“Surveillance Society”

July 26 (Reuters) – A counterterrorism organization formed by some of the biggest U.S. tech companies including Facebook (FB.O) and Microsoft (MSFT.O) is significantly expanding the types of extremist content shared between firms in a key database, aiming to crack down on material from white supremacists and far-right militias, the group told Reuters.

Until now, the Global Internet Forum to Counter Terrorism’s (GIFCT) database has focused on videos and images from terrorist groups on a United Nations list and so has largely consisted of content from Islamist extremist organizations such as Islamic State, al Qaeda and the Taliban.

Three weeks after Fox News host Tucker Carlson accused the National Security Agency of reading his communications, the agency has confirmed he was unmasked.

The allegations that spy software known as Pegasus may have been used to carry out surveillance on journalists, activists – and even perhaps political leaders – highlights that surveillance is now for sale.

The company behind the tool, NSO Group, has denied the allegations and says its customers are carefully assessed.

But it is another sign that high-end spy techniques, which used to be the exclusive preserve of a few states, are now spreading more widely and challenging the way we think about privacy and security in an online world.

In the not-too-distant past, if a security service wanted to find out what you were up to, it took a fair degree of effort. They might get a warrant to wiretap your phone. Or plant a bug in your house. Or send a surveillance team to follow you.

In an effort to identify potential deportees, the federal government quietly tested facial recognition technology on millions of unsuspecting travellers at Toronto’s Pearson International Airport in 2016.

The six-month initiative, meant to pick out people the Canada Border Services Agency (CBSA) suspected might try to enter the country using fake identification, is detailed in a document obtained by The Globe and Mail through a freedom of information request. The project is the largest known government deployment of the technology in Canada to date.

The Genie never goes back in the bottle.

Human rights activists, journalists and lawyers across the world have been targeted by authoritarian governments using hacking software sold by the Israeli surveillance company NSO Group, according to an investigation into a massive data leak.

The investigation by the Guardian and 16 other media organisations suggests widespread and continuing abuse of NSO’s hacking spyware, Pegasus, which the company insists is only intended for use against criminals and terrorists.

Pegasus is a malware that infects iPhones and Android devices to enable operators of the tool to extract messages, photos and emails, record calls and secretly activate microphones.

The Guiding Principles are creepily totalitarian, and yet one imagines the authors of this document think of themselves as being great public benefactors

The new Broadcasting Act, Bill C-10, may have been stymied in the Senate, but the actual content of its policy objectives has just been released, in the form of Heritage Canada’s “Guiding Principles on Diversity of Content Online.” For a government intent on control, the Guiding Principles have several advantages: they are not legislated; they can be revised and adapted according to how technology or society evolves; and they have no legally binding force. They have only the force of the large platforms to back them — if they sign on, as they are enjoined to do.

The U.S. Capitol Police will begin fielding military surveillance equipment as part of sweeping security upgrades as the police force pivots towards becoming “an intelligence-based protective agency” following the Jan. 6 attack.

Defense Secretary Loyd Austin recently approved the Capitol Police’s request for eight Persistent Surveillance Systems Ground – Medium (PSSG-M) units. The system provides high-definition surveillance video and is enabled with night vision. The system does not include facial recognition capabilities, according to the Pentagon.

Last week, Fox News host Tucker Carlson said in a bombshell broadcast that an NSA whistleblower had approached him with evidence that the National Security Agency has been spying on his communications, with the intent to leak his emails to the press and ‘take this show off the air.’

Today, Carlson told Fox Business’ Maria Bartiromo that the emails have in fact been leaked to journalists – at least one of whom has contacted him for what we presume is an upcoming article on their contents.

h/t Marvin