(Newswire.net — December 18, 2014) — Nearly 2,400 years ago, Aristotle found himself pondering the ethics of society which led him to study politics a bit more. After all this contemplation he decided to write a treatise on political philosophy which he cleverly named “Politics”.
In Politics he described how a tyrant abuses power for personal benefit at the expense of his subjects. This abuse is tolerated by disguising these actions as virtuous.
On instilling terror, Aristotle elaborated:
“A tyrant should also endeavor to know what each of his subjects says or does, and should employ spies . . . and . . . eavesdroppers . . . [T]he fear of informers prevents people from speaking their minds, and if they do, they are more easily found out.”
Better than Nostradamus, Aristotle accurately predicted the future as this seems to be the official playbook for those in power today, because this is precisely what’s taking place.
But the Sony hacking scandal has dramatically pointed out that it may not just be the government spying on you and it’s surprising that the giant corporation took its digital security so lightly.
Truth be told, most of your digital communications are completely unsecure.
But there are simple steps that you can take to protect your privacy.
Don’t EVER put anything sensitive in an email
There is no expectation of privacy in email and this is like shouting your message across a crowded room.
Encrypted email isn’t totally secure either and it doesn’t prevent you from future action against you. Do you think that your business communications can’t be used against you in court?
Think twice before hitting that “SEND” button
If you have something sensitive to say that you wouldn’t want a jury to see, don’t leave a record of it! Encryption doesn’t matter
Don’t store un-encrypted data in the cloud
Storing your un-encrypted information online using services like Dropbox (guaranteed to share your sensitive data with the government) is foolish at best.
For highly sensitive data, it makes sense to encrypt files locally on your own computer FIRST before uploading them to a cloud server.
There are other services like Switzerland-based Wuala, which offer, secure, “zero knowledge” encrypted storage.
This means effectively that you are the only one who can decrypt the files that are stored.
Yet like Dropbox, Wuala’s software automatically synchronizes your computer to the file server.
(SpiderOak, recommended by Edward Snowden, is a Chicago-based company that provides a similar service.)
As for email, look into using services like RPost where you can encrypt messages, as well as sending registered email.
Source: ttp://www.sovereignman.com/personal-privacy/what-we-can-learn-from-the-sony-hacking-scandal-digital-privacy-resources-15773/