Big Brother, Spyware, and You

It wasn't so very long ago that an enterprising computer boffin discovered that certain identifying data hadn't been stripped from a file in a Windows software update. The data identified a cryptographic key as being called _NSAKEY and with a name like that it was a given that people would worry about what it was actually there for and of course conspiracy theories abounded . Then a third key was discovered which surprised one of the Microsoft employees who had been directly involved in developing this section of code. None of this is very surprising as anyone who has used Windows for any period of time would have to realise that at Microsoft the left hand doesn't have any idea what the right hand is doing and possibly wonders at times if it is a double amputee. This is an interesting email exchange between a communication surveillance expert and the Microsoft Security Response Center which amply demonstrates Microsoft stonewalling on the issue.
Fast forward a few years and things are a lot more in your face. I suspect that the powers that be have woken up to the fact that they can get away with just about any obscenity and it isn't that people don't notice it's that they just don't care anymore. Maybe it's something in the water and not just in Britain either.
The latest attack on your privacy and civil rights is a piece of software brought to you by those friendly chaps at the FBI. It's a piece of spyware called Magic Lantern a keylogger that is part of the well documented Carnivore program. You might think that you will be OK because you use an antivirus program but you would be wrong. According to spokespeople at some of the major antivirus vendors they would purposefully not detect it.
Maybe it's about time you installed Linux on your system! I personally use and recommend Mandriva.

Magic Lantern is old news but is still dismissed by most as a silly conspiracy.

Tags: spyware, Computers and Internet, Security, Microsoft, Windows