MO: Revealed: Hundreds of words to avoid using online if you don't want the government spying on you

[Popeman38]

If it is electronic and "out there" then they have it.

How? People keep saying this, and claiming it, but how?

[AsburySkinsFan]

Can I ask how it is you think the government has the access to evaluate all of these?

Here's the rundown on the NSA's new Data Center in Utah.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/all/1

Flowing through its servers and routers and stored in near-bottomless databases will be all forms of communication, including the complete contents of private emails, cell phone calls, and Google searches, as well as all sorts of personal data trails—parking receipts, travel itineraries, bookstore purchases, and other digital “pocket litter.” It is, in some measure, the realization of the “total information awareness” program created during the first term of the Bush administration—an effort that was killed by Congress in 2003 after it caused an outcry over its potential for invading Americans’ privacy.

Encrypt your stuff you say?

But “this is more than just a data center,” says one senior intelligence official who until recently was involved with the program. The mammoth Bluffdale center will have another important and far more secret role that until now has gone unrevealed. It is also critical, he says, for breaking codes. And code-breaking is crucial, because much of the data that the center will handle—financial information, stock transactions, business deals, foreign military and diplomatic secrets, legal documents, confidential personal communications—will be heavily encrypted. According to another top official also involved with the program, the NSA made an enormous breakthrough several years ago in its ability to cryptanalyze, or break, unfathomably complex encryption systems employed by not only governments around the world but also many average computer users in the US. The upshot, according to this official: “Everybody’s a target; everybody with communication is a target.”

In the process—and for the first time since Watergate and the other scandals of the Nixon administration—the NSA has turned its surveillance apparatus on the US and its citizens. It has established listening posts throughout the nation to collect and sift through billions of email messages and phone calls, whether they originate within the country or overseas. It has created a supercomputer of almost unimaginable speed to look for patterns and unscramble codes. Finally, the agency has begun building a place to store all the trillions of words and thoughts and whispers captured in its electronic net.

According to the diagram on the article it is going to have a 65 megawatt electrical substation, that's enough to power 65,000 homes.

How they gather all that data.

Before yottabytes of data from the deep web and elsewhere can begin piling up inside the servers of the NSA’s new center, they must be collected. To better accomplish that, the agency has undergone the largest building boom in its history, including installing secret electronic monitoring rooms in major US telecom facilities. Controlled by the NSA, these highly secured spaces are where the agency taps into the US communications networks, a practice that came to light during the Bush years but was never acknowledged by the agency.

Secret rooms in switching stations throughout the country allow for domestic spying as well as international.

He explains that the agency could have installed its tapping gear at the nation’s cable landing stations—the more than two dozen sites on the periphery of the US where fiber-optic cables come ashore. If it had taken that route, the NSA would have been able to limit its eavesdropping to just international communications, which at the time was all that was allowed under US law. Instead it chose to put the wiretapping rooms at key junction points throughout the country—large, windowless buildings known as switches—thus gaining access to not just international communications but also to most of the domestic traffic flowing through the US. The network of intercept stations goes far beyond the single room in an AT&T building in San Francisco exposed by a whistle-blower in 2006. “I think there’s 10 to 20 of them,” Binney says. “That’s not just San Francisco; they have them in the middle of the country and also on the East Coast.”

[Koolblue13]

How? People keep saying this, and claiming it, but how?

Go google it. It's not a secret anymore, nor has it been. Heck, I bet you can download something to spy on your exgirlfriends for 20 bucks nowadays.

[LadySkinsFan]

I work in healthcare emergency management and I've probably researched and/or written about 90% of the terms on that list, many on a daily basis. Maybe I should just cut to the chase and have someone from DHS move in with me.

Yeah, me too. As a proposal manager for Federal contracts, I've used most of those words at one time or another.

[Corcaigh]

Here's the rundown on the NSA's new Data Center in Utah.

http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2012/03/ff_nsadatacenter/all/1

snip

While there are alarming possibilities, the cost of capturing everything and decrypting it for the general population is huge. Breaking very strong encryption such as AES, if possible, would be so incredibly expensive, you would only do it if you felt the message was an actual WMD attack plan and there was no other way of getting the information (because you would make it clear that you knew how to do it.)

Various security agencies, foreign and domestic will not use encryption that the NSA can break.

To add ... attacking a well-implemented encryption algorithm head-on is just about the worst way to gather information. There are many, many other ways to get information that are much more likely to be productive.

[Popeman38]

He explains that the agency could have installed its tapping gear at the nation’s cable landing stations—the more than two dozen sites on the periphery of the US where fiber-optic cables come ashore. If it had taken that route, the NSA would have been able to limit its eavesdropping to just international communications, which at the time was all that was allowed under US law. Instead it chose to put the wiretapping rooms at key junction points throughout the country—large, windowless buildings known as switches—thus gaining access to not just international communications but also to most of the domestic traffic flowing through the US. The network of intercept stations goes far beyond the single room in an AT&T building in San Francisco exposed by a whistle-blower in 2006. “I think there’s 10 to 20 of them,” Binney says. “That’s not just San Francisco; they have them in the middle of the country and also on the East Coast.”

EDIT: I will just say that working in telecom, what you and this article claim is not possible on many different levels. If you want to believe it is happening, more power to you. I would encourage moving to Wyoming or Montana and building a compound with no communication equipment though.

[AsburySkinsFan]

EDIT: I will just say that working in telecom, what you and this article claim is not possible on many different levels. If you want to believe it is happening, more power to you. I would encourage moving to Wyoming or Montana and building a compound with no communication equipment though.

Not that I don't believe that you believe what you're saying but I'll take their word for it especially since that word comes from those who were doing the very things that are stated in the article.

[Dan T.]

Funny that 'pork' is on the list.

All of the posters in the BBQ thread better sleep with one eye open!

Praise be to Allah that "bacon" is not on the list.

[Corcaigh]

Not that I don't believe that you believe what you're saying but I'll take their word for it especially since that word comes from those who were doing the very things that are stated in the article.

Is the NSA engaged in a giant illegal electronic drag net operation and storing that data in giant server farms - very likely.

Do they have the resources required to capture every piece of electronic data sent by everyone, everywhere and decrypt it - not plausible.

[Koolblue13]

Is the NSA engaged in a giant illegal electronic drag net operation and storing that data in giant server farms - very likely.

Do they have the resources required to capture every piece of electronic data sent by everyone, everywhere and decrypt it - not plausible.

Agreed. Over time, if you do get picked up using words like rights or pork or subway, then you'll start to get targeted more, but it's possible nobody ever listens to a word you say.

[Destino]

Is the NSA engaged in a giant illegal electronic drag net operation and storing that data in giant server farms - very likely.

Do they have the resources required to capture every piece of electronic data sent by everyone, everywhere and decrypt it - not plausible.

I imagine things would be filtered automatically so that the amount of data was reduced as much as possible. I don't think they want anywhere near "every" piece of electronic data.

[AsburySkinsFan]

decrypt it

If every piece were encrypted then it would not be plausible.

[Corcaigh]

I imagine things would be filtered automatically so that the amount of data was reduced as much as possible. I don't think they want anywhere near "every" piece of electronic data.

Sure, but as a very significant amount of traffic is encrypted at some level, that filtering is a very difficult thing to do. Many corporations use VPNs over the public internet. Sorting out that from secret terrorist messages is a challenge. Idiot wannabees discussing their fantasies unencrypted on Facebook or via e-mail should be easy to catch though.

[LD0506]

Well I'm definitely scrood just from TW

[Corcaigh]

If every piece were encrypted then it would not be plausible.

But a huge amount of data is. Even if tiny, tiny fractions of a % is using strong encryption this is a computational challenge that we don't have answers to. And as I commented, the CIA and other agencies would not be using these encryption methods if the NSA could eavesdrop on them.

[AsburySkinsFan]

But a huge amount of data is. Even if tiny, tiny fractions of a % is using strong encryption this is a computational challenge that we don't have answers to. And as I commented, the CIA and other agencies would not be using these encryption methods if the NSA could eavesdrop on them.

Well they aren't building these massive computers to play solitaire.

[Corcaigh]

Well they aren't building these massive computers to play solitaire.

No, but by your argument, they are spying on you when you play it. So better make sure that you don't choose cards which would reveal you to be as an enemy of the state.

[AsburySkinsFan]

No, but by your argument, they are spying on you when you play it. So better make sure that you don't choose cards which would reveal you to be as an enemy of the state.

It does beg the question though, if they can't break the encryption then what are these things for?

[China]

It seems like it would be real easy to get their attention just by telling a story. Here's one I just put together with 30 of their key/target words:

So my friend is in town from Colombia and I pick him up at the airport. We decide to take the Metro downtown to hit some clubs on Capitol hill, and a new one in particular in Southwest called Reyosa. Well we get there and there appears to be a power outage, but we come to find out the new owners didn’t get their electric bill paid, so it’s no go and we move on. We try a place called Sonora, which is supposed to have authentic food from Mexico, ‘cause we’re hungry. After dinner and margaritas, we head over to a club to drink and meet some ladies. After a couple of drinks I’m about to burst so I go to take a leak. On the way out of the restroom I bump into a couple of girls shooting jello shots and start chatting them up. They seem resistant to my charms, but then my friend comes over to help. We get them drinks (a Car Bomb and a Hurricane) to loosen them up some more. They eventually invite us back to their place. I’m in this one chick’s bedroom and I’m about to put on the Trojan ‘cause I don’t want no virus or nuthin’ when dinner hits me and I feel some painful gas pressure. So I excuse myself to the bathroom. When I go to fart it’s initially a relief but then quickly a disaster as I sharted in an explosive mess. I clean up the best I can but when I come out there is a cloud of toxic gas that follows me. When the wave hits her she gets sick and all the magic is lost. I quickly make my exit, leaving my friend stranded, and take the subway back home. When my friend caught up with me he said they threatened to call the cops on him if he didn’t leave right away. What a riot!

Hail!

[AsburySkinsFan]

.....and China was never heard from again......

[China]

.....and China was never heard from again......

Don't be sil

[Corcaigh]

It does beg the question though, if they can't break the encryption then what are these things for?

Oh they can, when the encryption isn't well implemented, and when people are stupid or sloppy. But the idea that they have technology that monitors our every electronic word and identify anyone with questionable thoughts is fantasy. That doesn't mean to say that oversight is badly required here, as already noted, the refusal to comply with FISA without good reason suggests to me that they don't trouble themselves with legality.

[Dan T.]

It seems like it would be real easy to get their attention just by telling a story. Here's one I just put together with 30 of their key/target words:

On the way out of the restroom I bump into a couple of girls shooting jello shots and start chatting them up. They seem resistant to my charms, but then my friend comes over to help. We get them drinks (a Car Bomb and a Hurricane) to loosen them up some more. They eventually invite us back to their place. I’m in this one chick’s bedroom and I’m about to put on the Trojan ‘cause I don’t want no virus or nuthin’ when dinner hits me and I feel some painful gas pressure. So I excuse myself to the bathroom. When I go to fart it’s initially a relief but then quickly a disaster as I sharted in an explosive mess. I clean up the best I can but when I come out there is a cloud of toxic gas that follows me. When the wave hits her she gets sick and all the magic is lost. Hail!

So you didn't get to pork her?

[AsburySkinsFan]

Don't be sil

[Koolblue13]

I attacked Subway, toxic pork brown out attack, relief, send help this gas cloud is toxic. Dirty bomb evacuation drill emergency.

It seems like it would be real easy to get their attention just by telling a story. Here's one I just put together with 30 of their key/target words:

So my friend is in town from Colombia and I pick him up at the airport. We decide to take the Metro downtown to hit some clubs on Capitol hill, and a new one in particular in Southwest called Reyosa. Well we get there and there appears to be a power outage, but we come to find out the new owners didn’t get their electric bill paid, so it’s no go and we move on. We try a place called Sonora, which is supposed to have authentic food from Mexico, ‘cause we’re hungry. After dinner and margaritas, we head over to a club to drink and meet some ladies. After a couple of drinks I’m about to burst so I go to take a leak. On the way out of the restroom I bump into a couple of girls shooting jello shots and start chatting them up. They seem resistant to my charms, but then my friend comes over to help. We get them drinks (a Car Bomb and a Hurricane) to loosen them up some more. They eventually invite us back to their place. I’m in this one chick’s bedroom and I’m about to put on the Trojan ‘cause I don’t want no virus or nuthin’ when dinner hits me and I feel some painful gas pressure. So I excuse myself to the bathroom. When I go to fart it’s initially a relief but then quickly a disaster as I sharted in an explosive mess. I clean up the best I can but when I come out there is a cloud of toxic gas that follows me. When the wave hits her she gets sick and all the magic is lost. I quickly make my exit, leaving my friend stranded, and take the subway back home. When my friend caught up with me he said they threatened to call the cops on him if he didn’t leave right away. What a riot!

Hail!

I think it pretty funny that both of our examples included taking a crap.