Dangerous Cybercrime Treaty Pushes Surveillance and Secrecy Worldwide As part of an emerging international trend to try to ‘civilize the Internet’, one of the world’s worst Internet law treaties--the highly controversial Council of Europe (CoE) Convention on Cybercrime--is back on the agenda. Canada and Australia are using the Treaty to introduce new invasive, online surveillance laws, many of which go far beyond the Convention’s intended levels of intrusiveness. Negotiated over a decade ago, only 31 of its 47 signatories have ratified it.
Wikileaks docs reveal that governments use malware for surveillance The latest round of documents published by Wikileaks offers a rare glimpse into the world of surveillance products. The collection—which Wikileaks calls the Spy Files—includes confidential brochures and slide presentations that companies use to market intrusive surveillance tools to governments and law enforcement agencies. A report that Wikileaks published alongside the documents raises concern about the growing use of mass surveillance tools that indiscriminately monitor and analyze entire populations. The group also points out that some of the products described in the documents are sold to authoritarian regimes, which use them to hunt and track political dissidents. The details revealed by Wikileaks echo a recent report by The Wall Street Journal (WSJ) that discussed the surveillance industry. The publication analyzed approximately 200 documents from 36 separate companies as part of a special investigative project called The Surveillance Catalog.
Thailand: $13 Million for Lese Majesty Web-taps | Asia Pacific | World By Alex JohnstonEpoch Times Staff Created: December 14, 2011 Last Updated: December 14, 2011 Thailand's King Bhumibol Adulyadej waves from his wheelchair in Bangkok on his 84th birthday Dec. 5, 2011. (Pairoj/AFP/Getty Images) AdFreak Need a new reason to cry at weddings? Tosando, a Japanese company that offers musical instruments and lessons, is pleased to oblige with this intense, time-tripping tear-jerker. The short film tells the story of a widowed, middle-aged father and his daughter on her wedding day. At the reception, dad sits at the piano and attempts to play Pachelbel's Canon, which opens the floodgates for memories both happy and sad. The flashbacks are a tad disorienting at first, but you'll get the gist. (RocketNews24 has a handy breakdown/translation for those in need.)
Occupy Wall Street's 'occucopter' – who's watching whom? | Noel Sharkey and Sarah Knuckey Tim Pool's 'occucopter' is a response to the police eviction of Occupy Wall Street protestors from Zuccotti Park, New York. Photograph: Keystone USA-ZUMA/Rex Features The police may soon be watching you in your garden picking your vegetables or your bottom. As police plans for increasing unmanned aerial surveillance take shape, there is a new twist. Private citizens can now buy their own surveillance drones to watch the police. Edward Snowden Provides Information on NSA Cyber Spying & Hacking to Hong Kong Newspaper Edward Snowden, the former National Security Agency (NSA) contractor who blew the whistle on secret US surveillance programs like PRISM, has provided details on United States government hacking and cyber-spying to a newspaper in Hong Kong. The South China Morning Post, which previously interviewed Snowden, was shown information that Snowden said indicated the US government had hacked into “Chinese mobile firms to steal millions of text messages.” He also showed the newspaper that Tsinhua University, which the Post describes as the “mainland’s top education and research institute,” was the “target of extensive hacking by US spies this year.” “It is not known how many times the prestigious university has been attacked by the NSA but details shown to the Post by Snowden reveal that one of the most recent breaches was this January,” according to reporting by the newspaper. The attacks were “intensive and concerted efforts.”
Druckversion - Cover Story: How the NSA Targets Germany and Europe - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International At first glance, the story always appears to be the same. A needle has disappeared into the haystack -- information lost in a sea of data. For some time now, though, it appears America's intelligence services have been trying to tackle the problem from a different angle. "If you're looking for a needle in the haystack, you need a haystack," says Jeremy Bash, the former chief of staff to ex-CIA head Leon Panetta. Spies Without Borders Series: Using Domestic Networks to Spy on the World Much of the U.S. media coverage of the NSA revelations has concentrated on its impact on the constitutional rights of U.S. Internet users. But what about the billions of Internet users around the world whose private information is stored in U.S. servers, or whose data travels across U.S. networks? Below, we're publishing a series of articles looking into how the information disclosed in the NSA leaks affect the international community and how they highlight one part of an international system of surveillance that dissolves what national privacy protections any of us have, whereever we live. The Spies Without Borders series is a joint project with CIPPIC.
International Customers: It's Time to Call on US Internet Companies to Demand Accountability and Transparency This is a joint international campaign between EFF and Access Now. The Guardian and the Washington Post recently published slides that indicate that the US government’s National Security Agency (NSA) is engaged in mass surveillance of users around the world through a program called PRISM. The NSA is extracting audio, video, photographs, emails, documents, and connection logs from nine leading Internet companies: Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, PalTalk, AOL, Skype, YouTube, and Apple.
Using Domestic Networks to Spy on the World Spies Without Borders I This is the first article of our Spies Without Borders series. This article has been co-authored by Tamir Israel, Staff Lawyer at CIPPIC and Katitza Rodriguez, EFF International Rights Director. The Spies Without Borders series are looking into how the information disclosed in the NSA leaks affect the international community and how they highlight one part of an international system of surveillance that dissolves what national privacy protections any of us have, whereever we live. You can follow the Spies Without Borders here.
U.S. Foreign Intelligence: From Carte Blanche Surveillance to Weak [Domestic] Protections This is the second article of our Spies Without Borders series. This article has been co-authored by Tamir Israel, Staff Lawyer at CIPPIC, Katitza Rodriguez, EFF International Rights Director and Mark Rumold, EFF Staff Attorney. The Spies Without Borders series are looking into how the information disclosed in the NSA leaks affect Internet users around the world whose private information is stored in U.S. servers, or whose data travels across U.S. networks.
An International Perspective on FISA: No Protections, Little Oversight Spies Without Borders III This is the third article of our Spies Without Borders series. It has been co-authored by Tamir Israel, Staff Lawyer at CIPPIC, Katitza Rodriguez, EFF International Rights Director and Mark Rumold, EFF Staff Attorney. The Spies Without Borders series are looking into how the information disclosed in the NSA leaks affect Internet users around the world whose private information is stored in U.S. servers, or whose data travels across U.S. networks. This article has been crossposted on the website of OpenMedia.ca. Universal, Self-Evident: I'm Not American but I Have Privacy Rights too, NSA In a letter sent today to the United States Congress, an international coalition of non-profit organizations called upon the U.S. government to protect the privacy and freedoms of not only its citizens, but of people everywhere. As news of the alarmingly broad reach and scope of America’s surveillance program reverberates around the globe, now is the time for the United States to pass formal privacy safeguards to protect the billions of foreign Internet users whose communications are stored in U.S. servers or whose data travels across U.S. networks. EFF joined more than 50 NGOs—including European Digital Rights, Association For Progressive Communications, Access Now, WebWeWant Foundation, Center for Technology and Society (Brazil) and Thai Netizen Network—in signing the letter, which was organized through Best Bits , a global network of civil society organizations.