A few days ago, the Senate was given the opportunity to vote for the reauthorization of the Patriot Act. The Act, which was passed in the wake of the 9/11 attacks, represented a huge expansion of the US surveillance state but passed without much hassle due to heightened fears around international and domestic terrorism. This new reauthorization, however, featured an amendment which would allow for the mass collection of internet browsing history, which goes beyond the remit of the original act. Why did this happen? What does it mean for you? And is there anything that we can do about it now?
The Reauthorization of the Patriot Act: What Happened?
Normally, this passes without much fanfare. Sure, the Act has its critics, but as the powers have already been enacted, it’s hard for legislators to scale them back. However, due to some notable absences from the Senate, the reauthorization with the new amendment was passed – by a single vote.
What Happens Now?
From now, it’s safe to assume that the FBI might be trying to collect the internet browsing history of US citizens in bulk. “Such power given to law enforcement and intelligence agencies has a chilling effect on freedom of information and ideas,” said Paul Bischoff, a privacy advocate at Comparitech.com. “If police and spooks can freely spy on what we search for and what websites we visit, then we’ll abstain from looking up things that we think has even the slightest chance of getting us in trouble.” According to the Center for Strategic and International Studies, the FBI hasn’t used its existing bulk collection powers too aggressively: Admittedly, internet browsing history is more intimate and potentially more revealing that phone call records – but again, there might be some issues with the FBI’s data collection. According to specialist IT publication The Register: As ever with matters of public policy and legislation, there is often a lot more nuance to issues than is presented.
Is There Anything We Can Do About It?
It might seem like the average person is fairly powerless to stop the FBI snooping on our browsing history. However, there are some ways of fighting back. The Tor Browser, for example, works by encrypting your connection to the internet and then passing your traffic through voluntarily run servers to help mask your IP address. However, the Tor Browser isn’t the easiest to use, and your upload and download speeds will suffer with all that encryption and server-hopping. VPNs are a slightly easier way to ensure incognito browsing. The basic idea behind a VPN is to create a private, encrypted ‘tunnel’ that connects your computer, smartphone, or tablet directly to a secure VPN proxy server. This, in turn, connects you to the rest of the internet. The VPN server hides your true IP address, making it impossible to trace the connection directly to you. With all traffic to and from your device secured, no one can snoop on your activity or hijack your connection. The methods will keep you more secure online than doing nothing. But, of course, you could always trying petitioning your senator or representative when the reauthorization returns to try and get the amendment removed. See Tech.co’s guide to the most secure VPNs you can use today to browse safely — from less than $3/mo
