out the present and likely future quite well. Everyone wants information: you and I, governments and corporations... Awareness is our only shield. Oh, and I do love Big Brother.
so do i... 2+2=5... honest
Since I'm already being monitored by "the machine" as we speak, WTF:
"Glimmerglass, a company in Hayward, California..." "WikiLeaks also released a brochure from SS8 of Milpitas, California..." "Yet others, like Blue Coat of Sunnyvale, California..."
For those who don't know, all these corps are located in Silicon Valley (now extending to the east bay in Hayward I guess,) ya know, where Apple is and Atari was. But most people don't know that ALL of Silicon Valley started out of the Defense Department$ investments into things like Apple and Atari, through corp conduits of the core technologies researched at places like Xerox and other on the DoD dole research facilities near and around Stanford. And most don't know still, that after WWII, before it was Silicon Valley, the Defense Dept was knee deep in this area with gargantuan corp campuses like Lockheed and Kaiser and IBM.
In other words, Silicon Valley has been, and ALWAYS WILL BE part and parcel of the DoD, the Pentagon, the Intelligence depts, military apparatus (hi Alameda Cyber-Intelligence Division☺,) and all other foreign policy related apparatus'. And as someone who grew up here, with countless friends and family members in those various DoD fields and professions (hi Lockheed database architects☺,) we all would consider the place to be a categorically dark and pathetic "hell hole" culture to live in, if it were not for some semblance of strikingly gorgeous landscapes of the bay, the redwoods, the not-so-distant ocean, and the arts of the City.
And so, the shopping mall parking lots are constantly full, with freeway exits repeatedly jammed to them, and children are taught to worship at the altar of technology, whether it be missiles, nuclear, oil, gizmos, or medicine. It doesn't matter because it pays the bills, sends their kids to elite colleges, and virtually commits an entire generation of them into the machine's ravenous mouth, once again.
Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more;
Or close the wall up with our English dead.
In peace there's nothing so becomes a man
As modest stillness and humility;
But when the blast of war blows in our ears,
Then imitate the action of the tiger. . . .
That is why it was so disgusting to see so many people recently idolizing Steve Jobs.
When, during the 1950s I grew up in what would later be know as Silicon Valley more than 80% of my schoolmates' parents worked for defense contractors.
I barf when I hear technobillionaires claim that they are proof of how well the free market system works.
I grew up in Sunnyvale. grad in 1953 Fremont UHS.Left for USMC 53.
Small world.
Again I'm posting, the spy system has a name. Its name is "ECHELON"..
This reminds me of a poster who once talked about his work in IT and how he wished he could get a job totally unrelated to DoD. Hooking people's lives and necessities to DoD is the worst thing that can ever happen in an empire nation such as this one. Thank you for bringing this up.
SkDoTo,
thank you for your informative post...
...peace...
As I have stated before.
Contrary to the claims made by so many ex-soldiers that post here where they suggest their SERVICE in the Military has protected Rights Liberties and freedoms, the exact opposite is the truth.
The US Military and those that serve in it are the biggest threats to the same. The Military, Militarism and the MIC are the forces most responsible for the erosion of liberties all under the guise of "National Security".
Henry V one of the best marketing tools for phoney male machismo ever written. Never mind how many died let's just celebrate the brotherhood and hold our manhood dear.
I love that reduced carbon footprint silver lining. There IS GOOD even in an insane world. And yes, it is always best to forgive (it's just so damn difficult).
Incredible stuff. So everything we say, do or purchase is always being monitored, stored, scanned and maybe later called up as evidence when they want to put a sting on our asses. Orwell barely tapped into how insidious this authoritarian culture might become. The best part, for THEM, is that most of us will never know we're being watched, unlike the Big Brother TV sets that saw your every move, and you knew they were watching. Julian Assange is one of the real heroes of this era. So of course he'll be eventually taken to Gitmo or some other hellhole and given the Bradley Manning treatment. Onward with OWS, our only hope at present, and DOWN with politicians, warmongers and spies of every stripe.
And good post, SkDoTo. Very insightful.
Isn't Mr. Assange some evil rapist or something? I'm sure it must be true - saw it on tv i think. A simple plain cell with no computer should do.
A rapist? All he supposedly did was try to have sex without a condom. that puts him in a class with ever man on the planet. I hope your post was sarcastic because this BS on
Assange is Orwellian itself.
Your hope is secure in fact.
Let us call them what they are: traitors. All of them.
But with nearly the whole population sounding off via internet against the corruption, the forever wars, the fast growing military dictatorship, etc. they just get overwhelmed with redundant information. Their effective use of all this information (for blackmail, "evidence" gathering, et al) depends on their being able pick people off one-by-one, or group-by-group.
Like with all the water, sewerage and recreational data they can find spurious "correlations" to jail just about everyone. But on second thought, even if they want to jail everyone they'll get bogged down because the millions of guards needed will also have to be jailed for the same reasons as everyone else. Where do they get the guards to guard the guards to guard....?
It generally works quite well to only take out the leaders, the most belligerent, the most vociferous, the occasional celebrity, a millionaire sympathizer (traitor?), then let the media do their work. A little smear, a bit of fear, it's all very clear.
Right, Greg R. The examples. See what could happen to you? You've been told to watch what you say.
If u really want to fight these fiends you need to stay off of the nets and the cell ph. nets. Even then u leave a huge trail unless u use cash only.
Even with cash only transactions there are so many surveilance cameras all around you'd have to be invisible to be totally untrackable.
you can minimize the data collected from your computer
first STOP USING INTERNET EXPLORER RIGHT NOW !!!!!
internet exploiter was built from the ground up as spy ware
it keeps a record of every web site you have ever looked at
when you looked at it and how meany times
even a system restore will not delete this stored data
use a mozilla browser instead and install ghostery and no script addons
if you want to go to extremes use a proxy some web sites keep a record of the IP address of every visitor to there web site some wifi hot spots keep a record of the MAC addresses (the serial number of the adapter) of every wifi adapter that connects to them this can be spoofed easy on linux harder on windows
I got feed up with cookies eating my band width (road runner is slower than dial up most of the time) when I looked in to it I found over 200 tracking cookies on my computer
EVEN COMMON DREAMS INSTALLS TRACKING COOKIES nobody on the net can be trusted
Cookies as they were originally designed serve a useful purpose. They allow websites to offer an individualized experience. You don't have to see the same preliminary introduction everytime you visit. Most expire after a time. You wouldn't be able to play games, or post anything online without them.
Firefox has a setting to automatically delete all cookies upon closing the browser. It's under Tools, Options, Privacy.
even CD installs tracking cookies
Any website that requires that you register before posting installs cookies and always has. How else would they maintain an archive or allow for posting. It's the nature of the data base and website architecture.
The "democracy" that Egyptians are fighting and dying for, being imprisoned and tortured for is a step up the so-called democracy food chain, albeit fairly low. Compared to our dead ideals, at least they are struggling to free themselves from chains.
But here? I ask this not only rhetorically but seriously: is there a single democracy anywhere in the world, besides Sweden, I think, that allows its citizens to vote directly on issues that matter? Our's is a sham faux-democracy. The constitution was a set of ideas good for the time but totally useless now given how far we've descended into corporate/governmental totalitarianism.
We're not useful as citizens, with worth, dignity and meaning. We're only useful to the corporate state as shoppers. That is why the American Dream has turned into the militarized fear-mongering nightmare it is. We who were raised on this milk know it. The milk is sour, spoilt. As concerns democracy, we vote ONCE every 2, 4 or 6 years. That's it. We have no other participation. We have no influence on the political process. We are merely fodder to be spied upon by a select demented and psychopathic minority because they went to Yale or Harvard, or now Stanford, and only they can decide things . If we were a real democracy, do you think we'd be in wars all around the planet? Do you think we'd be hated and feared by the rest of the world, sick and tired of being bullied by Wall Street and Washington? Do you think "we" would have just sold $60 billion in weapons to Saudi Arabia, a bastion of democracy, to help us with our next middle east wars in Syria and Iran? Do you think we'd have found a better way to have a decent domestic economy than the armaments and surveillance state, the criminal financial wheelings and dealings of the Wall Street bankster cartel, and the polluting of the planet by the oil, gas and coal conglomerates.
Wouldn't these conversations and the decisions that followed be different if we all had a say! But that can't happen here: the rich, the connected, the chosen would lose control. Can't have that. We have lost our souls as a nation. We are in a deep crisis. Democracy was our rock. It is no longer. In its philosophical essence, democracy is one big inclusive conversation, like they have been trying to have in Tahrir Square. We don't have anything close to it and it's an insult to be told and reminded relentlessly by the power structure about the fable of that shining city on a hill, the land of freedom and democracy.
Don't forget to register to vote!
The other side of this coin is that your ideas and intellectual property could be stolen from you before you can bring it to fruition. If you are working on a new business model or are putting together research on an intellectual property, collecting prices and material info, for example, coupled with your Internet history, these spy outfits could pass that all along to heavy hitters with big money that can bring your idea to fruition quickly and at a top level while you're still saving for a part. In this way, common people will never know what hit them.
Also, if you are involved in a law suit with a heavy hitter like say a polluter, etc. What are the odds that they are not privy to your correspondence and your net and search history. As far as Im concerned , these people have rendered the net useless for many things like sensitive correspondence.
Our government is no longer the people's government. it is a wholly owned tool of the OnePercent. We must realize how vulnerable our privacy is and stop using the net the way we do even though it is so convenient. .
That is an excellent observation and thank you for pointing this out. Even before the digital age, inventions would always be stifled with corporate "patents". This was why I pointed out earlier that creativity at least in the USA is dead. As you correctly point out, the already ill-conditioned common people will never know what hit them and I would add that pointing this out to them will cause them to react in denial mode at best.
Concerns about online privacy are one of the reasons I generally do not post as often as I used to in my earlier days of reading and posting in online forums. It is sad, however, that there is a lot of societal peer pressure going around to push everyone into "joining Facebook to increase your chances of getting hired" or "showing off on youtube to tell the world how special you are" crap but I never fall for any of that. In fact, it has been revealed that employers can look up private info about a candidate prior to a job interview that they would never be allowed to legally ask in an interview.
On your last point, in all my years of reading and posting on public forums, I have been upset and angry at the way some people act like professional snobs calling for a total invasion of privacy even when they are personally against it. Either they fail to realize the true costs of gutting people's rights to online privacy or they are cyberbullies by nature. With enough corporate bullies circling around us, the last thing we need are potential cyberbullies being given more power to abuse others and make matters worse.
watch this space.
so as the police/surveillance state expands, the number of individuals who are now complicit in spying and violating people's privacy is also expanding exponentially. i just typed cyber-intelligence division into google and the majority of the first 25 hits were job openings in the field (for MIC and the government).
if this corrupt plutocratic corporate government were to collapse and be redesigned, how many americans would be guilty of participating in the madness of the despotic regime in the status quo ? and how should they be punished ? it's somewhat of a ridiculous hypothetical, but the point highlights how our system is inherently flawed. it seems many folks are willing to do damn near anything for a buck, regardless of the negative consequences experienced by others (i.e. a complete lack of empathy).
...peace...
First they get you deeply into debt to obtain an education, then you are presented with jobs to do slimy things in order to pay back that debt. There's a racketeering case in here somewhere I suspect.
I'm 64, female, disabled, and have no desire to hurt even a bug (the kind that crawls)... yet somehow I don't think any of that will save me, as I am guilty of 'thought-crime'. I 'thought' we were a democracy.