Henry Porter's written in The Guardian on the growing desire of the present UK Government for data control...and the spiralling costs (Paying billions for our database state). There are two frightening aspects.
Firstly, the evident desire of our Government to find out what we are all up to - innocent or under suspicion, we are all targets for the prying eyes of the State.
So, despite Home Secretary Wacky Jacqui's decision to scrap the Interception Modernisation Programme (or at least the database aspects of it), she's still desperate for the security services to get their mitts on our internet activity.
The Register today (Jacqui's secret plan to 'Master the Internet') revealed details of the grandiosely named Mastering the Internet (MTI) project, which will see GCHQ using DPI techniques to monitor internet traffic:
The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada has a website of essays related to the internet and privacy, and many feature discussions of Phorm's vile and intrusive technology, tested in the UK as "Webwise".
You can view the essays here. There are contributions from individuals on both sides of the fence (but mostly it seems anti-dpi).
The Open Rights Group have set up a spiffy site, Statebook, to illustrate the dangers of the burgeoning Database State in the UK.
It's an effectve illustration of how the UK's intrusive data collection habits threaten our liberties and freedom, and how the future looks to be mapped out. The recent report from the Joseph Rowntree Trust revealed that not only is our government remarkably keen to get their dibs on considerable quantities of data on us and our movements, but that it's equally inept in obeying data protection regulations.
Lord Carter is the author of a report for the UK Government, Digital Britain. The UK Government, its Departments and other agencies have been remarkably ineffective over the fracas about Phorm's deep packet inspection technology, its covert testing by BT in 2006 and 2007, and its more open testing by BT on 2008.
Well, what's this in a Guardian report (Government's broadband-for-all pledge in jeopardy)?
The news that police have raided a meeting of climate campaigners on suspicion of plotting a protest at a power station near Nottingham (BBC News - Police hold 114 in power protest) doesn't seem to have been questioned - isn't this a bit odd? After the arrested hadn't actually protested, nor had they even set of to start their protest.
Now it transpires (BBC News - Power station protesters released) that all 114 protesters (or should I say, would-be protesters) have been on bail, but without charge. At least an MP has now questioned whether this was a proportionate response: Nottingham South MP Alan Simpson has reportedly raised concerns over the nature of the policing operation, and whether it was really proportionate:"
The BBC is reporting that the European Commission have launched an action against Britain over the Phorm phiasco (EC starts legal action on Phorm):
A list of websites supposedly blocked by the Great Australian Firewall, most of which (but by no means all) are porn sites, has been posted at Wikileaks. Since the list was posted, there have been recurring reports that Wikileaks has been blocked or shutdown. It's also possible that high traffic in response to this and other stories has overwhelmed the Wikileaks servers.
According to Wikinews, blocking is taking place (Portions of Wikileaks, Wikipedia blocked in Australia):
This is the kind of story that fuels my worries about the database state we in the UK are walking into. The Guardian reports that The Joseph Rowntree Reform Trust has examined a sample of 46 UK government databases and found significant issues (Right to privacy broken by a quarter of UK's public databases, says report).
46 databases, including the new ID card database and the DNA fingerprint database were examined to see whether they met standards of privacy and effectiveness, Of these, 11 were found to be so failing they should be scrapped.
The fallout from the revelations of just what is on the Great Australian Firewall blacklist continues, even as Wikileaks is still submerged. The Age reports (Labor's blog-watch plan hits Whirlpool of dissent) reports the latest utterances of Stephen Conroy, the minister behind the assault on internet freedom:
THE Government will begin trawling blog sites as part of a new media monitoring strategy, with documents singling out a website critical of Communications Minister Stephen Conroy for special mention.
As reported by the BBC (Extent of council spying revealed),
Councils in England and Wales have used controversial spying laws 10,000 times in the past five years, figures obtained by the Liberal Democrats show.
It appears that the James Randi Educational Foundation have had their YouTube account suspended - no reason is known. The JREF are an outstanding bulwark against the rise of paranormal and supernatural ideas in society, internationally. The blog and forum at the JREF website make for excellent reading. I cannot for the life of me see why this decision can have be made. The JREF's mission, as quoted from their website:
The James Randi Educational Foundation is a not-for-profit organization founded in 1996. Its aim is to promote critical thinking by reaching out to the public and media with reliable information about paranormal and supernatural ideas so widespread in our society today.
This mission statement seems eminently reasonable to me. You can write letters in protest, though I guess it would help if we knew why the JREF's account had been suspended. Perhaps the JREF trod on too many toes -from what I've read, YouTube tend to react quickly to takedown requests, but can be persuaded to reverse their decision, as in the case of David Colquhoun's video work.
[video:http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v7Cn_gjevik 480x295]
The Guardian reports on UK proposals for EU-wide vehicle surveillance (Big Brother is watching: surveillance box to track drivers is backed - dated 31/3/09, so presumably not an April Fool!):
The government is backing a project to install a "communication box" in new cars to track the whereabouts of drivers anywhere in Europe, the Guardian can reveal.
As a child, I can remember my parents illustrating the lack of freedom within states such as the USSR by pointing out that the citizens of such countries were not accorded the freedom to move and travel at will within the borders. Little did they (or I) know that such restrictions would be proposed by a UK Government. The new proposals are, of course, a consequence of the much pushed and overstated terrorist threat. This time the measures are held within Contest 2 legislation, which The Guardian's Henry Porter has picked up on (Planning a day trip to the Isle of Wight?) :
At what stage, I wonder, will those who say the loss of liberty isn't happening concede that it is? Maybe if they examine page 113 of the Contest 2 (pdf) counter-terrorism document, which Jason Lewis of the Mail on Sunday pointed out means that anyone boarding a ferry to the Isle of Wight, flying between British cities or travelling to Northern Ireland will have to provide their name, date of birth and address.
The Open Rights Group reports (Data retention endangers democracy):
European legislation that came into force today requires internet service providers to retain details of user's emails, net phone calls and other web traffic. This requirement, imposed on all all EU states, is a serious erosion of our fundamental human right to privacy.
The Which? report on Phorm and BT Webwise (Phorm uses legal muscle against critical press reports), and which was suppressed by legal action threatened by former spyware company Phorm has surfaced on Wikileaks (UK media suppressed Phorm survey and article, 2009).
The Guardian reports (Straw bows to pressure over data sharing) that the Government's controversial plans to permit government agencies to correlate and combine data held on citizens have been withdrawn. I previously reported on clause 152 in the otherwise innocuous sounding Coroners and Justice Bill Part 8 - Data Protection Act 1998 (c. 29) (The UK database state comes a step closer...). Now it seems that privacy campaigners have had an effect:
Jack Straw last night scrapped controversial government proposals that could have allowed patients' medical and DNA records to be shared with police, foreign governments and other bodies.
This morning, Ben Goldacre, the Guardian columnist and Bad Science blogger) has written on the difficulties and dangers of datamining to identify criminals and terrorists (Datamining would be lovely if it worked).
He's written this on the back of an IPPR report (The National Security Strategy: Implications for the UK intelligence community), and he's raising issues of accuracy and false positive rates - clearly analogous to evidence-based medical trials, which are closer to his usual blog fare. Goldacre quotes the author of the report:
The BBC reports (Protest officers seized balloons) that some unusual items were confiscated from a power station protest group. Supposedly items are meant to be confiscated to prevent offences being committed, but a FOI request reveals that along with the aforementioned balloons,
items taken included blankets, a walking stick, a clown outfit and soap. [...] A mountain bike, cycle helmets, bin bags and party poppers were also taken from protesters entering the camp site.
The Open Rights Group have reported on the Lords Constitution Committee report on surveillance and privacy. This is a monster document, which can be read here: Constitution Committee - Second Report. Surveillance: Citizens and the State. It's a big document, and it perhaps easier to digest via the ORG synopsis, and as the ORG say, "Those with nothing to hide can still have a great deal to fear".
The RIPA sections are interesting (Committee report section; ORG interpretation), in light of pretty clear local council abuses of RIPA ro spot fly-tippers etc.