Can the Government See Which Websites I Visit?

The National Security Agency isn't the only federal agency that conducts surveillance on the internet. For decades, the FBI has been doing it as well.

As this 2016 Wired article details, the FBI initially started conducting online surveillance back in 1998, using a tool called Carnivore, which it installed on internet network backbones with the permission of service providers. The tool enabled agents to monitor the online communications of a person who was an investigative target, filtering and copying metadata and the content of messages that they sent and received. The Carnivore program's existence was exposed in 2000 when an internet provider refused to install it. As it turned out, the bureau had only used the tool 25 times up to that point, which indicates that it engaged in widespread spying. In 2005, the FBI replaced Carnivore with commercially available filtering software [source: Zetter].

Additionally, the FBI has other ways to tell what a person is doing on his or her computer. It can break into the machine, either remotely or by breaking into someone's office, and install key logger software, which enables agents to monitor what a person types on the keyboard. That trick makes it possible to circumvent software encryption tools that are designed to protect emails and other messages from being intercepted [source: Zetter].

The FBI has other tricks for unmasking people who visit child pornography websites and other places where bad stuff happens. The bureau's own hackers can gain control of servers and embed spyware on pages on a site, which in turn infects the computers of people who access those pages [source: Zetter].

Those capabilities might seem scary, but they're probably not something that most law-abiding citizens will ever encounter, let alone have to worry about. In the next section, we'll look at a type of tracking that you're more likely to encounter.

There was a time, quaint as it might seem today, when Americans were worried about the government implanting cookies, the identifier files that websites place on your computer in order to recognize you. These days, though, we acquiesce to having Google, Facebook and other private-sector internet companies collect vast amounts of information on us [source: Curran]. So the threat of the government cookies may not seem like as big of a deal.

But if you want to know what information government might be collecting about you as a result of your visits to its websites, an article about privacy and security policies on USA.gov, the federal portal for government services, gives a detailed rundown. When you visit the site, it records your internet protocol address, the numerical code that identifies the router and device you're using. In addition, it records the website from which you linked to the USA.gov, the time and date of your visit, what searches you did and links that you clicked. It also even documents whether you use Chrome or Firefox, and what operating system is on your computer [source: USA.gov].

The government website also implants cookies on your computer that identify you, though not by name. "We use web metrics services to track activity on USA.gov," the website explains. "Government agencies only ever receive traffic statistics anonymously and, in the aggregate, officials can track trends in the website's usage." The site also explains how you can disable these so-called persistent cookies, in case you don't want to be tracked [source: USA.gov].