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Tag: Digital Surveillance

  • Here’s Everything You Need To Know About The NSA

    Even before the Snowden leaks of last year, the EFF had their suspicions in regards to what the NSA was up to. The group even tried to get the government to spill the beans a few times through lawsuits that never went anyway. As you can imagine, the Snowden leaks helped their cause greatly, and now they’re trying to educate the public on just how far the NSA goes.

    EFF Senior Staff Attorney Kurt Opsahl gave a talk at CCC late last year called “Through a PRISM, Darkly: Everything We Know About The NSA Spying.” The hour-long talk has just recently been uploaded to YouTube and it gives a brief overview of what the Snowden leaks have exposed in the months since the first leak regarding Verizon handing over Americans’ phone records.

    Here’s the full synopsis:

    From Stellar Wind to PRISM, Boundless Informant to EvilOlive, the NSA spying programs are shrouded in secrecy and rubber-stamped by secret opinions from a court that meets in a faraday cage. The Electronic Frontier Foundation’s Kurt Opsahl explains the known facts about how the programs operate and the laws and regulations the U.S. government asserts allows the NSA to spy on you.

    If you ever wanted to know what all the hubbub was about when it comes to the NSA, this is the video for you.

    Image via EFForg/YouTube

  • Video Surveillance Market Continues to Expand

    With the numerous disclosures from former NSA employee Edward Snowden that were released in 2013, a new light has been shined on a shadowy world of information gathering and government surveillance. While world governments scramble to appease their citizens and other government leaders, it seems that the security industry will simply keep running business as usual.

    Market research firm IHS today released a report showing that the video surveillance market is expected to increase by at least 12% in the coming year. The firm expects sales of video surveillance equipment to hit $15.9 billion, mostly on sales to national and local governments.

    “During the past decade the video surveillance equipment market has grown quickly, expanding at a double-digit rate in most years,” said Niall Jenkins, research manager for video surveillance and security services at IHS. “This year will be no exception, with growth led by strong demand for fixed-dome and 180/360-degree network camera products. As for vertical markets, the city surveillance and utility/energy sectors will drive the biggest increases in sales.”

    Other predictions for the video surveillance market found in the IHS report read like a list of the things government-overreach activists have been warning about for years. Police are expected to increasingly use crowd-sourced video surveillance data and companies are expected to collaborate more with police on the sharing of their own live video surveillance. IHS also believes that thermal imaging will catch on during 2014, with consumer thermal imaging products beginning to appear.