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Government's controversial plans to permit government agencies to correlate and combine data held on citizens have been withdrawn.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.

There is a meeting at the House of Lords this morning about

The Internet Threat: Who needs privacy when we can have relevant ads?
Online Privacy and the Interception of Internet Communications

You can read more on it at NoDPI (Press Release: House of Lords - A Round Table Event).  Participants will include:

The Register has a report on the House of Lords privacy meeting (Phorm CEO clashes with Berners-Lee at Parliament), and it sounds as though sparks were flying.

It would seem that comparisons have been made between the pathetic response of the UK government to the far more robust attitute of the US government:

Google have announced they will be launching behaviourally targeted advertising (The Guardian: Google introduces targeted display ads on sites including YouTube).  However, as a poster on the nodpi forum points out, there are significant differences between the Google strategy and that of Phorm:

Phorm uses intercepted ISP traffic - Google collects its OWN data and is easy to block.
Google is just a website - Phorm infiltrates an entire ISP network

 The Register - Phorm CEO clashes with Berners-Lee at Parliament

The Times - Web inventor Sir Tim Berners-Lee wants ban on snooping on internet users

There's a new Phorm web presence, which seems to mark the beginning of a new PR offensive.  The new site, called "inphorm", is a nicely laid out website featuring more spin from Kent Ertegrul, the Phorm CEO.  It should be be named "misinphorm".  It can be found at http://www.phorm.com/newsletter/01/article01.html.

The main story seriously misrepresents the Phorm system.  Remember, as it currently seems to work:

Over at the nodpi foums, there's a discussion about some rumoured employment changes regarding Phorm in Korea (Trouble at Mill).  Some of the emails contain Kent Ertegrul's contact details as they were at that time, and these have been looked at to see if the veracity of the Korean story could be checked.

One of the posters googled Ertegrul's phone number and found:

Two reports in the press highlight the database dangers the UK is sleepwalking into.

The Guardian reports (DNA details of 1.1m children on database) that the details of over a million children remain in the national DNA database,  despite over half of these individuals having no criminal convictions.

I'm visiting friends in South Wales, and I'm using their BT internet connection.  This gives me the first check that the BT-Phorm warning system is still working (it is - if you're on BT, you'll see the grey box with warning script on the right.

If you see this warning, click on the  InPhormation Desk link for more information about what Phorm, BT Webwise and deep packet inspection are, and why yo should be worried.

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 Register reports (Phorm unleashes legal attack on critics) that much-criticised former spyware company Phorm has unleased legal missives in the direction of Which?, who conducted a user survery which supposedly found that internet users were deeply unhappy about the intrusive and possibly illegal Phorm system, which scans all internet activity in order to extract keywords for targetted advertising.  According to The Regiser,

News articles based on a survey indicating public opposition to Phorm's web snooping and advertising system have been withdrawn after the firm made legal threats to their publishers.

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.

It's been a little while since I last blogged about the vile Phorm system, in which all internet activity that is undertaken by customers of ISPs using the system is inspected and analysed for key words via which targeted adverts may be delivered.  For more information about this system, check out the excellent Dephormation.  We've seen a variety of "spinning" techniques used by both Phorm (former spyware distributors) and their principal client, BT, over the last few years, and news over the last couple of days has been typical.

Back in 2006 and 2007, BT conducted secret tests of the system, using their customers as guinea pigs, without their knowledge or consent.  This was probably illegal, and certainly an unreasonable act.  A third trial (in which users were invited to participated) was held at the end of 2008.

The Guardian reports today (UK mobile phone firms to sell data about customer activity) that mobile telecomms firms have been harvesting data about their customers web browsing habits, and that they plan to uses these data to increase advertising revenues.

The GSMA's chief marketing officer, Michael O'Hara, said: "We can see the top sites, see where people are browsing regularly. See the time that sites are being viewed, the number of visits, the duration of visits and we can also get demographic data so you can have age ranges, male/female ranges. 

The former chief of MI5, Dame Stella Rimington, has warned that the UK risks becoming a police state (The Daily Telegraph, "Spy chief: We risk a police state").  In the interview, she accuses ministers of interfering with people's privacy and playing straight into the hands of terrorists.

This is a theme that I've returned to on numerous occasions over the last few months: that the UK Government has used (and, I believe, mainipulated) the terrorist "threat" to force through draconian measures that threaten out civil liberties and right to privacy.  From extended detention periods, to the increased databases held about (and following the Coroners bill, increasingly joined together), the general drift is to a situation where the state has uprecedented access to out communications and other aspects of out private life.Rimmington says

Over at his blog Heresy Corner, the Heresiarch has an excellent overview of the continual erosion of our civil liberties (Remember what he said about "British liberty"?).

The article is framed over a series of points made by Gordon Brown in a speech delivered shortly after he took office as Prime Minister.

Poor old Jacqui Smith!  The Home Secretary is currently embroiled in controversy concerning her expenses claim for here "second home" (which turns out to be the home she lives in.  Turns out of course that her "main home" is a room in her sister's house (BBC News "Smith asked to explain expenses".

I've got no opinion as to her guilt or innocence here, but the amusing thing in this report is that it suggests she was turned in by her neighbours:

The UK Government's plans to assemble a joined up database state appear to be drawing closer.  In the rather innocuous sounding Coroners and Justice Bill Part 8 - Data Protection Act 1998 (c. 29) lies an interesting clause, 152, in which the government empowers itself to authorise largely unlimited data sharing.

The bill's summary is as follows (my emphasis - at least it flags up the change that interests me):

Privacy International have issued a report on how the Coroners and Justice Bill Part 8 - Data Protection Act 1998 (c. 29) will impact on data protection in the UK, and it makes for depressing reading.

Clause 152 of the Bill will permit an almost limitless range of data sharing pportunities both within government and between commercial organisations[...]

An interesting report on the BBC website on the use and abuse of RIPA.  It would appear that local councils are always ready to use RIPA to keep an eye on their citizens.

Figures obtained by BBC Radio Lincolnshire show that local councils have used covert surveillance authorisations 217 times in the last three years.