Spies like us because we love smartphones, TV

It’s scary to know that smart televisions and phones are being used to watch us — in Ultra High Definition, of course. What we hear about ‘Big Brother’ could be true if Wikileaks’s latest revelations about the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) are to be believed. We could be staring into spy smokescreens as we watch our favourite soaps after a hard day’s night. The smarter the TVs or phones are, the easier it is to track us down and pin the rap on us, if it suits the CIA. Who knows, other intelligence agencies could also be doing it. This is big, and it’s getting bad, and certainly not brotherly when those meant to protect us are snooping on us and sharing that information with heaven knows who. Sure, it is for national security, to keep us safe, but it’s not nice to know that spies are finding their way into our bedrooms through cameras embedded in our gadgets, or shall we say smart gadgets.

It’s not a covert operation anymore, it’s in our face and we don’t even know it. Even if we do, we don’t seem to care as our narcissistic tendencies see a spurt and we lose all sense of privacy, even decency. We are walking, talking, emailing, storing, whatsapping, and leaking information like never before through our sophisticated, handy devices. There is enough Big Data on the Cloud for Big Brother to use against us, and those we love — and hate. Surely, the end does not justify the means for these snoops with their vastly improved capabilities. The CIA could be the biggest hacker of them all, according to the unverified documents accessed by Julian Assange’s organisation. But the American agency is also leaking major secrets in the process, which is not good for global security in an era of cyber wars. Big leaks from big data accessed by big brother who got it from small people like us who have lost lives to smart devices. Confused? This is turning into one big mess.