We all like to have our secrets and keep them private. We don’t share them with anyone, maybe just with the people we feel closed to. It makes us feel safe and protected.
Just imagine that right now, you’re telling someone something that is confidential, but you are not the only people that know that. There are tens or hundreds of other persons that now are potentially listening to you. What would you do if all of your secrets would be exposed to the whole world?
After the 9/11 terrorist attacks, President Bush allowed the National Security Agency (NSA) to do some interrogation within the United States the way they wanted, without any intercession by any government official. This concession of permission was against the very constitution of the nation, but it was imperative to take this step. President Bush was part of the “Terrorist Surveillance Program”, in which the NSA monitored the interactions of approximately 500-1000 people inside the US, who were suspected of having connections to Al Qaeda – the group who conducted the attacks. The NSA did all these things without requiring warrants.
There are a lot of things that are happening that were not directly aimed towards potential targets, but it is thought that 10 millions of American citizens who have never been suspected of crime were being monitored.
If you are curious about the fact that the NSA might know all of your secrets, keep on reading to find out how are they spying on you.
1.The NSA collected information about suspects
There are a few steps that the NSA respects and we are going through out them accordingly:
- degree one: The NSA took into account the suspect’s phone records. In addition to that, they were also tracking the phone records of those who had been called by the suspects.
- degree two: held the selection of those which calls were questionable.
- degree three: checked who the suspects had called. In order to do that, the NSA needed the approval of major telecommunication companies, such as AT&T, Sprint and MCI. These companies were convinced by the United States of America government to forward their client’s call-records information. This gave the NSA access to the client’s name, work address, home address etc. Also, after that, the government received details about further calls that were made by these clients.
2. The NSA asked companies to give the information they had
The NSA created a spying program for the information that was available online, called PRISM, which was revealed by Edward Snowden, a former NSA contractor.
This program is actually an enormous interface for all the information that has been previously collected. The NSA can gather information through online services as well, such as social media.
PRISM is in fact a government code name for SIGAD US-984XN. This is a data collection effort which congregates stored information through companies like Google and Apple.
It is believed that PRISM is the first source of pure raw intelligence that the NSA used for their analytic reports. In addition to that, it makes up for 91% of the Internet traffic acquire that belongs to the NSA.
3. The NSA gathered information through Google Cloud
The NSA got into the communication links that were between Google’s information centers and let them fulfill large amounts of information. This wasn’t within the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court jurisdiction, but due to the pressure made by authorities, Google provided NSA the information inquired.
The NSA screened some of the electronic mails that belonged to the suspects. This helped provide the NSA with the information of any electronic mails exchanged which were suspicious or mistrustful.
Also, the NSA continued to track the phones of the suspects for confirming their theories, even after the temporary relief that was given to the doubtful persons.
4. Tracking surveillance data
The NSA gathered statistical intelligence from many countries all around the globe with the help of the mapping tool “Boundless Informant”. This system was organizing information by geography. The mapping tool is color coded, which means that the more a country is under surveillance, the less green and the more red you see. For example, the United States of America has the color code orange.
That’s some pretty hard to digest information we have here. I don’t know about you, but now I’m wondering if I’m a suspect for the NSA. Leave in the comments down below what are your opinion about the NSA spying on American citizens and let’s get the conversation going.
What do you thing? Is the NSA spying on people or it’s just another conspiracy theory that goes around the Internet?
Happy spying day!
