Voice of the masses: GCHQ is upset. Does this mean we’re winning back our privacy?
Robert Hanning, the boss of Government Communications Head Quarters (GCHQ, the UK government agency tasked with spying on the internet) is upset. Apparently it’s becoming hard for him to spy on huge swathes of the internet because technology companies aren’t as willing to hand over data, and:
“Techniques for encrypting messages or making them anonymous, which were once the preserve of the most sophisticated criminals or nation states, now come as standard. These are supplemented by freely available programs and apps adding extra layers of security, many of them proudly advertising that they are ‘Snowden approved'”
Our question this fortnight is: If the head of GCHQ is upset, does this mean we’re winning back our privacy? Is this a genuine plea for us to give up our digital rights, or is it just crocodile tears from someone who can still trace every click we make and message we send?
Let us know your thoughts in the comments below and we’ll read them out in our upcoming podcast.
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About The Author
Ben Everard
Ben Everard is the co-author of Learning Python with the Raspberry Pi and hacks hardware projects held together with a big dollop of Linux and Free Software glue. He's @ben_everard on Twitter.
I have a severly hard time to get excited about utterances like this: intelligence agencies aren’t really in the habit of telling people about crypto they can crack frankly. I don’t think it would get them any more funding, for one thing.
And it seems that this, and the supposedly much better crypto in ios8 and Android L, is some nice advertising for companies whose reputation has been damaged – among the relatively few who care about their privacy. [the cynicism in the last bit stems to some degree from trying to organise a Cryptoparty-series at my Uni-hall]
and finally, I guess everytime someone at these agencies mentions crypto (or open source) technology and terrorists in the same breath, they get a raise.
I don’t think we can really tell from any public announcements by the security services. They are most unlikely to be unguarded off-the-cuff comments. Clearly the internet world in general is tightening up security and not just from Snowdon’s revelations. Firesheep shook the on-line world into the need for https connections. Apple has made an amazing job of the security of the new iPhones etc.
Sure these developments have made it more difficult for the security services and been an education for the less sophisticated criminal as long as they move away from POP3 email! Thats assuming there isn’t a convenient backdoor in eliptic curve crypto of course!
So independently of any official pronouncements my belief is yes it is more tough for them now and we need to remain aware of gagging orders on the on-line security providers who could be forced to install even more back doors and not mention them – as Steve Gibson of grc.com always says, “trust no-one” security is the best.
This is just subterfuge in order to make us think it is safe once again to use the systems we once trusted before Snowden blew a massive hole in them, I have no doubt mass surveillance will continue as it did before, and that the best way for them to cover up is to pretend that the software companies really care about our data and that the government agencies have no way of accessing it… 😉
If you want to, you can get a lot of your privacy back. The problem is that it is just not *cool*, it seems, to care about your privacy these days. Whenever you start talking about privacy issues concerning the internet at a party, people will roll their eyes and make remarks like “You are just not ready for teh internetz”. To be honest, I did not know about the ‘tor’ service provided by Facebook either, nor did I bother to fill in a fake e-mail address at this very comment form.
As long as we are willingly putting our personal information on public websites, privacy will be an issue. But then again, people just don’t seem to care that much. Perhaps in the future that will be different?
I’m not sure if we’re winning back our privacy, but I’d love it if you could interview him for the mag or podcast.
This would be fantastic to read. Would love to know what he’s thinking about ‘normal’ people have secrecy/privacy and why/how he could be against it.
As long as Facebook, Google, and other corporations make using a internet an exercise in being naked in public, we internet privacy is a nothing.
It beats me why persons complain and this or that government agency, then voluntarily run naked through Facebook.
Then there’s this: http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/technology/verizon-atandt-tracking-their-users-with-super-cookies/2014/11/03/7bbbf382-6395-11e4-bb14-4cfea1e742d5_story.html
By the by, the light gray on white I’m seeing in the comment dialog makes editing a comment difficult.
I don’t thing that will happen that quickly.
However I personally learned a lot from the Snowden reports.
I’m working on moving away from the US tech companies.
I’m working together with my brother to build our own “cloud”.
Currently we have our own email server (rented because it’s to complicated) and a VPS on which we set up various services to replace the various cloud services we use.
-We currently sync our contact and calendar with Owncloud.
-For files we plan to use Seafile because Ownclouds performance is very bad in this regard.
-For webmail we use Rainloop
-For RSS, Tiny Tiny RSS which turned out to be much faster than feedly which we used before.
-Currently we’re looking into note taking apps but there’s a bit of a lack in this section. turtl.it
seems to be the most promising.
-Something which I tried but I haven’t really achieved yet is OpenVPN. For some reason I’m unable to route all internet traffic trough it.
– In addition we we run a tor non-exit relay.
Yes it costs something ca. 260 Dollars per year (we use only swiss servers)and yes it requires work.
However I learn a ton in the progress and it let’s us feel a bit better about our data.
No idea if it works but it’s a fun project.
I can only say what nanu said: he’s trying to make us think we’re winning, but we’re not. Typical political statement. Be careful and don’t let his statement lull you into thinking you’re safe now.
We give up our privacy when we draw back or curtains, when we walk out the door, and of course when we decide that our lives and communications may be bounced of a hundred computers before reaching a “private” target. It is like passing a note in a classroom to your secret crush, hoping your teacher won’t spot you, or your trusted mates passing the message on won’t peek at the note. The public should be aware just as spies should be spies. The fact that so many people liberally distribute the minutiae of their lives over social media shows that really privacy is not valued as much as one might think.
The boss of GCHQ moaning about this is like the gambler at Las Vegas moaning that his little device for cheating cards has been discovered.
Does anyone remember when the UK Government wanted to pass those snooping laws? William Hauge (greatest living Yorkshireman my arse – and I’m not even from yorkshire) said “If you have nothing to hide then you have nothing to fear”. What?!?
All this means we’re not winning back our privacy. If we continue to give up our information for free, we have no right to protect it. And really, if GCHQ really want to spy on us they will. We’re just making it harder for them.
The problem is not that they intercept everything, there are legitimate cases where this is appropriate. The problem is that there has been no debate on when and where that access should be allowed, on what programs they are allowed to have, and any oversight of their activities.
Teresa May keeps going on about how there is strict procedure and oversight, but this is all secret. It must be public. I am sure that their oversight was just as effective as the Stasi.
The bogus excuses of terrorism and child pornography are trotted out every time as reasons, but when pressed they cannot provide examples where this information helped to convict anyone.
We in Europe having people who lived through the cold war, and even the Irish Troubles know that terrorism is defeated though dialogue, and the fair application of the law.
I think you underestimate the islamist threat in Europe as well as the scope of ongoing military operations of European forces against terrorist targets. There’s the war in Afghanistan, the actions in Libya, and the operations against IS/ISIL/Da’ash just to name a few recent examples with Britih forces involved. Dialog will take place when the field is leveled and with those who will be ready to talk.
I totally agree with the the other points in your post, thought. Intelligence has adopted a sort of wiliness that is unworthy of a democracy and is sometimes damaging to the cause it should serve.
As soon as you bring in the terrorist word, you fall into a trap. As if this is something special or different from a crime. It is just an ordinary crime, and we should deal with that through normal police process. We in the UK have first hand experience of this in dealing with the IRA, all the special measures to beat the IRA were totally ineffective. The only one that worked was normal police procedures of treating these events as crimes and catching the criminals, as well as rectifying the political problems that fulled the cause with dialogue.
There is plenty of evidence that the attacks on the world trade center were not missed because lack of evidence, but if anything because of too much information and the crucial points missed in the flood. What hope do we have for the spotting the next one.
The real problem is that we the people have had no say in this massive invasion of our privacy, or even a reasonable democratic discussion of what is being done in our name.
Nebucatnetzer’s post just goes to show how complicated and time consuming (albeit fun and interesting for us freedom loving Linux types) it is to achieve some sort of internet privacy. It seems like a never ending cycle of measures and counter measures between individuals and the authorities wishing to eavesdrop.
I’m not saying at all that we should give up our right to privacy, but there is another view. The advertising guru Cindy Gallup (I don’t know if her profession is significant) argues that, “if as businesses and individuals we define what we stand for and stay true to it, we could embrace a world of zero privacy”.
She gave a talk about her views on the BBC Radio 4 series, Four Thought, and it’s still available to listen to at http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b015cnyv
She talks well and makes a good argument – it’s well worth a listen – and it would be interesting to read what others on this page think.
Heads of Gonernment departments will always try and increase the size of their department , & therefore ultimately their own wage & pension . The head of GCHQ is no exception to this . By playing the security card , he can justify almost any level of snooping , including collecting our bank account passwords if possible . The activities of newspapers become insignificant by comparison . Perhaps the spying on citizens by goverment , police , & councils , would be a good election platform for one of the minor political parties .
I’m going to go with “no Scott”. I think we’re still pretty boned. You should still take steps to protect yourself in order to make it as difficult as possible for them to violate your privacy and guard against the script kiddies and mafias of the world, but for the most part I think if GCHQ or the NSA want your data they can get it. If this isn’t an outright trick to give us false comfort on their own behalf then it’s on the behalf of the tech industry. Apple can role out their default encryption but still leave in a few back doors on their cloud, then the NSA and GCHQ can throw them a bone and wine about it in public, and now they save face with their customers but nothing really changes.
Yes, As we start protecting yourself, the government spying organisation start making up lame excuses the people of a country will see the agency’s as pointless and will want them shut down, and seriously how easy is it to spot tons of explosives in boot of a car and how many terrorist have gchq caught.