Is Perfect Citizen national security, or Big Brother in disguise?

"Perfect Citizen" is the name of a government program to monitor the computer networks of public and private entities that will be led by the National Security Agency (NSA). The purpose of Perfect Citizen is to prevent cyber attacks against resources considered vital to national security like public utilities and power plants. To supporters, Perfect Citizen is a reassuring presence, when others see Big Brother in massive automated NSA surveillance.

Post resource: Is Perfect Citizen legit network security, or Big Brother?

 Perfect Citizen: Internet security on steroids

The story about Perfect Citizen broke within the Wall Street Journal. The Journal reports that the government's chief eavesdroppers, the NSA will deploy a set of sensors within the computer networks of entities deemed critical that is triggered by spikes that could possibly be warnings of a cyber attack. Phase one of Perfect Citizen can be executed by Ratheon, a defense contractor awarded $ 100 million for the task. Some industry and government officials who know about Perfect Citizen see it as an intrusion by the NSA into domestic affairs. Others believe it is about time the NSA got to the game, being that it is the only agency in place that can deal with the responsibility.

Intelligence gathered by NSA could be shared

 The Journal article explains that Perfect Citizen can be applied to older computer networks that were designed before Internet security was an issue. Everything from air-traffic control to subways are run by numerous of those networks. Since they have been linked to the Internet, they're more efficient, but very vulnerable to cyber attack. The NSA said Perfect Citizen will allow it to collect and share intelligence on cyber attacks that all companies can use for network security.

Can we trust Big Brother to behave?

Many people are uneasy about Perfect Citizen, maybe because of its Orwellian title. The primary concern, PC World reports, is that Perfect Citizen is just the prelude to the NSA's eventual monitoring of all domestic network activity. Details about the power usage and travel plans of private citizens may also be collected by the NSA with access to the computer networks of entities critical to national security. For now, nobody really knows if Perfect Citizen can enforce national security without trampling on the rights of private citizens.


More details accessible at these sites:

wsj.com

www.nsa.gov

pcworld.com