UK surveillance plan must be watched carefully
April 10, 2012 12:38 PM ET
When journalists make enemies in high places, they become vulnerable to the powers those figures wield. One such power is the state's capacity to wiretap and obtain personal records from communications companies. From Colombia's phone-tapping scandal to last year's case...
Farsi guides to the surveillance attack in Iran
September 16, 2011 4:23 PM ET
As we've reported before, there's strong evidence that forces with widespread access to Iran's internet infrastructure have been engaged in large-scale surveillance of https traffic in July and August, certainly of Google traffic, and perhaps many more websites, including Facebook...
Spying on media exposes French government's dark side
September 3, 2011 10:52 AM ET
"The freedom of the press and the lie of the state." The headline Thursday in the influential newspaper Le Monde was bound to make a big splash. While President Nicolas Sarkozy was basking in the glory of his Libyan...
Catching the Internet's spies in Iran and elsewhere
September 1, 2011 10:34 AM ET
In August, Google introduced a new, if rather obscure, security feature to its Chrome web browser, designed to be triggered only under extreme circumstances. If you were talking to Google's servers using the web's secure "https" protocol, your browser makes...
In lawsuit, Chinese writers allege Cisco aids government
August 24, 2011 5:20 PM ET
Three Chinese writers who have spent time in prison for articles published online are suing California-based Cisco Systems Inc., according to international news reports. The suit accuses the company of providing information and technology to Chinese authorities that facilitated...
The 10 Tools of Online Oppressors
May 2, 2011 8:45 AM ET
The world’s worst online oppressors are using an array of tactics, some reflecting astonishing levels of sophistication, others reminiscent of old-school techniques. From China’s high-level malware attacks to Syria’s brute-force imprisonments, this may be only the dawn of online oppression....
Attacks on the Press 2010: Internet Analysis
February 15, 2011 12:56 AM ET
Exposing the Internet's shadowy assailants by Danny O'Brien For the past decade, those who used the Internet to report the news might have assumed that the technological edge was in their favor. But online journalists now face more than just...
Facebook enables encryption: a first step on the right road
January 26, 2011 12:56 PM ET
Facebook is rolling out a a new feature starting today: its users now have an option in their account settings that will protectively encrypt all their Facebook activity as it travels over the Internet. Flipping the switch won't change much...
