Is Silicon Valley Spying On You For The Federal Government?
By: Zach Walton | Staff Writer
Everything you do on Facebook, Google or any other online service is
protected, right? There are strict privacy guidelines in place that keep
your data out of the hands of government or third parties. Well, that's
at least what we thought until yesterday.
Say hello to PRISM - your all-in-one data mining and surveillance system
that has its hands in pretty much every major tech company.
The Washington Post acquired a number of slides from an anonymous
source that details the top secret program. In short, it's a
collaboration between Silicon Valley and the NSA that allows the latter
to gather data from the servers of companies like Google and Facebook.
Do you think the government is practicing large-scale surveillance?
Let us know in the comments.
So, now we know that PRISM is a surveillance program. What exactly does
it do though? What is its purpose? According to The Post, PRISM is
intended to gather data on foreign threats. Oftentimes, communications
between terrorists and other antagonistic groups flow through data
centers located in the U.S. PRISM allows the NSA to gather this data
from the servers of Google, Microsoft, Facebook and others to expose
plans that these groups may have.
Well, that doesn't sound so bad. I mean, the government is only
collecting information on foreign entities. It's not like they the
program collects information on Americans, right? Well, this is where
things get tricky. Officially, PRISM is only supposed to collect
information on foreign threats, but the reality is that Americans' data
is collected as well. According to The Post, this is called "incidental"
data and it's impossible for the program to avoid it. In fact, the
government collects the data if it's anyway related to the target on
hand.
We now know what PRISM is, but who's involved? According to the
leaked documents, a large number of major players in Silicon Valley
are participating. Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, PalTalk, YouTube,
Skype, AOL and Apple have all allegedly opened up their servers to the
government so PRISM can be used to collect information from their
servers.
View the graph here.
What is collected from these servers? It depends on the company, but the
leaked documents say that PRISM goes through email, video chat, voice
chat, videos, photos, stored data, VoIP, file transfers, video
conferencing, notifications of target activity, online social networking
details and special requests.
View the graphic here.
It's all a little overwhelming, isn't it? What makes it worse is that
all of this is done in secret with the blessing of a secret court. Sure,
there are safeguards in place, but those safeguards mean nothing in a
program that has no oversight whatsoever. In fact, Sen. Mark Udall, a
staunch opponent of the NSA, says that the safeguards don't "prohibit
the intelligence community from searching through a pile of
communications, which may have incidentally or accidentally been
collected without a warrant, to deliberately search for the phone call
or emails of specific Americans."
So, what do the Silicon Valley giants allegedly involved in this have to
say for themselves? Well, not much, but everybody denies that they're
part of the program. In
statements sent to the press, Facebook, Google, Apple, Microsoft,
Yahoo and Dropbox all say that they take their users' privacy seriously
and that they only share information with the government when legally
obligated.
Of course, that's when you start to read deeper into these statements.
Most make mention of only sharing information when legally obligated or
when required by law. PRISM is part of FISA - a law. It may be an old
law, but it's still a law nonetheless. By complying with PRISM, these
companies would be sharing information when legally obligated. It's
important to note that we may be reading too much into this, but it's
hard to really believe these companies when they're slapped with gag
orders and other laws to keep them quiet about government programs that
they may or may not be involved with.
As for the government, James Clapper, Director of National Intelligence,
says that the recent leaks do not present the entire picture:
The Guardian and The Washington Post articles refer to
collection of communications pursuant to Section 702 of the Foreign
Intelligence Surveillance Act. They contain numerous inaccuracies.
Section 702 is a provision of FISA that is designed to facilitate
the acquisition of foreign intelligence information concerning
non-U.S. persons located outside the United States. It cannot be
used to intentionally target any U.S. citizen, any other U.S.
person, or anyone located within the United States.
Activities authorized by Section 702 are subject to oversight by the
Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, the Executive Branch, and
Congress. They involve extensive procedures, specifically approved
by the court, to ensure that only non-U.S. persons outside the U.S.
are targeted, and that minimize the acquisition, retention and
dissemination of incidentally acquired information about U.S.
persons.
Section 702 was recently reauthorized by Congress after extensive
hearings and debate.
Information collected under this program is among the most important
and valuable foreign intelligence information we collect, and is
used to protect our nation from a wide variety of threats.
The unauthorized disclosure of information about this important and
entirely legal program is reprehensible and risks important
protections for the security of Americans.
Before we move on, I just want to point out that Clapper is being a
little disingenuous when he says that FISA was reauthorized by Congress
after much debate. If you recall, FISA was
reauthorized with little debate on the grounds that terrorism is
scary.
Do you think that the government has the American people's best
interests in mind when it comes to PRISM? Should they be allowed to
continue monitoring networks?
Let us know in the comments.
What makes this particular leak more worrisome is that it follows on the
heels of Wednesday's revelation that the
NSA compels Verizon to share customer metadata with the agency. In
short, the NSA knows who calls who and the length of said phone calls
when they're made over Verizon's network. The administration admitted
that it was happening after the leak came out, but insisted that it was
needed to combat terrorist threats.
After the PRISM leak, the government came back out and insisted that
what it was doing was completely legal. It even listed what it says are
"limitations of the program:"
There is a robust legal regime in place governing all activities
conducted pursuant to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act,
which ensures that those activities comply with the Constitution and
laws and appropriately protect privacy and civil liberties. The
program at issue here is conducted under authority granted by
Congress and is authorized by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance
Court (FISC). By statute, the Court is empowered to determine the
legality of the program.
By order of the FISC, the Government is prohibited from
indiscriminately sifting through the telephony metadata acquired
under the program. All information that is acquired under this
program is subject to strict, court-imposed restrictions on review
and handling. The court only allows the data to be queried when
there is a reasonable suspicion, based on specific facts, that the
particular basis for the query is associated with a foreign
terrorist organization. Only specially cleared counterterrorism
personnel specifically trained in the Court-approved procedures may
even access the records.
All information that is acquired under this order is subject to
strict restrictions on handling and is overseen by the Department of
Justice and the FISA Court. Only a very small fraction of the
records are ever reviewed because the vast majority of the data is
not responsive to any terrorism-related query.
The Court reviews the program approximately every 90 days. DOJ
conducts rigorous oversight of the handling of the data received to
ensure the applicable restrictions are followed. In addition, DOJ
and ODNI regularly review the program implementation to ensure it
continues to comply with the law.
The Patriot Act was signed into law in October 2001 and included
authority to compel production of business records and other
tangible things relevant to an authorized national security
investigation with the approval of the FISC. This provision has
subsequently been reauthorized over the course of two
Administrations � in 2006 and in 2011. It has been an important
investigative tool that has been used over the course of two
Administrations, with the authorization and oversight of the FISC
and the Congress.
In the end, Clapper says that "surveillance programs like this one are
consistently subject to safeguards that are designed to strike the
appropriate balance between national security interests and civil
liberties and privacy concerns."
So, the official story is that PRISM is strictly used to monitor foreign
threats and communications. There may be some "incidental" data here and
there, but the NSA claims to not use this information. They would never
think to violate your privacy and civil liberties with PRISM and related
programs.
That's great and all, but the mere existence of PRISM is enough cause
for concern. Even if it's strictly used for the monitoring of foreign
threats, there's no guarantee that it won't be abused in the future. The
ACLU seems to agree when it says that "these revelations are a
reminder that Congress has given the executive branch far too much power
to invade individual privacy, that existing civil liberties safeguards
are grossly inadequate, and that powers exercised entirely in secret,
without public accountability of any kind, will certainly be abused."
Do you trust the government in regards to the NSA and PRISM? Or
do you think this goes too far?
Let us know in the comments.
|
