Too many wrongly characterize the debate as “security versus privacy.” The real choice is liberty versus control.
This is the loss of freedom we face when our privacy is taken from us. This is life in former East Germany, or life in Saddam Hussein’s Iraq. And it’s our future as we allow an ever-intrusive eye into our personal, private lives.
Many think that this debate will just go away – it won’t. This is a BIG deal, one that I think is the biggest in our generation. Do not be quiet about this. Do not let tech multinationals and your government do this.
There are many more articles on this (these are just today’s), but here’s another by Glenn Greenwald at the Guardian on the US and UK defeating privacy and security on the internet.
]]>Apparently, and surprisingly to me, the answer is “not Africa” or South America.
“During the last week of July, AVG researchers compiled a list of virus and malware attacks by country picked up by AVG security software. This means we have compiled data from over 127 million computers in 144 countries to determine the incidence rates of virus attacks by country.”
Dirk Singer, of AVG sent over the list of African countries, here they are country-by-country. As you can see, sub-saharan Africa is compatively ‘safe’ compared to other areas of the World. Your chances of being attacked while surfing the web in each country are:
North Africa
- Egypt 1 in 62.4
- Algeria 1 in 86.9
- Libya 1 in 87.7
- Mauritania 1 in 92.4
- Tunisia 1 in 110.7
- Morocco 1 in 112.1
Sub-Saharan Africa
- Mali 1 in 49.9
- Sudan 1 in 53.9
- Nigeria 1 in 67.5
- Benin 1 in 76.6
- Ghana 1 in 99.4
- Ivory Coast 1 in 101.5
- Gabon 1 in 113.1
- Angola 1 in 129.7
- Botswana 1 in 134.4
- Ethiopia 1 in 135.8
- Senegal 1 in 140.6
- Uganda 1 in 153.6
- Liberia 1 in 153.8
- Burkina Faso 1 in 163.4
- South Africa 1 in 172.3
- Tanzania 1 in 180.6
- Kenya 1 in 216.1
- Zambia 1 in 262.2
- Mozambique 1 in 263.8
- Zambia 1 in 262.2
- Namibia 1 in 353.1
- Togo 1 in 359.4
- Niger 1 in 442.0
- Sierra Leone 1 in 696.0
Keep in mind, this was over one week and it also doesn’t point directly towards where the attacks are originating from. Interesting data though, and not what I would have expected to see.
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