The FBI as advanced persistent threat – and what to do about it
Opinion The best device to reduce road deaths, suggested economist Gordon Tulloch, would be a large steel spike in the center of every car's steering wheel. Focuses the mind.
The IT security equivalent is an "Assume This Device Is Tapped" sticker on every phone, tablet and computer. Absent that, the best we can do is pay attention when those with legal access to all our data abuse those powers and help themselves.
Last week, repeat offender, the FBI, served this important public service. It has been caught using its power to hoover up communications without a warrant, ostensibly to monitor foreign threats, to plunder the privacy of many thousands of US citizens whose revulsion at a brutal killing of a Black man by white cops marked them as activists.
This is nothing new. Search for "FBI abuse of powers" – replacing FBI with other state agencies to taste – and you'll be scrolling for a year. It's actually quite cheering that democracies still have safeguards to bring this stuff to light, and yet it keeps happening. If you live in a part of the world where such protection is diluted or absent, you won't need telling how bad it can get.
