PRISM

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Midas
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Re: Why use a password manager?

#16 Post by Midas »

Sorry about the other topic hijack. :oops:
webfork wrote:A free society needs a boundary between criminals and free people, also known as due process. If I did something wrong, I need to be informed of my crimes, be able to bring it in a reasonable time to a court of law, and consult a lawyer.
Bravo! So well put, it makes me proud to be a part of this community. 8)

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webfork
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Re: Why use a password manager?

#17 Post by webfork »

Midas wrote:Sorry about the other topic hijack.
Nah, no prob. The topics were very connected, I wasn't surprised to see it.
Midas wrote:
webfork wrote:A free society needs a boundary between criminals and free people, also known as due process. If I did something wrong, I need to be informed of my crimes, be able to bring it in a reasonable time to a court of law, and consult a lawyer.
Bravo! So well put, it makes me proud to be a part of this community.
:) thanks

TenaciousD
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Re: PRISM

#18 Post by TenaciousD »

Hi guys long time no post. :D

I just wanted to add an interesting update. Apparently if you use Tor or other encryption mechanisms get ready for the NSA to be interested in what you're up to. Also sometime back the NSA said that as long as you are a US resident you shouldn't worry as they will not monitor you. That's not completely true, in fact there are quite a few exceptions so that means resident or no resident expect for your communications to be monitored.

Welcome to big brother my friends, just with less cameras and more monitoring. :twisted:
Source:
http://nakedsecurity.sophos.com/2013/06 ... est-in-you

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joby_toss
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Re: PRISM

#19 Post by joby_toss »

Joby's got mail!
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TenaciousD
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Re: Dead man's switch

#20 Post by TenaciousD »

Those of you who have been following the adventures of Edward Snowden may have already heard that he has given encrypted copies of undisclosed secret documents to a bunch of people. And in the event that he dies or goes to jail those documents will be unencrypted. He basically has some form of death switch in place. And a while ago I actually came across a website that offers such a service. Maybe he is using something like this?

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Midas
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Re: Dead man's switch

#21 Post by Midas »

Deathswitch.com 'Uses' area links to a PDF file containing a single page story from Nature magazine: "A brief history of death switches", by David Eagleman; great reading... 8)

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webfork
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Re: PRISM

#22 Post by webfork »

I've had a few discussions about this and found a few possible conclusions and resources here. Thought I'd post them on the site and see if anyone had any input.

Here to stay

If it's not the US government, it's China or companies that make their money building libraries of consumer data. It's also only going to get worse. There will only ever be more Internet monitoring, more video cameras, and more tools built to help detect and intelligently guess about those it analyzes.

Everyone has something to hide

Although we can probably all name off a few experiments over time in near-total openness, nobody to date has opened up their email, life, and every other aspect of their business to the general public. Because companies that control information on your past, current behavior, ad purchases can make this data public either as a threat or by accident/theft, you do have something to protect. It's something I try to make clear to people I know who want to talk to me using regular communication. It's either that or sanitize your communications to remove anything remotely personal, which is what people have to do in China.

This is still not okay

This stuff exists because everyone thinks it's either not a threat or necessary to freedom, even if its littered with problems (no oversight, hiding screw ups under "state secrets," unclear if it's better than standard police work). I think it's important to push back against this by taking political action, whatever your country or situation. Apathy is just feeding this.

Steps to take

There are tools you can use on a local level to help regain or maintain your freedom and privacy. None are perfect, but as these groups have a finite number of resources to spend, they can't backdoor every program and check every connection. Further, many secure programs are just as good or better than their insecure counterparts (I much prefer Pidgin with OTR to Google Talk), and the work here on portablefreeware makes those more accessible and (often) more private.

When I advised someone I knew with situation some years ago, I was really proud to make a lot of recommendations about using portable software here on the site to help stay safe. It sounds bizarre but I think this whole PRISM thing is good for the site.

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Midas
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Re: PRISM

#23 Post by Midas »

webfork wrote:When I advised someone I knew with situation some years ago, I was really proud to make a lot of recommendations about using portable software here on the site to help stay safe. It sounds bizarre but I think this whole PRISM thing is good for the site.
Although some disagree, short of running a completely volatile computing environment like TAILS, Liberté or Whonix, portable apps grant the utmost level of privacy control -- provided the user is keenly aware of what which one of them entails (pardon me for a squalid pun :roll:).

Note: For a discussion on the merits of the first two products, see https://tails.boum.org/forum/Liberté_Linux_vs._Tails/ (copy & paste the full URL, please).
Last edited by Midas on Wed Jul 17, 2013 2:20 am, edited 1 time in total.

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Andrew Lee
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Re: PRISM

#24 Post by Andrew Lee »

But we rely so much on the "cloud" these days that whatever we do at the local level pales in comparison. So I think this has to be resolved at the political level before it will make a meaningful impact on most people.

I mean, if even "Do no evil" Google is forced to comply, I am not sure what else is safe! My PC knows far less about my personal life than my mobile phone, which has a GPS and knows where I am all the time. I mean, when did you last check your location history at https://www.google.com/dashboard? :shock:

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Re: PRISM

#25 Post by carbonize »

I like how people are up in arms over PRISM despite the fact it's been known for years that governments are doing this but at the same time they are happy to post their entire life and enough data for a full psychological evaluation on Facebook and are happy to have Google track everything they do and scan their emails.

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SYSTEM
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Re: PRISM

#26 Post by SYSTEM »

carbonize wrote:I like how people are up in arms over PRISM despite the fact it's been known for years that governments are doing this but at the same time they are happy to post their entire life and enough data for a full psychological evaluation on Facebook and are happy to have Google track everything they do and scan their emails.
Agreed.
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TenaciousD
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Re: PRISM

#27 Post by TenaciousD »

I like how people are up in arms over PRISM despite the fact it's been known for years that governments are doing this but at the same time they are happy to post their entire life and enough data for a full psychological evaluation on Facebook and are happy to have Google track everything they do and scan their emails.
You're probably right, but it was too easy for governments in the past to justify it by saying it is hearsay or its a myth conveyed by conspiracy theorists. Its quite another to have actual proof that has been made available to the general public!

As for people posting their lives to websites like Facebook, since when was it ok to do this? Many people just assumed it was ok because other were doing it, not because it was actually safe. But how many will now stop?

@ Webfork: I completely agree with all you have said. And this has given me even more respect for portable apps and this site!!

The very fact they are monitoring us is a cause for concern.
We are being monitored 'wholesale', without cause, that's pretty bad in itself. But its not great either that its seems the general public are not nearly as outraged as they should be. They are in the illusion that you should only be worried if you have something to hide. That's utter rubbish! As Webfork deduced, we all have something to hide, not necessarily because it illegal or wrong but because its OUR BUSINESS!

I remember purchasing a PC a long time ago that still had some files from the previous owner. I read them and apart from feeling like a voyeur I also felt very sad. The files were word documents, letters that told the story of woman struggling with a sick husband and in the end even when the husband became better but not completely, he became arrogant and eventually they had a divorce. Even with this little information we can already see a picture of these peoples lives. If I was evil I could have used this in any number of ways, but I didn't. But what if I was bad?

If I have access to your digital life, I own you!
This sounds far fetched but in reality it isn't. Imagine all the data we send to other people via electronic means? Imagine in a hypothetical situation that you are giving the government a headache but you haven't committed a crime yet. Maybe you are reporting details about a major coverup perhaps. Now since the government is already monitoring you, they will eventually build a profile of you. What sites you visit, what forums you use. It would be trivial register on one of the forums your victim is on. Convince him/her to download something, perhaps a really useful app launcher for example, except its a trojan. The trojan would be launched and in this example it downloads child porn to folder hidden in the system directory. You of course are blissfully unaware, the trojan is custom made so it doesn't trigger an antivirus that you may have. And you may only notice a slight slowdown in your internet speed. Then you get raided by the the authorities on a 'tip-off' and guess what they find on your PC? This is only one example there can be many other ways to take out someone, but child porn is so revolting in itself that the mere mention of it is enough for most people to want to burn the 'perpetrator' to death!

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Midas
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Re: PRISM

#28 Post by Midas »

... as was heresy in the middle ages, to the point of justifying institution it's own form of thought police: the (so called) Holy Inquisition.

In the end, what purpose did it serve? It was merely a means to reign the wealthy literati of the age, and in so doing, plunge the nations that abetted such vile entity so much deeper into backwardness and obscurantism, that they're still struggling in this day and age to extricate themselves out of it...

EDIT: Ever heard of off-the-record messaging? Check it out at http://www.cypherpunks.ca/otr/.

Also, check Yacy (mentioned by m^(2) @ http://www.portablefreeware.com/forums/ ... 718#p43718): http://yacy.net/

EDIT2: For the "Steps to take" department, here's a valuable online resource I haven't seen mentioned yet: http://prism-break.org/.

EDIT3: Yet another relevant post concerning browser cookie management is at http://www.portablefreeware.com/forums/ ... 732#p65732 (and following)...

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Re: PRISM

#29 Post by joby_toss »


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SYSTEM
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Re: PRISM

#30 Post by SYSTEM »

Information about how Snowden got access to the NSA files: http://www.tomsitpro.com/articles/nsa-s ... -1657.html

In particular, NSA stored the files unencrypted.

BTW: starting from this post I have a 4-digit post count. :)
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