What the Future of Government Surveillance Looks Like

Before the Internet, when surveillance consisted largely of government-on-government espionage, agencies like the NSAwould target specific communications circuits: that Soviet undersea cable between Petropavlovsk and Vladivostok, a military communications satellite, a microwave network. This was for the most part passive, requiring large antenna farms in nearby countries.

Modern targeted surveillance is likely to involve actively breaking into an adversary’s computer network and installing malicious software designed to take over that network and “exfiltrate” data—that’s NSA talk for stealing it. To put it more plainly, the easiest way for someone to eavesdrop on your communications isn’t to intercept them in transit anymore; it’s to hack your computer.

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