A survey was done asking people if they would be willing to pack up the evidence of their life: all their credit cards, mailing lists, passwords, bank accounts, receipts, and transcripts of all their communications in box, then choose a stranger (or even a friend) to leave it with "for safe keeping". No surprise, no one chose that option. When asked why, the common answer was:
"I don't trust them".
Yet that is exactly what's now happening with the NSA, Prism, etc. with one exception: we don't get the choice and we don't even know who has our box.
I won't get political here, but...
Here's some ways you can protect your privacy if you choose, per a program on National Public Radio:
1. Search Engine: Duck Duck Go or Startpage.
DDG: "Not only is DuckDuckGo built on open source software, but it also doesn't track users: no personal information is collected, shared, or used to customize individual users' search results. So, anyone searching on a particular term in DuckDuckGo will get the same results."
Ever notice how Google anticipates your search and tailors it to you? You'll be shocked at how much more unbiased info you'll get with DDG, not to mention many special links and expansion of search it provides.
Startpage: Like DDG, no info on you is saved, all is encrypted, and it's located in the Netherlands, free of NSA/US orders and influence.
2. Android Communications: RedPhone and TextSecure
These two new apps are designed to "drop in" easily and act within your normal phone/texts to encrypt your calls and texts before they are released to the cloud. RedPhone is based on the well respected PGP ("Pretty Good Privacy") encryption. Only issue: your receiver also needs to use them to be able to understand you.
3. Cloud Storage: Dropbox and Tresorit
Both of these allow you to store data securely in the cloud for use by multiple devices or for sharing with your permission alone.
Dropbox: is an encryped, cloud-based storage for all your photos, docs, etc. that you can share with only those you select.
Tesorit: based in Hungary, designed for storing anything, but is promoted for sharing business data. It's encryption and permissions are reputed to be extremely powerful and convenient.
Note: the interview on NPR stressed that by far the most private method is personal encryption BEFORE it leaves your computer. Encryption by the big companies (eg Google or Microsoft) doesn't help if backdoors are provided to the government (and they are).
4. Social Networks: Diaspora
When you post on Twitter, Facebook, Google+ et al, you might as well give the world a key to your house and life. Powerful government computers can make associations and develop files that describe you and your life down to your underwear.
On the NPR show the most impactful quote was "If a product is free, then YOU are the product!" as your every contact, friend, statement, picture and scrap of information is shared, sold, used and stolen. Even more frightening is the appearance of huge and well-organized data-stealing "social bots" - computer generated people and profiles created by the millions, and which are designed to infiltrate and steal your information as directed by a "botmaster". Read this and be scared - very, very scared...
http://news.techworld.com/security/3456 ... evil-bots/
Diaspora: "Diaspora is intended to address privacy concerns related to centralized social networks by allowing users set up their own server (or "pod") to host content; pods can then interact to share status updates, photographs, and other social data.[6] It allows its users to host their data with a traditional web host, a cloud-based host, an ISP, or a friend. The framework, which is being built on Ruby on Rails, is free software and can be experimented with by external developers.""How safe is your online social network? Not very, as it turns out. Your friends may not even be human, but rather bots siphoning off your data and influencing your decisions with convincing yet programmed points of view.
A team of computer researchers at the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of British Columbia has found that hordes of social bots could not only spell disaster for large online destinations like Facebook and Twitter but also threaten the very fabric of the Web and even have implications for our broader economy and society."
"A key part of the Diaspora software design concept is that it should act as a "social aggregator", allowing posts to be easily imported from Facebook, Tumblr and Twitter. As Village Voice writer Nick Pinto explained, "the idea is that this lowers the barriers to joining the network, and as more of your friends join, you no longer need to bounce communications through Facebook. Instead, you can communicate directly, securely, and without running exchanges past the prying eyes of Zuckerberg and his business associates"
Diaspora is not easy to quickly comprehend, but what is going on is a form of peer-to-peer sharing with no middleman (eg Facebook). By eliminating the middleman you have absolute control over your information, and there is no way your information can leak via careless friends or by middleman design. Diaspora will probably grow rapidly and privately. For more understanding you must go the OFFICIAL site and FAQS...
https://wiki.diasporafoundation.org/Main_Page
https://wiki.diasporafoundation.org/FAQ_for_Users
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Diaspora_(software)
5. Anonymous Browsing: Tor
The Tor Browser bundle is very well known and widely used, has been for years. It's Firefox based but channels your encrypted searches through a series of random and anonymous IP's, so that your request will appear to be coming from one other than your own. Here's a C-Net review and safe download:
http://download.cnet.com/Tor-Browser-Bu ... 60251.html
6. Email: Thunderbird with Enigmail
Other than what you give away already, with almost every keystroke to Google, Microsoft, Facebook, Twitter, et al there are bots constantly working to get into the thousands of old emails still in the Gmail and other archives and which may contain all manner of account numbers, passwords and the like. Ever register somewhere and the site sent you a nice auto-reply stating "Here's your e-name and password" with both sitting there for easy pickings.
Seriously, do you really trust Google, et al who we now know are copying everything to Big Bother?
What to do? First of all - go to each of your email providers and delete - forever - everything. Although that won't stop Google or BB who already have them, but it WILL stop the bots from ever getting them. Next:
Thunderbird with Enigma: T'bird is on it's 17th version, so it's quite up to date. Although they are stopping development on add-ons, it will continue to be maintained for Security updates. And unlike your Outlook, etc. (which just means your sharing everything with Microsoft as well as your email provider), YOU own your own Thunderbird. And unlike your current email program, Thunderbird has tons of add-ons, the most important here being the Enigmail add-on, which allows you encrypt and decrypt easily and automatically if you choose.
Enigmail is an offshoot of PGP - GnuGP. Very secure and reputed to be the system used between Snowden and Greenwald.
http://www.mozilla.org/en-US/thunderbird/
7. Extras: Cloudsweeper and Security In-a-Box
Security In-a-Box: Discusses all the things you can do to protect your computer and your privacy, with a bunch of "hands-on guides" that walks you through using various options, like Thunderbird with Enigmail, above.
https://securityinabox.org/en/thunderbird_main
Cloudsweeper: Want to know what you forgot about in your gmail and what it's worth on the open market of identity theft (there is one, you know)? Cloudsweeper was developed by and resides at the University of Chicago. Here's some links:
https://cloudsweeper.cs.uic.edu/
http://www.geek.com/apps/cloudsweeper-t ... r-1560265/
Wanta hear the NPR program?
http://sciencefriday.com/segment/07/12/ ... ivacy.html
Cheers to all who are reading this! Not so fast, BB...