Summary: The Effects Of Mass Surveillance

In 2013, Edward Snowden, a former CIA analyst and contractor with Booz Allen Hamilton, copied and leaked hundreds of documents from the NSA, revealing its cooperation with various other countries to establish 100% surveillance across the globe. This secret alliance was known as the “Five Eyes.” Using a secret court known as a FISA (Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act) court, the Five Eyes can obtain warrants to view every crevasse of somebody's digital footprint, without probable cause. This discovery sparked a barrage of empty promises from the Obama administration to discontinue such practices, as well as the civilians pushing for more transparency.
The Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools to Intercept and
Obstruct Terrorism (U.S.A. P.A.T.R.I.O.T.) Act is a huge document that was hastily written and signed into law despite not being read by most of the lawmakers, forty-five days after the September 11 terrorist attacks in 2001. This bill granted the NSA rights that were meant to be temporary, and to prevent attacks by those inspired by nine-eleven. The law allows for intelligence agencies to collect untargeted data on Americans with no regard for privacy rights, and zero accountability for the intelligence agencies. The biggest act passed since the Declaration of Independence was signed out of fear and paranoia.
Up to this point, the effects of mass surveillance have been purely speculation.
This is the case because it is difficult to criticize the government on the basis of morals, because law and justice don’t necessarily mean the same thing. However, a trend that is beginning to emerge is that people are scared to interact via the internet. Growth of online chat boards and messaging systems have slowed to almost a halt. The popular method for change is now in violent, anarchic protests that are performed on college campuses and in major cities across the globe. The American citizens are becoming increasingly displeased by the actions of their governments, so they are reacting with violence. All this does is perpetuate the “homegrown terrorism” label that the government slaps onto violent protesters, which almost certainly ensures nobody will take them seriously. Often times protesters can be seen burning American flags and waving swastikas around. And while it is their right to do so, it only hinders the process by which the rights of Americans can be restored. For these reasons, it can be seen that the introduction of mass surveillance to the mainstream media has influenced people to stay quiet, or often times be violent, which does nothing but erode the integrity of the democratic system that has been quintessential to American politics since its inception in
1776.
Before the Obama administration, 30% of Americans believed the government kept secrets from them. Within 3 years of Obama’s first term, that number rose to over 50%. The Obama administration launched a clandestine operation to convert the Bahamas into a surveillance state, spying on millions of American citizens. For the Obama administration, the next frontier in spying was being able to eavesdrop on every single person in a country by obtaining "full-take audio" of all cell-phone conversations. Having succeeded at this in the Bahamas, a brand new initiative known as “signals intelligence” was started in Florida late into Obama’s first term. Every year through this program, the NSA collects 400 zettabytes of data, in the surveillance state Obama has built, this mass data overload threatens to bury terrorist threats under mounds of data. Law enforcement agencies around the world keep arguing that surveillance can safeguard national security and that it is necessary to detect the so-called "bad guys". However, the documents leaked by Snowden reveal that a lot of surveillance carried out by intelligence agencies does not target criminals and terrorists at all. In fact, a lot of it is geared towards international political figures, corporations, and economic interests.
Often times the Obama and Bush administrations hid behind the fact that they were foiling the plots of would-be terrorists on a daily basis. However, the evidence points in a different direction. The number of attacks on American soil since the attack on the world trade centers? Thirty-seven. The frequency of attacks has grown exponentially since not only 9/11, but also since the founding of the Signals intelligence program. Even worse, after congress launched an investigation into the NSA’s “SIGINT” program, it was learned that it had not discovered, nor neutralized a single terrorist since its inception. All the NSA has been doing for the past 8 years has been aimlessly collecting dirt on hundreds of millions of Americans. Dirt that could be used to send innocent people, such as political opponents to prison, while solidifying its own job security and the position of the bureaucracy. In the process of illegally collecting incomprehensibly large amounts of data, the NSA violates the most sacrosanct document in American culture, the Bill of Rights. As clearly articulated in the first amendment, American citizens enjoy the rights to freedom of speech, religion, press, and protest. These rights have been violated for people like Rachel Martin. Rachel Martin, a host on N.P.R, learned through a freedom of information act request that she was a suspect in the unibomber case. The FBI had illegally sifted through her data in an attempt to obtain information linking her to the unibomber. The method by which they established her as a possible threat? A keylogger. A software that illegally logged every single character she typed, and searched for words of interest such as "bomb" or "9/11". What if she was debating the patriot act? What if she was merely exercising her first amendment rights to question the government? By this logic, the government could use tactics like this to undermine, invalidate, or even incarcerate anybody that poses an immediate threat to it’s power. The NSA also violates the fourth amendment, which protects against unlawful search and seizure, by obtaining FISA court warrants without probable cause. The first amendment is what sets America apart from the rest of the world. Freedom of speech is merely an illusion designed to appease the masses in most other countries. In America however, freedom of speech is precious, and can never be allowed to dissolve. The U.S. government is silencing free speech, the natural balance of the country is out of order. The people are now scared of the government, and the current administration will continue to take advantage of that fear. By masquerading behind ambiguous terms like “national security” and convincing Americans that this is a necessary evil, the government is taking advantage of the fear of terrorist attacks, and dancing on the graves of the three thousand innocent people who were killed on nine eleven. Many people may argue that if one has nothing to hide, they shouldn't be worried. However, it is hard to believe that anybody would not be scared by the knowledge that a powerful entity can spy on their every move. In the event of a tyrannical regime, such technologies could be used to completely silence any political opposers, throwing them in a virtual gulag. Every time an American types a character into their device, they are being watched. These powers are being abused more and more with every incoming administration, and the liberties of the American people are rapidly receding because of it. It is the duty of American citizens to protect their rights. Not as Republicans or Democrats, not as white or black, not as rich or poor, but as a people bound together by their unshakeable, unwavering love for liberty, and the belief that freedom of speech and the values America was built on are absolute.