[governance] UK - Plans for extra email and web monitoring powers spark privacy fears
Riaz K Tayob
riaz.tayob at gmail.com
Mon Apr 2 06:23:45 EDT 2012
[ perhaps a workshop on what the south can learn from the advanced
democracies on regulation of the net may be useful...]
Plans for extra email and web monitoring powers spark privacy fears
Conservative MP David Davis leads criticism of coalition's bid to revive
extra powers to snoop on emails and social media
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Hélène Mulholland
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/helenemulholland> and Robert
Booth <http://www.guardian.co.uk/profile/robertbooth>
* guardian.co.uk <http://www.guardian.co.uk>, Monday 2 April 2012
10.03 BST
* Article history
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2012/apr/02/email-web-monitoring-powers-privacy#history-link-box>
david davis
David Davis MP has criticised plans for extra powers to monitor emails
and internet use as unnecessary Photograph: Martin Argles for the Guardian
David Davis <http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/daviddavis>, the former
Conservative shadow home secretary, has warned that government plans to
introduce a law allowing police <http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/police>
and security services to extend their monitoring of the public's email
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/email> and social media
communications are unnecessary and will generate huge public resentment.
Davis spoke out after it emerged a new system will allow security
officials to scrutinise who is talking to whom, and exactly when the
conversations are taking place, but not the content of the message.
The coalition's proposals are likely to be introduced in the Queen's
speech on 9 May and will focus on internet
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/internet> service providers (ISPs
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/technology/isps>) gathering the information
and allowing government intelligence operatives to scrutinise it.
Labour tried to introduce a similar system using a central database
tracking all phone, text, email and internet use but that was dropped in
2009. It followed concerns raised by ISPs and mobile phone operators
over the project's feasibility, and anxieties over who would foot the bill.
Civil liberties campaigners have strongly criticised the revival of the
plan because of the risk it could breach the privacy
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/privacy> of law-abiding Britons.
The Conservative MP for Haltemprice and Howden, who famously quit his
seat to trigger a byelection over the Labour government's 42-day terror
detention plan in 2008
<http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2008/jun/12/daviddavis.conservatives>,
said legislation was unnecessary. Current surveillance arrangements
under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act and the unwarranted
checks on "who calls who" were already "too loose".
"I'm afraid what this does is makes it 60m times worse," Davis told the
BBC Radio 4 Today programme.
The coalition government had vowed -- and enshrined in the coalition
agreement --
<http://www.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/sites/default/files/resources/coalition_programme_for_government.pdf>to
"end the storage of internet and email records without good reason" in a
section on civil liberties that espouses the way the British state "has
become too authoritarian".
Davis said: "What is proposed is completely unfettered access to every
single communication you make. This argument it doesn't cover content --
it doesn't cover content for telephone calls, but your web address is
content. If you access a [website], that is content.
"I'm afraid it is a very, very big widening of powers, which I'm afraid
will be very much resented by many, many citizens who do not like the idea."
A similar attempt in Germany two years ago led to 35,000 complaints to
the supreme court, which subsequently struck it down, he said, warning:
"I suspect the same thing will happen here."
He added: "It's going to cause enormous resentment. Already thousands of
people on the web are objecting to it. It was dropped by the last
government ... if it was so important, they should have kept going last
time."
Anthony Glees, director of the Centre for Security and Intelligence
Studies at the University of Buckingham, pointed to the recent killings
in Toulouse, France, supported the measures, saying it needed to be done
"because it can be done".
He told Today the measures were important in the year of the Olympic
Games and the Queen's Diamond jubilee. Terrorists can be monitored and
attacks dealt with, he said, accusing critics such as Davis of getting a
"bit obsessed" with privacy, which he said "militates in favour of the
people who want to take the liberties of the rest of us".
Davis pointed out that if the legislative plans were going to be in the
Queen's speech next month, they could only be implemented in late 2013
at the earliest.
The Home Office confirmed over the weekend that the plans would be
brought forward "as soon as parliamentary time allows".
The Home Office said: "It is vital that police and security services are
able to obtain communications data in certain circumstances to
investigate serious crime and terrorism and to protect the public.
"We need to take action to maintain the continued availability of
communications data as technology changes. Communications data includes
time, duration and dialling numbers of a phone call, or an email
address. It does not include the content of any phone call or email and
it is not the intention of government to make changes to the existing
legal basis for the interception of communications."
Lord Carlile, a Lib Dem peer and a former independent reviewer of
terrorism legislation for the government, said he expected parliament to
demand strict safeguards on any new powers.
"There is nothing new about this," he told Today. "The previous
government intended to take similar steps and they were heavily
criticised by the coalition parties.
"But having come into government, the coalition parties have realised
this kind of material has potential for saving lives, preventing serious
crime and helping people to avoid becoming victims of serious crime.
"We are talking about the updating of existing practices."
Lord Carlile said he would expect parliament to demand the setting up of
an independent board to monitor activity.
Isabella Sankey, director of policy at Liberty, said: "Whoever is in
government the grand snooping ambitions of security agencies don't change.
"The coalition agreement explicitly promised to 'end unnecessary data
retention' and restore our civil liberties. At the very least we need
less secret briefing and more public consultation if this promise is to
be abandoned".
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