We let technology into our lives. And now it’s starting to control us

“Our concern about government snooping sometimes distracts from self-awareness of our complicity as consumers of products so ubiquitous they have become everyday verbs.” Rachel Holmes is joining the resistance, because the so-called neutral platforms in reality facilitate hate against women, racism and homophobia.

www.theguardian.com

Complexity is the enemy of security: how to stay relevant in a hacked world

“And one way to fight back is through Open Source. To make sure that the systems we use are trustworthy and can be verified and can be veryfied by anybody [sic]. Relying on Open Source to bring us privacy and trustworthy security is a crucial point for our future on the Internet. The Utopia is gone, it’s not coming back. But we can do what we can to maintain as much trust on the Internet as possible. And openess is key to trust. Without openess there is no trust—without trust there is no democracy.”

Mikko Hypponen

Want people to behave better? Give them more privacy

“Team members had a kind of collective privacy—they were hidden from the constant scrutiny by management and other workers, even though within their shared workspace they were still visible to each other. The effect was to shrink the size of the surveillance audience and confine it to people the workers had a personal connection with. This kind of ‘privacy within team boundaries’ has been associated with better results in many workplaces, from Google to hospital emergency rooms.” David Berreby quotes research suggesting that workers often are more productive in an environment that does not monitor their every move.

www.psychologytoday.com

How surveillance stifles dissent on the Internet

“People who said they had ‘nothing to hide’ were in fact more likely to censor themselves.” Kaveh Waddell reports on resarch by Elizabeth Stoycheff that, given current practices of government and comercial entities around the world, rules out the Internet as a tool to promote democracy.

www.theatlantic.com

“This structure of surveillance will stop us doing things which are right, that we know we should be doing.”

Anthony Barnett speaking in October 2013

What we give away when we log on to a public Wi-Fi network

“Already 20 smartphones and laptops are ours. If he wanted to, Slotboom is now able to completely ruin the lives of the people connected.” Wouter Slotboom is one of the good guys, demonstrating to Maurits Martijn his effortless ability to retrieve people’s passwords, steal their identity, and plunder their bank accounts.

decorrespondent.nl

Why privacy matters


Playing this video requires sharing information with Google. Read the privacy policy

“He who does not move does not notice his chains.”

Glenn Greenwald

Mail-Dienste sehen alles

“Die elektronische Post kam mit kostenlosen Diensten in Mode. Für sie zahlen Kunden nicht in harter Währung, sondern akzeptieren Werbung und meist auch die Verwertung der aus ihren Daten gespeisten Kundenprofile.” Mittlerweile bekannt gewordene Abhörpraktiken der NSA rücken immer mehr auch Fragen nach der Sicherheit von E-Mails in den Vordergrund. Die Stiftung Warentest hat 14 Provider unter die Lupe genommen: Als Testsieger gehen Mailbox.org und Posteo hervor.

www.test.de

Edward Snowden: the untold story

“The question for us is not what new story will come out next. The question is, what are we going to do about it?” James Bamford interviews Edward Snowden, who regards the use of strong encryption in your everyday communication as a viable means to end mass surveillance.

www.wired.com

Also watch United States of Secrets, a two-part series detailing how the US government came to monitor and collect the communications of millions around the world.

Click to copy