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| Britain |
| Big Brother Is Watching You |
| 2008-05-20 |
| A massive government database holding details of every phone call, e-mail and time spent on the internet by the public is being planned as part of the fight against crime and terrorism. Internet service providers (ISPs) and telecoms companies would hand over the records to the Home Office under plans put forward by officials. The information would be held for at least 12 months and the police and security services would be able to access it if given permission from the courts. The proposal will raise further alarm about a “Big Brother” society, as it follows plans for vast databases for the ID cards scheme and NHS patients. There will also be concern about the ability of the Government to manage a system holding billions of records. About 57 billion text messages were sent in Britain last year, while an estimated 3 billion e-mails are sent every day. Home Office officials have discussed the option of the national database with telecommunications companies and ISPs as part of preparations for a data communications Bill to be in November’s Queen’s Speech. But the plan has not been sent to ministers yet. Industry sources gave warning that a single database would be at greater risk of attack and abuse. Jonathan Bamford, the assistant Information Commissioner, said: “This would give us serious concerns and may well be a step too far. We are not aware of any justification for the State to hold every UK citizen’s phone and internet records. We have real doubts that such a measure can be justified, or is proportionate or desirable. We have warned before that we are sleepwalking into a surveillance society. Holding large collections of data is always risky - the more data that is collected and stored, the bigger the problem when the data is lost, traded or stolen.” David Davis, the Shadow Home Secretary, said: “Given [ministers’] appalling record at maintaining the integrity of databases holding people’s sensitive data, this could well be more of a threat to our security, than a support.” The proposal has emerged as part of plans to implement an EU directive developed after the July 7 bombings to bring uniformity of record-keeping. Since last October telecoms companies have been required to keep records of phone calls and text messages for 12 months. That requirement is to be extended to internet, e-mail and voice-over-internet use and included in a Communications Data Bill. Police and the security services can access the records with a warrant issued by the courts. Rather than individual companies holding the information, Home Office officials are suggesting the records be handed over to the Government and stored on a huge database. One of the arguments being put forward in favour of the plan is that it would make it simpler and swifter for law enforcement agencies to retrieve the information instead of having to approach hundreds of service providers. Opponents say that the scope for abuse will be greater if the records are held on one database. A Home Office spokesman said the Bill was needed to reflect changes in communication that would “increasingly undermine our current capabilities to obtain communications data and use it to protect the public”. |
| Posted by:tipper |
| #11 #9 - Like we have not yet translated even a fraction of the Iraqi intelligence gleaned after Saddam fell? |
| Posted by: Bobby 2008-05-20 21:16 |
| #10 And so it has arrived - Britain's NHS goes NATIONAL/GLOBAL INFORMATION SERVICE [NIS, GIS]??? NET > The World is suppos to run out of Internet space in approxi THREE YEARS. D *** NG IT, NIS > NAVAL {NET?] INTELLIGENCE SERVICE?? SIGN OF THE APOCALYPSE NUMER **** + THE APOCALPYSE [Internet Apocalyp] IS ITSELF APOCALYPTIN'??? |
| Posted by: JosephMendiola 2008-05-20 19:47 |
| #9 I once proposed, quite seriously, that we should send Russia EVERYTHING that is produced by our government at every level, by our universities, and whatever is in print from every business in the United States - and send it to them in English. Since the Russians are paranoid, they'll translate every single word. With the proliferation of information in the United States (this was in the 70's), Russia would be totally overwhelmed in a year or two. Even if they managed to keep their heads above water at first, the requirement of translating that much data would force the government to employ 90% or more of the population. To really foul them up, take out all the punctuation and formatting. Neither "Big Brother" nor the Russians can afford to do that. The data may be there, but there are neither enough people in government to do the research, nor enough hours in the day to keep up with everything being said and done. You HAVE to do keyword searches, you HAVE to winnow out the useless bulk of the data, and spend your time on only those things that are truly necessary. |
| Posted by: Old Patriot 2008-05-20 16:47 |
| #8 They can watch me all they want, they'll die of boredom. |
| Posted by: Redneck Jim 2008-05-20 14:11 |
| #7 http://i2.photobucket.com/albums/y25/mluphoup/eyeballs.jpg |
| Posted by: Anonymoose 2008-05-20 11:36 |
| #6 Dumb and easily foiled. All an organization has to do is word swapping, or any simplistic code such as use every sixth word. |
| Posted by: wxjames 2008-05-20 11:32 |
| #5 for those of you not old enough to remember, there was a myth/meme originaly known to me as the "Trunk Trawler". The idea was that the gubmint was recording all phone conversations, and doing something unspecified, yet sinister with them. [insert favorite totalitarian sequence of events here]. IIRC, this idea goes back to the 70's. When the internet became popular, this myth/meme was updated to include your email. It also went global. Google ECHELON for a taste of the subsequent lunacy. Old Spook probably would have more to tell you, if he cared to. Of course, I could be just saying this to help with the cover. After all, I too work for the gubmint, and telling you the truth would ...$@#^&% >>NO CARRIER |
| Posted by: N guard 2008-05-20 09:40 |
| #4 Buy stock in disc drive companies? |
| Posted by: 3dc 2008-05-20 09:29 |
| #3 Oh, I see, the gubmint wants to spool the data into their own database in real time or close. That is even stupider. I can't imagine a better money sink. |
| Posted by: Spike Uniter 2008-05-20 07:24 |
| #2 Dumb. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2008-05-20 07:19 |
| #1 Stupid idea. Given that over 70% of email traffic is spam, the signal to noise ratio is very high. Also, most email is deleted from a server once downloaded by the user. To keep it all on servers would be prohibitive as cost is concerned. If the gubmint wants to pay for storage to keep copies of every spam, well... The solution is -- oh, the dreaded p-word -- profiling. |
| Posted by: Spike Uniter 2008-05-20 07:11 |