NSA Storing Internet Data, Social Networking Data, on Pretty Much Everybody

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2013/10/nsa_storing_int.html

by frrp • 13 years ago

97 30 13 years ago

schneier.com

ktr100• 13 years ago

So this government shutdown seems to have no effect on the NSA.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/norman-solomon/the-nsa-deserve...

samstave4• 13 years ago

I'm ready to shutdown my taxpaying status to this utter joke of a government.

mapt• 13 years ago

Did it?

http://www.northeastern.edu/research/raf/files/NSA-Govt-Shut...

brokenparser• 13 years ago

Is there a mirror for this?

hrasyid• 13 years ago

Thanks, captain!

nwzpaperman2• 13 years ago

Some people owe me up-votes for all those down-votes they gave me six+ months ago when I stated one must assume a zero privacy environment when engaging technology today.

I'm just happy I knew what the Internet was like before mosaic and the www emerged. It seems so quaint now.

Edit - How long until people ditch their Black Amex cards and go back to cash for some privacy restored? A short decade ago it wasn't so uncommon to carry a few bucks. How many people really want banks and the government knowing all of their consumption habits in addition to the timing of their consumption?

All in the name of fraud prevention! Just carry a few bucks and no worries again!

dlinder• 13 years ago

Data Mining Guy won't put hamburgers on his CC, says insurance companies will eventually retaliate: http://www.economist.com/node/21556263

CoreDumpling• 13 years ago

Can't we turn the tables on them if we know what's going on?

1) Take out life insurance policy.

2) Pay with credit card at McDonald's and the bar.

3) Get a bunch of speeding tickets.

4) Sell policy to a data mining firm that hopes I die soon.

5) Profit!

sanxiyn• 13 years ago

I do most of my small transactions in cash. Is this in any way unusual? Is this American thing?

frank_boyd• 13 years ago

go back to cash

What do you mean, go back to cash?

Not everybody was OK with their transactions being stored and monitored.

samstave4• 13 years ago

The idea of Total Informational Awareness has been shouted about for years. there is only ONE next step: stand up against the NSA in entirety. We must make a move that is truly going to force reform.

nwzpaperman2• 13 years ago

If people believed the NSA was running the free porn sites, there would be mutiny fo sho!

Edit - No one cares until they're hit where it hurts.

samstave4• 13 years ago

http://www.scribd.com/doc/116008498/Cover-up-5200-Pentagon-P...

samstave4• 13 years ago

Alexander must be indicted immediately for anyone to regain ANY trust in the NSA.

Alexander is a criminal, however, so is Holder, Pelosi, Cheney, Bush, Powell, Obama, etc etc etc etc....

jonnybgood• 13 years ago

We have to assume that the NSA has everyone who uses electronic communications under constant surveillance.

We don't have to assume anything except that which is provided by evidence. If you have the evidence, then allow it to present itself. Assumption leads to conspiracy theory and inaccurate information. I really don't think that's what this cause really needs.

Is it just me or does Bruce Schneier's posts read more like propaganda than journalism? It's pretty awful and I'm surprised HN is eating it up. He tip toes on fear mongering through exaggeration, e.g. in OP getting people more hyped up and fearful of the NSA because they're tracking EVERYONE... except, it's only an assumption. Calls to action should not be based on assumptions.

hackinthebochs3• 13 years ago

Oh brother, its as if some people have learned nothing from the last 6 months (or are actively shilling... apparently you only comment on NSA stories).

When it comes to your personal privacy and security, you must assume that anything that is reasonably possible is being carried out by your adversaries. The recent leaks prove that the NSA will do absolutely anything within its power to further its goal of total information awareness.

All of the NSA revelations could have been predicted (and were predicted) by anyone with some technological skill and a little bit of foresight. If you wait until proof is presented to you, you have already lost; your privacy and security have already been compromised. The game is to think ahead and protect yourself from all possible current and future attacks. There are some people who's very freedom depends on such foresight.

csandreasen4• 13 years ago

In another context jonnybgood might instead be called a "skeptic" or perhaps even "capable of applying critical thinking skills" rather than dismissed as a "shill". Instead of mocking him for not paying attention over the last 6 months, you should go back and examine all of the leaked documents. You'll note that they speak quite a bit to the capabilities of the NSA, but don't reveal much about who they're targeting, why and what the ultimate goal of targeting would be. If you disagree, I challenge you to actual provide a leaked document that shows the NSA is specifically targeting ordinary citizens like the GP was calling for, rather than a secondary article from Greenwald, Schneier, etc., that makes broad assertions that because a spying agency with collecting foreign intelligence has the technical capability to conduct the most invasive possible infractions on the privacy of people it is not charged with collecting against, they must indeed be doing so. Your armed local police force has the technical capability of detaining citizens indiscriminately without regard to whether or not they violated the law, then summarily executing them without trial. That doesn't mean that's their job.

bostik• 13 years ago

I think he's mostly shortcutting conclusions. Not jumping, just cutting corners. As for evidence: we know from Schneier's previous posts that he actually has some hard evidence, having been provided yet-unknown-number of Snowden documents. In this case I'm willing to give him the benefit of the doubt. We can't, at the moment, know what the documents contain or what they prove. We do know that there are still more stories coming out based on the material.

I think the technical term for withholding the evidence in this case is "embargo".

fearful of the NSA because they're tracking EVERYONE... except, it's only an assumption.

"Only"? Really? How about the known fiber taps? The splitter rooms?[1] The fact that the NSA tried to belittle their activities by stating that they are "only touching 1.6% of all internet traffic"?[2] Their stated application of three degrees of separation? (Sorry, can't find a reference for this one now.)

Considering that 1.6% of traffic can easily skip all the video and torrent traffic, it leaves quite a lot of communication data to trawl through. I don't remember seeing any good figures so I don't know how much of the global internet traffic routes through US but I guess it's a fair chunk.

1: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Room_641A

2: http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/aug/13/nsa-int...

guelo• 13 years ago

It's not a conspiracy theory. It's an obvious inference from the data we have. They are building 'pattern-of-life' profiles of all of us.

simgidacav• 13 years ago

Anybody looked at http://www.dailydot.com/politics/flowchart-avoid-nsa-online/ (linked by Schneier in the blog post)?

Isn't that a little drastic? The fact that my 4096-bit-gpg-encrypted mail has been stored by them doesn't mean my communication is pwned: the idea with strong encryption is exactly you cannot trust the transmission channel! And besides it doesn't take in account OTR for chat.

SideburnsOfDoom• 13 years ago

Isn't that a little drastic? The fact that my 4096-bit-gpg-encrypted mail has been stored by them doesn't mean my communication is pwned

The'll store it until they can pwn it. That's what the huge data center is for.

jackgavigan• 13 years ago

The fact that my 4096-bit-gpg-encrypted mail has been stored by them doesn't mean my communication is pwned...

Maybe not today. Maybe not tomorrow. However, if they ever manage to get hold of your secret key (or crack the encryption scheme you're using), they'll be able to decrypt and read all your old email.

How safe is your secret key? Is it on a computer than you connect to the Internet with? How do you know it hasn't already been purloined by malware? Have you ever left it alone at home or in a hotel room? Or carried it through an international border?

As for GPG, how do you know the NSA haven't been multiplying every single number together with every other single number for the past forty years to build a gigantic rainbow table that they just have to grep through to find the factors of any number?

  $ grep 4294967296 products.txt | head -20
  65536 x 65536 = 4294967296
  131072 x 32768 = 4294967296
  262144 x 16384 = 4294967296
  524288 x 8192 = 4294967296
  1048576 x 4096 = 4294967296
  2097152 x 2048 = 4294967296
  4194304 x 1024 = 4294967296
  8388608 x 512 = 4294967296
  16777216 x 256 = 4294967296
  33554432 x 128 = 4294967296
  67108864 x 64 = 4294967296
  134217728 x 32 = 4294967296
  268435456 x 16 = 4294967296
  536870912 x 8 = 4294967296
  1073741824 x 4 = 4294967296
  2147483648 x 2 = 4294967296
  4294967296 x 2 = 8589934592
  4294967296 x 3 = 12884901888
  4294967296 x 4 = 17179869184
  4294967296 x 5 = 21474836480
  $

Are you paranoid yet? ;-)

PS: Yes, yes, I know... sigh

return0• 13 years ago

So, where is it stored?

czr80• 13 years ago

The NSA probably is building profiles on many people. But so are Google, Facebook, etc. The real problem is not the NSA (well, not just the NSA) - it's the inherent design of the internet. We're trying to live private lives on public networks, and we're going to have to go through some serious growing pains before that is resolved.

Zigurd• 13 years ago

Facebook might be just as black-hearted about your privacy, but thankfully they don't have the heads of the IRS or DEA on speed dial.

NSA Storing Internet Data, Social Networking Data, on Pretty Much Everybody

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