Bezos Becomes World’s Richest Man As Whistleblower Exposes NSA & CIA Collusion with Amazon

Washington, D.C. – Amazon, and its owner Jeff Bezos, who recently surpassed Bill Gates to become the richest man in the world – and who has a $600 million dollar contract with the CIA – have come under fire after a purported whistleblower implicated the company of collusion with the CIA and NSA to spy on Americans.

Bezos, who also owns one of the main propaganda outlets in the United States, The Washington Post, is a controversial figure, who has deep ties to the national security apparatus. He is a former Bilderburger, who has enmeshed his corporations with the national security state.

After building Amazon into an e-commerce behemoth, CEO Jeff Bezos purchased the ailing 140-year-old media goliath in 2013 for $250 million — but his lack of experience in media raised the eyebrows of that industry and much of the business world. The same year Bezos purchased the Post, Amazon landed a $600 million deal with the CIA to develop a coordinated computing cloud for all 17 agencies of the U.S. intelligence community.

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Although innocuous on the surface, that sizable deal appears somewhat darker in consideration of this year’s quasi-official continuance of the U.S. government’s most notorious propaganda program, Operation Mockingbird — during which intelligence agents posed as the media to imbue pro-American propaganda and censor certain information.

Now, a person claiming to be a former tech at one of Amazon’s data centers, which operates “under the purview of VADATA, Inc.” — in an effort to conceal its relationship to Amazon – made a detailed, and scathing claim, which directly implicates the company in working directly with the NSA and CIA to domestically spy on Americans hosting their data on AWS servers.

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The whistleblower claims that after having stumbled upon the illegal domestic surveillance, and notifying superiors to no avail, he/she began to be targeted by both electronic and physical surveillance.

According to the whistleblower’s post on Reddit titled, “I will remain quiet no longer and Americans need to know. I worked on AWS systems (Amazon) and they let agencies carry out unconstitutional domestic surveillence on their customers.“:

In 2011-2012 I worked for AWS on the PDX OPS team. We were responsible for the installation and upkeep of a newly created data cluster in Boardman, OR and Umatilla, OR known internally as PDX. These datacenters are different from others in that they only hire natural born citizens mainly because hidden away in these datacenters is a section known as PDT. Amazon has these datacenters under the purview of VADATA, Inc so the public doesn’t directly know its an Amazon datacenter.

The PDT section is where the government hosts are located. Within this area you’re not allowed to bring in ANY outside electronic device. Doing so accidentally can bring about a felony charge that carries a 10 year sentence, purposefully doing so can be upwards of 50. The security of these datacenters was so tight they even hired an ex-CIA officer to run security.

One afternoon, while reading articles about Snowden leaks, I get a ticket of a PDT host being utulizied by the CIA that had a failed Network Interface Card (NIC). I replaced the card, loaded the firmware and got the host to assimilate to the rest of the network. To verify I fixed the issue I used a RedHat Linux command to show what other hosts the host I was working on was connected to. I had to use a special command known as “sudo” to give me temporary admin privileges to run the command.

What I got back from that command was seeing this host was connected to PRIVATE hosts. When I was first hired I was explicitly told that I should report any instance of a PDT host connecting to a PDX host as it was unconstitutional. I suspected maybe other hosts were like this and found other CIA and NSA hosts doing the same thing. I immediately reported it to the datacenter manager and he told me not to worry.

After that I noticed a lot of weird things outside of work. My phone would make odd noises when I was calling someone. Numerous occasions I had planes follow me. One time I took a walk around town and this helicopter was following me almost the entirety of my walk. I tried to be out as long as I could and the helicopter left to refeul and came back to find me. I also had someone logging into my bank account on a recurring basis. I would get a text notification everyday at 6am that someone logged into my account. I spoke with the bank IT staff and got them traceroute the request and it was coming from Langley, VA. After this the logins into my account immediately stopped.

Nevertheless my contract wasn’t renewed and my career in IT has stalled since then. My suspicion is I was placed on a blacklist. I am also an unusual IT technician in that I have experience in working in DC having a lot of facetime with politicians and other powerplayers. I was in a unique position to understand the technology AND the significant political impact that this could have on the rest of America.

I can no longer sit idly by and be quiet. What I saw is a crime of the highest order and this was over six years ago. Now the datacluster has grown leaps and bounds and is much more compartmentalized. God only knows what the hell they allow now. I’m done living in fear what happened and I feel ashamed to work on technology that serves to limit and constrain all of us. I only did what I thought was true, just and patriotic and I was punished for it. Amazon is just as much of the swamp and President Trump has every reason to go after them. MAGA

The Free Thought Project attempted to contact the whistleblower to corroborate their version of events, but at the time of publication had not received a response. The clear collusion between Amazon and Post owner Jeff Bezos, and the national security apparatus, is clear and unambiguous.

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The whistleblower’s revelations provide a unique insight into exactly how Bezos is using his mega-fortune to assist in propping up a duel purpose propaganda/domestic surveillance apparatus that allows the government to essentially use these companies as private contractors for the security state, while outwardly operating as businesses that serve the public interest, thus lulling the average American into complacency.

Please share this story to help awaken the public to the collusion between government and business at the expense of privacy and truth!

John Lennon ‘Murdered by CIA-trained Killer to Stop ex-Beatle Radicalising Youth’ – Author

Singer, songwriter, and Beatle, John Lennon didn’t meet his fate at the hands of a deranged fan, according to a book; instead, his killer received training from the CIA and other U.S. Intelligence agencies — and not for his music.

Author John Potash claims the U.S. government wanted Lennon erased for his robust influence promoting what it deemed “radical leftist” ideologies.

In essence, dissenting opinion coupled with massive popularity brought to fruition Lennon’s killing.

But United States Intelligence mavens didn’t shake perturbance with dissent after Mark David Chapman ended Lennon’s four decades of life with a hail of gunfire outside the penultimate icon’s New York City apartment on the night of December 8, 1980 — Potash insists the CIA pursued both epochal rapper, Tupac Shakur, and grunge rock legend, Kurt Cobain.

Described in news reports as a rabid, psychotic fan, 25-year-old Chapman landed a sentence of 20 years-to-life after pleading guilty to second-degree murder.

Lennon’s murder has since kindled countless putative ‘conspiracy’ theories, including many mirroring that proffered by Potash in his incendiary book, “Drugs as Weapons Against Us.”

Potash, according to Express, writes that Lennon’s ostensively untenable activities included spearheading anti-war demonstrations and a benefit concert to free imprisoned activist, poet, and similar U.S. government target, John Sinclair.

Sinclair’s radical beliefs and actions — which included founding the revolutionary anti-racist White Panthers — also shook the war-mongering establishment to the core, and the Flint, Michigan, native ultimately succeeded proving he’d been the subject of illegal domestic surveillance to the U.S. Supreme Court in 1972.

Lennon’s turn from drugs toward the anti-war movement and political activism, Potash writes, reaped grave concerns from the Intelligence Community — which saw the ex-Beatle’s unhindered clout over youth as a threat to the U.S. agenda abroad and at home.

Lennon, a native of Liverpool, had just one month remaining until U.S. citizenship would be granted when Chapman took his life.

“This exemplified the international interest and influence of Lennon, underscoring why his leftist activism was a threat to the CIA and the oligarchy,” Potash explains.

“The book recounts an investigation by former Sunday Express legal correspondent Fenton Bresler, who obtained classified documents from the FBI and CIA,” Express reports.

“The documents were said to show the star’s arrest for drugs use in 1972 was ‘to neutralise and disrupt’ his activities. They suggested Lennon was tracked by the intelligence agencies during the 1970s.”

One of the most salient, if explosive, claims detailed in the book surrounds Chapman’s alleged CIA training in Beirut, Lebanon, where — with a hefty population of Palestinian refugees, and as that nation spiraled into heated conflict — the U.S. spy agency had a massive presence, in the years surrounding Lennon’s murder.

According to Potash, Chapman “waited for Lennon to arrive home on the fatal night, kneeled down in a combat stance and shot the star four times in the back from 20ft away […]

“He could have escaped but instead took of his coat, folded it up and took out Catcher in the Rye out of his pocket.”

Countless theories have enunciated peculiarities surrounding Lennon’s killing, including that, as Phil Strongman penned in “John Lennon: Life, Times and Assassination,” Chapman might have been “programmed” to carry out the murder — and J.D. Salinger’s epic tome indeed played a role. He wrote,

“Catcher In The Rye was part of Chapman’s hypnotic programming, a trigger that could be ‘fired’ at him by a few simple keywords [via] a cassette tape message, telex or telegram or even a mere telephone call.”

In a previous interview, NYPD Lt. Arthur O’Connor told Bresler, the Sunday Express journalist, “Chapman looked like he could have been programmed and I know that you are going to make of that word. That was the way he looked and that was the way he talked.”

A spokesman for the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency unsurprisingly asserted to Express the claims in Potash’s book are ‘baseless’ and do not warrant consideration.

However, to the untold numbers comprising Lennon’s perpetual fan base — and to all who champion the right to dissent and the imperative of liberties in the Constitution delineating as much — accounts like Potash’s provide resounding confirmation the government does not, and will never, abide being crossed.

Ron Paul: Comey was a Good Start — Now Fire the Entire FBI

President Trump fired FBI Director James Comey and set ablaze the Internet gossip mill, as political analysts and ordinary Americans, alike, debated the implications for the bureau’s investigation into the president’s alleged collusion with Russia — while others celebrated that, for the first time, it might be possible to copy that favorite VHS tape or remove the tags from pillows without an agent knocking down the front door.

Others proposed more ambitious plans for the newly headless Federal Bureau of Investigation — perhaps, Dr. Ron Paul posited, the entire bureau should be disbanded.

Lamenting the degree to which Comey’s termination has been politicized by media pundits and Washington pols, Paul implored the need for critical thinking on the matter, asking the nation to consider several imperatives.

“What is the purpose of the FBI? And are they fulfilling a purpose?” Dr. Paul rhetorically asks Daniel McAdams for the Liberty Report. Further, is it possible Comey had already politicized the position of FBI director, well before Trump harkened back to his days as a reality TV host to tell the head spook, ‘You’re fired’?

Further still, is the existence of an organization “investigating and spying on everybody” in the country even necessary — let alone, justifiable?

With around 35,000 agents at its disposal — enough to populate a small city — the agency has mushroomed to proportions unnecessary for a nation virtually devoid of terrorism or other constant, existential threats.

Dr. Paul explains the spin machine keeps Comey’s firing in the headlines, with politicians contributing significantly in plastering the incident — rather than aggressive and belligerent actions by the U.S. military — nonstop across headlines. Indeed, the same politicians now feigning disgust with Trump’s dismissal of the FBI chief, just one month ago would have seen Comey’s head on a figurative platter.

That hypocrisy and the resultant untenable anger on display merits a closer look at whether the controversial spy organization has outlived any benefit to the public, if in fact, there ever was one.

Discussing the State’s propaganda machine, Dr. Paul emphasizes that what’s typically termed ‘spin’ in actuality, “it’s mostly flat-out lying — when they lie us into war,” as has been the case in Syria and a lengthy list of other zones of conflict with U.S. military involvement.

“It isn’t just modification in tone,” he continues, “it literally is deceiving the people. And this doesn’t mean that what’s happening at the FBI isn’t serious, but I also think this whole process brings up the subject, ‘How important is the FBI?’

“I mean, it is powerful. And we know this is just one-hundred-and-some years old, and was started during Teddy Roosevelt’s term in office — which is no surprise — and they don’t have a very good record.”

It was the era of J. Edgar Hoover — a man who held the position for nearly five years, Comey has been forced to leave — when the collection of data became an obsession of the FBI. Hoover’s bureau possessed “data on everybody,” and frequently used that as a form of political “blackmail,” Paul notes, adding, “in many ways, Hoover was a disgrace, but that sentiment has continued, and still exists in the FBI.”

Hoover’s storied tenure with the bureau forced the imposition of a ten-year term limit for FBI directors. Dr. Paul isn’t alone in such a critical assessment of the FBI’s history and continued legacy after Hoover.

Indeed, the controversial figure managed to keep that title for so long, in part, because, as former Washington Post investigative reporter Ronald Kessler noted,

“He wrapped himself in the flag and was this great patriot, and nobody could question him, so in that sense, he was a product of the times.”

“But over the course of his term,” TIME reports, “the power he held began to seem a little too extreme. During those years, Hoover had already become infamous for keeping blackmail files on members of Congress, even Presidents, and for wire-tapping dissidents (which, in his view, even included Martin Luther King Jr.). Even so, he kept his job. Richard Hack, author of Puppet Master: The Secret Life of J. Edgar Hoover, told NBC’s Dateline that President John F. Kennedy was ‘scared to death’ of Hoover because he didn’t know the full extent of the dirt that Hoover may have had on him. As President Lyndon B. Johnson once explained why he couldn’t fire Hoover: ‘I’d rather have him inside the tent pissing out than outside pissing in.’”

To bring that history into modern relevance, McAdams explains the FBI’s pattern of quashing vocal opposition to U.S. involvement in various wars is longstanding if unstated policy — currently, and particularly, in the case of Syria, where a proxy battle with Russia has been ongoing for years.

Dr. Paul suggests the FBI’s penchant for scrutinizing dissenters both inside and outside the political realm could be in practice now, as the Hoover-era bureau amassed data on German- and Japanese-Americans — beginning a full two years prior to the start of World War II. Even more telling of our present climate and the focus of the Feds, McAdams adds, that same FBI kept an eye on politicians seeking a diplomatic recognition of Soviet Russia — the same narrative proffered by the D.C. establishment today, sans the U.S.S.R. overtones.

“It’s like history repeating itself,” McAdams asserts.

“You know, the founders warned against a standing army,” Dr. Paul affirms, “and I think … we have the standing army. We have the nationalization of the police force. And the FBI has thirty-five thousand in their ‘army.

“But that is even small when you look up everything else under the Department of Homeland Security. I mean, we are an armed State against the People. There are probably more people patrolling our streets from the Federal Government than the horrible mess we’re doing overseas.”

Dr. Paul asks, “And what do they do? We end up losing. We’re supposed to be fighting and getting involved to protect our Constitution and our liberties.”

But that isn’t what the FBI does — its collection of information on American citizens and leaders runs in direct contradiction to the supposed protection of freedoms with which such an organization ostensively began.

Looking to the formation of the United States, Paul reminds the audience just three areas were considered the purview of Congress: “treason, counterfeiting, and piracy” — today’s manifestation of federal oversight has instead become a pernicious and overbearing force, with the FBI one of the primary culprits.

As Paul and McAdams continue the discussion, the insidious nature of the modern FBI is made apparent, between spying and data collection, to the creation of a climate of fear — where a pro-war, pro-U.S. interventionist belief system equivocates laudable patriotism — and civilians blindly accept whatever narrative the government puts forth, no matter the consequences to liberty and innate rights.

“I would not be upset if we didn’t have an FBI,” Dr. Paul opines.

People might believe such a stance means an Intelligence Community shouldn’t exist at all, but Paul clarifies, “I believe in an intelligent gathering of intelligence — and not to give power to a select group working in privacy.”

Perhaps, considering the tabloidesque iterations in headlines and discussions of the firing of James Comey, Ron Paul’s call to dismantle the factious spy organization known as the FBI isn’t such a ludicrous proposition, after all.

They Can See a ‘Stick of Butter from Space’ — The Billion Dollar Spy Agency You’ve Never Heard Of

While most Americans would consider the CIA, and perhaps the NSA, household names, one U.S. spy agency — whose headquarters surpasses the U.S. Capitol in size — has managed to keep to the shadows while possessing cutting edge tools of the surveillance trade.

Called the  National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA), even former President Barack Obama didn’t know of its existence when he first took office — despite that the agency employs some 15,400 people.

“So, what do you [do]?” Obama asked a customer at a Washington, D.C., Five Guys hamburgers in May 2009.

“I work at NGA, National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency,” he answered.

“Outstanding,” then-president Obama asserted. “How long have you been doing that?”

“Six years.”

“So, explain to me exactly what this National Geospatial …” Obama asked, unable to recall the agency’s full name.

Timidly, the man replied, “Uh, we work with, uh, satellite imagery.”

“Obama appeared dumbfounded,” Foreign Policy’s James Bamford reports. “Eight years after that videotape aired, the NGA remains by far the most shadowy member of the Big Five spy agencies, which include the CIA and the National Security Agency.”

The NGA’s secretive identity belies the agency’s massive physical size and the scope of its surveillance activities, as Bamford continues,

“Completed in 2011 at a cost of $1.4 billion, the main building measures four football fields long and covers as much ground as two aircraft carriers. In 2016, the agency purchased 99 acres in St. Louis to construct additional buildings at a cost of $1.75 billion to accommodate the growing workforce, with 3,000 employees already in the city.

“The NGA is to pictures what the NSA is to voices. Its principal function is to analyze the billions of images and miles of video captured by drones in the Middle East and spy satellites circling the globe. But because it has largely kept its ultra-high-resolution cameras pointed away from the United States, according to a variety of studies, the agency has never been involved in domestic spy scandals like its two far more famous siblings, the CIA and the NSA. However, there’s reason to believe that this will change under President Donald Trump.”

Originally tasked primarily with cartography — before a mammoth expansion, the spy arm had been called the National Imagery and Mapping Agency — until a name and mission switch in 2003 gave the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency its name, with the hyphen allowing a three-letter acronym so enamored by the government.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower, whose fondness for imagery intelligence became known when he served as a general during World War II, created the National Photographic Interpretation Center shortly before leaving office — an agency also later absorbed by the NGA.

Now, the NGA works in conjunction with the U.S. Air Force to analyze the staggering amount of data collected through aerial surveillance abroad — mostly by unmanned aerial systems, such as drones with high-powered cameras.

According to at least one source, as of 2013, the NGA was integral in the analysis of surveillance data pertaining to Iran’s nuclear capabilities.

Revelations on the depth and breadth of the Central Intelligence Agency’s domestic capabilities, long believed out of its territory, was exposed by Wikileaks Vault 7 recently to be on par with National Security Agency programs — so much so, analysts say it constitutes a duplicate Big Brother.

Data provided to the NGA by military officials has assisted in various U.S. operations in the Middle East by tracking vehicles believed responsible for planting improvised explosive devices, or IEDs, and for monitoring hot spots for insurgent breakouts.

But the NGA hardly only keeps to support operations, as David Brown — author of the book, “Deep State: Inside the Government Secrecy Industry” — explained,

“Before the trigger was pulled on NEPTUNE’S SPEAR, the mission to kill Osama Bin Laden, SEAL Team Six had access to a perfect replica of the Abbottabad compound where the terrorist mastermind was hiding. The details for the replica were gathered by the NGA, which used laser radar and imagery to construct a 3D rendering of the compound. How precise were its measurements and analysis? The NGA figured out how many people lived at the compound, their gender, and even their heights. But the NGA didn’t stop there: Its calculations also helped the pilots of the stealth Black Hawks know precisely where to land.”

With a combined budget request for 2017 of $70.3 billion, the National and Military Intelligence Programs — NGA falls under the latter — have seen a quickening of support from the authoritarian-leaning, pro-military Trump administration. This and additional factors — such as the astonishingly sophisticated equipment at the agency’s disposal — have ignited fears the NGA could be granted authority to bring its expert microscope into focus against the American people.

“While most of the technological capacities are classified, an anonymous NGA analyst told media the agency can determine the structure of buildings and objects from a distance, has some of the most sophisticated facial recognition software on the planet and uses sensors on satellites and drones that can see through thick clouds for ‘all-weather’ imagery analysis,” reports news.com.au.

Efforts to bolster NGA’s innovate staff pool ratcheted up on Thursday, as Business Wire reported,

“From navigating a U.S. aircraft to making national policy decisions, to responding to natural disasters: today’s U.S. armed forces rely on Geospatial Intelligence (GEOINT) to meet mission requirements. As the nation’s primary source of GEOINT for the Department of Defense and the U.S. Intelligence Community, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency (NGA) depends on the National Geospatial-Intelligence College (NGC) to produce top-tier talent to deliver intelligence with a decisive advantage. Today, Booz Allen Hamilton (BAH) announced that it has been awarded a five-year, $86 million contract by NGA-NGC to lead the Learning Management and Advancement Program (LMAP) that will provide high-quality learning solutions to equip a diverse workforce with the knowledge and skills necessary to meet current and future GEOINT mission requirements.”

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Bamford points out for Foreign Policy the Trump administration intimated a significant expansion of spying on mosques and Islamic centers, while others admonish said surveillance could put Black Lives Matter and other protest groups in the NGA’s silent crosshairs.

Of distinct concern for privacy advocates are drones with uncanny zooming capabilities — features used against U.S. citizens before. Bamford continues,

“In 2016, unbeknownst to many city officials, police in Baltimore began conducting persistent aerial surveillance using a system developed for military use in Iraq. Few civilians have any idea how advanced these military eye-in-the-sky drones have become. Among them is ARGUS-IS, the world’s highest-resolution camera with 1.8 billion pixels. Invisible from the ground at nearly four miles in the air, it uses a technology known as ‘persistent stare’ — the equivalent of 100 Predator drones peering down at a medium-size city at once — to track everything that moves.

“With the capability to watch an area of 10 or even 15 square miles at a time, it would take just two drones hovering over Manhattan to continuously observe and follow all outdoor human activity, night and day. It can zoom in on an object as small as a stick of butter on a plate and store up to 1 million terabytes of data a day. That capacity would allow analysts to look back in time over days, weeks, or months. Technology is in the works to enable drones to remain aloft for years at a time.”

With cutting edge technology, a rapid enlargement underway, and billions in budgetary funds at the ready, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency is the cloaked, mute sibling of the nefarious Intelligence Community — but it’s time to pull the protective shell off this potential ticking time bomb before reining it in becomes an impossibility.

Windows 10 Has Been Logging Everything You Type — Here’s How To Stop It

According to a startling new report, if you use Windows 10, every, single keystroke you’ve ever entered on your computer has been logged.

If that weren’t alarming enough to the privacy-minded among us, all of that information is being sent directly to Microsoft.

All of which begs the question, is this why Microsoft was so insistent its users download Windows 10 as soon as it became available?

“You know those nagging questions during the installation process that ask you whether or not you want to ‘help’ improve Windows by sending data to Microsoft? If you happened to answer ‘yes’ to one of these questions, or if you went with the Microsoft default installation, there is a real possibility that everything you have done on your computer from the get-go, including sending ‘secure’ messages (because the keyboard logger captures your keystrokes before they appear in your secure messaging app), is now a part of a massive user database somewhere,” reports SHTFPlan.com.

“It’s been reported that Microsoft has been using the data to improve artificial intelligence writing and grammar software, but it’s not clear what else they are doing with it.”

Unlike recent headlines of security breaches, hacks, and compromised database information, this rather contentious little issue has a few rather simple solutions.

If you have yet to upgrade to Windows 10, you’re in luck — just select “custom install” and make sure to check “no” for each of the questions asked about sending information out to Microsoft or any third party.

“To find out whether everything you type is being logged, SHTFPlan notes,

Simply click on your Windows 10 Start Menu. From there, go to Settings (or the gear icon) -> Privacy -> General.                                                                                              

You’ll want to turn off the option that says, ‘Send Microsoft info about how I write to help us improve typing and writing in the future.’

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International Business Times explains what to do if you’ve already upgraded:

If you have Windows 10 installed, then you need to go to the Start menu and then select Settings > Privacy > General. Turn off the option that reads, ‘Send Microsoft info about how I write to help us improve typing and writing in the future’. To be safe, restart your computer after selecting this option.

For those with technical knowledge, there are additional steps you can take to eradicate the gossip line between your computer and Microsoft — but they come with the caveat the methods have been discovered by the Windows 10 users community, so they cannot be guaranteed to be safe or effective.

Windows Update MiniTool

“The Windows Update MiniTool freeware by MajorGeeks allows users to check for Windows Updates and see a description of what they do. You can decide whether you want to install the available updates, hide the ones you don’t like and even delete updates that have been installed that you disagree with,” IBT explains.

This software explains software updates simply and makes an uninstall easy if necessary.

Reduce Updates

By reducing the number of extraneous updates Microsoft sends your computer — keeping vital security patches and the like — users with low bandwidth have an option.

“To do this, go to the Start menu and then select Settings > Network & Internet > Wi-Fi. In Wi-Fi, click ‘Advanced Options’ and then select ‘on’ for the option ‘Set as metered connection’.”

Turn Off All Updates

Although this method is not at all advised and thus must be done at your own risk, “Go to the Start menu and type ‘Run’ in the search field. Click on the program, type ‘services.msc’ and then click ‘OK’. Look in the list of services, find the ‘Windows Update’ listing and double-click on it. Click on the drop down menu for ‘Startup type’ and select ‘Disabled’, then click OK to confirm and restart your computer.”

While these fixes might take Microsoft’s nose out of your business, keep in mind we have recently become privy to the CIA’s egregiously invasive spying program — a mirror twin of the already-dubious NSA domestic spy dragnet and more.

The World Has Spoken! Over 1 Million People Just Demanded Obama Pardon Snowden

More than 1 million signatures from around the world graced a letter from the heads of the American Civil Liberties Union, Amnesty International, and Human Rights Watch, delivered to President Obama on Friday, in an eleventh-hour attempt to pardon whistleblower Edward Snowden.

“As you well know, Snowden disclosed information to journalists revealing that the NSA had overstepped U.S. statutes, the Constitution, and international law by engaging in widespread, warrantless surveillance. In response, we’ve seen a global debate that has changed government policies and profoundly affected how people think about personal privacy,” wrote Anthony D. Romero, ACLU Executive Director; Salil Shetty, Secretary General of Amnesty International; and HRW Executive Director Kenneth Roth — after amassing 1,101,252 signatories from around the globe.

“Since Snowden acted, all three branches of the U.S. government have worked to rein in the NSA’s powers. Technology companies have increased their use of encryption. The United Nations appointed a first-ever privacy watchdog. These are but a few examples of the reforms triggered by Snowden.

“You said yourself in 2014 that the debate spurred by Snowden ‘will make us stronger.’ You were proven right. His actions gave people everywhere the knowledge to debate the merits of surveillance powers that had largely evaded democratic oversight even as they vastly grew in scope.”

Snowden, of course, has been branded either a true hero or America’s villain number one — the result of a propaganda campaign falsely conflating his actions with an act of treason. In fact, blowing the whistle — exposing corruption, collusion, or any illegal activity — has been revered throughout history for keeping the government in check.

While Snowden’s detractors focus on the fact he broke the law, supporters view the hugely unconstitutional and invasive domestic surveillance dragnet — which had continued without public disclosure for years — as the infinitely more serious crime.

Retaliation by the government against whistleblowers is unfortunately standard practice, as the authors of the letter note, pointing out Snowden — for his part — had not been indiscriminate in his choice of responsible journalists to whom the classified information was provided. As the letter continues,

“We are confident that Edward Snowden will be remembered as a human rights hero and one of history’s most important whistleblowers. A presidential pardon for Snowden would be a brave affirmation of citizens’ right to hold governments to account when power is abused.”

Indeed, that he prudently considered who would receive the stunning information — knowing they would vet the documents and not release anything unnecessarily — contrasts with the methods of whistleblowing publisher and Wikileaks founder, Julian Assange.

Wikileaks will never divulge its sources and has a spotless record of publishing authentic documents; but — with the exception of imminent danger to individuals — the outlet posts documents it receives, in full.

But one thing they share in common evinces the humanitarian instinct behind shining the light of truth on wrongdoing behind the curtains — both have offered themselves in place of beleaguered whistleblower Chelsea Manning.

Manning, a transgender woman (prior name Bradley), exposed atrocities in war committed against civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan.

In fact, the rawest portrayal of horrifying acts committed by the U.S. military came from Manning’s handing over to Wikileaks video of an Apache helicopter crew gleefully gunning down a group of civilians gathered on a sidewalk — two of whom were Reuters journalists.

“Collateral Murder,” as that video is known, ripped the veil off naked and callous violence U.S. troops had been employing against innocent people in Middle East operations — even though it is thought the crew believed the journalists’ cameras were actually guns.

For doing the right thing by handing over the enormous trove of documents and that video, Manning now languishes in military prison, having served seven years of a 35-year sentence — but she hasn’t fared well in confinement. Having twice attempted to end her life, it’s widely believed Manning won’t survive if forced to endure the entirety of the sentence.

In light of this — and considering the incoming administration of President-elect Donald Trump is predicted to take a more authoritarian turn — Snowden pleaded with President Obama to grant Manning clemency, rather than even consider a pardon for himself.

“Mr. President, if you grant only one act of clemency as you exit the White House, please: free Chelsea Manning. You alone can save her life,” Snowden tweeted.

Mr. President, if you grant only one act of clemency as you exit the White House, please: free Chelsea Manning. You alone can save her life.

— Edward Snowden (@Snowden) January 11, 2017

Mere hours after that plea, Assange followed suit — and sweetened the deal — by offering himself for extradition to the United States if Obama allows Manning to walk free.

“If Obama grants Manning clemency Assange will agree to US extradition despite clear unconstitutionality of DoJ case,” Wikileaks posted to Twitter.

If Obama grants Manning clemency Assange will agree to US extradition despite clear unconstitutionality of DoJ case https://t.co/MZU30SlfGK

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) January 12, 2017

Assange has called the Ecuadorian Embassy in London home since 2012 by invitation amid fears Stockholm would turn him over to the U.S., where, of course, whistleblowers face lengthy prison sentences and worse. His asylum is therefore akin to political imprisonment — but the offer to sacrifice his own freedom in exchange for Manning’s shows how imperative it is that she be released.

Obama has promised to continue granting clemency until his last day, and as that draws near, the conclusion in the letter to pardon Snowden could as easily apply to all three of these courageous whistleblowers who did nothing more than tear the façade from heinous government activity:

“We know your last days in office are filled with many demands. We hope you will recognize the importance of addressing the fate of this American whistleblower.”

Cops Now Taught to Use Appliances in Crime Investigations, Because Your Fridge is Watching You

Thanks to what’s known as the Internet of things — the growing number of ‘smart’ devices and appliances connected to the web and each other — will be used by police to solve violent crimes.

Your fridge, law enforcement says, might help solve a murder.

However beneficial that sounds, it indicates a number of circumstances to send chills down the spines of privacy rights advocates — or anyone who doesn’t find the idea of, say, a washing machine spying on their every move.

“Wireless cameras within a device, such as fridge, may record the movement of owners and suspects,” Metropolitan Police head of the digital, cyber and communications forensics unit, Mark Stokes told The Times.

“Doorbells that connect directly to apps on a user’s phone can show who has rung the door and the owner or others may then remotely, if they choose, to give controlled access to the premises while away from the property.

“All these leave a log and a trace of activity. The crime scene of tomorrow is going to be the internet of things.”

Stokes explained detectives are already being trained to hunt for such devices at crime scenes in order to map both victims’ and suspects’ digital footprints. So many appliances and personal devices are now linked to the Internet under the premise of convenience, Stokes assessment isn’t an exaggeration.

Indeed, many privacy advocates and domestic surveillance critics — like whistleblower Edward Snowden — have long warned the consumer culture’s lust for convenience and saving time would usurp more rational goal of keeping the government’s prying eyes out of our homes.

Instead, as the Telegraph explains, in just one example,

“The new Samsung Family Hub Fridge has cameras that carry a live feed of its contents, so shoppers can tell what they need when they are out at the shop. The dates and times that people logon to the fridge, therefore could provide alibis or prove people were not were they said they were.”

Further, authorities have been working to create a portable “digital forensics toolkit” —  for analyzing microchips and downloading information on the spot — so police would not be forced to remove large appliances from a crime scene for testing.

As Stokes noted, however, private corporations — the manufacturers of these devices — could create obstacles to this potential gold mine of information. Concern for customers’ privacy has, indeed, been a barrier for investigators in Bentonville, Arkansas, who have filed search warrants to obtain the information from murder suspect James A. Bates’ Amazon Echo.

Law enforcement have filed search warrants with Amazon for recordings from the device in hopes it had been voice activated and captured clues to explain how Victor Collins was strangled to death in Bates’ hot tub in 2015 — but, thus far, the company has not complied.

“It is believed that these records are retained by Amazon.com and that they are evidence related to the case under investigation,” the search warrant reads.

Police have already obtained information from the electric water meter on Bates’ house, and feel the Echo — a voice-activated device which plays music, can answer questions, turns on home appliances, and uses artificial intelligence to improve service over time — might have recorded information vital to parsing out the murder.

When it comes to the Internet of things and the accommodating features such devices provide, costs to personal privacy far outweigh the benefits of saved time. Indeed, considering law enforcement and government authorities are far from infallible, the thought your connected devices have an astonishing amount of information about your otherwise private life should be of sharp concern.

While it might be noble to solve violent crime using any means necessary, the potential for abuse — police trumping up charges after accidentally ‘discovering,’ for example, non-violent, victimless crimes a person committed — is unparalleled.

For owners of the Amazon Echo worried about privacy, instructions for deleting audio recordings can be found here.