A report on El Reg about MI5 reportedly wanting access to travel records associated with Oyster cards (report originally in The Observer 16/3/07) raises considerable issues regarding electronic data and privacy.
This makes me wonder what MI5 might want, once the Phorm system is installed in the ISPs representing the great majority of broadband users.
Here's the cover of the journal Science (7th March issue which just arrived at my office), featuring a work by the graffiti artist Banksy.
Just thought this was a nice image!
This morning saw the first of the North Bucks Road Club events in the 2008 time trial series. Ian Stokes arranged several 10 mile time trials on the Astwood sporting course and we had the use of Astwood village hall.
On a pretty windy day, thirteen riders turned out. I very nearly failed to make it in time, puncturing in Cranfield en route to Astwood. I refrained from getting too grumpy, as a passer-by helped with my annoying tyre levers! Having (sort of) pumped up the tyre with my very small pump, I dashed off to Astwood, arriving after the first four or five riders had started, in a state of some perspiration. To add insult to injury, I ended up with number 13! I quickly removed unnecessary clothes (bib tights etc), much to the horror of my fellow competitors.
Despite the squishyness of my repaired rear tyre, I made it round the course (and indeed home afterwards) without further deflation. The strong wind made it quite hard at times, particularly on the leg out to Chicheley, and strong cross winds at times made the front trispoke twitchy.
When I finally crossed the finish line, it was to a chorus of "pssshh!" - oh the humour, the wit!
Tony's report on the event can be read over at the club web page. Here's my heart rate trace (click the image for the full size version:
Result
| Pos | No | Name | Club | Time | Cat | Vets Std | .+ / - | on Vets Std |
| 1 | 13 | Rob Saunders | NBRC | 24.57 | V48 | 27.07 | .+2.10 | 1 |
| 2 | 9 | John Buchanan | NBRC | 26.04 | S | |||
| 3 | 5 | Gareth Richards | NBRC | 26.35 | S | |||
| 4 | 4 | Ian Stokes | NBRC | 26.43 | V48 | 27.07 | .+0.24 | 2 |
| 5 | 7 | Alan Crane | Team Sanjan Design | 27.08 | S | |||
| 6 | 8 | Chris Wood | NBRC | 27.54 | S | |||
| .= | 11 | Daren Haseldine | TeamMK | 27.54 | V41 | 25.42 | .-2.12 | 5 |
| 8 | 3 | Chris Hartley | NBRC | 27.59 | V50 | 27.33 | .-0.26 | 3 |
| 9 | 10 | Lindz Barral | TeamMK | 28.38 | S | |||
| 10 | 1 | Alan Lawson | NBRC | 29.25 | S | |||
| 11 | 12 | Tracey Haseldine | TeamMK | 30.47 | LV40 | 27.07 | .-3.40 | 6 |
| 12 | 2 | Chris Parkes | NBRC | 32.22 | V47 | 26.54 | .- 5.28 | 7 |
| 13 | 6 | Brian Hills | NBRC | 34.51 | V72 | 32.46 | .-2.05 | 4 |
| Time Keepers :- Mary Hartley & Tony Farmborough NBRC | ||||||||
British Telecom have a Privacy Policy. I reached this page from the BT Webwise page, so presumably it applies to their proposed arrangement with Phorm.
We may share your personal information with other companies so that they can contact you with details of other products or services you may be interested in. We will only do this if you have agreed to this and where the companies agree to use your personal information for that purpose only. If you have agreed to receive information about products and services from another company and later decide not to you will need to contact that company yourself to let them know. You can of course ask us not to continue to provide your personal information to any more companies in future.
From this, I would assume that writing to BT and requesting they do not harvest my web browsing habits (opting out from webwise does not appear to stop this happening) would really opt me out from their data pimping.