http://www.theverge.com/2013/12/29/5253226/nsa-cia-fbi-laptop-usb-plant-spy
“The report indicates that the NSA can even exploit error reports from Microsoft’s Windows operating system by intercepting the error reports and determining what’s wrong with a target’s computer, the NSA can then attack it with Trojans or other malware.”
It was reported earlier in the year that Microsoft was notifying the nsa of just such vulnerabilities in their Windows OS and delaying addressing them to allow sufficient time for the nsa to exploit.
The logical question to ask is are the cited companies going to take legal action? If you or I planted any form of spyware on a computer and were discovered we’d be heading to jail.
Another question is why aren’t, and will, computer security companies that sell users “security suites” target the nsa’s malware and allow their software that the consumer has purchased in good faith to ferret out and block them….or are they in on the deal as well?
The power of companies that offer search engines, browsers, and security software is such that they could become a major force in stopping these invasive, rogue, and criminal intrusions-the fact that they only of late are making a lot of noise about developing encryption seems to be little more than a public relations move-they had the opportunity to stand as a group to protest and reveal some time ago and yet failed to do so.
The reality is they are doing the same thing in collecting your personal data for marketing purposes and amounts to little more than the kettle calling the pot black.
There is an assumption that all on the net warrant suspicion, they need to be watched-maybe it’s just me but that doesn’t sound “democratic”, it is by any metric Orwellian-and no less egregious than racial profiling or hidden “security” cameras in store dressing rooms….and yes there have been cases involving that as well.
The more that is revealed the more I believe that Eric Snowden did the nation a great service, and the “patriots” who rail against him as a spy or a traitor can all go to hell.
We are repeatedly told these types of programs are essential and benign when concerning the citizens of this country, yet for all the world those instituting and operating them appear to be as villainous as the Joker and his band of cohorts.
They aren’t doing you a service, unless you consider being repeatedly exploited or raped a good thing.
It’s time to do the Howard Beale thing-to get “mad as hell”, go to our windows, and say we’re not going to take it anymore.
Either that or remain silent and cower as we second guess everything we say, everything we do, for fear that it will be seen as something less than acceptable.
Until we hesitate to turn on our computers, or wonder if that web cam and microphone has been activated, that the very device we have spent our money on is watching and listening at the behest of others who haven’t a single right to do so.
Is that what you call Democracy and living free?
