Watching the Watchers: Pakistan’s Total Surveillance State – Can’t Happen Here, Right? Right?

​With help from vendors in the United States, Canada, Europe, and China, Pakistan has relied on a global supply chain to create comprehensive and sophisticated surveillance and censorship tools, according to a new report released by Amnesty International on Tuesday.

Agnès Callamard, Secretary General of Amnesty International, said:

“Pakistan’s Web Monitoring System and Lawful Intercept Management System operate like watchtowers, constantly snooping on the lives of ordinary citizens. In Pakistan, your texts, emails, calls and internet access are all under scrutiny. But people have no idea of this constant surveillance, and its incredible reach. This dystopian reality is extremely dangerous because it operates in the shadows, severely restricting freedom of expression and access to information.”

Amnesty International provides a real-life example, a journalist who is responding to constant surveillance with self-censorship. The journalist describes what happened after he published a story on public corruption:

“After the story, anyone I would speak to, even on WhatsApp, would come under scrutiny. [The authorities] would go to people and ask them, ‘Why did he call you?’ [The authorities] can go to these extreme lengths … Now I go months without speaking to my family [for fear they will be targeted].”

Keep in mind that virtually every bit of data that Pakistan extracts from its citizens relies on technologies sold by U.S. companies and used by our federal government. In our country, internal agency procedures, ethical commitments, and laws prevent such ready and rampant surveillance. But all the elements are in place. Through purchased data and FISA Section 702, the federal government can already view virtually anything it wants without a warrant.
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Pakistan is a reminder of just how perilously close we are to an American surveillance state.

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