CIA Whistleblower John Kiriakou: They Can See All Your Messages!

TL;DR

John Kiriakou, a former CIA officer and whistleblower on the agency’s torture program, claims the U.S. government spends billions spying on Americans via NSA, CIA, and FBI, that the CIA can remotely hack cars and smart TVs to turn speakers into microphones, and that personal data is bought and sold without warrants.

Key insights

• The CIA can take remote control of a car’s computer system to crash it, and can turn a smart TV’s speaker into a microphone even when the TV is off, broadcasting audio back to the CIA (Vault 7 documen
• 95% of people who agree to become spies do it for money; the remaining 5% are motivated by love, family, ideology, revenge, or excitement.
• The CIA actively seeks to hire people with “sociopathic tendencies” (not full sociopaths) because they are willing to operate in legal, moral, and ethical gray areas.