Earlier today, Der Spiegel reported that Israel might have done a little cellular snooping on US Secretary of State John Kerry during his peace talks with Palestinians last year. Apparently, during the height of the peace talks, Kerry made several important phone calls using a normal telephone beamed via satellite — rookie mistake.
Image by Win McNamee/Getty Images
Israel has also allegedly used some of the obtained information from Kerry’s unencrypted slip up in its own talks within the Middle East. This seems like an obvious point because most of us live, work, and play on the internet and our smartphones, but you have to encrypt everything if you want security.
Even then, you’re never completely in the clear. Sure, most of the time it doesn’t matter — if some unknown intelligence agency wants to know that I spend an unhealthy amount of time on Netflix? Go for it. But when the peace of an entire region is up for grabs, you should probably take the extra step.
Maybe a White House staffer goofed or John Kerry had a momentary technological lapse of reason. Regardless, if you don’t want someone to read or listen to something, encrypt it — especially if you’re the Secretary of State. [Der Spiegel]