Brazil’s Federal Supreme Court (STF) has turned to contractors to keep an eye on social media and smoke out main critics – including by identifying them, and their location.

Other judicial institutions that are said to have contracts of a similar nature are the Superior Court of Justice, the Superior Labor Court, the Superior Electoral Court, and the National Council of Justice.

Reports out of Brazil about the contracting of outside entities to perform online surveillance is based on a public call for bids (the closing date was June 14), where STF looked to hire a company that will monitor, in real-time, what’s referred to as “the digital presence of the Federal Supreme Court” on social media.

The contractor will also have to provide alerts via instant messages, daily, weekly, and monthly – both quantitative and qualitative – analytical reports, as well as “occasional bulletins and preparation of a monthly action plan strategy for acting on social networks.”

This is yet another move by the country’s judiciary branch (the Superior Electoral Court’s activities offer more examples) that tests the boundaries of its powers. And, it’s a move that is explained as the need to protect democracy from “disinformation.”

But it didn’t stop there, as the Supreme Court’s lengthy investigations would at times cover not only “fake” but also real news – the kind that, in one example, exposed a former justice as having links with a company accused of corruption.

Contractors will now not only carry out “continuous monitoring” of social platforms (in search for “main detractors”), but also propose to the Court how it may “improve communication” with citizens.

In the past, Supreme Court justices and even a prosecutor general launched legal battles against people because of their online speech, but when these officials were allied with former President Balsonaro…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

EU’s Mass Surveillance Faces Fierce Resistance

June 21, 2024

EU’s Mass Surveillance Faces Fierce Resistance

If you’re tired of censorship and surveillance, subscribe to Reclaim The Net.

The European Union (EU) has managed to unite politicians, app makers, privacy advocates, and whistleblowers in opposition to the bloc’s proposed encryption-breaking new rules, known as “chat control” (officially, CSAM (child sexual abuse material) Regulation).

Thursday was slated as the day for member countries’ governments, via their EU Council ambassadors, to vote on the bill that mandates automated searches of private communications on the part of platforms, and “forced opt-ins” from users.

However, reports on Thursday afternoon quoted unnamed EU officials as saying that “the required qualified majority would just not be met” – and that the vote was therefore canceled.

This comes after several countries, including Germany, signaled they would either oppose or abstain during the vote. The gist of the opposition to the bill long in the making is that it seeks to undermine end-to-end encryption to allow the EU to carry out indiscriminate mass surveillance of all users.

The justification here is that such drastic new measures are necessary to detect and remove CSAM from the internet – but this argument is rejected by opponents as a smokescreen for finally breaking encryption, and exposing citizens in the EU to unprecedented surveillance while stripping them of the vital technology guaranteeing online safety.

Some squarely security and privacy-focused apps like Signal and Threema said ahead of the vote that was expected today they would withdraw from the EU market if they had to include client-side scanning, i.e., automated monitoring.

WhatsApp hasn’t gone quite so far (yet) but Will Cathcart, who heads the app over at Meta, didn’t mince his words in a post on X when he wrote that what the EU is proposing – breaks encryption.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

EU Plans Major Expansion of Mass Surveillance, MEP Claims

June 9, 2024

EU Plans Major Expansion of Mass Surveillance, MEP Claims

If you’re tired of censorship and surveillance, subscribe to Reclaim The Net.

The European Union (EU) is planning to implement a new set of draconian mass surveillance rules shortly after Sunday’s EU Parliament election, a member of the EP has warned after the plans surfaced on the internet.

The conclusion that radical surveillance measures are in the works proceeds from documents detailing the meetings of working groups, dubbed “high level group(s) on access to data for effective law enforcement.”

The documents originate from the EU Commission, and contain a number of recommendations, including reintroducing indiscriminate retention of communications data in the bloc, creation of encryption backdoors, as well as forcing hardware manufacturers to give access to anything from phones to cars to law enforcement through what is known as “access by design.”

MEP Patrick Breyer announced that the plan contains 42 points produced by the EU Commission and governments of member-countries. The purpose of being able to access phones, IoT (such as “smart home”) devices, and cars is to make sure they can be monitored around the clock.

Meanwhile, the return of controversial data retention is planned despite a previous ruling of the EU Court of Justice, and could even be extended to include over-the-top services such as messengers (this is defined as retaining IP information data “at the very least”). That, Breyer explains, means that all internet activities will become trackable.

A favorite target of authorities actively undermining their image as democracies has for a while been end-to-end encryption. Here, the EU intends to ban secure encryption of metadata and subscriber data, as well as force messaging services who implement encryption to allow interception.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Creeping Fascism, Part 1: Just The Beginning

May 22, 2024

Creeping Fascism, Part 1: Just The Beginning

“Way crueler than any dictatorship”

I keep a “creeping fascism” file with the intention of tracking governments’ erosion of their citizens’ rights and freedoms. But the file is filling up so fast that the first few articles in this series will have to be “data-dump” cut-and-past jobs rather than in-depth analyses of any specific depredation. So here goes:

JK Rowling Could Be Imprisoned For “Misgendering” Trans People Under New Law

(Modernity) – Author JK Rowling could be prosecuted for “misgendering” trans people under Scotland’s new hate crime law that comes into force today, an SNP minister has admitted.

A person could now be imprisoned for up to seven years if they engage in “insulting” behaviour towards ‘protected’ groups, and the prosecution only needs to prove that the hatred was “likely” rather than “intended”.

Siobhian Brown, the SNP’s community safety minister, stated that calling a “trans woman” (a man) “he” “could be reported and it could be investigated. Whether or not the police would think it was criminal is up to Police Scotland for that.”

During their training program on enforcing the new law, police officers were taught that even the content of plays and comedy gigs should be considered as potential hate crimes.

Rowling has vowed to continue calling biological males men and says she will now be targeted for telling the truth.

Blame Canada? Justin Trudeau Creates Blueprint for Dystopia in Horrific Speech Bill

(Racket) – Life sentences for speech? Pre-crime detention? Ex post facto law? Anonymous accusers? It’s all in Justin Trudeau’s “Online Harms Bill,” a true “threat to democracy”

On February 21st, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau gave a press conference in Edmonton, announcing his government’s decision to introduce the Online Harms Act, or Bill C-63…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The surveillance state will be a power hog

May 21, 2024

The surveillance state will be a power hog

The amount of power required for the data centers that underpin the control grid and AI is overwhelming.

From a recent Wall Street Journal article:

U.S. power usage is projected to expand by 4.7% over the next five years, according to a review of federal fillings by the consulting firm Grid Strategies. That is up from a previous estimate of 2.6%.

The projections come after efficiency gains kept electricity demand roughly flat over the past 15 years, allowing the power sector to limit emissions in large part through coal-plant closures.

“We haven’t seen this in a generation,” said Arne Olson, a senior partner at consulting firm Energy and Environmental Economics. “As an industry, we’ve almost forgotten how to deal with load growth of this magnitude.”

Just over 60 percent of China’s power grid is fueled by coal, according to the International Energy Agency. How else could you transform a country as big and as vast from backwater to tech leader in about 30 years?

source: https://www.iea.org/countries/china

But, while China has used every available source of energy in its arsenal, the West has been hell bent on destroying traditional energy generation for use by our remnant industrial base by focusing on wind and solar, which is nowhere near stable enough to maintain baseload for the kinds of important manufacturing activities needed in a modern economy — whether making steel, or appliances, or cars. Instead, we basically handed over our industrial and economic infrastructure to China, seduced by the lax environmental rules, cheap labor and promise of vast profits for shareholders.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Belgium and Hungary Launch Controversial Digital IDs, Vaccine Passport, Ahead of EU Regulations

May 18, 2024

Belgium and Hungary Launch Controversial Digital IDs, Vaccine Passport, Ahead of EU Regulations

If you’re tired of censorship and surveillance, join Reclaim The Net.

Belgium and Hungary are leading the way in launching digital ID wallets ahead of EU’s eIDAS (“electronic identification and trust services”) 2.0 regulation and EUDI Wallet coming into force later this month.

In Belgium, the MyGov.be app, covering all of the country’s federal public services, was launched on Tuesday, with the government promoting the digital identity as “simplifying” the use of its services, and “making life easier.”

In other words, the authorities there are playing the convenience card – while downplaying the risks that come with this type of centralization of people’s identities.

The wallet, via “eBox” mailbox, gives access to government-issued documents, as well as 683 services, identity data, Covid vaccination records, and more.

However, the success of the scheme is by no means guaranteed – on the one hand it is not mandatory, so people are free to decide not to use it.

Judging by an opinion poll Deloitte carried out last year, “71 percent of Belgians do not want a digital ID on their phone,” reports say, adding that the same survey showed that 79 percent “do not want a mobile driver’s license, while half refuse to fully digitize their IDs.”

“Ease of use” is also how digital ID is pushed in Hungary, where the appropriate app will be made available for download as soon as this week, while the service will be fully operational from September.

Enthusiastic reports about this development describe the digital ID program as “innovative,” “handy” and “saving costs.”

At the same time, putting all of a person’s data in one place and storing it in the cloud is advertised as something positive, instead of what opponents consider as scary – from the security standpoint alone.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Controversial FAA Bill Passes Senate, Promotes Digital IDs and Mobile Licenses, Facial Recognition Concerns Ignored

May 18, 2024

Controversial FAA Bill Passes Senate, Promotes Digital IDs and Mobile Licenses, Facial Recognition Concerns Ignored

The US Senate has passed the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) reauthorization act, which enjoyed bipartisan support, with an overwhelming majority (88-4).

The legislation includes a push to introduce digital ID and digital or mobile driver’s licenses, and will be considered by the House this week – the final hurdle before, if approved, it gets signed by President Biden.

The section dealing with acceptance of digital IDs and driver’s licenses is buried and we found it on page 1,015 of the document.

We obtained a copy of the bill for you here.

It reads that the FAA administrator “shall take such actions as may be necessary to accept, in any instance where an individual is required to submit government-issued identification to the Administrator, a digital or mobile driver’s license or identification card issued to such individual by a state.”

While adopting the bill, the Senate left out an amendment drafted by Senator Jeff Merkley, meant to temporarily halt wider deployment of facial recognition tools at US airports.

The Democrat’s idea was to impose a moratorium on biometric surveillance proliferation by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) at least over the next three years.

The reasoning behind the amendment was that the current usage of facial recognition technology lacks transparency and results in travelers being poorly, if at all, aware of their rights in this regard.

The Senate chose to ignore the amendment, which wasn’t even put up for a vote, despite it making what appears to be a reasonable demand to ensure people can make informed decisions about participation in the schemes – namely, provide “simple and clear signage, spoken announcements, or other accessible notifications” about the ability to opt-out.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

The Warrantless Surveillance Bill Renewal Is Even Broader Than Many Noticed

May 16, 2024

The Warrantless Surveillance Bill Renewal Is Even Broader Than Many Noticed

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA, amended in 2008), as a whole and its Section 702 in particular have been a “gift that keeps on giving” where all manner of controversies are concerned.

In late April, it was time to once again reauthorize this legislation whose privacy safeguards have been routinely bypassed by law enforcement for years, and this did happen, with persistent major points of contention being warrantless access to data belonging to Americans (and respect for their constitutional rights).

The issue this time surfaced in a provision that changed the definition of electronic communications service providers (ECSPs) – in terms of which companies fall under this category, that is, which providers are obligated to give the government access to communications.

As things stand, more US businesses than ever would have to provide access to phones, Wi-Fi routers, and other equipment.

This in April launched a debate in the Senate around the scope of surveillance authorities – opponents were saying it significantly expanded them – yet in the end, they failed to stop the reauthorization (“Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act”).

The question was left open with a “pledge” that it would be revisited down the line, and now reports say that Congress is working to “fix” the problem through the Senate Intelligence Committee’s annual intelligence authorization bill.

The promise was originally made by Senator Mark Warner, who heads the committee when he assumed a major role last month in making sure the reauthorization bill passed without incorporating changes to the controversial provision.

The Democrat was now speaking at the RSA security conference when he repeated that promise, saying that work is being done toward fulfilling it, and adding that he is “absolutely committed to getting that fixed.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

A True Bipartisan Scandal

May 5, 2024

A True Bipartisan Scandal

How out of control is our surveillance state? Read about a dubious investigation that swept up communications of some of the country’s most senior highest officials, and their families, in secret

Last October, current and former congressional staffers from both parties began receiving curious notices. They came from Google, which obeyed years of gag orders before finally informing House and Senate aides, legal advisors, even members of Congress themselves that their Gmail messages and Google phone records had been turned over to the Justice Department as part of a leak investigation.

Former Senate Judiciary Committee Chief Investigative Counsel Jason Foster, now at Empower Oversight, received a notice on October 19th last year, telling him the Justice Department obtained records for his Gmail account as well as “two Google Voice telephone numbers connected to his family’s telephones and his official work phone” back in 2017. At that time, he was coordinating with confidential sources and whistleblowers for the Judiciary Committee. A number of senior Congressional staffers from both parties with access to sensitive information were similarly targeted.

What’s the rub? Agencies like the Department of Justice get more latitude to demand, say, records of contacts between individuals than they do the contents of emails or phone calls. However, when dealing with things like the identities of whistleblowers, confidential sources, or journalists, the contacts are the content. Prosecutors didn’t tell Google this crucial context, that it was seeking records of its own congressional overseers. In an effort to find out if the state was similarly cavalier in what it told the court, Foster filed a motion yesterday to unseal the DOJ’s filings in the case. It described the bipartisan nature of the problem:

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Australian Authorities Push for Encryption Backdoors After Internet Censorship Attempt

May 2, 2024

Australian Authorities Push for Encryption Backdoors After Internet Censorship Attempt

Australia ramps up calls for “accountable encryption,” pushing tech giants toward compliance with controversial backdoor legislation.

In a relentless bid to give some of the most authoritarian regimes in the world a run for their money where internet censorship is concerned, Australia’s government continues to come up with one dubious initiative after another.

Recently, there was an attempt to censor content globally (related to two stabbing attacks in Australia), and shortly after, the country’s intelligence chief Mike Burgess, and Federal Police Commissioner Reece Kershaw addressed the National Press Club, to launch yet another attack on encryption by urging compliance with encryption backdoors legislation.

Burgess chose to call this – “accountable encryption.”

It isn’t “accountable” right now because, while Australia has passed laws to essentially break encryption, those who are supposed to implement them, technology companies, are not cooperating.

“I am asking the tech companies to do more. I’m asking them to give effect to the existing powers and to uphold existing laws. Without their help in very limited and strictly controlled circumstances, encryption is unaccountable,” he said.

Burgess was careful to nestle his encryption backdoors plea among seemingly reasonable arguments, such as that encryption provides privacy and is “clearly a good thing” that “enables” transactions (he for some reason chose not to stress that it is in fact necessary for secure transactions).

But, the Australian spy chief went on, encryption also “creates safe spaces for violent extremists to operate, network and recruit.”

And it is their encrypted messages – and only theirs, governments around the world promise faithfully – that the authorities, as “good actors,” would like to be able to access communications at will.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Banking on Surveillance: Republicans Investigate Major Banks’ Warrantless Data Sharing with Federal Agencies

April 30, 2024

Banking on Surveillance: Republicans Investigate Major Banks’ Warrantless Data Sharing with Federal Agencies

Congressional inquiry into banks’ role in warrantless data surveillance following January 6 raises alarm over potential civil liberties violations and improper government collaboration.

Congressional Republicans are further investigating claims that at least 13 major US banks collaborated with federal agencies to monitor private transactions for signs of “extremism” following the January 6 Capitol events. The House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of the Federal Government, led by Republican Jim Jordan from Ohio, is delving further into the alleged cooperation between these financial institutions and federal agencies without proper warrants.

These banks, including Bank of America, Chase, US Bank, Wells Fargo, Citi Bank, and more, are among those scrutinized for their roles in the reported surveillance. We previously reported about how Bank of America was found to be handing over data of everyone in the area during the events of January 6, whether they were suspect or not – and whether they had a warrant or not. But now, investigations suggest that the transfer of data was more systematic, potentially involving multiple financial institutions and the Biden administration itself.

Read an example of the letter sent to a bank here.

Already-uncovered information suggests that the Biden administration worked with banks to identify potential “extremism” by monitoring certain purchases such as religious texts like the Bible, or by flagging searches that included terms like “MAGA” and “TRUMP.”

According to the House Judiciary Committee, the probe has now expanded to include additional financial firms: Charles Schwab, HSBC, MUFG, PayPal, Santander, Standard Chartered, and Western Union. Letters sent to these institutions by the committee request documentation and communications with FinCEN (Financial Crimes Enforcement Network) and the FBI to further investigate potential warrantless surveillance.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Wave Goodbye to Another Set of Freedoms With the New Digital ID

April 24, 2024

Wave Goodbye to Another Set of Freedoms With the New Digital ID

In the 1980s, Australians fought hard against a similar national ID program, what has changed since then?

Commentary

“Papers please” used to be the ostinato of totalitarian systems, at least in the movies.

With the passing of the government’s Digital ID bills, Australians will have to become used to the digital equivalent—so what does that say about present-day Australia?

A few things have surprised me over the last few years, not the least the way the famous Aussie spirit of insubordination has been subsumed into a goody-two-shoes compliance with whatever capricious orders the authorities made.

I can’t imagine our forebears accepting lockdowns and forced vaccinations, and I certainly couldn’t see them accepting an identity card linking not just government accounts but private sector ones as well.

While the first proposition is an assertion based on a gut feeling, the second is very much based on fact.Remember the Australia Card?

In 1984, the Hawke Labor government introduced the Australia Card, and for the next three years, the government and opposition parties tussled over it to the extent that it triggered a double-dissolution election in 1987.

Objections didn’t just come from the federal Opposition either.

Queensland Labor Senator George Georges resigned from the governing party in 1986 over the issue, and in the lower house, Labor backbencher Lewis Kent said:

“Nothing can be more un-Australian than the need to provide one’s identity on the call of an official, be it a policeman or a bureaucrat. It would be more appropriate for the proposed card to be called a Hitlercard or Stalin-card.”

As a result, while the government won the 1987 election, and had the numbers to push the card through, instead, it withdrew the card when a technicality was found that could have affected its operation. One senses this was a relief.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Down with Big Brother: Warrantless Surveillance Makes a Mockery of the Constitution

April 21, 2024

Down with Big Brother: Warrantless Surveillance Makes a Mockery of the Constitution

“Whether he wrote DOWN WITH BIG BROTHER, or whether he refrained from writing it, made no difference … The Thought Police would get him just the same … the arrests invariably happened at night … In the vast majority of cases there was no trial, no report of the arrest. People simply disappeared, always during the night. Your name was removed from the registers, every record of everything you had ever done was wiped out, your one-time existence was denied and then forgotten. You were abolished, annihilated: vaporized was the usual word.”—George Orwell, 1984

The government long ago sold us out to the highest bidder.

The highest bidder, by the way, has always been the Deep State.

What’s playing out now with the highly politicized tug-of-war over whether Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act gets reauthorized by Congress doesn’t just sell us out, it makes us slaves of the Deep State.

Read the fine print: it’s a doozy.

Just as the USA Patriot was perverted from its stated intent to fight terrorism abroad and was instead used to covertly crack down on the American people (allowing government agencies to secretly track Americans’ financial activities, monitor their communications, and carry out wide-ranging surveillance on them), Section 702 has been used as an end-run around the Constitution to allow the government to collect the actual content of your conversations (phone calls, text messages, video chats, emails and other electronic communication) without a warrant.

Now intelligence officials are pushing to dramatically expand the government’s spying powers, effectively giving the government unbridled authority to force millions of Americans to spy on its behalf.

Basically, the Deep State wants to turn the American people into extensions of Big Brother.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Oh, The Irony: Congress Passes FISA-702 Extension, Allowing Warrantless Document Searches & Electronic Surveillance Of Americans, On Patriots Day 2024

April 21, 2024

Oh, The Irony: Congress Passes FISA-702 Extension, Allowing Warrantless Document Searches & Electronic Surveillance Of Americans, On Patriots Day 2024

Authored by ‘Sundance’ via TheConservativeTreehouse.com,

The fourth amendment to the United States constitution says:

“The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized.”

Late last night, early this morning (after midnight), the United States Senate passed a FISA reauthorization bill that directly and specifically violates every tenant of the 4th amendment.

The senate voted to authorize warrantless federal government searches of every American’s private papers, effects, emails, electronic data records, cell phone calls, contact lists, text messages, buying habits, purchases, banking records, social media posts, direct messages, private communications and every keystroke of every electronic device in your life.

All of it continues to be subject to the capture, review and surveillance of an unelected opaque law enforcement mechanism, and congress supports it.

The issue is magnified because the Supreme Court has never ruled on the constitutionality of the FISA-702 data collection system, because the Supreme Court also says no American has standing to challenge the federal government violation of their 4th Amendment right to privacy. It’s all infuriating… It’s all FUBAR!

Oh, and if you are reading this… you’re likely on the list.

Last night Senator Dick Durbin (D-IL) teamed up with Sen. Kevin Cramer (R-ND) and added an amendment that would have required the government to get a warrant before reviewing any communications incidentally collected from Americans.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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