For this week's blog, I watched Christopher Soghoian's TED Talk about people listening in to your phone conversations. The opening line of Christopher's talk got my brain moving quickly. To open his TED Talk he stated, " For more than 100 years, the telephone companies have provided wiretapping assistance to governments." I kind of had an idea that people from the government could always tap in if they wanted to but I never knew that it has been going on for that long. It's crazy to think that you could be talking to a spouse, child, or friend having a private conversation, and some stranger working for not just the US Government but any government could just tap in and listen. But it isn't just the government that could tap in and listen, a hacker, criminal, or stalker could tap in and listen as well. Soghoian talks about how there are surveillance systems put into place by the telephone companies but not from Silicone Valley companies. Although Christopher mentions that over the last couple of years, Silicon Valley companies have built strong encryption technology into their communications products that make surveillance extremely difficult. Christopher says to control whether these encryption tools will be used by the good or bad guys Soghoian says networks need to be built as secure as possible. He ends his talk like this "We need to use these tools. We need to secure our telephone calls. We need to secure our text messages. I want you to use these tools. I want you to tell your loved ones, I want you to tell your colleagues: Use these encrypted communications tools. Don't just use them because they're cheap and easy, but use them because they're secure." I support Soghoian on his stance. Even though it may mean for now that police have a tougher time catching criminals, in the long run, the privacy of your personal life will benefit.
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