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Title

Big Brother is (Efficiently) Watching You

Description

When it was revealed that the Bush administration was wire-tapping whomever the hell it pleased without a warrant, the country was up-in-arms for a minute or two. Once that barely risen dust had settled---with the Bush administration having changed its policy in no significant way---the American public consoled itself that at least the gross inefficiencies of government would prevent <i>too</i> many of them from being wiretapped.<fn> Luckily, tons of tax dollars and the willing cooperation of large telecoms companies---for chunks of those dollars, naturally---are leading to technological solutions that are allowing the government to funnel your data to the various arms of its surveillance network with increasing efficiency. As detailed in the article, <a href="http://arstechnica.com/telecom/news/2009/12/sprint-fed-customer-gps-data-to-leos-over-8-million-times.ars" source="Ars Technica" author="Jon Stokes">Sprint fed customer GPS data to cops over 8 million times</a>, Sprint made strides by making <iq>it so easy for law enforcement to gain access to customer data on a 24/7 basis through the use of its Web portal and large compliance department.</iq> With their addition of GPS data to all of the other personal information about you that they're regularly shoving over to the cops---all without any warrants or probable cause---<iq>the number of requests [have gone] through the roof.</iq> Imagine that. And this was all made legal in the U.S.---for your protection. It's simply incredible that the same people who want to impeach Obama because they think he will try to take away their guns couldn't care less about his massive invasion of their privacy and infringement of their rights---as <i>human beings</i>, to say nothing of their rights as Americans. The U.S. is politically moribund and is most likely psychologically incapable of any change. If you want an easy way to fight this surveillance, start using cheap and accessible encryption---for your mail, for your chat sessions, for your phone (if you can). Even the cops can't break encryption, but everybody has to start using it or you'll limit your audience. Good luck. <hr> <ft>Said wiretapping has proceeded apace---unchanged---under the Obama administration.</ft>