Things have become barrel scrapingly low when a majority of ordinary citizens no longer trust their governments. Not that any citizen should extend trust to the government unilaterally. "Trust, but verify" is an obligatory responsibility of all free citizens to demand and require from their governments. Verification usually is through the oversight of separate powers of government, such as the judiciary, parliamentary committees, the courts, or special (independent) commissions. In a free society, government agencies are mandated to watch other government agencies, reporting and accounting to separated governmental, representative powers. Such things seem ancient history now. Hence trust is evaporating faster than sweat in a Melbourne heat wave.
We appear to have reached the bottom of the barrel in the trust stakes. Here is the latest shakedown from the Snowden revelations, this time about the unwarranted, unauthorised collection of text messages, according to The Guardian:
The National Security Agency has collected almost 200 million text
messages a day from across the globe, using them to extract data
including location, contact networks and credit card details, according
to top-secret documents. The untargeted collection and storage of SMS messages – including
their contacts – is revealed in a joint investigation between the
Guardian and the UK’s Channel 4 News based on material provided by NSA
whistleblower Edward Snowden.
The documents also reveal the UK spy agency GCHQ has made use of the
NSA database to search the metadata of “untargeted and unwarranted”
communications belonging to people in the UK. The NSA program, codenamed Dishfire, collects “pretty much everything
it can”, according to GCHQ documents, rather than merely storing the
communications of existing surveillance targets.
The NSA has made extensive use of its vast text message database to
extract information on people’s travel plans, contact books, financial
transactions and more – including of individuals under no suspicion of
illegal activity. An agency presentation from 2011 – subtitled “SMS Text Messages: A
Goldmine to Exploit” – reveals the program collected an average of 194
million text messages a day in April of that year. In addition to
storing the messages themselves, a further program known as “Prefer”
conducted automated analysis on the untargeted communications. An NSA presentation from 2011 on the agency's Dishfire program to collect millions of text messages daily. Photograph: Guardian
The US National Security Agency collects information and data on millions of private text messages daily, and provides them to the UK spy agency (GCHQ), which then stores private communication data on ordinary UK citizens, not suspected, not being surveilled via warranted approval. Big Brother is watching most definitely.
Yet, the routine denials continue to flood forth. This from the NSA:
In a statement to the Guardian, a spokeswoman for the NSA said any
implication that the agency’s collection was “arbitrary and
unconstrained is false”. The agency’s capabilities were directed only
against “valid foreign intelligence targets” and were subject to
stringent legal safeguards, she said.
And this from the GCHQ:
A spokesman for GCHQ refused to respond to any specific queries
regarding Dishfire, but said the agency complied with UK law and
regulators. “It is a longstanding policy that we do not comment on intelligence
matters,” he said. “Furthermore, all of GCHQ's work is carried out in
accordance with a strict legal and policy framework which ensures that
our activities are authorised, necessary and proportionate, and that
there is rigorous oversight, including from the Secretary of State, the
Interception and Intelligence Services Commissioners and the
Parliamentary Intelligence and Security Committee.”
GCHQ also directed the Guardian towards a statement made to the House
of Commons in June 2013 by foreign secretary William Hague, in response
to revelations of the agency’s use of the Prism program. “Any data obtained by us from the US involving UK nationals is
subject to proper UK statutory controls and safeguards, including the
relevant sections of the Intelligence Services Act, the Human Rights Act
and the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act,” Hague told MPs.
We simply don't believe the government any longer. The "plausibility" in the denials has long since gone. That is why Vodafone, the UK phone giant has reacted the way it did to these latest revelations:
But Vodafone, one of the world’s largest mobile phone companies with
operations in 25 countries including Britain, greeted the latest
revelations with shock. “It’s the first we’ve heard about it and naturally we’re shocked and
surprised,” the group’s privacy officer and head of legal for privacy,
security and content standards told Channel 4 News. “What you’re describing sounds concerning to us because the regime
that we are required to comply with is very clear and we will only
disclose information to governments where we are legally compelled to do
so, won’t go beyond the law and comply with due process.
“But what you’re describing is something that sounds as if that’s
been circumvented. And for us as a business this is anathema because our
whole business is founded on protecting privacy as a fundamental
imperative.” He said the company would be challenging the UK government over this.
“From our perspective, the law is there to protect our customers and it
doesn’t sound as if that is what is necessarily happening.”
Let's try a thought experiment. How would we have reacted thirty years ago if we found out that the government security services were permanently wire tapping and recording all telephone conversations in the country, and that they were systematically steaming open every mailed envelope, copying and filing its contents, before sending it on its way? With justified fury, no doubt.
What has changed? Some minor things. Firstly, there is the terrorism bogeyman, which Western governments have parlayed into a perpetual "clear and present danger" justifying perpetual comprehensive surveilling of all citizens and as many non-citizens as it can. Governments are now self-righteous in the matter. Secondly, there are technological developments which allow surveillance on all electronic communications to be conducted remotely and at relatively low expense. Because governments can provides justification that they ought.
In a democracy, ultimately all comes back to the people--what they will permit and allow. And here we reach the crux of the matter. Successive Western governments have overpromised their competence and powers to their respective populations. A messianic "nothing bad will happen to you on our watch" promise has resulted in the rapid development of the all-seeing, all-watching panoptican state. It is a promise supine citizens have been all too ready to believe. The State, after all, is the West's functioning deity, its most universal idolatry.
Imagine an aspiring government which had promised, "There will be no murders whilst we are in office". It would have been laughed out of the polling booth. Its pledge would have been regarded as ridiculous. Yet, for some reason, similar common-sense has not prevailed in the "no terrorist attacks on our watch" pledge. The attempt to make good on that false-pledge has come at a great price--that of ordinary citizens being tacitly subjugated under the panoptican, ever-watching lidless eye of Sauron. It's a diabolical bargain.
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