The NSA has a lot of data to sort through — basically any internet traffic that passes through the US can be intercepted and gathered by the agency. And anytime something suspicious pops up like searches for “Al Qaeda” or “pressure cooker” or “hidden bomb,” they’ll probably take notice.
If you’re not a fan of the NSA and their surveillance practices, you’ll probably be a fan of Flagger. Flagger is a browser extension for Firefox and Chrome that takes a random selection of keywords (called “red flags”) that the NSA would find suspicious, like the aforementioned pressure cooker, and adds those words into the address of every website you visit. The idea is that the NSA will have to deal with more noise and have to sort through many more false alarms. You can even choose which red flags you’d like to use and then add a message for the NSA to read if or when you get their attention.
The video below walks you through Flagger:
If enough people start using the extension, who knows what kind of damage it might be able to do? And if it doesn’t really put a dent into the NSA’s overbearing practices, I’m sure people wouldn’t mind getting the chance to troll the NSA at least once or twice. You can download Flagger from the its website. Just don’t be surprised if men in black suits show up at your door.
[via Quartz]