I appreciate that the following, linking to an article on US legislation, might at first glance to be outside your immediate area of interest. However, given the UK governments apparent willingness to “roll over” and accept legislation coming out of Washington DC these days, it’s likely that the EU may soon be facing attempts to implement or support this internationally…

http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/2012/apr/23/ron-paul-cispa-cyberterrorism-bill

It’s worrying to consider how much consideration this sort of thing gets by the UK government (who were *so* keen for the likes of Phorm to get established here in the UK), and then how much abuse such frameworks may be subjected to… Worth watching, perhaps?

Thanks for clipping the video…

We miss you here in Washington State. A LOT!

RIPA already works. My Council, Leicester City Council, publish details of their RIPAs, how many, what they were for etc. They are pretty transparent, as much as they can be without revealing too much to affect possible prosecutions.

If RIPA is used properly and saves us taxpayers money and keeps us safe, it is perfectly adequate along with various other existing legislation. We do not need this further legislation, we already have the tools. It is nothing more than a way to spy on everything we do and should be an utter outrage to everyone, not just clued up civil liberty types.

We must all fight it instantly, every time someone in Gvt, whatever political party or coalition, suggests. it.

Thank you for the articles and raising awareness, Heather.

1. “Terrorists and Paedophiles” seem to be the “hot buttons” that Ministers use every time they are arguing for something that they know is contentious. Is it worth reminding the viewers of this fact, or of asking what % of the population Ministers feel fall into either category (If our population is 60,000,000, then 0.01% = 6000 people. How many terrorists does the Government think are operating in the UK?) Is it also worth pointing out that if the costs are true (£2 Billion) then to catch the theoretical 6000 “bad people” we would be spending an average of £333,333 to catch *each bad person*. Do these numbers really stack up? [I am not suggesting that this sum of money is appropriate, just that there may be better ways to spend it]. What % of existing activity under existing legislation is used to track these two criminal activities, as opposed to *other* types of activity?

2. Track Record – if we were to take the known, participants in, say, the 7/7 attacks in London, can the Government show how the proposed changes would have caught those individuals *before* they attacked? [ To my knowledge the govt only had film footage of the activists scoping targets in London and that only made sense after the fact ].

3. Presumed Innocence – the UK legal system is supposed to operate on the basis of presumed innocence – the Crown has to prove guilt (“beyond a reasonable doubt”) to secure a conviction. Surely, a national dragnet to monitor all phone calls, all emails, all web site access moves us beyond that “innocent until proven guilty” and takes us to “Potentially guilty until checked and given the all-clear”???

4. Misuse and Abuse – We’ve seen from FOI answers that councils have used RIPA to spy on parents suspected of busting school catchment areas [that's real terrorism, that is!] but what about the stories that don’t come to light? What about those in authority [who could operate without warrants under the new proposals] spying on neighbours? The daughter’s new boyfriend? The wife’s boss?

5. What’s Next? Do we go to some kind of statistical analysis engine [like insurance companies use] to compute the percentage probability that you’re a terrorist? How far away is “Minority Report”?

Quis custodiet ipsos custodes?

6. What’s the point? If the “fear of terrorism” results in a nation subjecting it’s citizens to this level of monitoring and subjugation, haven’t the terrorists won? Won’t we be living in a police state? Where does the point of balance lie? What’s enough?

7. Who is this for? I’d hope the correct answer to this question is “the tax-payers and citizens of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland”. Question is: do we want it? On some topics [such as the national budget, for example] it makes sense to have a government advise us in terms of what we can and can’t afford to do. But something like this, which is more about social justice, should surely be subject to greater voter/taxpayer scrutiny. So bearing in mind the previous labour government tried for a national database and were defeated, precisely what mandate does the current government believe that they have to do this, given that they’ve already seen the majority of people oppose it? [ Why does this feel a lot like European Integration all over again? Wanted by the bankers and the elite, and ends up costing Joe Taxpayer a fortune in net contributions every year]???

I wish you well in any future invitations to speak on national media.

Thank you, again, for putting up such a spirited defense on the BBC earlier today.

I have no issue with the focus on government, however many conspiracies that you focus on are covering up incompetence and the law of unforeseen consequences rather than some grand illumanitesque scheme.

But it is not just email.

In the USA, Verizon have notified their subscribers that they intend to profile them on the basis of their private and confidential internet communications.

In the UK, the major ISPs are routinely and illegally spying on telecommunications with impunity, and with corrupt support from Police, Prosecutors, and central Government.

For example; Vodafone in the UK are relaying the URL of every single page viewed by their subscribers to California, where Bluecoat are using a replay attack to read exactly the same page. In effect, Bluecoat are stalking thousands Vodafone UK users (without their knowledge or consent, or the consent of the websites affected).

BT and Phorm (a US registered Delaware corporation with links to spyware pushers OCSLabs in Moscow) intercepted the private and confidential communications of 200,000 BT users and the sites they visited in 2006/7/8… even making a television appearance to brag about their intentions… No regulator intervened. No one was prosecuted. No one was arrested.

If we can’t have confidence in the privacy/security/integrity of our communications against warrantless surveillance… we can’t have confidence in our communications at all… which has profound consequences for the future.

I gather you’re visiting the Bath Lit2012 festival in the UK? I hope I might get a chance to meet you; you’ll recognised me.

Someone was kind enough to buy me ‘The Revolution Will Be Digitised’ for Christmas. Your comments about the importance of professional journalism in democratic societies remind me of the following Dalai Lama quote:

“When I talk to people of various professional backgrounds, particularly from the West, they seem to have a tremendous amount of attachment to their own profession. One could say that many people have an enormous personal investment in their profession, they identify with it, so much so that they feel as if their profession is so vital for the world’s well-being that if it were to degenerate the whole world would suffer. This suggests to me that their level of attachment is inappropriate”(HH Dalai Lama, ‘Transforming the Mind’, 2000: 64-65).

You write:

“A statement isn’t a fact. Even when the person making the statement is an authority he or she still needs to provide evidence or proof that what they say is the truth and a professional journalist should be asking for this proof and supplying it for public scrutiny”(‘The Revolution Will Be Digitised’, 2011: 72).

I agree but sadly, as the media scholar Robert McChesney explains, this rarely happens because

“Journalists who question agreed-upon assumptions by the political elite stigmatize themselves as unprofessional and political. Most major U.S. wars over the past century have been sold to the public on dubious claims if not outright lies, yet professional journalism has failed to warn the public” (Robert McChesney, ‘The Problems of the Media’, 2004: 74).

You add:

“All this accumulating of statements, data and information which then has to be verified takes time. But this is the only thing a journalist does that marks him out as professional. It’s the only reason anyone would choose a well-known newspaper’s website over an unknown blog. The newspaper as a brand has built up, over time, a reputation for challenging the powerful and giving people meaningful, true information.

“The press is not like any other business and what it sells shouldn’t just be rehashed press releases or celebrity gossip, but the civic information necessary for people to understand their society and participate in it. It is a check on political and financial power, or at least it should be”(‘The Revolution Will Be Digitised’, 2011: 73).

In reality, the press is exactly like every other business because it’s raison d’être is not to inform the public, but to make a profit. In their excellent book ‘Guardians of Power’ (2006) David Cromwell and David Edwards ask:

“Can a corporate media system be expected to tell the truth about a world dominated by corporations? Can newspapers, including the “liberal” Guardian and New York Times tell the truth about catastrophic climate change – about its roots in mass consumerism and corporate obstructionism – when they are themselves profit-orientated businesses dependent on advertisers for more than half of their revenue?”

Why did you choose not to explore these questions?

I look forward to your reply.
Tony

The new batch of e-mails – “climategate 2.0″ – released this morning merits your attention:

http://climateaudit.org/2011/11/22/new-climategate-emails/#comments

I thought you might be interested to read the following email, which details about the Met deal with FOIs from journalists:

From:
Davies Merilyne – DoI
Sent:
06 June 2008 17:11
To:
MPS – Information Managers
Cc:
Duncan Andrea – DoI; Pallen Sarah E – DoI; Shankster Nigel J – DoI; Simmons Kevin –
DoI; Aldridge Shannon – DoI
Subject:
High Risk FoI Cases
Importance:
High

Dear Colleagues,

This email serves as a reminder to be alert to the issue of identifying High Risk FOIA
requests.

You will notice that when allocated a Freedom of Information Act request to deal with by
the Public Access Office, the log will contain the following phrase:-

You MUST obtain approval from DPA / Press Liaison and / MPS ACPO portfolio
lead before release if this request is from a journalist or identified as high
risk.

The management of FOIA and the potential release of information into the public domain
has to be consistent, corporate and within the legislative requirements of
FOIA. It is therefore vitally important to the MPS that those requests having the potential
to cause significant harm are identified at the earliest opportunity. Again,
ACPO guidance summarises HARM as follows:-

The undesired consequence of the disclosure of information which will or could lead to
the physical or mental harm to an individual, damage to property, loss of confidence or a
reduction in the effective provision of public service delivery, temporary or permanent.

With this in mind, the Public Access Office are categorising the following types of
request as HIGH RISK and would wish to be notified at the earliest opportunity of any
change to the status of a request from either normal > high risk or vice versa.

This High Risk assessment is over and above the normal Central Referral Criteria that
exists already and is purely for MPS purposes.

HIGH RISK

Covert Human Intelligence Source / Informant information
Registered Sex Offender or MAPPA related information
Information impacting on MPS Counter Terrorism Command
Surveillance Information
Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) information

Witness Protection Programmes
Any data falling with the realm of Section 23 or 24 Freedom Of Information.
(Security Bodies and or National Security Issues)
Any information relating to or requests from VIP’s (MP’s etc) and or Royal
Household
Covert or MPS secure IT systems

Procurement / high value contract information
Any unpublished MPS procedures
Any statistical information either Crime or HR, especially when from an identified
media source

Requests for Third Party Information in the hands of the MPS, ie: from the Home
Office, MPA, GLA, IPCC etc.
High Profile Investigations, ie; Stockwell, Cash for Honours etc.
Misconduct, Employment Tribunal or Civil Action Information

Any request involving an identified member of the Media.

The process is not intended to hinder or delay the release of information but to
ensure that we release consistent information and are properly prepared for any
potential consequences of the release.

Merilyne Davies
Head of Public Access Office
Data Protection Officer and Freedom of Information Lead