The Washington Post reports on leaked U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) slides that reveal the agency is “piggybacking” on tools used by Internet advertisers to locate potential targets for government hacking and surveillance. According to documents leaked by Edward Snowden, the NSA and the UK’s GCHQ use cookies to identify individuals. Specifically, they have used Google’s PREF cookies, which generally do not contain personal information but do include users’ e-mail addresses and numeric codes to identify their browsers, the report states. Additionally, the documents reveal that the NSA is using commercially collected data to help it locate mobile devices around the world. Meanwhile, in Canada, Jean-Pierre Plouffe has indicated “recent leaks about the Five Eyes intelligence network are being taken out of context by the media,” The Canadian Press reports, while several Canadian privacy experts have written an op-ed contending, “Surveillance with such lax privacy protections is fundamentally inconsistent with the values of a free and democratic society.” (Registration may be required to access this story.)
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