NSA Cyberwarfare Could Pick the Wrong Targets, Snowden Says

Photo Credit: WIRED / Platon

Photo Credit: WIRED / Platon

The National Security Agency is planning to combat cyberattacks from overseas with a sophisticated yet highly risky program code-named ‘MonsterMind,’ warns whistleblower Edward Snowden.

In an interview in the September issue of Wired, Snowden said that MonsterMind software aims to identify the start of foreign attacks and block them from entering the U.S. What makes MonsterMind unique is its ability to “automatically fire back” at these attacks without human involvement, he said.

Snowden described MonsterMind as problematic, noting that cyberattacks are often routed through computers in “innocent” third countries. This raises the possibility of U.S. counter attacks against the wrong targets. “You could have someone sitting in China, for example, making it appear that one of these attacks is originating in Russia,” he said. “And then we end up shooting back at a Russian hospital. What happens next?”

The former NSA contractor also views MonsterMind as a massive threat to privacy, warning that the agency would have to get access to virtually all private communications entering the U.S. from overseas.

“If we’re analyzing all traffic flows, that means we have to be intercepting all traffic flows,” he said. “That means violating the Fourth Amendment, seizing private communications without a warrant, without probable cause or even a suspicion of wrongdoing. For everyone, all the time.”

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