UK POISED TO ADOPT LEGALIZED HACKING
The “Snoopers Charter” which is about to be passed into law by the UK Government poses a serious threat to privacy across the whole country. Oddly enough, the sweeping powers have met little resistance in Parliament with only privacy advocates and human right groups voicing concerns. The law allows for the most intrusive government surveillance in the world. Whilst the targeting of criminal elements in society should be applauded, it is the harvesting of data from the vast majority of innocent citizens which is deplorable. It seems now that the “delete recent history” function on your computer will soon become redundant as service providers will be forced to maintain records of sites which you have visited over the previous 12 months. It has also come to light that police forces in the UK are using harvesting techniques to collect voice and SMS messages from targeted cell sites. This represents another gross invasion of privacy where innocent members of the public can no longer feel comfortable when their intimate conversations and texts can be intercepted and retained.
For those of us who want to communicate freely and surf the web in private, all is not lost. In a reaction to this indiscriminate mass surveillance, we will start to write about tools which are available for secure communications and private web browsing.
Any third party which runs a communication system is a weak spot which can readily be exploited by the government through either “legal” means or clandestinely. However, we’ve found one system out there which runs independently. The advent of Bitcoin has shown that decentralized systems can readily function on their own without oversight or interference.
There are many clones and look-alike digital currencies around but one in particular is designed with total transaction anonymity in mind. The shadowproject.io released the crypto currency called ShadowCash in 2014. Unlike other digital coins which concentrate on transmitting value, this coin works in conjunction with a groundbreaking platform that allows unfettered communications between either individuals or whole groups. This platform is called UMBRA and it has just been released. The app is ideal for anyone who wants to express themselves freely, be they whistleblowers, journalists, activists or the public at large. Groups can be private by invitation only or public groups with no size limitations. The thing that is so innovative about Umbra is that it is totally decentralized. The chat groups, or ShadowChat as it is known, cannot be shut down as there is no central authority involved. The users, acting as nodes, make up the network. The developers have even added extra layers of protection through automatic Tor and I2P integration to hide each user’s presence on the network itself. There is no domain to be blocked or DNS to be switched off and with this system, user anonymity is guaranteed.
ShadowChat does not maintain logs or collect metadata so your profile is a big zero. Communications are totally encrypted so even if they are harvested via mass surveillance, they cannot be read. Being decentralized, other developers are free to build upon this platform so that the privacy ecosystem can grow and prosper. The app can be downloaded here: umbra.shadowproject.io
Later this week we will write about how your phone is spying on you and what you can do to counteract this.
