Mass surveillance

Source: Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia.

Mass surveillance is the intricate

federal governments or governmental organizations, but it may also be carried out by corporations (either on behalf of governments or at their own initiative). Depending on each nation's laws and judicial systems, the legality of and the permission required to engage in mass surveillance varies. It is the single most indicative distinguishing trait of totalitarian regimes. It is often distinguished from targeted surveillance
.

Mass surveillance has often been cited[

totalitarian state wherein civil liberties are infringed or political dissent is undermined by COINTELPRO-like programs.[3]

In 2013, the practice of mass surveillance by world governments

Digital Age.[5] Mass surveillance is considered a global issue.[6][7][8][9] The Aerospace Corporation of the United States describes a near-future event, the "GEOINT Singularity", in which everything on Earth will be monitored at all times, analyzed by artificial intelligence systems, and then redistributed and made available to the general public globally in real time.[10][11]

By country

Privacy International's 2007 survey, covering 47 countries, indicated that there had been an increase in surveillance and a decline in the performance of privacy safeguards, compared to the previous year. Balancing these factors, eight countries were rated as being 'endemic surveillance societies'. Of these eight, China, Malaysia and Russia scored lowest, followed jointly by Singapore and the United Kingdom, then jointly by Taiwan, Thailand and the United States. The best ranking was given to Greece, which was judged to have 'adequate safeguards against abuse'.[12]

Many countries throughout the world have already been adding thousands of

surveillance cameras to their urban, suburban and even rural areas.[13][14] For example, in September 2007 the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) stated that we are "in danger of tipping into a genuine surveillance society completely alien to American values" with "the potential for a dark future where our every move, our every transaction, our every communication is recorded, compiled, and stored away, ready to be examined and used against us by the authorities whenever they want".[15]

On 12 March 2013, Reporters Without Borders published a Special report on Internet Surveillance. The report included a list of "State Enemies of the Internet", countries whose governments are involved in active, intrusive surveillance of news providers, resulting in grave violations of freedom of information and human rights. Five countries were placed on the initial list: Bahrain, China, Iran, Syria, and Vietnam.[16]

Australia

Bahrain

Bahrain is one of the five countries on Reporters Without Borders' March 2013 list of "State Enemies of the Internet", countries whose governments are involved in active, intrusive surveillance of news providers, resulting in grave violations of freedom of information and human rights. The level of Internet filtering and surveillance in Bahrain is one of the highest in the world. The royal family is represented in all areas of Internet management and has sophisticated tools at its disposal for spying on its subjects. The online activities of dissidents and news providers are closely monitored and the surveillance is increasing.[16]

Media reports published in July 2021 exposed the use of NSO Group's phone malware software, Pegasus, for spying on rights activists, lawyers, and journalists, globally, by authoritarian governments. Bahrain was among the many countries listed as the Israeli firm's clients accused of hacking and conducting unauthorized mass surveillance using phone malware despite a poor human rights record. The software is said to infect devices, allowing its operators to get access to the target's messages, photos, record calls, and activate the microphone and camera.[17]

Yusuf al-Jamri had no idea that even after fleeing Bahrain, he won't be able to escape the government's prying eyes, even after taking asylum in the UK. After moving to the UK and getting his asylum request accepted, Al-Jamri legally filed charges against Bahrain along with the notorious spyware firm, NSO Group for infecting his phone with a malware, built with military-grade technology in August 2019. The hacking was verified by the researchers at Toronto based CitizenLab. As a result of which Yusuf complained of being subjected to personal injury, loss of privacy, distress and anxiety. Al-Jamri's lawyers made claims about the same in a pre-claim letter sent to both the accused, NSO Group and the Bahraini government. No response was received from the two on being approached for comments.[18]

Canada

China

China is one of the five countries on Reporters Without Borders' March 2013 list of "State Enemies of the Internet", countries whose governments are involved in active, intrusive surveillance of news providers, resulting in grave violations of freedom of information and basic human rights.[19] All Internet access in China is owned or controlled by the state or the Chinese Communist Party.[20] Many foreign journalists in China have said that they take for granted that their telephones are tapped and their email is monitored.[16]

The tools put in place to filter and monitor the Internet are collectively known as the

Deep Packet Inspection (DPI) technology to monitor and block access based on keyword detection. The Great Firewall has the ability to dynamically block encrypted connections. One of the country's main ISPs, China Unicom, automatically cuts a connection as soon as it is used to transmit encrypted content.[16]

The monitoring system developed by China is not confined to the Great Firewall, monitoring is also built into social networks, chat services and VoIP. Private companies are directly responsible to the Chinese authorities for surveillance of their networks to ensure banned messages are not circulated. The QQ application, owned by the firm Tencent, allows the authorities to monitor in detail exchanges between Internet users by seeking certain keywords and expressions. The author of each message can be identified by his or her user number. The QQ application is effectively a giant Trojan horse. And since March 2012, new legislation requires all new users of micro-blogging sites to register using their own name and telephone number.[16]

TOM-Skype, is slightly different from the downloadable versions in other countries. A report by OpenNet Initiative Asia[21] says everyday conversations are captured on servers. Interception and storage of a conversation may be triggered by a sender's or recipient's name or by keywords that occur in the conversation.[22]

On 31 January 2013, The New York Times reported that it had been the target of attacks by the Chinese hackers.[23] The first breach took place on 13 September 2012 when the newspaper was preparing to publish an article about the fortune amassed by the family of outgoing Prime Minister Wen Jiabao. The newspaper said the purpose of attacks was to identify the sources that supplied the newspaper with information about corruption among the prime minister's entourage. The Wall Street Journal and CNN also said they had been the targets of cyber attacks from China. In February, Twitter disclosed that the accounts of some 250,000 subscribers had been the victims of attacks from China similar to those carried out on The New York Times. Mandiant, the company engaged by the NYT to secure its network, identified the source of the attacks as a group of hackers it called Advanced Persistent Threat 1, a unit of the People's Liberation Army operating from a 12-story building in the suburbs of Shanghai that had hundreds, possibly thousands, of staff and the direct support of the Chinese government.[16]

The newest form of mass surveillance in China is the Social Credit System, where citizens and businesses are given or deducted good points based on social behavior such as adherence to laws, honesty, tax evasion or political activism.[24]

By October 2018, the Chinese government had set up more than 20 million surveillance cameras equipped with facial recognition in public places across the country as part of the

religious persecution against Uyghurs,[27] Christians[28] and Falun Gong practitioners.[29][30]

Internet surveillance is pervasive within China, under the Cybersecurity Law of the People's Republic of China, all SIM cards purchases require real name registration,[20] all WiFi hotspots throughout the country require SMS verification through a phone number which is incidentally linked to a user's resident ID card and all instant messaging and internet service providers including but not limited to ISP's, internet cafes and gaming service providers are required to verify the real identity of users through either a foreign passport or national ID card prior to the provision of a service. All domestic flight tickets and purchases of high speed train tickets and banking and financial services also require real name ID in order to be provided in order to be purchased.[31]

East Germany

Before the Digital Revolution, one of the world's biggest mass surveillance operations was carried out by the Stasi, the secret police of the former East Germany. By the time the state collapsed in 1989, the Stasi had built up an estimated civilian network of 189,000 informants, who monitored even minute hints of political dissent among other citizens.[32] Many West Germans visiting friends and family in East Germany were also subject to Stasi spying, as well as many high-ranking West German politicians and persons in the public eye.

Most East German citizens were well aware that their government was spying on them, which led to a culture of mistrust: touchy political issues were only discussed in the comfort of their own four walls and only with the closest of friends and family members, while widely maintaining a façade of unquestioning followership in public.

European Union

The right to privacy is a highly developed area of law in Europe. The Data Protection Directive used to regulate the processing of personal data within the European Union, before it was replaced by the GDPR. For comparison, the US has no data protection law that is comparable to this; instead, the US regulates data protection on a sectoral basis.[33]

Since early 2012, the European Union has been working on a

U.S. National Security Agency.[34] European Union justice and rights commissioner Viviane Reding said "The question has arisen whether the large-scale collection and processing of personal information under US surveillance programmes is necessary and proportionate to meet the interests of national security." The EU is also asking the US for changes to US legislation to match the legal redress offered in Europe; American citizens in Europe can go to the courts if they feel their rights are infringed but Europeans without right of residence in America cannot.[35] When the EU / US arrangement to implement International Safe Harbor Privacy Principles were struck down by the European Court of Justice, a new framework for transatlantic data flows, called the "EU-US Privacy Shield", was adopted in July 2016.[36][37]

In April 2014, the European Court of Justice declared invalid the EU Data Retention Directive. The Court said it violates two basic rights – respect for private life and protection of personal data.[38] The legislative body of the European Union passed the Data Retention Directive on 15 December 2005. It required that telecommunication operators retain metadata for telephone, Internet, and other telecommunication services for periods of not less than six months and not more than two years from the date of the communication as determined by each EU member state and, upon request, to make the data available to various governmental bodies. Access to this information is not limited to investigation of serious crimes, nor was a warrant required for access.[39][40]Protection

Undertaken under the

Seventh Framework Programme for research and technological development (FP7 - Science in Society[41]) some multidisciplinary and mission oriented mass surveillance activities (for example INDECT and HIDE) were funded by the European Commission[42] in association with industrial partners.[43][44][45][46]
The INDECT Project ("Intelligent information system supporting observation, searching and detection for security of citizens in urban environment")

The main expected results of the INDECT project are:

  • Trial of intelligent analysis of video and audio data for threat detection in urban environments,
  • Creation of tools and technology for privacy and data protection during storage and transmission of information using quantum cryptography and new methods of digital watermarking,
  • Performing computer-aided detection of threats and targeted crimes in Internet resources with privacy-protecting solutions,
  • Construction of a search engine for rapid semantic search based on watermarking of content related to child pornography and human organ trafficking,
  • Implementation of a distributed computer system that is capable of effective intelligent processing.

HIDE ("Homeland Security, Biometric Identification & Personal Detection Ethics")[50] was a research project funded by the European Commission within the scope of the Seventh RTD Framework Programme (FP7). The consortium, coordinated by Emilio Mordini,[51] explored the ethical and privacy implications of biometrics and personal detection technologies, focusing on the continuum between personal detection, authentication, identification and mass surveillance.[52]

France

Germany

In 2002 German citizens were tipped off about wiretapping when a software error led to a phone number allocated to the

German Secret Service being listed on mobile telephone bills.[53]

India

The Indian parliament passed the

Information Technology Act
of 2008 with no debate, giving the government fiat power to tap all communications without a court order or a warrant. Section 69 of the act states "Section 69 empowers the Central Government/State Government/ its authorized agency to intercept, monitor or decrypt any information generated, transmitted, received or stored in any computer resource if it is necessary or expedient so to do in the interest of the sovereignty or integrity of India, defence of India, security of the State, friendly relations with foreign States or public order or for preventing incitement to the commission of any cognizable offence or for investigation of any offence."

India is setting up a national intelligence grid called

Unique Identification Authority of India being given to every Indian from February 2011, the government would be able track people in real time. A national population registry of all citizens will be established by the 2011 census, during which fingerprints and iris scans would be taken along with GPS records of each household.[56][57]

As per the initial plan, access to the combined data will be given to 11 agencies, including the Research and Analysis Wing, the Intelligence Bureau, the Enforcement Directorate, the National Investigation Agency, the Central Bureau of Investigation, the Directorate of Revenue Intelligence and the Narcotics Control Bureau.

Several states within India have already installed CCTV surveillance systems with face matching capabilities using biometrics in Aadhaar.[58] Andhra Pradesh and Telangana are using information linked with Aadhaar across different agencies to create a 360-degree profile of a person, calling it the Integration Information Hub. Other states are now planning to follow this model.[59]

Iran

Iran is one of the five countries on Reporters Without Borders' March 2013 list of "State Enemies of the Internet", countries whose governments are involved in naturally active efforts to news providers . The government runs or controls almost all of the country's institutions for regulating, managing or legislating on telecommunications. The Supreme Council for Cyberspace, which was headed by President Ahmadinejad, was established in March 2012 and now determines digital policy. The construction of a parallel "Iranian Internet", with a high connection speed but fully monitored and censored, is almost complete.[16]

The tools used by the Iranian authorities to monitor and control the Internet include data interception tools capable of

post-election uprising in 2009. The use of Israeli surveillance devices has also been detected in Iran. The network traffic management and surveillance device NetEnforcer was provided by Israel to Denmark and then resold to Iran. Similarly, US equipment has found its way to Iran via the Chinese company ZTE.[16]

In September 2023 The Iranian government approved a law enabling it to have instant undeniable access every single thing in digital online life of citizens including location /photos, data and other vital record tied to people's real identity, The persistent monitoring system is part of Iranian seventh quinquennial development program bill package.[60]

Malaysia

In July 2018, the Malaysian police announced the creation of the Malaysian Intercept Crimes Against Children Unit (icacu) that is equipped with real-time mass internet surveillance software developed in the United States and is tasked with the monitoring of all Malaysian internet users, with a focus on pornography and child pornography. The system creates a "data library" of users which includes details such as IP addresses, websites, locations, duration and frequency of use and files uploaded and downloaded.[61][62][63]

Mexico

After struggling with drug trafficking and criminal groups for decades Mexico has been strengthening their military mass surveillance. Approximately half of the population in Mexico does not support democracy as a form of government, and believe an authoritarian system is better if social matters are solved through it.[64] The relevance of these political beliefs may make it easier for mass surveillance to spread within the country. "This does not necessarily mean the end of democratic institutions as a whole—such as free elections or the permanence of critical mass media—but it means strengthening the mechanisms for exercising power that exclude dialogue, transparency and social agreement."[65] Developing intelligence agencies has been on Mexico's radar for a while for means of security.

Netherlands

According to a 2004 report, the government of the Netherlands carries out more clandestine wire-taps and intercepts than any country, per capita, in the world.[66] The Dutch military intelligence service MIVD operates a satellite ground station to intercept foreign satellite links and also a facility to eavesdrop on foreign high-frequency radio traffic. An example of mass surveillance carried out by corporations in the Netherlands is an initiative started by five Dutch banks (ABN AMRO, ING, Rabobank, Triodos Bank and de Volksbank). In July 2020 these five banks[67] have decided to establish Transaction Monitoring Netherlands (TMNL) in the collective fight against money laundering and the financing of terrorism.[68] The goal of TMNL-organization is to gather all transaction information provided by Dutch banks in a centralized database to enable full-scale collective transaction monitoring. Preparations have been started but the actual monitoring by TMNL can start after an amendment of the Dutch Anti-Money Laundering and Anti-Terrorist Financing Act.

North Korea

Having attained the nickname 'surveillance state', North Korea's government has complete control over all forms of telecommunications and Internet. It is routine to be sent to a prison camp for communicating with the outside world. The government enforces restrictions around the types of appliances North Koreans may own in their home, in case radio or TV sets pick up signals from nearby South Korea, China and Russia.[69] There is no attempt to mask the way this government actively spies on their citizens. In North Korea, an increasing number of citizens do have smartphones. However, these devices are heavily controlled and are being used to censor and observe everything North Koreans do on their phones. Reuters reported in 2015 that Koryolink, North Korea's official mobile phone network, has around 3 million subscribers in a country of 24 million.[70] Obviously, in order to have digital data to draw from, the citizens must have access to phones and other things online.

Russia