hankyoreh

“The Snowden incident transformed the security paradigm. In the past, people assumed they just had to worry about the security of their servers and software. The files leaked by Snowden created a sense of crisis, since we now have to maintain the security of our networks and routers, too,” a senior official at the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning told the Hankyoreh when asked to explain the significance of Snowden’s revelations.

During the reporting process, sources at some intelligence agencies contacted by the Hankyoreh downplayed Snowden’s whistleblowing, arguing that surveillance and wiretapping are activities that intelligence organizations have always been involved with.

But Thomas Drake, a former employee for the US’s National Security Agency (NSA) argued that attention should be paid to how technology is changing. While intelligence organizations have always had the instinct to snoop on people, he said, the fact that they are now able to carry out indiscriminate surveillance online not on specific targets but on the public as a whole is a different story altogether.

They aren’t perfect, but there are some ways to go about protecting your personal information.

An increasing number of people are using PGP, a program that encrypts emails and files. The name of the program stands for “Pretty Good Privacy.” Basically, the program seals messages in an envelope that is hard for third parties to open.

When this program is installed, two “electronic keys” are created. One is your “public key,” which you provide to the recipient of the email, and the other is the “private key,” which is used to open an encrypted email upon delivery.

Consequently, when sending encrypted emails or files by PGP, both the sender and the recipient must have received and registered each other’s public keys.

All of the activists at about 10 of the privacy advocacy groups in the US and the UK that the Hankyoreh contacted post their PGP public keys on their websites. If hackers are determined, they can still crack PGP, but it’s not easy to do.

Another option is the Tor browser, which hides information about the sites that you have accessed. If you use this browser for internet searches, third parties will have a hard time figuring out what sites you have visited. At the same time, the browser makes it difficult for sites you visit to determine your IP address.

Both the PGP program and the Tor browser can be downloaded at no cost. In addition to these, individuals can make an effort to safely delete their data and to encrypt their Windows devices. The digital security guide on Jinbo.net, in Korean, is worth taking a look at.

Useful sites: downloading and learning about the PGP program: www.gpg4win.org, downloading and learning about the Tor browser: www.torproject.org, other information: Jinbo.net‘s digital security guide: guide.jinbo.net/digital-security

By Kwon Oh-sung and Ko Na-mu, staff reporters

Please direct questions or comments to [english@hani.co.kr]