{"id":107094,"date":"2014-01-29T07:53:00","date_gmt":"2014-01-29T07:53:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/?guid=38928327014cfab12e9e0a3e3effd75d"},"modified":"2014-01-29T07:53:00","modified_gmt":"2014-01-29T07:53:00","slug":"international-data-privacy-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/rinf.com\/alt-news\/editorials\/international-data-privacy-day\/","title":{"rendered":"International Data Privacy Day"},"content":{"rendered":"
International Data Privacy Day<\/b><\/div>\n
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by Stephen Lendman<\/div>\n
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It’s commemorated annually on January 28. More on its significance below.<\/div>\n
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This year’s DPA comes when revelations show unconstitutional NSA spying. Privacy no longer exists. <\/div>\n
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Other fundamental freedoms are eroding. They’re disappearing in plain sight. <\/div>\n
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America was never a democracy. Today it’s more police state than free society. Unconstitutional mass surveillance is official US policy.<\/div>\n
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What Bush began, Obama accelerated. He governs secretly. His administration is the least transparent in US history.<\/div>\n
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He operates extrajudicially. He ignores constitutional law. He violated the public trust. He broke every major campaign pledge  made.<\/div>\n
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He promised to end Bush\/Cheney abuses. They’ll be no “wiretaps without warrants,” he said. Straightaway as president he authorized them. His pledges belie his policies.<\/div>\n
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“When I came into this office,” he said, “I made two commitments that are more important than any commitment I made: number one to keep the American people safe, and number two to uphold the Constitution.”<\/div>\n
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He’s gone all out to consign it to the dustbin of history. He’s done more to subvert rule of law principles than any previous US president.<\/div>\n
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Americans have never been less safe. Police state priorities threaten everyone. Obama lied claiming mass surveillance “help(s) prevent terrorist attacks.”<\/div>\n
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False! None occurred on US soil in modern memory. 9\/11 was state-sponsored. The Big Lie persists. So-called “crazed Arabs” had nothing to do with it.<\/div>\n
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Obama calls NSA spying “modest encroachment on privacy.” It’s sweeping. It’s pervasive. It’s lawless. It destroys privacy altogether.<\/div>\n
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He lied saying “nobody is listening to your telephone calls.” Or reading your emails. Or your text messages. Or what web sites you visit.<\/div>\n
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False! Phone calls, emails, and other communications are systematically monitored. It’s done secretly. It’s without court authorization.<\/div>\n
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It’s without probable cause. Telecom and Internet companies cooperate. All three branches of government are complicit. Big Brother is more pervasive than Orwell ever imagined.<\/div>\n
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On January 26, Edward Snowden told German public broadcaster ARD TV about NSA’s industrial espionage. <\/div>\n
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At issue is giving US corporations a competitive edge. Companies like Siemens are targeted.<\/div>\n
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“If there’s information at Siemens that’s beneficial to US national interests – even if it doesn’t have anything to do with national security – then they’ll take that information,” said Snowden.<\/div>\n
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“There is no question that the US is engaged in economic spying,” he stressed.<\/div>\n
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Polls show most Germans don’t trust America. Only 35% call Washington a reliable partner. Snowden is considered a hero.<\/div>\n
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New information keeps surfacing. In mid-January, top secret documents released show the NSA collects around 200 million text messages daily.<\/div>\n
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They do it worldwide. The program is codenamed “Dishfire.” It collects “pretty much everything it can.”<\/div>\n
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A 2011 NSA presentation titled “SMS Text Messages: A Goldmine to Exploit” revealed a daily April 2011 average collection of 194 million text messages.<\/div>\n
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A separate program called “Prefer” analyzes information obtained.<\/div>\n
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On January 28, London’s Guardian<\/span><\/a> headlined “Angry Birds and ‘leaky’ phone apps targeted by NSA and GCHQ for user data,” saying:<\/div>\n
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They “transmit users’ private information across the internet, according to top secret documents.”<\/div>\n
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Data collected from iPhone and Android apps range from “phone model and screen size to personal details such as age, gender and location.”<\/div>\n
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Some apps identify sexual orientation. Smartphone users don’t know how extensively personal information is shared across the Internet.<\/div>\n
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NSA collects it freely. So does Britain’s GCHQ. Both agencies consider obtaining it a high priority.<\/div>\n
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They want to know everything about everyone everywhere. It’s unrelated to national security. <\/div>\n
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It’s for control. It’s for political and economic advantage. It’s about destroying privacy. <\/div>\n
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It gives government more power than ever. It facilitates repression. It makes state terror easier. <\/div>\n
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It leaves activists challenging out-of-control policies vulnerable. It lets authorities identify them more easily.<\/div>\n
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It means more law-abiding citizens will be wrongfully targeted. Thousands of political prisoners already languish in America’s gulag.<\/div>\n
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Expect many more to join them. Police states operate this way. America is by far the worst. It’s out-of-control globally.<\/div>\n
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Pervasive NSA spying leaves no place to hide. Smartphone use greatly aids data collection efforts. <\/div>\n
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A program called “Golden Nugget!” does it. A “perfect (NSA) scenario “(t)arget(s) uploading photo(s) to a social media site taken with a mobile device. What can we get?”<\/div>\n
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Notes explain obtaining a “possible image,” email selector, phone, buddy lists, and “a host of other social working data as well as location.”<\/div>\n
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Virtually everything about users can be collected, including:<\/div>\n
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