Black Code

---

1

[clock ticking]

[typing]

[man] We are going through

the most profound change

in communication technologies in

all of human history right now.

[chattering]

Printing press, radio, telegraph,

television. All very important.

But I believe we're going

through the most transformative,

purely on the basis

of three technologies.

Mobile, social media

and cloud computing.

They share one

very important characteristic.

And that's the amount

of private information.

Information that used to be in

our desktops or filing cabinets,

even in our heads,

that we now

entrust to third parties.

[whirring]

Data that we are conscious of,

and deliberate about,

like the e-mails we send

and the tweets we post.

But it also includes

a lot of information

that we're completely,

or mostly, unconscious about.

So if you take my mobile phone,

even when I'm not using it,

it's emitting a pulse,

trying to locate the nearest Wi-Fi

router or cell phone exchange,

and within that beacon is

the make and model of the phone,

the fact that it's my phone,

because my name is attached

to the operating system,

and most importantly,

the geolocation of the phone.

[drone humming]

[man speaking Portuguese]

[Deibert continues] We are

leaving this digital exhaust

that contains extraordinarily precise

information about our lives,

our social relationships reduced

to trillions of data points

that form now this new ethereal

layer around the planet

that's only growing

in all directions.

[ticking]

Capabilities are being put

in the hands of policy makers,

five years ago, they'd never

imagine that they would have.

This is where big data

meets Big Brother.

[ticking]

[buzzing]

- [folk music]

- [chuckles]

[man with accent]

Should be here.

[American man] It is kind

of in a rock, I think.

[American man #2]

Yeah, the entrance is in a rock.

- [speaking over each other]

- Or a bunker.

Oh, yeah, the bunker.

It is down there!

[driver] There is a

bunker under here.

- [man] Yeah.

- It is between 33 and 39.

[Deibert] Right there.

Look at that door.

- [driver] Yeah.

- [Deibert] Yeah, this is it.

- Bahnhof.

- [driver] Okay.

[beeps]

- [door squeaks]

- Hey, I guess we just go in.

[electronica music]

[servers whirring]

[electronica continues]

[loud whirring]

Many people believe that you have this

cloud services that are floating around.

People think, "Okay,

it's a cloud server."

But this is the actual physical

location of the Internet.

[whirring, clicking]

[Karlung continues] It's a

constant struggle to protect data.

[voices echo]

The Swedish Security Police

wanted to install tools

to automatically log in to our

data and get out the information.

So I invited them

to our facility,

and then I had a microphone

which I was provided by the Swedish

Public Service, national radio.

[speaking Swedish]

I taped this conversation,

and they were so angry.

And they also wanted us

to sign a paper

where they said that we could

not say anything about it.

It should be total secrecy.

They said, "If a terrorist attack

happens, it's your fault."

[click, buzz]

[man speaks Swedish]

[Karlung]

It's, like, a creepy feeling.

Nobody can say that

any facility is safe.

There are always possibilities to go

in and find data and take it out.

People say that, "Oh, I don't

have anything to hide.

They can read my mail.

I don't have anything."

But it's not that

which is this problem.

The problem is, without secrecy,

there can be no democracy.

Without secrecy,

there can be no market economy.

Right.

There is an obvious candidate

for the Nobel Peace Prize.

- Really?

- And that is Edward Snowden.

I mean, yeah.

Does the public enjoy the same right

to privacy that we have in the past?

Are we still private citizens,

and then public officials, where the

government knows very little about us,

but we know

everything about them?

Why are we, the public,

becoming disempowered

at the same time that

governments around the world,

corporations around the world,

institutions around the world,

are gaining greater and greater leverage

over the range of our activities,

their knowledge of what we do?

[Deibert] The Citizen Lab

is an unusual place.

[cell phones ringing]

We're a research unit

at the University of Toronto.

We combine the skills of

engineers, computer scientists

with social scientists.

We collaborate with people

from all over the world

to do the field research

that we do.

And we do this to advance

research on global security,

cyberspace

and human rights.

The world is

a very dangerous place

as we saw recently in... in

tragic incidents in Paris,

and you want to have security

agencies be well adept at discerning

what those threats

are over our horizon.

But is it okay that the government

sets up a giant digital X-ray machine

over everything that we do?

Because that's effectively

where we're headed right now.

[typing]

[continues] We've been a kind of

digital early warning system,

scanning the horizon.

And what we've seen, frankly,

has been really disturbing.

[digital chirping]

[typing]

[praying, chanting]

[chanting in Tibetan]

[man, in Tibetan]

[chimes playing]

[Golog, in Tibetan]

[vibrates]

- [shouts]

- [blows landing]

[Golog]

- [shouting in Tibetan]

- [blows landing]

[beating continues]

[stops]

[Golog]

[vehicle horns honking]

[woman, in English] Tibetans are watched

from every angle and from every corner.

It's in their homes, it's in their

offices, it's in the streets.

In Tibet,

certainly in central Tibet

and around

the capital city of Lhasa,

Chinese authorities, together

with Chinese corporations,

telecommunications companies,

they've integrated the ability to spy

on people via their mobile phone,

via the last communications they

may have had over the Internet.

Down to the closed circuit

television camera on the streets.

The Chinese so strictly

control access to Tibet,

it's just like a black hole

for media,

for independent observers,

for international agencies,

for anything.

[Golog, in Tibetan]

[woman speaks in Tibetan]

[Golog]

How I escaped is a secret.

[light music]

[Tethong] People are

incredibly courageous.

People inside Tibet will

send out news and information.

And they'll say,

"I want this story to be told."

They could be imprisoned.

They could be tortured.

Their family

could pay the price.

[music continues]

We on the outside have to decide

how to walk this very, sort of, fine line

between protecting people's security

and honoring their wishes about

getting news and information out.

And we know for a fact,

thanks to Citizen Lab's report,

that we are being

successfully targeted.

[music stops]

A new report has been released from

a group of digital detectives.

From their computers in Toronto,

they've tracked a high-tech spy ring

that reaches around the world.

[typewriter clicks]

[reporter]

For the past ten months,

these computer experts have

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