Impact of NSA Spying Fallout on Tech Companies
Norman Young, Morningstar senior equity analyst talks about the security concerns that tech companies are now experiencing.
By: BizAsiaAmerica
More:
Impact of NSA Spying Fallout on Tech Companies - Video
Even civil rights defenders like myself acknowledge that there might be instances when the NSA needs to monitor a person's communications, but that in no way justifies mass data collection. Section 215 is the critical foundation upon which the 4th Amendment is under assault.
Obama's plan to push the burden of domestic spying upon private companies is also a loser for reason other than the fact that this in no way stops the mass violations of the 4th Amendment. It merely privatizes it. The NSA is already working with private companies to spy on us.
And that only counts external hackers. Barclays Bank just got busted for illegally selling customer data.
The fact is that you are more likely to have had your personal information stolen in the last five years than to have not. In fact, the supply of stolen credit cards has literally flooded the black market.
I remember a gentleman tell me back in the 90's how software companies had the wrong incentives when it came to security. Basically, they made more sales for adding features, but security patches only factored into the cost of making the product. So security is considered a liability, not an asset.
Like the issue of government spying, the issue of the lack of security on the internet is also reaching critical mass. It won't be long before the majority of people realize that the internet is a very different place than the image we'll been sold, and that the drawbacks are often greater than the advantages.
3:05 PM PT: The FISA court has approved Obama's modest NSA reforms. The actual court ruling remains secret.
3:08 PM PT: The uproad over the NSA spying has endangered the TTIP trade agreement. Thank you Snowden.
3:16 PM PT: Consider the effectiveness of the NSA spying program.
Read the rest here:
Daily Kos: House threatens to end NSA spying
Hackers sue Merkel entire German govt over NSA spying
Europes largest association of hackers has filed a criminal complaint against the German government for aiding foreign spying by NSA and GCHQ, and violating ...
By: lutuf sar
Read more here:
Hackers sue Merkel entire German govt over NSA spying - Video
What does the NSA andPresident Obama say about its spying program? Director of National Intelligence, James Clapper (above), denied the NSA possesses the powers ascribed to it by whistleblower Edward Snowdon. He told media outlets on June 10th, 2013, that not only was the NSA "not spying" on Americans, the "real problem" are the "whistleblowers".
The Obama Administration, NSA, CIA, Naval intelligence and DHS (Department of Homeland Security) view you as the threat, not themselves!
President Obama assured the PRISM program wasn't doing "much" harm to civil liberties anddeclared,
Did Shia LeBeouf reveal the truth in 2008?
A video clip has emerged online that reveals the truth about NSA spying.
Apparently, actor Shia LeBeoufknew long before any of the rest of us just what the NSA is up to. In 2008, during anappearanceon The Tonight show, LaBeouf described in detail how the CIA/NSA/FBI apparatus is able to spy on your most intimate moments, all the time. YouTube Clip here
LaBeouf says, "We had an FBI consultant on the picture [Eagle Eye] telling me that they can use your ADT security box microphone to get the stuff that's going on in your house. Or OnStar, they can shut your car down."
"And he told me that one in five phone calls that you make are recorded and I laughed at him, and he played back a phone conversation I had two years prior to joining the picture," LaBeouf continues. "Extremely creepy."
By Edward Krudy
NEW YORK Thu Feb 6, 2014 7:23pm EST
Swatch Group Chief Executive Officer Nick Hayek Jr addresses the company's annual general meeting in Biel some 45 kilometres north of Bern May 29, 2013.
Credit: Reuters/Arnd Wiegmann
NEW YORK (Reuters) - The eccentric chief executive officer of Swatch Group, one of the world's top watchmakers, was so incensed by recent allegations of mass U.S. spying that he chastised a top New York official over the matter in a letter late last year.
Nick Hayek's comments seemed odd coming in response to a letter from New York State Comptroller Thomas DiNapoli, who administers the state's $161 billion pension fund.
DiNapoli had asked Hayek and nine other Olympic sponsors to take a stance against Russia's recent clampdown on gays ahead of the winter games in Sochi.
Most corporate executives balk at open political conflict. But not the cigar-chomping Hayek. He vigorously defended his Omega subsidiary's role as a politically neutral timekeeper at the Olympics. And that's not all. He also gave DiNapoli a dressing down over the spying scandal surrounding the U.S. National Security Agency.
DiNapoli released Hayek's comments this week, along with those from five other companies that responded to his request.
"As you claim you are an investor with Swatch Group you should be equally preoccupied about what has been publicized lately: the massive collection of data of the NSA worldwide including Switzerland," fumed Hayek, whose first language is not English, in a letter dated December 13.
The rest is here:
Swatch chief executive ticked off about NSA spying scandal ...
Deputy Attorney General James Cole testifies on Capitol Hill in Washington Tuesday before the House Judiciary Committee hearing.(Photo: Cliff Owen, AP)
WASHINGTON One of the principal authors of the U.S. Patriot Act, which allowed the bulk collection of virtually all Americans' telephone records, warned Tuesday that the authority would surely end unless the surveillance program was dramatically altered.
Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Wis., addressing Deputy Attorney General James Cole at a House Judiciary Committee hearing, said the collection authority "never would have been approved'' had details of the program revealed last year by former National Security Agency contractor Edward Snowden been more widely known.
"The revelations were a shock,'' Sensenbrenner said, adding that the program amounted to a "vacuum cleaner.''
The congressman's remarks represented the latest rebuke to the controversial surveillance program that has been the focus of congressional, judicial and administrative review since its disclosure last June.
Cole continued to defend the program as legal, citing the opinions of more than a dozen judges assigned to the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court.
"Although we continue to believe the program is lawful,'' Cole said, "we recognize that it has raised significant controversy and legitimate privacy concerns, and as I have said we are working on developing a new approach as (President Obama) has directed.''
Read this article:
NSA spying revelations 'a shock' to Patriot Act author
A group of computer hackers and human rights campaigners in Germany announced Monday that they are suing their government for allegedly breaking the law by aiding foreign spies.
The Chaos Computer Club and the International League for Human Rights submitted a criminal complaint to federal prosecutors claiming that Chancellor Angela Merkel, her government and security officials tolerated and even helped members of the U.S. National Security Agency and Britain's GCHQ to spy on German citizens.
The groups point to documents released by NSA leaker Edward Snowden as evidence that the emails, social media messages and phone calls of ordinary citizens are screened beyond what is allowed under German law.
"With this criminal complaint, we hope to finally initiate investigations by the Federal Prosecutor General against the German government," the Chaos Computer Club said in the statement. The group calls itself Europe's largest association of hackers; it regularly campaigns for greater privacy rights and exposes flaws in electronic security systems.
Federal prosecutors have been considering for months whether to open an investigation of alleged NSA activities. They will now have to consider whether to open an investigation on the basis of the new criminal complaint as well.
While the German government has expressed misgivings about some of the reported allegations and is seeking to negotiate a 'no-spy' agreement with the United States, opposition lawmakers have accused Merkel's administration of failing to put sufficient pressure on Washington for fear of jeopardizing diplomatic relations and intelligence cooperation.
Merkel's spokesman, Steffen Seibert, noted that "everyone in Germany can file a criminal complaint" and declined to comment on the hackers' suit.
See the rest here:
Hackers Sue German Government Over NSA Spying - ABC News
This video is called Federal Judge Rules NSA Spying On All American Phone Calls Unconstitutional.
Tech company transparency reports reveal massive NSA spying
5 February 2014
Major US telecommunications companies released figures this week showing that the National Security Agency has requested data relating to tens of thousands of customer accounts in just the first half of last year. The release of the transparency reports was part of an agreement reached with the Obama administration allowing limited disclosures of information about the massive police-state spying apparatus.
The accounts spied on were targeted as part of the NSAs PRISM surveillance program, which has been in operation since 2007. Using PRISM, the spy agency obtains orders from the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court to require telecommunications companies to turn over information. PRISM came to the attention of the public as a result of documents provided by NSA whistle-blower Edward Snowden.
Slides released by Snowden show that PRISM collects email, chat (voice and video), video, photos, stored data, file transfers, video conference data, notifications of target activity and online social networking details from a range of providers including Microsoft, Google, Yahoo, Facebook, PalTalk, YouTube, Skype, AOL, and Apple.
Yahoo said it turned over information on between 30,000 and 30,999 accounts between January and June 2013. Facebook reported 5,000-5,999 requests. Microsoft reported 15,000 to 15,999, and Google reported 9,000-9,999. The figures released by the company show a steady increase over the past several years.
These figures cover only a small aspect of the convoluted network of spy programs. The information released is subject to a six-month delay imposed by the government on all disclosures of data requests.
Despite claims to be increasing transparency, there is in fact very little information included in the reports aside from aggregate figures. The fact that the information reveals spying on the order of tens of thousandsas opposed to the hundreds of millions of records obtained through other programsis also aimed at downplaying the extent of the unconstitutional intrusion into the privacy of citizens and non-citizens alike.
Emma Woollacott, writing for Forbes, noted that the transparency reports do little to improve knowledge of just how much data is being accessed by the NSA. Theyve been described as a tech company PR stuntbut, in fact, they are far more of a PR coup for the government. Permission to release these figures means the government looks more open, a set of comparatively small numbers captures the headlines and attention is diverted away from other types of snooping.
See the original post:
NSA spying scandals continue | Dear Kitty. Some blog
Hackers sue Merkel and entire German government over NSA spying
One of the world #39;s largest hacker groups is suing Chancellor Merkel and the entire German government for fostering in-depth spying projects led by American a...
By: RTQuestionMore
Read more:
Hackers sue Merkel and entire German government over NSA spying - Video
The German IT sector is hoping to profit from trust lost in American technology firms in the aftermath of the NSA spying scandal. But critics warn that plans to create a European routing system could affect the openness of the Internet.
For those interested in learning what German Interior Minister Thomas de Maizire thinks of the Internet, a visit to the little-known website bevoelkerungsschutz-portal.de (population protection) can be instructive.
The website is full of information regarding Germany's response to potential catastrophes: mass epidemics, terrorist attacks, floods and the like. Last week, the site posted a video from a conference during which de Maizire discussed Internet security with the country's digital elite.
In the video, the interior minister, a member of Chancellor Angela Merkel's Christian Democratic Union, speaks of a "devastating crisis of confidence," but he shies away from explicitly naming the danger.
Instead of talking about the United States' NSA intelligence agency or about whistleblower Edward Snowden, he talks of "the recent events" and of "those who collect data." He says the task is now that of rebuilding trust.
Read more:
NSA scandal boosts German tech industry