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UNITED STATES: GOVERNMENT :
SURVEILLANCE :
PRIVACY :
LIBRARIES: LIBRARIANS:
Librarians Versus the NSA
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Librarians Versus the NSA
Your local library is on the front lines against government surveillance.
Zo Carpenter
May 6, 2015
This article appeared in the May 25, 2015 edition of The Nation.
http://www.thenation.com/article/206561/librarians-versus-nsa
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Alison Macrina had bad news for the 30 or so librarians in the darkened
auditorium on a recent Friday. Your password is bad, she informed them. Im
really sorry. Everything youve learned about passwords is wrong. Its not
your fault.
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Macrina was nearly an hour into a presentation on digital privacy. She and
her colleagues had covered encrypted browsers, tracking, mobile security,
surveillance laws, and what to do if federal agents show up with a letter
from the government demanding library records. Many of the librarians were
bent over their notebooks, scribbling frantically as Macrina whipped
through her slides.
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snip
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Under the Patriot Act, the government can demand library records via a
secret court order and without probable cause that the information is
related to a suspected terrorist plot. It can also block the librarian
from revealing that request to anyone. Nor does the term records cover
only the books you check out; it also includes search histories and hard
drives from library computers. The Muslim-American who uses a library
computer to correspond with family abroad, or the activist planning a
demonstration against police brutalitythose digital trails are vulnerable
to surveillance, along with everyone elses.
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The governments power to vacuum up our personal details seems unstoppable,
but a lot of it depends on how much we give away. Macrina wants librarians
and library users to be less complicit. She installed privacy-protection
tools on computers at the library where she worked in Watertown,
Massachusetts, and started teaching classes on digital privacy to patrons.
Soon, she was leading workshops throughout New England, working with the
American Civil Liberties Union to explain how the government collects data
and about the various tools that librarians can use to protect their
patrons. They started calling their partnership the Library Freedom
Project, and in January they won a Knight Foundation grant to scale up the
program.
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Macrinas project is not just about bringing libraries up to speed. Its
also about leveraging their unique position as community institutions to
invigorate a pallid public dialogue about the surveillance state and civil
liberties. Key sections of the Patriot Act are due to expire on June 1,
but there has been little public scrutiny so far of the congressional
debate about extending or reforming those provisions.
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Librarians have frequently been involved in the fight against government
surveillance.
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The complete article may be read at the URL above.
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Sincerely,
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Temple University
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