The nature of the United States’ PRISM program, operated by the National Security Agency, has left many shocked after its existence was leaked by contractor, Edward Snowden. Snowden claimed PRISM’s collection of public data was far more extensive than people knew, often violating privacy rights due to the program’s underhanded surveillance tactics. In the wake of this scandal, we at The Practice were interested to consider how such data intrusion might affect us, and what can be done to stop it?

Snowden leaked NSA documents that showed access to vast amounts of public data such as chat logs, voice traffic, file transfers, social networking information and other stored data, as well as requests from companies for phone call information made by individuals. Most notably, PRISM allegedly also enabled access to the servers of companies such as Microsoft, Yahoo, Google, Facebook, AOL, Skype, YouTube and Apple. By gaining admission to these technology companies and social networking sites, the program would enable the NSA to view individuals’ private posts and messages, web chats, and Internet searches. Facebook however, was quick to deny any collusion with the government program, with Mark Zuckerberg stating that no agency had any “direct access” to the site’s servers, nor had the NSA or other program implored the company for user information. Google and Apple were also eager to deny any compliance too, with both arguing at the time that they “had not heard of a program called PRISM until yesterday.” Google went on to add that the US government has no “back door” access to its servers, claiming that any press reports that suggested otherwise were simply untrue.

Regardless of who’s admitting what, the root of the issue is that yes, our privacy rights are being infringed, yet simultaneously, data inception allows us a degree of protection: essentially, a “Big Brother” approach could be useful for tracking terrorist or other harmful activity. Ordinary citizens, however, should not need to worry about their data being used for sinister reasons. Still, Internet monitoring is unsettling regardless of motive, so how can we protect ourselves? We at The Practice and other Internet users who are familiar with company clauses stating that user information will not be shared with third party sites, know that Data Protection laws are in place. However, these are geared more towards data companies and the storing, duration, and usage of an individual’s information, rather than governmental agencies. Where other data monitoring is concerned though, things aren’t as simple. According to the Privacy International website, “[s]ince many of the world’s leading technology companies are based in the US, essentially anyone who participates in our interconnected world and uses popular services like Google or Skype can have their privacy violated through the Prism programme.” Unfortunately, there is no foolproof way of protecting the information we share online- perhaps we should just keep schtum and simply make time for more real-life interaction?!

Do you think it unacceptable for governments to have such free access to our confidential data? Or do you think these actions are a necessary precaution against criminal activity now that so much data is exchanged across the web? We’d love to hear your thoughts on this, so please tweet to us @PracticeDigital and leave your comments on our Facebook page.