Obama Admin asks secret FISA court to re-start dragnet. Source article from The Guardian This post sponsored by RecipeSchmecipe.com The Backdrop By Susan Modaress @SusanModaress After weeks of political showdown, infighting and drama, the Senate finally passed the USA Freedom Act, a bill to reform provisions of one of the National Security Agency’s most controversial surveillance programs, The US Patriot Act, …
Government Data Breach
Millions of federal employees’ personal info stolen. Source article on CNN.com Create your own user feedback survey US officials say nearly every government agency was hacked. Personal information of 4 million federal employees was stolen. Investigators say the breach was traced to China. Officials claim China is building a database of Americans’ info. The breach didn’t affect uniformed military personnel. …
NSA Patriot Act Ruling
Appeals court says NSA’s meta data collection illegal. NSA collects MOST of our texts, calls, emails, & web traffic. All of that is completely legal, in part, thanks to the Patriot Act. Part of the data they collect is called “meta data.” Meta data is info about calls: the numbers and length of call. After Snowden revelations, the ACLU (and …
NSA Hacks SIM Cards
NSA/GCHQ stole millions of SIM cards’ encryption keys. The GCHQ is Britain’s NSA. Your phone’s SIM card contains a secret encryption key. Your carrier/provider also has that same encryption key. To connect, your SIM and provider check that they keys match. If they do, all communication between them is encrypted. Carriers like Verizon, AT&T do not make their own SIM …
1.2 Billion Passwords Stolen
Could be the largest heist of its kind Russian hackers have stolen 1.2 billion username and password combinations. The digital credentials came from ~420,000 sites. The sites included small and well-known ones. The hackers make money by logging into social and email accounts and posting about fake products. This could be the largest theft of username and passwords. Security experts …