Move over NSA surveillance. If you are headed to Sochi for the 2014 Winter Olympics, you might want to read this. For Russia’s opposition Yezhednevniy Zhurnal, Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan, who regularly report on the Russian security services, write that there will be no e-mails, no text messages, no telephone calls, in fact, no communications at all, that will be beyond the reach of the Russian intelligence services. The reporters write that even visitors taking comfort in the knowledge that their data will be protected by modern Western encryption are in for a rude awakening.
For Yezhednevniy Zhurnal, Andrei Soldatov and Irina Borogan start out this way:
The Olympic Games in Sochi could put Russia in first place in the competition to spy on athletes and fans. Organizers of the previous games in Beijing and London put great effort into security for stadiums and the surrounding areas. However in Sochi, Russian authorities have adopted a comprehensive approach, which combines the most advanced technologies in the fields of interception and surveillance, along with administrative controls often used during the 1980 Moscow Olympics.
The first suspicion that Big Brother is watching comes the moment you register on the official Sochi 2014 Web site to obtain a “supporter’s passport.” All visitors aged two or older must register for one, regardless of their country of origin. When you attempt to take a photo of yourself, which is required for registration, your computer warns, “https://pass.sochi2014.com is requesting access to your camera and microphone. If you press ‘accept,’ you will be registered.” The data that visitors are obliged to give will be forwarded to the FSB to be checked.
The key role of providing security at the Olympics was in 2010 given to FSB counterintelligence chief Oleg Syromolotovback, who will lead the Olympics operations staff. Syromolotov has little experience in the fight against terrorism, having spent most of his career chasing spies. Evidently, Olympic organizers have decided that the main threat comes not from [Chechen] militants or their leader, Dokka Umarov – who has called for a resumption of terrorist attacks during the Games, but from foreign intelligence agencies.
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