Welcome
to the post-Snowden era, where everything you say or do can be
monitored by secret services - regardless of a court of law. One year
on,here are the top 10 revelations showing us how the world has been
fundamentally transformed by state snooping.
1. Everything you do online can be monitored
The
National Security Agency (NSA) has direct access to the systems of
Google, Facebook, Apple and other US internet giants. Using
its PRISM surveillance
program, the agency can collect your search history, the content of
your emails, file transfers and live chats.
2.
What you do offline is monitored!
According
to a report in
Der Spiegel, an NSA division called ANT has technology, including a
radio-frequency device, which can monitor and even manipulate data on
computers that are not even connected to the internet.
3.
They are collecting your phone records, too
Who’s
calling whom, at what time, and for how long: Verizon and other US
phone companies have beenrequired to
turn over so-called telephony metadata for millions of unwitting
Americans to the NSA.
4.
And if you live in some countries, it is not just metadata
The
NSA records almost all domestic and international phone calls in
Afghanistan and the Bahamas using a program called SOMALGET.
In the Bahamas, the NSA boasted of being able to log “over
100 million call events per day.” The
full telephone conversations are stored for up to 30 days
5.
Or ordinary citizens for that matter
World
leaders including Brazil's Dilma Rousseff and German Chancellor
Angela Merkel have been incensed to learn that the NSA was monitoring
their phone conversations. Merkel, born East Germany and its
all-invasive surveillance state, was reportedly so furious she
immediately called Obama and told him to cut it out. One can only
assume whoever was listening in on that call was doing so with a red
face..
6.
The NSA engages in industrial espionage
If
you thought it was all about terrorism, think again. “There
is no question that the US is engaged in economic
spying,” Snowden told German
broadcaster ARD in January.
"If
there's information at Siemens that's beneficial to U.S. national
interests – even if it doesn't have anything to do with national
security – then they'll take that information nevertheless," he
said.
7.
The NSA is also hacking its way into the global financial system
Using
a program called Project Bullrun, the NSA is waging war against
its greatest enemy: encryption. According to a document released last
September, the agency has already circumvented much of the encryption
which secures the global commerce and banking systems.
8.
Sweat the small stuff – your Angry Birds are also fair game
The
NSA and its UK counterpart, GCHQ, can also gather sensitive
personal dates from phone apps that transmit users’ data across the
web, such as the extremely popular Angry Birds game, which has been
downloaded 1.7 billion times.
Some
users were so… angry,
they took matters into their own hands by hacking and defacing the
game’s site.
9.
Sweat the sweaty stuff, too
The
NSA is interested in the porn habits of
targets, and is gathering evidence visits to pornographic websites to
discredit the “credibility,
reputation and authority” of
those accused of attempting to radicalize others through incendiary
religious speech. You know what they say about people who live in
glass houses…
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