The UK's Surveillance State Grows Exponentially. The Snooper's Charter
I know the British wanted to leave the EU because of its perceived authoritarian bureaucracy, they should be really terrified of what they have let loose in this fortress Britain bubble mentality. Now they have their own home grown totalitarians.
A Bill to make provision about the interception of communications, equipment interference and the acquisition and retention of communications data, bulk personal datasets and other information; to make provision about the treatment of material held as a result of such interception, equipment interference or acquisition or retention; to establish the Investigatory Powers Commissioner and other Judicial Commissioners and make provision about them and other oversight arrangements; to make further provision about investigatory powers and national security; to amend sections 3 and 5 of the Intelligence Services Act 1994; and for connected purposes.
Anyone that has walked around British towns has some idea of the damn near blanket coverage of CCTV.
A Londoner is caught on a close circuit surveillance camera over 300 times a day, thanks to the 51,600 CCTV cameras installed across Britain controlled by local authorities, almost 20 per cent of the world's CCTV population.
That was in 2012 there are far more today, double it probably.
Now your everyday browsing online
The Investigatory Powers Bill, which was passed on Thursday, would, among other measures, require websites to keep customers' browsing history for up to a year and allow law enforcement agencies access to help with investigations.
Edward Snowden, former US National Security Agency contractor-turned-whistle-blower, said the powers "went further than many autocracies".
Edward Snowden, former US National Security Agency contractor-turned-whistle-blower, said the powers "went further than many autocracies".
"The UK has just legalised the most extreme surveillance in the history of western democracy," he said on Twitter.
"The passage of the Snoopers' Charter through parliament is a sad day for British liberty," said Bella Sankey, the group's policy director, in a statement on Thursday.
"Under the guise of counterterrorism, the state has achieved totalitarian-style surveillance powers - the most intrusive system of any democracy in human history. It has the ability to indiscriminately hack, intercept, record and monitor the communications and internet use of the entire population," she said.
We all know how close the ties are that the NSA and GCHQ are.
It's therefore sort of funny that the hated EU dislikes this shit
The British prime minister set out the proposal, dubbed the Snooper’s Charter by critics, a year ago when she was home secretary and has twisted arms to get the bill through parliament. The bill allows government security services to hack people’s computers and smartphones, snoop on browsing history going back a year and track millions of devices simultaneously at the request of the home secretary
The powers are fated to trigger a legal and political conflict between the U.K. and the EU over privacy – similar to the one Brussels has waged with the U.S. since Edward Snowden — revealed mass spying practices by the American government.
For now, U.K. companies can transfer data — everything from family photos to employee pay slips — within the EU. But once separated, the U.K. and EU will have to hash out a deal allowing companies to continue to transfer data across the Channel, much like the transatlantic “privacy shield.” Any future EU-U.K. deal will hinge on whether EU regulators believe their citizens’ privacy is respected under U.K. law. This doesn’t look straightforward.
Brussels has undertaken a crusade to export its vision on privacy and data protection across the world, devoting significant resources to negotiating new deals on privacy protections. In the past year, EU officials got the U.S. to start toning down its surveillance on EU citizens. The EU’s highest court has picked up the baton as defender of privacy as a fundamental right, striking down legislation that failed to protect internet users. European data watchdogs increasingly bite and bark at tech giants like Facebook and Google.
No wonder the UK's latest Tory Government wants to ditch the oversight of the European Court as part of Brexit
You see, when you let the right wing [I include many centrist Dems in this] grab hold of the apparatus of the State then we have an ever increasing interference in our daily lives. I for one don't trust them, since their fucking wars and asset stripping foreign policy only make the situation worse and easier for them to ramp up the god-damned fear.
Will any more whistle-blowers come forward? I very much doubt it, the way the current ones have been hounded and treated has been a disgrace. Those that join in with the State's persecution of these individuals and take verbatim what is released by these State's to the media are helping the system progress.
Oh for a free and independent media, we need it more than ever, break up the media conglomerates.
Maybe electing Trump will drive the distrust to new levels never seen before, just maybe complacency will get a kick in the teeth. Maybe? Under a Democratic Party President most just went "meh" [and would have remained that way under a new one], perhaps they can now take notice? Perhaps? Now that we have a bloody awful one, possibly normal service could be resumed? Possibly?
I won't hold my breath.
I can hear George Orwell screaming with rage "I fucking warned you, you pillocks".
"The war is not meant to be won, it is meant to be continuous. Hierarchical society is only possible on the basis of poverty and ignorance. This new version is the past and no different past can ever have existed. In principle the war effort is always planned to keep society on the brink of starvation. The war is waged by the ruling group against its own subjects and its object is not the victory over either Eurasia or East Asia, but to keep the very structure of society intact."#George Orwell
Fear of the other is the new Soma: "All the advantages of Christianity and alcohol; none of their defects." A Brave New World~Aldous Huxley
Vive la Revolution [Live the Revolution]
Comments
Wake me when the Brits cease to occupy Ireland.
On a point about your excellent post, as long as London is one of the centers for international monopoly capital, individual rights and liberties will continue to be eroded by the plutocrats.
First, leave the EU; second, kick the international corporatists out of your country. You cannot be free until you do. Look to the USA for what will happen to you.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
The fuuny thing is that the EU is offering more protections
for individuals against the States and Corporations than many individual governments want, the people have never come into the equation.
I confess to knowing little about how the EU operates but I
have the impression that their stance on human rights is quite good. Reading about how the EU promotes rights to the basics like food, shelter, education, health care and the like, if true, sounds positive. As you've written, the blame and shame comes in at the national level and although the Eurocrats have defined ideas about protecting the banks and corporations, there also seems to have been a genuine concern for the well being of people, or so I have read.
Thanks again for the diary.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
I think I will write an essay on because many have just
heard the objections of some highly dubious individuals. The positives are not talked about enough.
For example
Marine Le Pen could not do what she wants as an authoritarian within the EU therefore she proposes leaving the EU and makes up a load of shit some of which maybe nearly true enough to get repeated.
The way Europe works is extraordinarily boring and driven by consensus of all member states hence radical nutcases have little input. Bureaucrats also happen to be a lot less creative than politicians.
Now the EU financial structure, bankers and Euro are another matter entirely and where most of the objections actually lie.
Bureaucrats have to be stolid and boring: That's the way they
are supposed to function, in my view. No policy shifts can come from the bureaus and almost any attention is unwanted. The best bureaucrats can do is to implement the policies and laws evenhandedly - which is no small thing; it's a plus. The consensus decision-making is also OK in my eyes as long as the rights of all are protected.
To the extent the Euro-Bank exists to reflect German dominance, that's not a plus. I would object if I were an Italian(say) and had my country repeatedly referred to as on Europe's "periphery." All countries are supposed to be somewhat equal, the only inequality stemming from relative size. I should know more than I do but confess to being out of my league when it comes to the failure of Greece vis a vis the Euro-Bank and the German banks. I'd like to know more.
Very interesting that Le Pen would have to take France out of the Eurozone to impose her plans.
"The justness of individual land right is not justifiable to those to whom the land by right of first claim collectively belonged"
There's a series on Netflix
featuring BBC's channel 4 hit show "Caught on Camera". It shows the use of countless cctv cameras placed all over London. I thought it was bad here. It's out of control.
"I can't understand why people are frightened of new ideas. I'm frightened of the old ones."
John Cage
As the Brits would say "it's totally f'ing bonkers"
I don't mind the CCTV's
Those are out in public. If someone's doing something out in public that they don't want others to know about, I have to question what exactly it is they're doing, and why they're doing it in public in the first place. I actually support doing the same in the US. The part I disagree with is the control being in the hands of the local authorities. The control should be in the hands of civilians, with public access to the cameras' footage. That way, the authorities would be watched just as much as the civilians.
Only when the whole system is coupled together will you worry?
Too late.
If it's not clear
I don't mind things that are happening in public being monitored. It's public, after all, not private. What matters is when a person's actual privacy is being monitored, because then there's no longer such thing as privacy.
So there is no privacy when you go outside, I'm glad French
law disagrees. As for the UKs record in maintaining government data safe, that's a bloody joke.
This camera count only includes cameras rum by government [local] there are hundreds of thousands more [millions] securing businesses and homes. It's wall to wall.
What privacy can you have
when you are in a crowd? Like I said previously: "If someone's doing something out in public that they don't want others to know about, I have to question what exactly it is they're doing, and why they're doing it in public in the first place."
What "private" things are done in the public eye, and how can doing them in public be private? The only things I can really think of are illicit things, or things you're doing on a phone or computer. And why is a camera seeing you do it so much worse than a crowd of strangers?
The reason it was brought in in France was for
blackmail, not with the person you are meant to be with for example.
That doesn't answer the questions I asked.