The Guardian reports on Optic Nerve, a program created by UK intelligence agency GCHQ in conjunction with the U.S. National Security Agency to intercept and store webcam images of millions of Internet users, many of whom were not suspected of wrongdoing. According to files leaked by Edward Snowden, the program collected images from Yahoo webcam chats in bulk and stored them in agency databases. In one six-month period, the GCHQ collected images from more than 1.8 million user accounts. Yahoo said it was unaware of the activity. “This report, if true, represents a whole new level of violation of users’ privacy that is completely unacceptable, and we strongly call on the world’s governments to reform surveillance law,” the company said.
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