Technology advances means anyone could be listening

By Yigal Schleifer, Peter Mayer and Lennart Simonsson Apr 12, 2010, 15:40 GMT

Berlin - In a television interview last year, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan was asked if he was concerned about his phone being tapped.

'What do you think? Of course,' Erdogan answered. 'Therefore I watch what I say over the phone. I'm not comfortable speaking over the phone. I tell people who want to speak on the phone to come visit me.'

Most Turks would not be surprised to hear that even the prime minister is worried about having his phone conversations tapped. In the last few years, wiretaps - both legal and illegal - have been increasingly used in investigations and as smear weapons by warring camps in Turkey, unleashing an almost national sense of paranoia in the country.

'I think right now, the legal and illegal wiretapping going on in Turkey, most of it by people in official positions, could be described as more or less out of control,' says Asli Aydintasbas, a columnist with Milliyet, a daily newspaper.

'Me and most of my colleagues do not feel that our conversations are private. Turkey has reached a point where nobody wants to talk to you on the phone if you are a journalist. Nobody wants to give you a quote on a critical topic.'

But Erdogan and his countrymen are far from the only ones who should be worried about their privacy. Advancing technology and a keen sense of curiosity have combined around the world to make it easier for anyone to snoop on anyone else, be it a politician on his rival or a concerned parent who wants to keep track of his teenager.

While Turkish retailers report a booming business in listening and anti-bugging devices, they are far from the only market where these devices are available.

A few clicks on the internet can provide parents with tracking chips for their younger children or hidden global positioning system devices to sneak into their teenager's car to make sure they're at the library when they say they are - as opposed to Friday night's party.

Employers who want to track productivity also have the option to install tracking software onto employees' computers to make sure workers are doing their job and not, say, spending time on social networking sites.

Modern browsers have responded with options to selectively erase viewing history so people can delete the part of their surfing history that they might not want others to know about.

But still, people track down secrets. For example, a UK-based Latvian hacker gained notoriety this year when he seized more than 7 million tax records and fed details about how the elite are dodging austerity measures to the press.

It seems, there is nowhere to go and nothing to do that couldn't theoretically leave one open to a privacy invasion.

Nor is Erdogan the only one worried about his personal information. Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi routinely complains that he is the victim of surveillance, claiming telephone transcripts of his conversations have been leaked to the media for political reasons.

Berlusconi has used the issue to build momentum for legislation to punish journalists who publish certain transcripts. Critics say this is just Berlusconi trying to bottle up potentially embarrassing information.

Nonetheless, several scandals have resulted from leaked transcripts, including most recently some suggesting that Berlusconi allegedly tried to pressure Italy's communications watchdog to block state television talk shows critical of his government.

A Swedish move to permit the wide-ranging monitoring of e-mail and internet traffic has also resulted in a popular backlash.

The Pirate Party - which joined the European Parliament in June 2009 on a platform that included protecting internet privacy, and is also hoping to enter the Swedish parliament in September - has put on seminars on encryption keys and virtual private networks - both of which can keep prying eyes from emails and internet communications.

Kalle Vedin, a member of the Pirate Party and one of the co- organizers of the seminars, told the German Press Agency dpa that those who attended were mainly interested in 'how to hide their identity' and secure their privacy on the internet.

To counter the bugging law, the Pirate Party has also launched free software and an open network, dubbed Tor. The aim is to protect personal freedom and privacy, as well as 'confidential business activities and relationships,' according to the party's website.

'It's nice to know you are not under surveillance,' said Vedin.

More seminars are planned this summer. But other concerns abound, including European Union moves to store data for months at a time.

Aydintasbas, in Turkey, shares fears about attacks on privacy.

Tapping 'instills fear in society at large that there is a big brother watching all of us. Privacy should be a non-negotiable element of democracy.'