In a joint U.$. and UK spying operation, agencies hacked into links to
Yahoo and Google data centers, allowing them to freely collect
information from user accounts on those systems. This data collection
project, called MUSCULAR, is a joint operation between the U.$. National
Security Agency (NSA) and the British Government Communications
Headquarters (GCHQ). Documents released by former National Security
Agency (NSA) contractor, Edward Snowden and “interviews with
knowledgeable officials” are the sources for this news that was broken
by The Washington Post on October 30, 2013. Google was
“outraged” at this revelation, and many Amerikans were shocked to learn
of the violation of their privacy by their own government.
Of course, for those of us serious about security in our political
organizing work, this is not breaking news. It is just further
confirmation of what we’ve been saying for a long time: email is not
secure, especially email on the major service providers like Google and
Yahoo. Back in August
MIM(Prisons)
had our email account shut down when the U.$. government demanded
that our email server, lavabit.com, turn over information on the
accounts it provided. Lavabit decided it would rather stop providing
services at all than comply with the government’s demand. We can only
assume that any email service still in operation is supplying
information to the U.$. government.
What is interesting about this story is not that the NSA is caught red
handed snooping on people’s email, but that they would even need to do
this in the first place, when major companies are freely providing
backdoor access to the U.$. government. A court-approved process
provides the NSA with access to Yahoo and Google user accounts, through
a program known as PRISM. Through PRISM, the NSA can demand online
communications records that match specific search terms. Apparently this
restriction to court approved search terms was too limiting for the NSA,
who has been siphoning off vast portions of the data held in Google and
Yahoo data centers, for analysis and more targeted snooping.
MUSCULAR gets around the already lax U.$. government policies on spying
on Americans by exploiting links between data centers holding
information outside of the U.$. where intelligence gathering falls under
presidential authority and has little oversight or restriction.
As we pointed out in the article
Self-Defense
and Secure Communications: “Currently, we do not have the ability to
defend the movement militarily, but we do have the ability to defend it
with a well-informed electronic self-defense strategy. And just as
computer technology, and the internet in particular, was a victory for
free speech, it has played a role in leveling the battlefield to the
point that the imperialists recognize computer warfare as a material
vulnerability to their hegemony.” In that article we provided some basic
suggestions for communications self-defense, most of which are only
possible for people outside of prisons.
As more information comes out on the vast resources invested in
electronic surveillance it is clearer that improving our technology is a
form of offensive work as well, even if we aren’t launching attacks. The
imperialists are spending a lot of resources trying to defeat the tools
we mention in our last article. In using these tools in our day-to-day
work we tie up those resources that could be used to fight other battles
against the oppressed elsewhere. This should be stressed to those who
think security is taking time away from “real work.”
Some will not organize until they’ve read all of Marx’s writings to
ensure they understand Marxism. This is a mistake, just like waiting to
get the perfect electronic security before doing any organizing work.
But you should assume that all of our communications are being
intercepted. Take whatever precautions you can to ensure your
information cannot be accessed, or if it can, that it cannot be used
against you or others. Security is like theory and any organizing skill;
it should be constantly improved upon, but it should not paralyze your
work.