Hello and welcome back to Life’s Biggest Questions, I’m Ron McKenzie-Lefurgey.
There has recently been a meme circulating, telling of how FBI agents are out there, monitoring
us through various means.
Some will jokingly claim to have received a text from the FBI offering homework help,
or else warning them against activities that may be illegal.
But is this just a harmless meme, or is the FBI really spying on innocent citizens?
Let’s find out.
If you want more videos like this, check out our “Biggest Debated Topics” playlist
on the channel.
Now get ready, it’s time to ask the question: Is the FBI Watching Us?
Of course, the FBI being an American organization, that studies domestic threats, this video
will focus on citizens of the United States.
So for the purposes of this video, “Us” will largely refer to American citizens.
Even though I’m Canadian.
Eh.
First of all, we should probably discuss what it is the FBI does.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation is in charge of dealing threats to the United States
from within the country.
It employs both human intelligence gathering, or HUMINT, and Open-Source Intelligence gathering,
or OSINT with great success.
However, there are a number of covert methods used to obtain certain pieces of information,
and some claim that one of these methods is watching people through webcams.
So, is there an FBI agent watching everyone in the United States?
Of course not.
There simply wouldn’t be the man power to keep tabs on hundreds of millions of citizens.
But even if it was logistically possible, it still wouldn’t be a good idea.
The FBI cannot legally spy on citizens unless they have a warrant to do so, and they sometimes
get in hot water when they do watch someone without cause.
The FBI was recently under fire for the potentially illegal surveillance of Trump staffers, and
has had a good deal of trouble despite rather little evidence of wrongdoing.
If this much trouble comes of possibly watching a select few individuals without good reason,
then watching the American people would be all but a death sentence to them.
No amount of information about innocent civilians is worth dismantling everything the FBI and
government have worked towards over the years, making it rather unlikely that they would
risk so much for so little potential reward.
Of course, if there is reasonable cause to suspect someone of wrongdoing, then a warrant
can be issued, and they can be put under surveillance.
And yes, the FBI has been known to use remote administration tools, or RATs, to spy on those
suspected of serious crimes.
This is colloquially known as "ratting", and is reportedly used rather sparingly, due to
the potential risk of accidentally gaining information about innocent people.
The fact that the FBI sometimes elects not to spy on a suspect through their webcam for
fear of accidentally spying on an innocent person indicates that they don’t intend
to spy on innocent civilians.
However, something important to note is that much of the information about FBI methods
comes from the FBI itself, so if they were engaging in illegal activities, they would
likely say very much the same thing.
But in this case, there seems to be little reason to be sceptical.
However, just because there’s no evidence that the FBI is actively watching innocent
citizens, that doesn’t mean there isn’t anyone watching.
For years, hackers have taken to finding their way into other computers, so that they can
use the webcam and observe the user without their knowledge.
This often results in blackmail, using nude or incriminating images to force money out
of the person being spied on.
And as with most of these technology issues, there’s a Black Mirror episode about it.
While this is relatively rare, some prudence can be useful.
Simply putting tape over your laptop webcam, or moving or disconnecting an external webcam,
can prevent them from watching you.
There is also some evidence that our phones do listen to us, even if this is not an effort
made by the FBI.
Many have reported discussing something, then later seeing advertisements for it on their
phone or computer.
For example, you might be talking about how you’re looking to buy a bike, then soon
after you receive advertisements for bicycles.
Many believe this to be proof that our devices are recording and transmitting our conversations,
and selling them to advertising companies to make a buck.
This could well be the case, but it could simply be an instance of the Baader-Meinhof
phenomenon, where you notice something more when it’s fresh in your mind, whether it’s
a newly-learned word, or, in this case, a bike for sale.
However, the large number of such reports seem to indicate that something more sinister
could be afoot.
It should be noted that the FBI does engage in limited surveillance of phone records.
However, they abide by the policy of the Department of Justice, and reportedly do not collect
content.
This means that emails, texts, and images stored on the phone can't be used or collected,
but calls and texts being made can be intercepted, and location can be ascertained.
This, however, is not nearly as intrusive as someone watching you through your webcam.
And now we return to our question: Is the FBI Watching Us?
Well, yes and no.
The FBI is certainly keeping an eye out and monitoring those suspected of criminal activity,
and they do remotely access their webcams to gather information from time to time.
However, this is used sparingly, and if the FBI tried to watch every citizen of the United
States through their webcam, it would be both incredibly illegal, and logistically difficult.
It’s possible that advances in AI could make this a more feasible option, greatly
reducing the required man-power.
However, this would still be a huge risk for relatively little reward, and would run contrary
to the claim that there are agents assigned to certain people.
As it stands, there simply isn’t conclusive evidence that the FBI is watching us, so this
meme seems to be, as suspected, nothing but a joke.
Thank you for watching Life’s Biggest Questions, I hope this was interesting and informative,
and maybe even inspired you to look into it further on your own.
If you liked this video, please thumbs up and subscribe to the channel down below.
While you’re down there, let me know if YOU think the FBI is watching us in the comment
section.
Until next time, I’m Ron McKenzie-Lefurgey with Life’s Biggest Questions, wishing you
the best of luck, on your quest for answers.