We recently reported that NSA had been tapping into Verizon’s phone records to access information about millions of customers. However, that seems to be the tip of the iceberg. It has now transpired that National Security Agency (NSA) has been tapping into the records of many leading internet companies in the U.S.
This revelation shouldn’t really come as a surprise. U.S. government and related agencies have long considered it their right to violate users’ privacy rights on the name of security. Of course, security serves as an effective pretext to access confidential information of the customers, defying constitutional and legal bounds.
The companies that seem to be affected by this surveillance include Microsoft, Google, Facebook, AOL, Yahoo, Skype, YouTube, Apple and PalTalk. It is rather shocking to note that NSA is comprehensively monitoring nearly all major tech giants in the U.S. This essentially means that the user data and information that is available with any of these companies is directly accessible to NSA.
In the case of Verizon, it has been cited that NSA only accesses call logs to thwart any security risks. But it has been found out that NSA has been monitoring internet companies under an umbrella program called ‘PRISM.’ Under this program, NSA has been accessing not only data logs, but also video conversations, photos, emails as well as documents of the customers.
In other words, any user data that goes through the aforementioned tech companies is being actively monitored by NSA. And it is quite expected that other agencies, such as FBI, also indulge in similar surveillance methods.
Courtesy: Ubergizmo
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