This is the best summary I could come up with:
The National Security Agency (NSA) has admitted to buying records from data brokers detailing which websites and apps Americans use, US Senator Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) revealed Thursday.
“The US government should not be funding and legitimizing a shady industry whose flagrant violations of Americans’ privacy are not just unethical but illegal,” Wyden said in a letter to Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Avril Haines.
To fix the problem, Wyden wants intelligence communities to agree to inventory and then “promptly” purge the data that they allegedly illegally collected on Americans without a warrant.
Wyden’s spokesperson, Keith Chu, told Ars that “the data brokers selling Internet records to the government appear to engage in nearly identical conduct” to X-Mode.
That includes some commercially available information on Americans “where one side of the communications is a US Internet Protocol address and the other is located abroad,” data which Nakasone said is “critical to protecting the US Defense Industrial Base” that sustains military weapons systems.
Rather than being a customer in this sketchy marketplace, intelligence agencies should stop funding companies allegedly guilty of what the FTC has described as “intrusive” and “unchecked” surveillance of Americans, Wyden said.
The original article contains 976 words, the summary contains 193 words. Saved 80%. I’m a bot and I’m open source!
The real problem here is that companies can hoard and sell said data. The NSA part in essence is a red herring.
Agreed, this is the real issue “Wyden suggested that the intelligence community might be helping data brokers violate an FTC order requiring that Americans are provided “clear and conspicuous” disclosures and give informed consent before their data can be sold to third parties. In the seven years that Wyden has been investigating data brokers, he said that he has not been made “aware of any company that provides such a warning to users before collecting their data.””
Privacy policies have become much more readable in my experience. I still feel like I’m the only one who reads them though.
That said… I think that companies that won’t allow you to use their app without consenting to your data being sold are scum of the earth.
Disagree. Just like marketing and government propaganda are entwined, marketing and surveillance are entwined. There’s no red herring here. It’s a multi-headed dragon.
Honestly the only thing that surprises me is that they’re paying for information instead of somehow just taking it.
Honestly I don’t see why buying data on the open market is illegal. I think it shouldn’t be legal to sell it but it is. I’d prefer nobody have access than the NSA pretend they don’t see what anyone else can buy.
Legal loophole, asking for it requires courts or judges. Buying it is just a cost.
It’s the same thing for medical data. Hospitals can’t sell your medical data in the US but if you google stuff or engage with media that tells you have a medical condition… that’s fine. So much so that they will sell data that includes who is pregnant or has diabetes and such.
Cool! Now what?
