ECHELON: The Secret Global Surveillance Network

Until Edward Snowden revealed the extensive global surveillance carried out by the US security agency, the NSA (National Security Agency) and other government spying agencies, ECHELON was just a name or rather a codename whose meaning was unclear to the public.

Designed and coordinated by NSA, ECHELON is a system used to capture and virtually analyze every phone call, email, fax, internet downloads, and telex message sent anywhere in the world.

Monitored transmissions are said to include up to 3 billion communications on a daily basis. These are transmissions of both public and private organizations.

The system is operated by the NSA in conjunction with the General Communications Security Bureau (GCSB) of New Zealand, the Australian Defense Security Directorate (DSD), and the Communications Security Establishment (CSE) of Canada. All these organizations are bound together under a secret agreement whose terms, conditions, and texts remain a closely hidden secret even today.

ECHELON Targets

ECHELON was primarily designed for non-military targets, unlike most electronic spy systems developed during the Cold War.

These targets include organizations, governments, businesses, and individuals in virtually every country around the world. The surveillance basically affects anyone communicating between and sometimes within countries anywhere in the world.

How Does ECHELON Operate?

The ECHELON system does not operate like other government spying agencies. It’s not designed to snoop on a particular email or fax message.

Rather, this system gathers huge volumes of data indiscriminately through an extensive system of radio antennae and particular satellites that closely monitor satellite communications. There are also sniffer devices that gather internet communications derived from data packets.

The system then filters out important information by use of computers (the computers identify and extract messages of interest to the organizations from a huge volume of information).

To make the filtering process easy, the system is designed to automatically identify messages/information containing pre-programmed keywords. These keywords contain target names, localities, subject, including others.

Various interception facilities have been established all around the world to eavesdrop into all international telecommunications networks. By linking all these facilities, ECHELON provides the involved organizations with the ability to tap into virtually any communication network around the globe.

According to various reports, ECHELON helped the US government learn of the plans to bomb the World Trade Center a few months before it actually happened. It’s not known how much information was intercepted by intelligence gatherers but since it was not prevented, we could assume the details were either unclear or insufficient.

Although the system has possibly stopped many attacks, the invasion of privacy has not been taken lightly by private organizations and the general public.

Internet Safety Tips To Avoid Cyber Attacks

There are many Cyber Attack cases reported each year and any business firms, and even you could become a victim. Tech giants are also not immune since the recent Apple App Store issue demonstrates how these cyber-crimes happened. It can as well be recalled that Microsoft, AOL, and eBay became victims of cyber-attacks.

Here are some Internet safety tips to keep you away from cyber-attack that can breach your personal accounts.

Use strong and unique passwords and change them frequently.

Use a password that is difficult to guess like from random letters and numbers to prevent your computer and online accounts from cyber-attack risk. Never use a password containing some of your personal information such as complete name, birth date, home address, the name of your school or business and more. Change also your password as frequent as you can to prevent any chance of attackers in entering to your computer system.

Use a different password for multiple online accounts and never disclose it to anybody.

It is safer to use different passwords for your various accounts online. In this case, you are keeping away your personal accounts, especially money-related accounts from cyber-attack risks. As much as possible, you must keep your passwords confidential and never confess them to anybody else.

Always update your computers.

Ensuring your computers up to date is one of the easiest ways of avoiding cyber-attack risks. You must pay attention to all notifications concerning updates to your operating systems, anti-virus, web browsers and firewalls. If you disregard any of these, you will certainly be allowing a threat to invade your security system.

Always read the permissions before installing apps.

Malicious apps have always the chance to gain access to your personal information like in Google Play store. One way of avoiding the risks of cyber-attacks is being patient to read even long permissions before installing apps. It is also essential to be aware of the types of information the apps are asking for an access that can involve your contacts and location.

Make sure to secure your data.

Any business can be at risk of cyber-attacks, especially when it is associated with customer data. Therefore, it is very important to be always mindful of these computer system crimes and know the best actions in reducing it. Cyber-attacks can also cause damages to companies like when issues in their products were revealed to the public.

Ask help from a security expert.

If you suspect that your computers are vulnerable to cyber-attacks, get help from security experts like the “ethical hackers.” These people are well trained to detect any malicious or criminal intent towards your computer and help find security risks that may be hiding in your company system.

Cyber criminals are capable of finding new ways to penetrate your computer system and gain access to your personal information. In business companies, these cyber-attackers can steal sensitive data that cause a billion losses. Learning about the most recent cyber-attack issues and the risks may help you become prepared in protecting your intellectual properties.