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Several devices have been deployed in Albania that perform Deep Packet Inspection, DPI, a monitoring system that IT experts consider quite dangerous when not accompanied by a legal framework to protect citizens' data.
Expert Besmir Semanaj, speaking with concern about this issue on the show "The Unexposed", about the possibility of using DPI for mass surveillance, explained how citizens, politicians, journalists, etc. can be targeted.
" The first information, the first complaint I made on March 29. It came from colleagues who work at ISPs and state organizations. Tik Tok was not closed and it was decided to use a DPI. The reason was Tik Tok, but Tik Tok is the minimum that the device can do. First, who did the request come from? Second, who is the Albanian institution that sent the devices to the ISP. A device costs over 100 thousand euros, how was it obtained? State institutions have stated that 7 of these have been installed. If they are donors, what benefits will the donor have?
The deployment of devices without a strong legal framework. There are two typologies, autocratic states, India, China, Russia, Iran. Then we have democratic states, France, Britain, and so on, but there has been public discussion and there has been a strengthening of the legal basis and rules on how citizens' data will be processed, so mass surveillance is not allowed, but it can be used for national security.
In Albania, it took over two and a half weeks for the institutions to react. They admitted that they were set up, but with the claim that they are not being tapped, but this is not done with an oath. We need a legal basis. We do not have a legal basis that prohibits tapping. Profiling is more problematic.
This device recognizes what applications I use, what sites I read, for example, if I read Muslim community sites, they profile me as Muslim, etc. They can see sexual preferences, etc.
"We take a politician or an ordinary citizen, they open inappropriate pages ," Semanaj said.
He went on to add that these devices could be used for censorship. " The government can block at any moment. Normal monitoring simply shows that a user is doing traffic, but it cannot monitor what program they are using, the name of the site and all these things."
DPI also does censorship, which simple monitoring cannot do, as they could not do with Tik Tok. DPI degrades the service. Let's say we are on MCN live now, this causes degradation and the program is not realized.
It was used in Turkey, after the arrest of the opposition leader, to shut down social networks, to shut down VPNs that avoided shutting down and slowing down the internet throughout Istanbul. So, one of the bases of DPI is censorship. The state has an unlicensed weapon in its hands. As long as there is no legislation… We ask for permission to then buy the weapon. They have installed the weapon, loaded it. We also have the case of Iran after the elections, Saudi Arabia, where all personalities were monitored. Each of us has weak points, they may have a gambling addiction, a drinking addiction, an addiction to pornography, information was collected and used for blackmail ,” he said.
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