21st Century Wire says…
Much has been made about NSA spying and bulk data collection of American citizens, as well as an increasing loss of privacy in the face of the new digital Big Brother State – but amazingly, few are really aware of the fact that even the NSA needs working partners in crime to carry out their assault on American freedoms guaranteed in the US Constitution, specifically those enshrined in the 4th Amendment.
One such partner in crime appears to be Microsoft Corporation based in Redmond, near Seattle. Upon further examination, it appears that Microsoft’s new “operating” (policing) system, Windows 10, has given itself permission to watch your every move through its built-in spying feature.
You have to ask yourself: how out of touch is Microsoft that, in light of the Edward Snowden revelations and the rest too – that it would have the outright gall to build a back door into its latest OS and make it a nonnegotiable clause in the customer’s the Terms and Conditions?
Techworm confirms the brazen move by Gatestown product engineers:
“As more and more users are jumping the queue to download the Windows 10 through the Windows Insider Program, almost all of them have forgotten to check the Privacy Policy and Terms and Conditions users accept while downloading the Windows 10. If you study the privacy policy you will be startled at the amount of freedom you are giving Microsoft to spy on you.”
According to its Terms and Conditions, Microsoft has all but invited itself into your private domain 24/7:
“Microsoft collects information about you, your devices, applications and networks, and your use of those devices, applications and networks. Examples of data we collect include your name, email address, preferences and interests; browsing, search and file history; phone call and SMS data; device configuration and sensor data; and application usage.”
According the Forbes writer Gordon Kelly, “.. despite offering some options to turn elements of tracking off, core data collection simply cannot be stopped.”
Speaking to PC World, Microsoft VP Joe Belfiore admitted, “In the cases where we’ve not provided options, we feel that those things have to do with the health of the system,” he said. “In the case of knowing that our system that we’ve created is crashing, or is having serious performance problems, we view that as so helpful to the ecosystem and so not an issue of personal privacy, that today we collect that data so that we make that experience better for everyone.”
Now you have to ask yourself the question: how tight is Microsoft’s top brass with spy chiefs at the NSA?
Earlier this summer, we learned how NSA spying relies on AT&T’s “extreme willingness to help”, which should give us an idea of the scale of corporate collusion with the NSA.
In the wake of the early Snowden releases, The Guardian laid the foundation to this narrative:
“One slide in the undated PowerPoint presentation, published as part of the Guardian’s NSA Files: Decoded project, illustrates the number of intelligence reports being generated from data collected from the companies. In the five weeks from June 5 2010, the period covered by the document, data from Yahoo generated by far the most reports, followed by Microsoft and then Google. Between them, the three companies accounted for more than 2,000 reports in that period – all but a tiny fraction of the total produced under one of the NSA’s main foreign intelligence authorities, the Fisa Amendments Act (FAA).”
In addition to all this, you have the issue of whether or not Microsoft has embedded a heavy-handed ‘TPP‘ backdoor access clause in its privacy terms as well. The following was brought to light by a Reddit user recently:
“Here is there Privacy Statement where they state:
Finally, we will access, disclose and preserve personal data, including your content (such as the content of your emails, other private communications or files in private folders), when we have a good faith belief that doing so is necessary to:
comply with applicable law or respond to valid legal process, including from law enforcement or other government agencies;
protect our customers, for example to prevent spam or attempts to defraud users of the services, or to help prevent the loss of life or serious injury of anyone;
operate and maintain the security of our services, including to prevent or stop an attack on our computer systems or networks; or
protect the rights or property of Microsoft, including enforcing the terms governing the use of the services – however, if we receive information indicating that someone is using our services to traffic in stolen intellectual or physical property of Microsoft, we will not inspect a customer’s private content ourselves, but we may refer the matter to law enforcement.
Yeah I don’t want to give them access to ANY of my hard drives contents. Is there any way to turn this off?”
So, Microsoft has been at it for quite sometime.
Considering how this company has enjoyed a license to print money since the late 1980’s, you would think that they would be more appreciative of the millions of customers who have made so many millionaires, and billionaires in Seattle and beyond. You’d think that Microsoft might just stand up for the privacy of the little man, right?
You’d think so, but then again… you might be wrong.
READ MORE NSA NEWS AT: 21st Century Wire NSA Files