a new way of tracking terrorists-Privacy ALERT

They are now able to see every click they make on the internet. Privacy advocates say this is bad, but the FBI says you will never even notice, and it won't affect the common man at all.
How's that for a short link?
Brings new meaning to big brother is watching you.

1984, here we come. Ughh.

Uh, I see you Big Brother! /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

So who are we at war with today, and how's the re-writing of the newspapers and books? Any new revision to Newspeak? /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/wink.gif

Time to get me a victory gin and victory cigarette. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

They have legally been able to spy on anyone on the net at least since the signing of the "Patriot Act". People often wonder why I care enough to be as paranoid as I am about securing my computer, well, such as this is the reason. Now days, they really *are* watching you!

I can already predict some of the responses that this will garner to because I've seen this sort of thread play out before in many places. Someone will almost certainly chime in and say something to the effect of 'if you have done nothing wrong then you have nothing to fear from the government'. Well, if you are naive enough to think that way then there is little that I (or anyone else) can do in one single post in order to change your entire outlook on life, except perhaps, to ask you to go take a history class and see what this, as well as other governments, have done to abuse such great powers in the past and apply what you learn from history to what will almost certainly happen in the future if the government is allowed such sweeping powers such as this.

It may just be terrorist today that they are using such vast spying powers as this to catch, but it could be *you* tomorrow. As quickly as our politicians are passing crooked laws such as the Patriot Act, you could be on the list of people that they consider "bad" overnight and never even know it. Just look at the thread that I started a while back about how lithium battery owners could go to jail for a very recent proof of this concept.

This is the sort of thing that I've been warning people about ever since the government wanted to give various police entities free reign to spy on *everyone* on the internet in order to catch a few pedophiles. I told everyone back then that the government was only using pedophiles in order to get their "big brother" foot in the door because they were confident enough that everyone's common hatred of that particular variety of sicko (funny how the government hates pedophiles, but homosexuals are only an "alternative lifestyle") would be enough to solidify support for their big brother agenda.

This was all happening in the days before 9/11 that they were pushing for this plan concerning the pedophiles. Now it would appear that the government has no more need to use pedophiles in order to further their "big brother" agenda, now they have terrorist for that and the end result is exactly the same, we are all being spied upon with no legal warrant issued or anything.

The Patriot Act specifically says that the government is now allowed to spy on anyone on the net in any way they wish without obtaining any sort of legal warrant what-so-ever. This applies to *everyone* on the net, not just U.S. citizens.

This is just like what they used to do with the phone system until a decision by the Supreme Court that said that it was illegal and that a warrant would first have to be issued in order have such great powers over the people. I'm certain that that is what will have to happen here to, if we are ever to have our internet privacy back once again.

The founding fathers must be turning over in their graves over what this once free government is becoming now days...

OK. I get it. This thread was meant to be taken as a joke. /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smile.gif

Well, what I said above was said in all seriousness, they really are watching you on the net and they have the legal authority to since the passing of the Patriot Act to even go so far as to read your e-mail without a warrant of any kind, if they wish. Funny how your phone conversations are protected (and private) speech in this country, but your e-mail isn't, also funny how so many people say that the Patriot Act doesn't really affect them, when in fact, it affects everyone, whether they realize it or not.

LOL!!!!

X-Cal, they spy on you even without the legal authority. All legal authority gives them is the right to legitimately utilize what they find on you to proscecute you for crimes against the state etc.

TSG /ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif

Yes, tsg68, sadly, they do spy on us in an unconstitutional manner whether they have the legal right to do so or not, but at least before they were, for the most part, powerless to use what they learned to come busting down your doors in the middle of the night in order to drag you off to jail to be held nearly indefinitely without a speedy trial, or just shoot you on the spot if you resist. It's also important to point out that defending your family and home against such an attack in the middle of the night counts as resistance.

Just look at Waco for instance. I saw the videos of this and the government dropped agents out of helicopters onto the roof and busted in the windows with guns blazing. I ask you all to think about how *you* would react to such an attack in the middle of the night? I know how *I* would react and I also know how I would be portrayed on the nightly news for defending myself and my family to. I would be made out to look like the worst criminal ever for shooting up a bunch of police officers in my own, and in my families, self defense. Just think about that when you want to allow the government more and more power over your private life.

Also, this new authority that they have to hold you pretty much indefinitely without trial if they label you as a "terrorist" is pretty much new to the "Patriot Act". This is a *major* difference from the previous status quo. I'm not sure how much truth there is to it, but I've even read that they are still holding people, without trial, all the way back from 9/11!

Is this really what everyone wants in order to have the illusion of security in this country, for that is all that it is, an illustion. You are never truly secure in your daily lives, no matter how much the government spies on it's own people, but your freedoms will be greatly infringed by such invasiveness, of that I am certain.

Take this as a random example of what I'm talking about here. Say a terrorist with a private cropduster (owns one or steals one) decides to one day fill it up with smallpox (or something worse) and fly cross country spraying major cities as he goes, what on Earth can our ineffectual government possibly hope to do to stop that? I can tell you, they are just as powerless to stop such a thing as that as they were to stop 9/11 because nobody will see it coming till it's too late.

Now, given such a random scenario as this, and given how the government is mostly powerless to stop such a thing no matter how many unconstitutional laws that it deems worthy to pass, how many of you are still keen to have the government to read your private e-mail, watch which web sites you hang out on and are affiliated with, read your private instant messages, steal your passwords, learn what political party you are for or any of the the endless number of other things that they can learn about you (and use against you) with such crooked laws as the Patriot Act?

No, it's not true yet, at least not entirely, but it will be soon. With IPV6 and new router capabilities to query and track, it will be. It will be possible to track a single keystroke back to the source machine.

I'd guess that privacy advocates (including me) would have had a very good chance to get a privacy bill passed, but hackers and spammers have probably killed that for good, everyone hates both and wants them caught. I guess I shouldn't gripe, it probably would have come to that anyway sooner or later.

It is worth noting though that ECP can be used in your favor to some degree by using encryption for your emails. The FBI hates it and wishes encryption would go away forever. Although it's technically illegal to encrypt, there hasn't been a successful prosecution and the FBI is subject to the same laws - i.e., they can't break your coded message without a court order since it's electronically protected. The same law they used to get you can be used against them.

Ha...Ha!

Al

"They can't break your coded message without a court order since it's electronically protected."

This was true before the Patriot Act, but now anything they find on the internet is fair game from my understanding of the Act.

Also, another little known fact is that the government has forced many companies that write encryption programs to write in back doors for use by government police agencies, all in the name of "national security", of course... I read an article about this on Slashdot.org a few months back.

It's important to note that not every encryption author has submitted to this government demand as of yet though, and also, encryption programs from other countries than the United States don't come under this. So, in effect, you are more secure by using an encryption program written by someone from another country than you are using one written by someone living in the U.S. To me, this is very sad and very wrong.

Al said: "With IPV6 and new router capabilities to query and track, it will be. It will be possible to track a single keystroke back to the source machine."

I wasn't aware of this previously, but it doesn't surprise me very much. I'm sure that their excuse is to track down computer hackers and spammers like you said, but they are attempting to track down genius' (except for script kiddies), so how long do they really think that a competent hacker will take to figure out a way around this and the end result is that all anonymity for the rest of us on the internet will be lost forever.

I bet the record and movie companies are spending millions to get such as this passed to, now that they have just started suing little 12 year old girls living in the projects for thousands of dollars for downloading some Britney Spears songs and other such teen girl stuff from the net.

Funny that the Home Recording Act of 1992 gives everyone the legal right to record any song that you like from the radio for your own personal use, but if you download the same song in the same quality from the internet, the RIAA may take you to court and try to clean out your life savings just like they did to that one college kid. Anyway, I digress...

It reminds me of the old 'Paranoid Homer' one, where he would always look away from the mouse cursor.

Well, how about two machines, one on the net and a second NEVER on the net. The second has private info. Info from the first has to be burned onto a plain CD-rom and then loaded onto the second machine after scanning.

Best to have the second machine with a LCD screen.

GregR

Don't forget, your monitor can be used as a camera to take your picture or that of anyone in the room where your monitor is!

They're watching you!