CyberSecurity - Privacy vs Disclosure. What will you Compromise?

What is privacy?

Is privacy a tool, a technique or a legal provision? Does privacy mean not sharing anything with anyone?

Privacy is a human right protected by law. For the individual, it is the right to be left alone. It is being able to control what we are sharing, to whom we are sharing it, and when we are sharing it. But in order for people to function in society, they tend to disclose information about themselves. This enables building relationships, engaging in social networks, etc.

Privacy and Disclosure are two sides of a coin i.e. opposing forces in a balancing act. We need to disclose information about ourselves in our everyday lives. Disclose privacy to participate in society, to form personal relationship or develop co-operation and collaborations. We need to have the ability to decide what we share, whom to share and how to share. Privacy is a personal concept and privacy requirements vary between individuals. It varies because it is influenced by ones beliefs, opinions and attitudes. Also, each individual has rights to make decision about what information they want to reveal and what they want as private.

Privacy also depends on context. Let's take a simple example: You have recently been appraised in work. You may be happy sharing this information (with the amount been appraised) with your family but not with work colleagues. Privacy has a variety of dimensions including informational, physical and social. Informational privacy refers to control over information. It describes the ability to determine for oneself when, how and to what extent information about oneself is communicated to others. This includes both information shared online and offline.

How concerned are you about privacy?
Different individuals have differing concerns for privacy. Taking into account the response of individuals they can be divided into three category

1. privacy fundamentalist: individuals who are ‘distrustful of organisations that ask for their personal information, worried about the accuracy of computerised information and additional uses made of it, and are in favour of new laws and regulatory actions’.
2. privacy pragmatist: practical individuals who ‘weigh the benefits to them of various consumer opportunities and services, protections of public safety or enforcement of personal morality against the degree of intrusiveness of personal information sought and the increase in government power involved’.

3. privacy unconcerned: individuals who are ‘trustful of organisations collecting their personal information, comfortable with existing organisational procedures and uses and are ready to forego privacy claims to secure consumer-service benefits’.

Privacy online and offline

Every day we have to choose what to disclose and what to share. But how is online privacy different?

Theoretically, online privacy is different from offline privacy, especially for the person exercising their privacy. This is because in an online situation, companies are involved. Companies need to be involved because, to provide us with quality services, they retain information about us, sensitive or personal information. They have to process the information and store it around on servers, etc. So compared to the offline situation where we can just pull up the curtains in our home or we can drop out of a conversation or have an emotional response to protect our privacy, we cannot do that online. And also, we cannot depend on people to forget what we've told them yesterday or the week before as well, because information is stored forever anyway.

Who controls what companies hold about us and what can companies do? 

Companies have a duty of care towards their customers to protect their privacy. They have to abide, for instance, by the UK data protection law or the EU regulations. They employ security controls, conduct privacy impact assessments to verify their systems. But still, there might be intentional attacks from outsiders, to hack into their systems or unintentional mistakes by insiders, employees, forgetting to log out of a system or losing equipment, for instance. So that means that sensitive and personal information of the customer is still at risk in a way.

How to improve the situations?

The situation can be improved via different facets. One of them is new policies and regulations, such as the right to be forgotten. And secondly, via research. There are currently lots of research looking into the technical aspects of improving privacy mechanisms, privacy tools online. But there is also new research looking into how human beings interact with privacy systems, what makes them take certain decisions, and what drives them to respond in a certain way and disclose or share information.

 

 Some examples of what can go wrong have been very much advertised in recent years. And this happens by security attacks resulting in huge privacy breaches. We all know of the scandalous cases, for example, of WikiLeaks a few years ago. Apart from that, we have the situation of Adobe, where hackers raided a backup server containing customer information. Then we have the situation of Snapchat, where hackers wanted to expose Snapchat's poor cybersecurity practices. And to do that, they exposed customer details online, personal information and sensitive information. Another scenario is the EBay situation, where hackers gained access via employee login credentials. And again, there were sensitive and personal information of customers exposed, including physical addresses and date of births.

What value do businesses get from our personal data?

The ‘free’ service we receive from many companies such as Facebook or Google is not actually free.

From the company perspective, we, the users, willingly decide to give them data about ourselves in exchange for the service they provide.

One thing these companies have in common is that advertising accounts for the much of their revenue.

In order to make profit from advertising, companies need us to spend more time on their platform - even if we’re actually looking at different websites. Once you have logged in on Facebook, Google, or Twitter, if you stay logged in then you can be tracked when you visit another site with a Facebook like button, Google’s +1 button, or Twitter share button. Even if you do not click on those buttons, Facebook, Google, or Twitter get notified so they know which websites you visit. That’s why many ad blockers provide the possibility of disabling social media buttons by default and re-enabling them only if you actually click on them.

Think about the amount of information these companies have about us: 

• who your friends are
• what products you like to buy
• which places you have visited and when
• who you contact (message, email) and how frequently
• where you live and which banks you have accounts with.

 

 Any one of these is enough for a so-called ‘market research’ study. When combined, they provide even more information about demographic and geographic preferences and market trends. Organisations specialising in market research make hundreds of millions of dollars each year. You can now imagine the value of all the information we decide to disclose about ourselves online.

Now, consider loyalty cards. If you have one of these cards, you’ll get, say, 10% discount on your purchases from a retailer, such as a supermarket chain. A loyalty card might make us more likely to choose a particular supermarket over others when we decide to buy something, but the real value to the supermarket is that it now has information about our individual buying habits and history regardless of which method of payment we use to make our different purchases.

This purchase history has a value. Let’s say an individual purchase history is worth 5% of the amount of purchases we make at the supermarket. Scaling this up, we can see that this information alone is worth 5% of the turnover of the supermarket chain. Remember, we are not talking about the profit they make, but the total turnover they have.

 

  In both of these cases, we can see that our personal data is of huge value to companies. In return for allowing the companies to have the data, we gain something:

• the convenience of online interactions
• discounts on shopping
• suggestions for purchases that are tailored to our own buying history.

Cyber101x Cyberwar, Surveillance and Security - Week 4 - PRIVACY, INDEPENDENT REVIEW AND DISSENT

BRET WALKER
 
  BRET WALKER: Well, it doesn't take all that much courage to dissent in a place like Australia. And the example you brought up of the so-called dissent in my last report is, I hope, a happy one, because it succeeded and they reversed that policy-- I don't flatter myself because of my dissent, or my dissent alone. But saying what you think, expressing your opinion about the merits of your country's laws, about the merits of international law, and about how either of those should be changed-- that really is the area in which one person dissents and another person delivers the government line. It's to be recalled, in most countries on Earth, and there's a government and something called an opposition. And this year's dissenter might be next year's lawmaker. And so dissent is really only expressing your opinion where you are confident from what you know or from what you expect that other people will disagree with you, and perhaps hold an opposite view. It is of the essence of democratic principled and scholarly consideration of laws, that there will be those who think they're fine as they are, those who think they're an abomination, and those who think they should be improved. That will never lead to just one voice with one opinion. INTERVIEWER: And within in the context of the surveillance, metadata and security, within the organisation itself, it's been said in the literature that independent monitoring will not necessarily be successful if there's not that healthy dissent within-- almost one that we never get to look at, to view. How do we encourage that level of professionalism where it is seen as-- and I'm drawing from the literature here-- where that internal dissent that is, away from the eye of the public, is encouraged. BRET WALKER: Well, it does help to bring in people like David Anderson in the United Kingdom and me here, whose careers do not depend upon favour from government, and who professionally and culturally inclined to say what we think, even when that is unpopular, or confronting for some of your audience. That's the first thing. The second thing is it's very important, as you say, functionally to define the role as one where you are not merely welcome to, but positively expected to canvas, consider and assess contrary views to those which promoted the laws in question, or which manifest in the laws in question. So testing and auditing and scrutiny-- all of those are ideas which positively involve considering hypotheses different from those that inspire the lawmakers. So if you have the right kind of person recruited-- and you don't have to be a lawyer, but certainly independent bars are-- accidentally, I'm sure-- perfect as throwing up people with a willingness to express so-called dissent. And second, you must frame the role in a way that is designed to encourage the expression of opposite views. Now that requires real confidence in the polity. The people who vote for the Parliament and the Parliamentarians who vote for governments need, at all levels, to be confident that this is the kind of role they want. It's a pretty new role in the world. There aren't all that many of them. They haven't been around for a long time. But I think there is a good future for such positions, so long as they're given security from government pressure, so long as they're given appropriate resources, and so long as the task they perform is a focused one. INTERVIEWER: Thank you. The second question-- you begin your last report by observing about non-response, essentially by the governments you reports, or we could take it at a higher level-- non-response to very office of the Independent National Security Legislation Monitor. Now moving on to the context of metadata and surveillance, emerging interpretations of Article 17 in the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights require governments to justify. We can frame it as a form of dialogue, ongoing in terms of surveillance and metadata. So I take those two ideas, and we merge them when we ask, will the government be able to enter into dialogue? If it was, if it did have a response, I wonder what might that sound like? What is true dialogue and justification that you would be looking for in the perfect scenario? BRET WALKER: The best form that I'm aware of is also the most practical and cheapest form. And that is routinely and frequently to have the monitor appear before Parliamentary Committees, either the committees of one of the Houses or Joint Committee. And most countries with Parliaments or things like Parliaments have devices whereby subsets of the whole Assembly can take on particular subject matters, and examine people who might be thought to have something useful to say. An official person like the Monitor is, in my view an ideal person to be, as it were, hauled before the committee fairly frequently, and there to be examined, perhaps in a testing, even hostile fashion, in relation to what he or she has done, hasn't done, has said, or hasn't said.  I really only had that once. And it was not hostile at all.  Perhaps because I am an advocate in an adversarial system, I'm used to, if not hostile-- well, certainly occasionally hostile-- but certainly sceptical or testing dialogue between me and judges. And in my view, it enhances very considerably the standard of arguments, and the standard of the ultimate resolution after hearing argument for that to be so. It's very much like what we read about in terms of the mediaeval testing of scholars by final occasions. We still use the expression viva voce to describe those kind of tests. Now, Parliamentary Committees are obvious way to do it. But then, so also are public appearances. So giving lectures in the civil society segment, assisting academics and scholars by lecturing from time to time, specialist colleges-- National Security College, for example, in Australia-- they are all ways in which there can be something like dialogue. But you ask about dialogue, and I think the best dialogue is that which is unstructured, that is not restricted, and which involves pushing and pressing people, perhaps on both sides. I think that's all very practical and could be done. I regret that it wasn't done more. INTERVIEWER: Thank you.  Your role was a fundamental one. It was to create trust and integrity, essentially, in the context of counter-terrorism laws. You were the first appointment. Now in the context of metadata and surveillance, again drawing from international observations, a core feature is going to be independent oversight of some form, in terms of metadata collection. I wonder, as you reflect back to your time in your role, what are the core features, skills, attitudes, characters, lessons learned to acquit the role of independent oversight?  BRET WALKER: There are two forms of independent oversight to be considered. The one is the very familiar form. Many countries have it or an equivalent of it, and those are warrants, whether they're issued by judges, retired judges, or other people sufficiently independent to make it worth getting their warrant. That can't be undersold as existing essentially in order to bring the independence, and also to bring the supervision or oversight which is the safety check we have on these tremendous powers otherwise being given to the Executive.  And all I can say in relation to that kind of independent oversight, that I'm very enthusiastic about, and have argued publicly ought to be required for access to quite a bit to do with metadata, all I can say about that is, you really must have independent judiciary-- a genuine, strong, independent judiciary. Not all countries have that. And so it's not easily generalised internationally. That's the first thing. I'd go so far as to say most countries do not have strong, independent judiciary. So that's a real problem internationally. The second kind of independent oversight is the kind of specialised, focused position that I had as Monitor and David Anderson had as Monitor. Committees of kinds in Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom now, perhaps not quite the same.  The chief lesson learned is that the very ample powers of investigation, coupled with top-secret clearance, is essential. I had it, and I know that I could not have done the job really at all, but certainly not to a degree that I would have regarded as appropriate, without that. The capacity to be able to ask anybody, however senior and however delicate their secrets, questions that I thought germane to my mandate, was, without any doubt, at the heart of matter. And Australia's legislation for the moderate's position is very good, I think, in that regard. But the second thing is that you do really need to be given the wherewithal to push back as this independent supervisor, to push back against the very strong combined force of ministers, their advisers, and the bureaucracy. The ministers are actually the easiest, I think, because they understand rather more overtly the need for the independent role. I'm not so sanguine about the real acceptance of such roles among the what I call full-time professional bureaucracy. But that's all right, so long as the monitor has the power, and can wield it, and is prepared to wield it. But the Monitor literally has to sit somewhere, as well as figuratively has to sit somewhere within a bureaucracy. And those are details. They sound trivial and housekeeping, but they are important details that need to be regarded. Literally where is the Monitor going to be? I refuse to have, in my professional chambers, secret material, because I didn't wish to add security risks. And so I travelled to an office that I had in Canberra. I'm content that it was sufficiently secure. But you need staff who, I believe, have to be dedicated only to that role. There must be no divided loyalties. It follows, then, you might be surprised to know that one of my last recommendations was that nobody should ever be able to be reappointed to such a position. I really do think that the partial analogy with judicial tenure under the British system, the so-called Act of Settlement tenure, ought to be reproduced in such positions. You should have nothing to fear while you are of good behaviour during your term. But neither should you have anything to hope for. Now, I was perfectly happy to finish off doing this job. But I can well understand how some people would be very anxious to continue. I am not casting slurs on my colleagues when I say I think there is too much risk of subliminally wishing to impress, perhaps oblige, those responsible for appointment selections if there is a possibility of reappointment. So all of that is a rather formal way of saying there must be real independence.

 PRIVACY, INDEPENDENT REVIEW AND DISSENT

 REBECCA LAFORGIA: The right to privacy under Article 17 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights also requires in the context of metadata and surveillance that there be independent review. The special rapporteur, in his concluding summary, notes that the independent oversight must be adequately resourced, and it must be mandated to conduct the review in terms of surveillance. Article 17 of the covenant requires this level of independent review. And the independent reviewer-- whether they be individuals, tribunals, courts-- will, for example, inevitably find tensions and mistakes in terms of surveillance activity. Now, this will arise either in its practice or so-called mission creep. And the identification of these mistakes will, if there is truly independent review, be openly and publicly responded to by the government, a dialogue. For independent review, there needs to be public information and acknowledgement of where mistakes have been made, emphasising that dialogue with the government. Literature and the UN reports also speak about standing for individuals that feel that their metadata has been incorrectly used. A writer, Mr Frank Moorhouse, who has written a recent text on surveillance in the context of Australia, has commented that independent review requires a certain culture as well within the security organisations. And I quote, "A high degree of professionalism creates a working and social atmosphere where dissent is an honourable thing." To create that professionalism, there would have to be a culture which encourages internal dissent and difference of opinion. This is not the whistleblower. The internal dissenter which Moorhouse is referring to are internal to the organisation, independent thinkers within the organisation who are questioning, and this questioning is seen as honourable and necessary. They are essential to independence of the organisation. The right to privacy in the context of metadata and surveillance presupposes such a culture while not explicitly saying so and, we could make an argument, it is part of an effective independent review. In summary, metadata and surveillance balance is political and involves power. International human rights provides a way of rebalancing this power, and stabilising the debate around a constantly evolving technology. The right to privacy provides a language that is not subject to the latest technology innovations, but rather constantly demands of the state wherever they're doing the metadata surveillance an ongoing public dialogue and independent review.

Cyber101x Cyberwar, Surveillance and Security - Week 4 - Privacy in context of Metadata and Surveillance

Privacy in context of Metadata and Surveillance



 DR REBECCA LAFORGIA: Surveillance is and always will be a political question. Who gets to look over your information? What do they get to do with it? Why are they looking at it? Surveillance is inherently about politics and power. Now, this political element is highlighted by UN reports which consider the right to privacy in the area of metadata and surveillance. Ben Emmerson, QC, is the current special rapporteur on the promotion and protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms while countering terrorism. And he reported to the General Assembly on counterterrorism and mass digital surveillance and metadata. He stated that "the international community needs to squarely confront this revolution in our collective understanding of the relationship between the individual and the State." Similarly, the General Assembly resolution located the right to privacy in the digital age in its political context. It affirmed that privacy leads to protecting rights which are, quote, "one of the foundations of a democratic society." The UN reports we will consider acknowledge that there is a core obligation that is relevant to rebalancing power and politics in mass digital surveillance, and that is the right to privacy. This right is contained in Article 17 of a treaty -- the treaty is the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights notes, "The General Assembly resolution recalls international human rights law provides the universal framework against which any interference in individual privacy rights must be assessed." Before considering the content of the obligation, I want to reflect on the fact that the first and very important contribution which international human rights make, and privacy in particular provides, is stability. It's a way of engaging with this rapidly evolving world of metadata and surveillance. The United Nations reports from the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights and also from the special rapporteur that we will be considering were produced in 2014. And they were created due to increasing concerns as to the question of metadata surveillance and its relationship to privacy. Both reports do apply and interpret the international right to privacy in the context of this increasing surveillance through the collection of metadata. But the reports begin with a factual reality, that there is an increasing surveillance across the board. The High Commissioner for Human Rights notes, "Deep concerns have been expressed as policies and practices that exploit the vulnerability of digital communications technologies to electronic surveillance and interception in countries across the globe [have been exposed]. Examples of overt and covert digital surveillance in jurisdictions around the world have proliferated, with governmental mass surveillance emerging as a dangerous habit rather than an exceptional measure." I want to centre on this point. The reports consider the issue of metadata and surveillance as a global problem around the world, impacting both on citizens and on individuals outside of state borders, that is called extraterritorially. Through stepping back from a national perspective, the reports therefore frame the issue of increased surveillance as being subject to a universal right, to a conceptual idea that can apply to all and across the states, that of privacy. The effect of centering on core and stable rights, as contained in Article 17, is to produce a very important stabilisation of the debate around metadata and surveillance, which has the capacity to transcend the latest technology or surveillance scheme because often technology and covert actions seem relentless. For example, the special rapporteur reports and describes Prism and then Quantum. Consider his description of Quantum. "The agency is said to operate an internet exploitation mechanism called Quantum, which enables it to compromise third-party computers. The methodology reportedly involves taking secret control or ownership over servers in key locations on the backbone of the internet. By impersonating chosen websites (including such common sites as the Google search page), Quantum is able to inject unauthorised remote control software into the computers and Wi-Fi-enabled devices of those who visit the clone site, who will, of course, have no reason to doubt the clone site's authenticity. Technology experts assess that this methodology can permanently compromise the user's computer, ensuring that it continues to provide intelligence to the National Security Agency in the United States indefinitely." He goes on, though, to consider a virus called the Ambassador's Reception. It's from the United Kingdom. Quote: "Subsequent disclosures have focused on the role of the Joint Threat Intelligence Group in Government Communications Headquarters. This agency is reported to have deployed a computer virus called the Ambassador's Reception for the purpose of online covert action. This virus is said to be able to encrypt itself and act as a chameleon imitating communications by other internet users." Consider this, the Prism, Quantum, the Ambassador's Reception. And these will be replaced, and maybe are being replaced now, by further technological advances and actions. One of the issues in engaging with such a relentlessly developing area of technology, with its, quite frankly, dramatic and intriguing descriptions, is a tendency of being swept along, following each development and revelation. Human rights language, its first contribution is to offer a stability in such a rapidly changing area and therefore to enhance the capacity to engage in the debate politically, to give stable language in contrast to the relentless evolution of technological advances. I want to illustrate this through an analogy exploring the same relationship between technology and development, and the importance of stable human rights language, but just from a different perspective for a moment. Consider the evolution of weaponry, the technological advances, for example, Predator Reaper drones creating increased capacity for targeting. However, no matter what the evolution of technology in terms of weaponry, the human right to life remains, the human right to life as a core foundation idea stabilising the relentless development of technology. It remains a constant benchmark. In the same way, metadata and surveillance, there are endless terms for surveillance actions. There will be more being developed even now. But at the same time, human rights stabilises this relentless evolution. And through considering the right to privacy, there is a way of engaging, despite technological advances. This is an important contribution to political engagement. It enables demands to be made on the state, consistently and coherently, in a rapidly evolving area.

Cyber101x Cyberwar, Surveillance and Security - Week 1 - The New Internet

CONCEALING YOUR IDENTITY ON THE INTERNET
 
 BRUCE SCHNEIER: The old saying is that on the internet, nobody knows you're a dog. And these days, it's more like, on the internet, everyone knows exactly what kind of dog you are. It is becoming harder to change your identity. And if you're a woman, to have a male name and maybe be taken more seriously. Or if you're a member of a minority to use a more common name and be treated differently. That's incredibly valuable. Even taking an alias to explore a different aspect of yourself. If you're joining a support group at some time, you might not want to use your real name. This is becoming harder. It's incredibly important. We know that being able to shed the baggage of your identity, especially if you are from a minority class, is incredibly empowering. And that's something we shouldn't give up lightly.

HOW WE GIVE UP METADATA

  BRUCE SCHNEIER: I mean, certainly, we give up metadata continuously willingly on our computers, on our phones. And every device we use these days is producing data and metadata sitting as the cloud. And in some ways, yes, we do it willingly. We accept Facebook, which is collecting enormous data and metadata about us, for free in exchange for that. Now you can argue that we're doing that as consumers willingly, but I'm not sure we're really doing it informed. I'm not convinced that we think in the morning, you know, I'm really happy my phone company is tracking my location 24/7 and maybe sharing that data with the government, because I love getting cell phone calls. We just think, I need my cell phone. So a lot of this data and metadata collection is hidden. It's not salient. We're not really thinking about it as it happens. So even though we're doing it willingly, I'm not convinced there's informed consent going on. I think that most of us believe, at some level, that we're maintaining our privacy. That if I go off and sneak around the corner, I'm thinking I'm sneaking around the corner. I don't think, well, the jig is up, because Apple knows where I am.

SOCIAL NORMS AND KIDS MAINTAINING PRIVACY

 BRUCE SCHNEIER: It's interesting to see how social norms change. We are seeing changes that for now for kids, it's public by default private by effort. Kids still value privacy enormously. And if you're a teenager or know a teenager, you know that's true. Privacy from their peers, their teachers, their parents, they don't think about the government, but they certainly think about privacy. And kids spend a lot of effort trying to maintain their privacy. Whether it's using apps like Snapchat that delete things, or scraping their Facebook wall or using aliases, kids take a lot of pains to keep their privacy. They may not be sophisticated. They might not be able to maintain privacy against the government or foreign governments, but they are trying to maintain privacy. Even though it's harder, even though public is more of a default, privacy is an inherent human need. So I think we are in the middle of some profound social changes, but we're not going to move to a world where kids say oh I never had any privacy.