Questions tagged [surveillance]
19 questions
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Did the FBI plant an informant in the Trump campaign during the Obama administration?
Donald Trump has tweeted allegations of the US's Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) planting spies in his 2016 presidential campaign:
Wow, word seems to be coming out that the Obama FBI “SPIED ON THE TRUMP CAMPAIGN WITH AN EMBEDDED INFORMANT.”…
Mawg says reinstate Monica
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Can a computer be hacked to use a connected speaker as a microphone?
I read a book in which someone hacked into a computer and used the speakers (not a microphone) to listen to what was happening in the room. Is this even remotely possible without gaining physical access to the computer, assuming you could completely…
John Stimac
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24
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Must churchgoers be registered with the government in Kansas City?
According to this article and to this Reddit thread, linking the article in fact:
Kansas City, Missouri, officials are now requiring every church to submit a list of members and attendees along with their names, addresses and telephone numbers to…
Ionică Bizău
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Can cell phones be turned on remotely for surveillance by the NSA?
Edward Snowden had previously revealed that NSA has the capability to turn on a cell phone even when it is turned off ( but with batteries on ) and can then record conversations. Others like CNN state that :
..But government spies can get your…
Aswin P J
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Can Skype wiretap your calls?
The Skype-Open-Source Blog speculates that Microsoft have changed the architecture of Skype in order to facilitate wiretapping:
Two months ago, Skype replaces user-hosted P2P supernodes with Linux grsec boxes hosted by Microsoft, but for…
Jesvin Jose
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Have the NSA spying programs stopped any terrorist attacks?
The government claims that these security programs are necessary for our safety, and have cited over 50 examples wherein terrorist plots were discovered and stopped due to this surveillance. However, opponents have debunked at least some of these…
Bigbio2002
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Do the "Presidential Alerts" give the government full access to all phone functionality?
John McAfee, libertarian politician and former computer programmer, tweeted this:
The "Presidential alerts": they are capable of accessing the E911 chip
in your phones - giving them full access to your location, microphone,
camera and every…
James G.
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Are electronic power consumption "smart meters" an invasion of privacy?
I've recently seen some commotion online about "smart meters," electronic power consumption meters that are replacing the mechanical meters in some areas. My understanding is that these meters have radio transmitters that broadcast each household's…
Carson Myers
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Do "License Plate Blockers" work?
There are several products on the market that claim to block license plates from being read by cameras, including:
Plastic covers,
number plate covers which are designed to protect your vehicle licence plate from speed cameras that are aimed at…
WernerCD
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8
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Were Papadopoulos, Manafort, and Flynn subjects of FISA applications?
Democratic Congresswoman Sheila Jackson Lee said this in December, in a closed-door hearing of the House Judiciary Committee (on pages 66-67 of this transcript, released a few days ago):
I want to talk about the spring, summer, and autumn of 2016.…
Keshav Srinivasan
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Can cell phones be remotely converted into listening devices?
This is one of the statements of Richard Stallman in his homepage as an explanation of why he doesn't own a cell phone:
Cell phones are tracking and surveillance devices. They all enable the
phone system to record where the user goes, and many…
marcanuy
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Did a series of PSAs about surveillance culture lead to schools in New Mexico getting Ritalin eliminated as a behavior-modifying drug?
I was reading up on Godfrey Reggio’s film, Koyaanisqatsi (1982) when I came across this claim on Wikipedia regarding some PSAs (public service announcements) he made for the ACLU in New Mexico in the 1970s; bold emphasis is mine:
The television…
Giacomo1968
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Did J. Edgar Hoover blackmail politicians by threatening to release information gathered through surveillance?
The encyclopedia Britannica claims:
Hoover habitually used the FBI’s enormous surveillance and
information-gathering powers to collect damaging information on
politicians throughout the country, and he kept the most scurrilous
data under his own…
Christian
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Do spying devices implanted through human ear canals exist?
An article from a professor of psychology describes a type of so-called “ radio-wave, auditory, assaultive. transmitting (RAAT) implants,” which is essentially a covert listening device, and it can be implanted into and stay in human ear canal as a…
RLR
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Can wifi signals be used to read lips?
This Atlantic article claims that researchers have been able to do numerous high-level diagnostics by analyzing disruptions in wifi signal fields, including identifying individuals and reading lips:
As people move through a space with a Wi-Fi…
Cain
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