The National Security Agency has enjoyed relatively broad authority to monitor communications among suspected terrorists and their associates, even when those people happen to be American citizens and even without a warrant . However, The New York Times reports the NSA is stopping one of its most controversial practices: the collection of Americans’ international emails and text messages that mention a foreigner under surveillance. The NSA is attempting to adhere to a 2011 ruling by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. The court found this “about the target” collection program violated the Fourth Amendment because some internet companies packaged and processed emails in bundles — meaning if one message contained a foreign target’s email address, the entire group was swept up. The NSA was intercepting domestic communications, resulting in illegal searches. FISC allowed the surveillance to continue, but with a new safeguard in place: The NSA proposed a program where it would keep these bundled emails in a separate repository where analysts would not be able to see them. In 2016, the NSA reported the revamped program was not going as planned and analysts were, in fact, still searching the sequestered documents, The New York Times says. FISC delayed renewing the agency’s warrantless surveillance program until it promised to cancel the entire “about the target” collection process. The NSA has argued its bulk-collection methods help officials track potential threats, as contact with someone under surveillance is grounds for suspicion. Privacy advocates like the American Civil Liberties Union argue otherwise. “This development underscores the need for Congress to significantly reform Section 702 of FISA, which will continue to allow warrantless surveillance of Americans, ” ACLU legislative counsel Neema Singh Guliani says in response to today’s news. “While the NSA’s policy change will curb some of the most egregious abuses under the statute, it is at best a partial fix. Congress should take steps to ensure such practices are never resurrected and end policies that permit broad, warrantless surveillance under Section 702, which is up for reauthorization at the end of the year.” I’m going to go out on a limb & add a big reason: bulk access going darker 1—email providers moved to TLS/https 2—targets moved to E2E apps https://t.co/zz5WCxOHmZ — Thomas Rid (@RidT) April 28, 2017 Of course, technology continues to rapidly advance, and online communication has changed a lot since 2011. Today, more people are using end-to-end encryption and email providers are offering more secure ways to communicate, potentially making it harder for the NSA to round up these messages in the first place. In 2014, Google announced it would use HTTPS connections in Gmail specifically because the NSA was poking around in users’ business. Source: The New York Times
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NSA will stop illegally collecting American emails
The free iOS version of the Tor browser “sparked a tidal wave of interest” after its release in December, according to Silicon.co. Mickeycaskill writes: The cost has been scrapped due to developer Mike Tigas’ worries that the price was limiting access to anonymous browsing for those who need it most. “Given recent events, many believe it’s more important than ever to exercise and support freedom of speech, privacy rights, and digital security, ” Tigas wrote in a blog post. “I think now is as good a time as ever to make Onion Browser more accessible to everyone.” “I’m still a little terrified that I’ve made this change, ” Tigas adds. For four years the Tor Onion browser was available on the Apple App Store for $0.99, the lowest non-free price allowed by Apple, providing a “reliable” income to Tigas which helped him move to New York for a new job while allowing him “the economic freedom to continue working on side projects that have a positive impact in the world.” Tigas also writes that “there’s now a Patreon page and other ways to support the project.” Last month the Tor Project also released the first alpha version of the sandboxed Tor Browser. Read more of this story at Slashdot. 
The world’s largest aircraft has finally completed its first flight after months of preparation and years of searching for funding. The Airlander 10 as it’s called spent 20 minutes in the air on Wednesday, landing safely at Cardington Airfield north of London. CNNMoney reports: “Part airship, part helicopter, part plane, the 300-foot long aircraft is about 50 feet longer than the world’s biggest passenger planes. The Airlander, made by British company Hybrid Air Vehicles, has four engines and no internal structure. It maintains its shape thanks to the pressure of the 38, 000 cubic meters of helium inside its hull, which is made from ultralight carbon fiber. The aircraft was originally designed for U.S. military surveillance. But the project was grounded in 2013 because of defense spending cuts. [The team behind the giant blimp-like aircraft] said the aircraft could carry communications equipment or other cargo, undertake search and rescue operations, or do military and commercial survey work. The Airlander can stay airborne for up to five days at a time if manned, and for more than two weeks if unmanned. It can carry up to 10 tons of cargo at a maximum speed of 91 miles per hour. The aircraft doesn’t need a runway to take off, meaning it can operate from land, snow, ice, desert and even open water.” You can view the historic flight for yourself here (Warning: headphone users beware of loud sound). Read more of this story at Slashdot. 
Khari Johnson, writing for VentureBeat:A bot made to challenge traffic tickets has been used more than 9, 000 times by New Yorkers, according to DoNotPay maker Joshua Browder. The bot was made available to New Yorkers in March. In recent years and decades, residents of The Big Apple have seen a persistent increase in traffic fines. A record $1.9 billion in traffic fines was issued by the City of New York in 2015. Since the first version of the bot was released in London last fall, 160, 000 of 250, 000 tickets have been successfully challenged with DoNotPay, Browder said. “I think the people getting parking tickets are the most vulnerable in society, ” said Browder. “These people aren’t looking to break the law. I think they’re being exploited as a revenue source by the local government.” Browder, who’s 19, hopes to extend DoNotPay to Seattle this fall. Read more of this story at Slashdot. 
An anonymous reader writes with Ars Technica’s story on the relevations reported today by The Intercept that the UK’s GCHQ has been tracking World Wide Web users since 2007, with an operation called “Karma Police” — “a program that tracked Web browsing habits of people around the globe in what the agency itself billed as the ‘world’s biggest’ Internet data-mining operation, intended to eventually track ‘every visible user on the Internet.'” Read more of this story at Slashdot. 