Hey everyone, the government’s tracking you. Quelle surprise. In what has to be one of the least shocking pieces of news to come from the Edward Snowden leaks, The Washington Post is reporting that the National Security Agency has been gathering surveillance data on foreign cellphone users’ whereabouts globally, with some Americans potentially caught in the net. The database, which collects about 5 billion records per day, is so vast that not even the NSA has the proper tools to sift through it all. That’s not to say the agency hasn’t been able to make “good” use of it with analytics programs, though. One such program, ominously labeled Co-Traveler, allows the NSA to determine “behaviorally relevant relationships” based on data from signals intelligence activity designators (or sigads for short) located around the world, including one codenamed “Stormbrew.” That’s a lot of jargon for what are essentially data hubs that collect geolocation information down to the cell tower level. Co-Traveler can locate targets of interest based on cellphone users moving in tandem, even if they’re unknown threats — frequent meetups with an existing suspect could reveal a close associate, for instance. As we’ve come to expect by now, both the NSA and the Office of the Director for National Intelligence argue that this location-based surveillance is legal. Agency representatives tell the Post that the collection system doesn’t purposefully track Americans. However, the NSA also says it can’t determine how many US residents get swept up in these location scans; there are concerns that it’s following targets protected by Fourth Amendment search rights. Joseph Volpe contributed to this report. Filed under: Cellphones , Internet , Mobile Comments Source: Washington Post

Read More:
NSA collecting 5 billion cellphone location records per day

The NSA / PRISM / MUSCULAR scandal sparked by Edward Snowden’s leaks stained many tech companies, and tonight Microsoft has laid out several plans it hopes will convince customers (particularly non-US businesses and foreign governments) they’re safe using its products and services . In a blog post , general counsel and executive VP Brad Smith lays out a three pronged approach of “immediate and coordinated action” against the threat of government snooping. It’s expanding the use of encryption to cover any content moving between it and its customers, any transmissions between its data centers, and data stored on its servers — all of this is said to be in place by the end of 2014. In terms of court orders that may push it to reveal data , Microsoft is committing to notify “business and government” customers of any legal orders, and if it is prevented from doing so by a gag order, says it will challenge those in court. Finally, it’s expanding the existing program giving governments access to its source code so they can make sure it doesn’t contain any back doors. According to Reuters , this will put Microsoft on par with other Internet companies like Amazon Web Services, Yahoo and Google for how it treats data. Still, while that may help foreign diplomats feel better about logging into Outlook or Skype , there are probably a few individuals who will keep their tin foil hats on, Kinect cameras covered and cellphones off . Filed under: Internet , Microsoft Comments Source: Microsoft TechNet Blog

Continue Reading:
Microsoft’s immediate plans against NSA ‘threat’: court challenges, encryption and transparency