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The State of Privacy Today
Mike Hudack
Editor-in-Chief
As our lives grow increasingly wired and our conversations are, perhaps, increasingly personal or confidential, a question must arise. Just how safe are our so-called secrets? Between the government, rival corporations and the omnipresent curious individual, our privacy is gradually eroding towards nothingness. But just how bad is it?
The Government
The government is probably the most obvious eavesdropper. They have the ability, albeit with the approval of a judge being of the utmost importance (although it has not always been present), to monitor all communication between two entities.
Current regulations state, in part, that all new phone networks in the country must include a system to make tapping easier for Federal agencies. The system, placed into law and regulation at the urging of the FBI and cooperation of the Clinton Administration, means that FBI agents can monitor any phone calls in the country (as long as they´re on modern lines) with the simple push of a couple buttons.
Similiar to the new ease of monitoring phone communications, unencrypted computer communication and processing is no longer safe from government eyes. Several programs available to, and largely held secret by, Federal agencies allow them to monitor everything happening on a Windows 9x computer which is connected to the Internet. These programs, which are similiar in function to cDc´s Back Orifice, allow the downloading of documents and programs, the monitoring of Internet traffic and the manipulation of files.
In addition to hi-tech communication via phone and computer, federal agencies do, of course, have other methods at their disposal. High power tools such as infrared cameras which can see through walls, tracking devices, pin-hole cameras and even the venerable ankle bracelet have also been used numerous times by the powers that be.
While the FBI and other federal agencies can monitor your phone and computer traffic, they can of course use other methods to track and survail you as well. The traditional tailing, or following, of a suspect to determine where he (or she, of course) goes physically when combined with other traditional methods of surveillance combine to quite a stark portrait of privacy at the hands of the government. In other words: they can survail every aspect of your life if they so choose.
Rival Corporations (and other larger entities)
Espionage is no longer the soley the province of the state. For some time now, corporations have engaged in their own surveillance and information-gathering techniques for numerous purposes, usually involving a rival corporation or prospective or current employee.
The impediment of checks and balances do not exist for corporations and other private entities, although laws do regulate many of the surveillance tools they may use. There is, however, little liklihood of investigation to divulge any illegal activity at the hands of a corporation in such a situation.
Older phone systems are incredibly easy to monitor using age-old techniques developed by phreakers (phone hackers of a sort) years ago. These techniques, many of which are still used by law enforcement today, often allow anyone to listen to your phone conversation. Sometimes, in fact, monitoring of the actual phone network is not necessary due to the use of portable telephones. Portable telephones are, in fact, portable radio transcievers which broadcast your conversation for anyone with a scanner to listen to.
Private investigation firms are a sort of hired-gun for corporations who would like to spy on their employees or rivals. They possess the same tools that the government had not too many years ago, and they´re just as effective as they were in yester-year. Private dicks can follow you, photograph you, and report your life to their employer.
Every time you fill out a credit application, an insurance application or a survey, that data goes into national databases mantained by industry groups. At any time, an insurance company, a loan company or your employer can access that information and use it to form a more comlete picture of you.
Private entities aren´t as well equipped to survail you as governments, but they can be similiarly successfull. Through the use of hired guns from phreakers to private dicks, they can learn more about you than you would like.
The Curious Individual
Anyone has the ability to spy on anyone else, it´s simply a matter of resources at that entity´s disposal. A government has nearly unlimited resources, and a large corporation has a rather large pool of resources to pull from as well. An individual such as an ex-husband, or even a stalker, however has more limited resources than others who are likely to spy on you.
The most likely way that an individual would spy on another would be through a private detective. That private detective is capable of spying on most computer communications, photographing and following your every physical move, listening to your phone conversations and checking your credit and insurance bureau reports.
The Conclusion
Your privacy is, at this point, at an all-time low tide. Between telephone, electronic, photographic and physical eavesdropping, you aren´t by yourself at any point in the day. You can be observed in your bedroom, on your laptop, on a payphone or walking through the streets.
There aren´t many ways to protect yourself from such intrusions. First and foremost is to use cryptography on your computer communications. The other countermeasures that you can take are more for those who are sure they´re being survailed than for those who simply suspect it. You can try using random pay phones for important calls, taking a different route everywhere every day and the like.
More importantly, call your senator and representative and ask them to sponsor future cryptography legislation and to try to keep the government from becoming even more of a Big Brother. |
