National Security Agency gets fix on Internet users
 

Top secret group applies for patent to ID physical address of Web surfers

Internet users hoping to protect their privacy by using anti-virus software, Web anonymizers, false identities and disabled cookies on their computer's Web browser have something new to worry about – a patent filed by the National Security Agency (NSA) for technology that will identify the physical location of any Web surfer.

Patent 6,947,978, granted this week, describes a process based on latency, or time lag between computers exchanging data, of "numerous" known locations on the Internet to build a "network latency topology map" for all users. Identifying the physical location of an individual user, reports CNET News.com, could then be accomplished by measuring how long it takes to connect to an unknown computer from numerous known machines, and using the latency response to display location on a map.


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yeah i saw that too. early 21st century us paranoia driving it. still, i may find some use for it. in the same way i click whois to get my ip address, maybe i'll use this bigbrother thing to locate my physical address. one click and i'll know where i am. wow. pretty soon i won't have to run outside and look at my mailbox. you know these new england weather systems... :RI:

- js.