In the summer of 2013 NSA whistle blower, Edward Snowden, revealed to the world that the United States Government spies on and collects data on their own citizens over the web and the phone lines. But now the nation up north, America's hat, Canada admitted on December 20th of 2013 that they "incidentally" track their own citizens. This was coming from Canada's equivalent to the US' NSA, which is the Communications Security Establishment Canada or the CSEC. The statement was posted on their website but it went noticed for some time by many Canadians. The CSEC did state that such actions are illegal in Canadian law and that they do not track Canadians on purpose, but their are many skeptics.
During the Snowden leaks, it was revealed that the NSA, the CSEC and their equivalents in Australia, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom are best friends and they share their information and intelligence as part of the Five Eyes Alliance. Its pretty clear that the Five Eyes are close, especially the NSA and the CSEC. According to the Huntington Post, the Snowden documents revealed that the CSEC had set up spying post at the request of the NSA and that the NSA and the CSEC are in joint spying operations in 20 countries. The CSEC also spy in countries that are unavailable to the NSA.
But for those of us living in the United States who have been worried over the past half a year if the NSA will ever stop keep track of all the cat videos we watch on the internet and if the president if ever plans to address the NSA issue, well we are in luck. On January 17 of 2014 President Obama will deliver a speech about reforms to the NSA.
The upcoming speech is in response to many civil liberty activists and excutives of tech companies, like Google, who want the NSA to reformed. As stated in the article in the Washington Post, that various US agencies defend that the NSA's activities are important to public safety, but an White House Advisory board report in December of 2012 that the data has done anything what so ever stop terrorism.
I'm curious to what will be said on January 17 by President Obama. I want to see what the changes will be and how dramatic they will be, or maybe it will just be some simple name change, like the NPA, National Protection Agency.
Five Eyes Facts - www.privacyinternational.org/blog/the-five-s-fact-sheeteye
Obama Reforms NSA - http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/obama-to-announce-changes-to-nsa-surveillance-on-jan-17/2014/01/10/462f9140-7a2c-11e3-af7f-13bf0e9965f6_story.html
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