http://www.globalresearch.ca/spying-on-americans-before-911-nsa-built-back-door-in-all-windows-software-by-1999/5338215

Was George Orwell's '1984' their training manual?

No country can claim its hands are clean.
And we would want answers if a terrorist act took place and we knew nothing about it.
I am against Americas actions against whistle blowers.
But not against the act.
We tend to demand protection but then ask for privacy, in this case I take the protection, content to believe that part of the world confronting us has no respect for either our safety or privacy.

What act Belly ? There was no Act of Congress that approved these actions. They are illegal and the US Govt is not being held accountable.

This means the NSA IS ABLE TO LOOK AT ANY BUSINESS,INDIVIDUAL OR ORGANISATION PRIVATE FILES and use that information against them. You won't see this info on mainstream media because it is controlled by these interest groups.

Govts with absolute power cannot protect us from terrorism. Note this was before 911.With absolute power,our Govts become the terrorists.

What the USA, England, Australia etc are doing is the same as if any Government security officer could enter your house anytime they like and go through all your personnel belongings to see if they can prosecute you for something they find.

Also keep a record of what they find so if something you have is deemed illegal in the future they can say you had one.

There claim to not spying on Australian and American citizens has to be one of the biggest blatant lies of the year.

If you don't believe me put a few words in an email like kill, bomb, plans, president etc (make it sound convincing) and see how long before the federal police turn up at your house on the behest of the American Secret Service.

It surprises me a little that it has taken you so long to "uncover" this one Arjay. It has been common knowledge in the IT industry for many years, and has never been convincingly denied. The same applied to every piece or US software that featured communications in any way, incidentally. The software companies were not allowed to sell their products without government approval, for a start. And the sale outside the US of many programs was frequently forbidden, to prevent the code being apprpriated by unfriendly governments.

And don't for a moment imagine that they have not implemented similar surveillance into Facebook, Twitter etc. They consider them to be essential tools in their constant battle to protect their citizens from harm.

Whether you feel this to be excessive, tolerable, or even inadequate, is an entirely personal view, like the individual's take on death penalty or abortion. Or speed limits. There isn't really a "right" answer - or at least, one that will satisfy everyone.

My own view, for what it is worth, is predominantly one of sadness, in that there is an increasingly onerous price to be paid - with our privacy and freedoms - even for the most basic protections in our technologically-overloaded world.

However, I also take the fairly sanguine position that there is so much information flowing around the system, any surveillance must of necessity be driven by the most abstract of meta-algorithms. If I am right, Philip S' suggestion will not drive the plod to your door, until such time as the behaviour becomes part of a pattern, and includes a number of associated actions or activities.

Fortunately, I am insufficiently paranoid to let all this worry me too much.

If it helps, Arjay and Philip S, here's a reminder of the challenge these people face.

http://techcrunch.com/2010/08/04/schmidt-data/

"we create as much information in two days now as we did from the dawn of man through 2003".

That was in 2010, when we were producing over 2 exabytes of data every day. Today, Twitter users create close to half a billion tweets per day, and Facebook addicts post three-quarters of a million pieces of content... every minute.

>> the NSA IS ABLE TO LOOK AT ANY BUSINESS,INDIVIDUAL OR ORGANISATION PRIVATE FILES and use that information against them.<<

Only if they can find it amongst all the noise.

On reflection, Big Brother had it easy, compared to this lot.