What’s keeping the “King of Encryption” awake at night… Privacy – as apple-pie as the Constitution… A 960% gain on anonymous money… In the mailbag: “Kudos to Los Cuatro Hombres”…
That’s the warning from the “King of Encryption,” Phil Zimmermann.
He was the keynote speaker at a small gathering of cryptocurrency experts I (Chris) attended recently in Amsterdam, in the Netherlands.
You may not have heard of him. Most people haven’t. But in 1991, Zimmermann invented the world’s first publicly available, unbreakable encryption program, which he modestly called Pretty Good Privacy (PGP).
Up until then, unbreakable cryptography was something only the military and spy agencies had access to.
He made sure the feds couldn’t stop folks from using it.
At the time, Washington considered strong encryption to be in the same category as “munition” – guns, bombs, ballistic missiles, and so on. And after Zimmermann posted the source code for PGP to an online message board, the feds came after him with a criminal investigation into “exporting munitions without a license.”
Luckily, Zimmermann is no dope. He outsmarted the feds by printing the source code for PGP in a book so that anyone could replicate it.
MIT’s publishing arm, MIT Press, sold the book all over the world. This allowed anyone, anywhere in the world, to use Zimmermann’s source code to stay private online.
The feds could legally halt the export of munitions. But the First Amendment prevented them from legally stopping the export of a book, which is classed as speech.
It’s for-profit surveillance companies Google and Facebook.
And he’s not alone.
Here at The Daily Cut, we’ve been raising the alarm about how these Silicon Valley giants have gotten in bed with the national-security faction of the Deep State.
Thanks to Google, Facebook, and all the other data-gathering operations being run out of Silicon Valley, children born in the last decade will have no concept of privacy.
These companies will record, monitor, and track every single thing they do online. The word “privacy” will be a meaningless term to them.
As we told you yesterday, these Silicon Valley giants gather mindboggling amounts of highly personal data on their 4 billion combined users.
They then hawk it to advertisers… and even pass it on to the National Security Agency (NSA), via court-approved electronic eavesdropping programs.
As Zimmermann pointed out in Amsterdam, there’s no difference between the mass digital surveillance the U.S. spy agencies carry out… and the corporate-level online snooping by Silicon Valley firms.
Documents leaked by Edward Snowden from the Deep State’s electronic eavesdropping agency, the NSA, revealed the government has direct access to the same personal data Google and Facebook sell to advertisers.
The surveillance these companies carry out passes through to the NSA by way of court-approved programs such as the one Snowden made public, codenamed PRISM.
When confronted with evidence that corporations and governments are spying on them online, most folks shrug it off.
But as we’ve been warning, that’s a mistake if you value your personal liberty. Here’s how colleague Nick Giambruno put it to readers of our Casey Report advisory…
The government and its media allies have convinced the average person that “privacy” is a dirty word.
They’ve duped people into believing only criminals and wrongdoers want privacy. “If you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to worry about,” as the popular, but wrongheaded adage goes.
Many people have forgotten that privacy is fundamental to preserving human dignity and protecting individuals from government overreach.
In the words of Phil Zimmermann, “Privacy is as apple-pie as the Constitution.”
Every traditional digital financial transaction you’ve ever made – credit card payments, bank transfers, even ATM withdrawals – has been tracked, stored, and monitored.
But cryptocurrencies were developed with online privacy in mind.
Bitcoin was the first step…
The super-secure database (aka “blockchain”) that records bitcoin transactions doesn’t include your name or other personal details. This helps keep your financial transactions secure.
But contrary to popular belief, bitcoin isn’t fully anonymous.
The bitcoin blockchain includes a record of the unique ID of your bitcoin “wallet” – the app you use to store, send, and receive payments. And it’s open to the public. So a forensic research team can unravel your entire payment history.
As world-renowned crypto investing expert Teeka Tiwari put it to readers of our Palm Beach Confidential advisory…
Investigators can track who sent you money, who you sent money to, what you bought, and who you bought it from.
Take Monero (XMR), an open recommendation at Palm Beach Confidential. It adds an extra layer of security so online snoops can’t link each transaction to you. Teeka again…
To an outside observer, your transactions on the Monero blockchain look like they’re going to multiple addresses. This is done so no one can track the actual address the money is going to.
Imagine a million homes with a million different names on each door. Your name might be on every door… but only one of the doors leads to your home. If you are an outsider looking in, you have no idea which address is the “real” address.
Monero and other privacy coins are a leap forward in protecting your financial transactions.
And that’s a big deal. As Teeka made clear when he first recommended Monero in September 2016, you need anonymous money to protect your personal freedom.
Monero is solving the real-world problem of how to protect your financial life from digital snooping. And as Teeka predicted, this has pushed up demand… and prices.
When Teeka recommended Monero back in 2016, it was selling for $8.46. Even after the recent dip in the crypto market, one Monero coin sells for almost $90 today. That’s more than a 960% gain.
Don’t worry if this is all new to you. Over the coming weeks, we’ll be digging deeper into how blockchain technology will tip the playing field back in favor of ordinary Americans in the battle for online privacy.
And if you want us to take a deeper dive into how to buy cryptocurrencies such as Monero, let us know at [email protected].
This week at The Daily Cut, we’ve been exposing the connective tissue between the Deep State and Silicon Valley. And your fellow readers have some strong opinions about that.
Here’s a small sample of the dozens of responses we’ve gotten…
The “big picture” stories like this one about Big Tech, is just something I’ve recognized as a possibility for years. I’ve begun to look at Google, corporately, as a defense contractor and no longer as a source of information. Quite the contrary. It is becoming a source of restricted information. – John S.
Kudos to Los Cuatro Hombres for not buckling under to the social justice warriors at Google, Facebook, et al. If I may, I’d like to offer a few of phrases in hopes that they will be found encouraging. The first I learned from my ex-father-in-law several decades ago: Illegitimi non carborundum (don’t let the bastards grind you down). The second I learned from reading Ludwig von Mises: Tu ne cede malis (you should not give in to evils). The third I learned from the laborers I worked with back in the day: You go, dawg! Thank you for your courage, honesty, and integrity and for always making me think. – J.C.W.
Don’t cave in to Google or anyone else. Resist! – David T.
Forget about Google, Facebook, and Twitter. You have us. We will spread your valuable insights to absolutely everybody and their dog. We will create alternatives and make government and their cronies obsolete, once and for all! – Ralf W.
So, it has come to this! I am not at all interested in all the political correctness overwhelming the news of the world. I need to know the truth. I believe that the diversity of your wonderful sane publications (which I pay to receive) are just what I want and need to help me survive in this mad world. Hang in there and have courage. We can survive this assault on our right to free speech.
Keep up the good work! – Peter A.
Thanks for standing up to the invasive behavior of Google! I applaud your candid conversation and thoughts. It’s what I pay for, after all. – Darwin P.
Thank you for being a bastion of free information against the dark side of our country. We, as a culture, are at a crossroads. Our only chance to keep on the correct path is to have access to the type of data that you provide. Thanks again! – Dennis W.
Thank you for joining together to help defend the few freedoms we have left! I’m very glad to have such an amazing group of intelligent and honest people, on “The Side Of Right” (the hard working American public). Defending the (non-elite) population is not an easy task. God Bless You All! – Noreen K.
Chris, it’s long overdue, but better now than never! Hopefully, The Daily Cut will CUT to the chase, pardon the metaphor, and provide the insight and reality that we, the everyday, poor, dumb masses (if I may use a term that is synonymous with author Neal Boortz) are deprived of.
I look forward to reading the real truth behind the news each day. I for one would gladly pay for this service as I have profited by following the advice of the principals of the Legacy Research Group. – Norm B.
The Daily Cut is free to all paid-up subscribers of Bonner & Partners, Casey Research, Palm Beach Research Group, and Delta Report.
There is no need to pay us a single cent for the ideas, insights, and recommendations you’ll be receiving from Bill Bonner, Doug Casey, Teeka Tiwari, Jeff Clark, and their teams of analysts.
As a loyal subscriber, it’s yours, with our compliments.
And don’t forget, if you have any questions, comments, or feedback on your new subscription, send them to [email protected].
Regards,
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Chris Lowe
August 23, 2018
Lisbon, Portugal