Government to monitor Internet Use

[Matt D]

Originally Posted by Kosh

And so it begins...

Online privacy: Home Office to write blank cheque for 'snoopers' charter'

Originally Posted by The Grauniad

The government is to offer a blank cheque to internet and phone firms that will be required to track everyone's email, Twitter, Facebook and other internet use under legislation to be published on Thursday.

The Home Office has confirmed it will foot the bill, thought to run into tens and possibly hundreds of millions, for collecting and storing the extra social media and web browsing records needed to implement the scheme, which critics have dubbed an "online snooper's charter".

Ministers did not put a figure on the cost of the new scheme but said it would be far less than the £2bn price tag estimated when Labour put forward a web-tracking scheme based on a central Home Office database in 2006.

The Liberal Democrats are expected to scale back their criticism of the legislation, which is to be published in draft form on Thursday, after Nick Clegg's intervention secured a series of safeguards, including a scrutiny inquiry by MPs and peers that will report by the end of November.

But the measure is expected to continue to attract fierce criticism from libertarian Conservatives, led by the former shadow home secretary David Davis, who this week attacked it again, calling it "expensive, unnecessary and a huge invasion of everyone's privacy".

An online petition run by the campaign group 38 degrees has already attracted more than 163,000 signatures under the slogan: "Our civil liberties have taken a battering in recent years from politicians of all backgrounds. Now it's time to for us to push back."

(snip)

Ah, so Cleggy has secured safeguards has he? I feel so reassured...


David Davis continues to be the only Tory MP I have any real respect for. I wish he was Home Secretary instead of Theresa May.

[Damien]

I told you the Liberal Democrats will fold and give in. All that talk they gave is for show, they intended to give in right away!

[Sirius]

I can see a massive increase in the sales of VPN,s

[jempalmer]

Originally Posted by Sirius

I can see a massive increase in the sales of VPN,s

Yes mate, I'm looking in to that

[Fawkes]

Originally Posted by Sirius

I can see a massive increase in the sales of VPN,s

Law abiding citizens shouldn't have to hide from their own government. We must push back and reject the principle of guilty until proven innocent.

I can feel a strongly worded letter to my MP coming on!

[nomadking]

If a friend of yours is found to be involved in terrorist activity, these sort of records might help show that you were not involved. How would that be a bad thing? If there were no records then it would be less easy to prove that you weren't involved and you would therefore still be considered a suspect.

[Hugh]

I shouldn't have to prove my innocence - the accusers should have to prove my guilt.

[danielf]

If a mate of your is involved in terrorist activity you're a knob head for not ditching this 'mate' for his extreme views. You may not know about his terrorist activities, but you'll know he has extreme views.

[Fawkes]

I been following the debate on this for a while now and have tried to look at it from the governments and polices point of view. Although the evidence they present is shaky at best it isn’t hard to imagine that having access to more data about a potential suspect would help them.

Any good citizen who witnessed a crime would help the police so why shouldn’t CSP’s turn over the information they have if it helps? Well that’s exactly what they already do under RIPA. This new law would require CSP’s to not only hand over information they already have but to collect additional information they have no business need to collect. Going back to the good citizen analogy it’s more like asking you to spy on your neighbour.

The police need to keep up with technology, I wouldn’t what to stand in the way of that but is this the right move? Merely an update to allow them to capture data they have long had access to, like call history but in a VoIP context. This is how the government portrays it. They say this is only communication data, no content will be captured but the lines between communication data and content are not always clearly drawn in the internet age.

They can’t access the body of your emails or the voice data of your calls using these powers but you can tell a lot about a person from their web history, and phone location data. In the offline world the government did need to know what newspaper I read. They don’t need to know it in the online world but this data will be captured nevertheless.

I’ve not seen that much debate about the substance of this bill, maybe there doesn’t need to be after all people splash their personal data all other the web all the time and the police are only interested in criminals not the average Joe on the street. But it’s your data you should have your say.

[Damien]

More information, less privacy and less liberties will always help the police. The question isn't if the police would be helped but if the benefits outweigh the cost to our liberty. That is the balance the government needs to strike and successive governments have failed to do that.

[Fawkes]

Originally Posted by Damien

More information, less privacy and less liberties will always help the police. The question isn't if the police would be helped but if the benefits outweigh the cost to our liberty. That is the balance the government needs to strike and successive governments have failed to do that.

But the police would only be able to access the data if they could justify needing it.

[Hugh]

That worked so well for RIPA.......

[Fawkes]

Originally Posted by Hugh

That worked so well for RIPA.......

You're right, RIPA has been miss used. This was one of the main reasons I was against the Communications Data Bill but given the number of RIPA requests annually the number of errors are small. Successful uses of RIPA to bring people to justice go unreported.

Operation Rally - Dorset Police used communications data to very good effect when investigating a violent robbery of a pensioner that occurred at an isolated dwelling in March 2011. The victim was bound and physically tortured over a two hour period by three masked men. Eventually the victim provided the offenders with access to two safes and as a result 20 firearms, thousands of rounds of ammunition and £4,000 cash were stolen. The case became a force priority with the main objectives being to recover the firearms and minimise the risk to the public. A range of communications data was acquired in relation to the case; this led to a significant telephone number linked to the offence being identified. Analysis of the communications data associated to that phone led to the identification of mobile phones linked to the offenders. Analysis of the phone data was able to prove communication between the offenders, as well as evidencing their presence in the vicinity at the time of the offence. Further analysis evidenced their collective movement to the scene.The communications data in this case formed the main strand of the prosecution case and excellent quality analytical charts were prepared for court. Ultimately three defendants were found guilty of robbery and received indeterminate sentences (IPPs) which in effect represent 15+ years’ conventional prison sentences. The co-ordinator of the offence was sentenced to 12 years imprisonment. The final defendant received a sentence of 12 months for the possession of firearms

From: 2011 Annual Report of the Interception of Communications Commissioner[PDF]

I'm not saying we shouldn't demand better just that we need to look at the whole picture, as Damien says it's about getting the balance right.

[Fawkes]

Well it looks like the Home Office didn’t get the balance right according to the Joint Committee looking into the Communications Data Bill.

They criticised them for:

• Failing to properly consult CSPs
  
• Giving the Home Secretary too much power:
  
  

  Clause 1 would give the Secretary of State sweeping powers to issue secret notices to communications service providers (CSPs) requiring them to retain and disclose potentially limitless categories of data.

• Providing some figures that were “fanciful and misleadingâ€�.

Although they did agree that new legislation was needed.

Link to the full report. [HTML]

[martyh]

Originally Posted by Fawkes

Well it looks like the Home Office didn’t get the balance right according to the Joint Committee looking into the Communications Data Bill.

They criticised them for:

• Failing to properly consult CSPs
• Giving the Home Secretary too much power:
• Providing some figures that were “fanciful and misleadingâ€�.

Although they did agree that new legislation was needed.

Link to the full report. [HTML]

I'm skeptical about even that ,
is terrorism such a threat now ?
Don't the security services have effective tools already at their disposal they seem to be doing a good enough job at the moment
Terrorists don't send emails anyway ,at least not the clever ones ,they use Gmail or similar and just leave the message in the drafts box and give access to anyone they want