By Steve Huff 9/07/12 4:53pm

Privacy is Dead

Do you always feel like somebody's watching you? (Image via AnonNCarolina2, Twitter)

The FBI’s Billion-Dollar Facial Recognition Project Announced Just in Time For Worldwide Privacy Protests

The Federal Bureau of Investigation has begun implementing a $1 billion face recognition program that will probably scare everyone outside of law enforcement.  NewScientist reports that the Next Generation Identification (NGI) program will lump iris scans, biometrics, DNA and even voice prints into one formidable profiling tool and some states are already using the program in a limited fashion. The whole thing will be in effect across the country in about 2 years. NewScientist addresses the privacy problem: Read More

By Steve Huff 8/22/12 4:34pm

Occupy the Internet

Tartan Metrics (Screen grab)

Does Tartan Tie TrapWire to Surveillance of Occupy Wall Street?

Russian news outlet RT.com has been excitedly suggesting that the TrapWire surveillance system marks the advent of an American police state. Now RT is suggesting a fairly direct connection between the shady ex-CIA types behind TrapWire and something called Tartan Metrics.

Tartan certainly uses dense doublespeak to describe itself, stating on its site landing page that it “quantifies key influencers and hidden connections in social networks using mathematical algorithms” for “un-biased output.” RT doesn’t note that Tartan is so secretive those interested in its services can try them for free over the web, but maybe they have more important information to impart–Tartan expressly mentions using its software and services to analyze Occupy Wall Street and related movements: Read More

By Steve Huff 2/26/12 10:29pm

Big Leaks

Wikileaks's symbol for the Stratfor email leak

[UPDATED] Anonymous Teams With Wikileaks To Publish Confidential Stratfor Emails in ‘The Global Intelligence Files’

Wikileaks dropped a bomb on Texas-based “global intelligence company” Stratfor late Sunday with “The Global Intelligence Files,” a dump of over 5 million hacked emails containing confidential information about Stratfor’s informers, psych ops, pay-offs and the methods they use to make the payments. Anonymous has proudly taken credit for the hack via @YourAnonNews: Read More