In my post yesterday looking at betting odds for the date of the next general election, I hinted that a change of government could be a positive step for civil liberties campaigners.
I’ve now stumbled across this excellent piece from the ever impressive James Graham. He questions where the Conservatives will go with Human Rights if elected, following some comments from Shadow Home Secretary Dominic Grieve seemingly differentiating between those “deserving” and “undeserving” in society. As James also points out, they might not be that hot on civil liberties either, calling for extra surveillance powers for police.
Delving a little deeper, their policy to scrap ID cards still appears to be valid, but what will the money saved be spent on?
We will scrap the ID cards scheme, and use some of the savings to build more prison places, provide more drug rehabilitation for those in custody and create a dedicated Border Police Force.
Extra spying powers for police, more prison places, a dedicated border police force… suddenly the promise to scrap ID cards isn’t looking as rosy…
So, would a change of government be a positive step for civil liberties? Or a false dawn?
Much could depend on whether the Liberal Democrats hold the balance of power. Then in addition to scrapping ID cards, we may see more of their policy paper “Security and Liberty in a Globalised World” implemented.
If a general election is called this year, be sure to delve deep in to what each party is really promising on civil liberties. Over the next few weeks we’ll be doing just that - watch this space.
One of the big hopes of civil liberties campaigners is that a change of government will bring an end to Labour’s creeping surveillance state. Of course the reality will be somewhat different, but if the politicians keep to their word, we should at least see an end to ID cards and ContactPoint.
But when might that change take place?
Word on the bush telegraph is an autumn 2009 poll is favoured. I’m not so sure. With the economy breathing like a 40-a-day smoker, Brown would be wise to choose a date that coincides with another planned election to save the country some valuable cash. Ladbrokes currently price a poll in May 2010 (local elections) as 13/8 favourite, followed by June 2009 (Euro / locals) at 4/1.
Those predicting an early poll could cash in if Gord calls one in April 2009 (14/1) or May 2009 (16/1).
Travellers who had trips ruined by Passport Service mistakes have claimed £500,000 in compensation in the past five years. The figures revealed by The People show claims of up to £2,000 due to passport and visa application errors.
It makes you wonder how much the government has budgeted for compensation payments when the inevitable problems with ID cards start.
It seems not a week goes past now without another example of public sector officials misplacing our private data. The latest dose of stupidity comes from a NHS Trust staff member in Lancashire. The health worker lost a memory stick being used to backup 6,000 records from clinical databases at HMP Preston.
The memory stick was of course encrypted. But, wait for it… the password was written on a note attached to the stick!
According to a spokesman from the Central Lancashire NHS Trust, the stick contains prisoner surnames, their broad age range, prison number, cell location, prison clinic appointment times, and review dates. It also includes details of some prisoners’ ailments, such as diabetes, asthma, mental health and sexual health.
Encryption is utterly useless unless those responsible for the data follow processes to the letter. Any deviation and our data is at risk. With thousands of people expected to be involved in administering the National Identity Register and ID card programme, how can we possibly trust the government when they say our data is secure?
…it may just land you with a visit from Plod.
The BBC’s Five Live Breakfast sparked a flurry of anti-surveillance texts this morning following their story on internet companies being forced to keep records of our emails.
From March, new legislation will force ISPs to keep information about every e-mail sent or received in the UK for one year. Crucially, says the Government, the content of emails will not be retained. The justification is, of course, that it will aid in fighting crime and terrorism. That’s of course assuming the police can wade through the hundreds of millions of emails offering them discount Viagra and a bigger ****.
Although content will not be retained, it still allows the police (or in fact, any number of public bodies from Councils to Health Authorities!) to pinpoint your location at any time, understand your friendships, your work relationships, even how and where you access a computer. But the benefit of this information is questionable without the content of the emails. So it is pretty clear to all this is the first step on the road to an immense communications database. Once the systems, policies and protocol are in place for this first step, it will be virtually impossible to stop.
Did I mention this “first step” is costing somewhere in the region of £25-70m of public money? Someone should tell the Government there’s a recession on.
A database developer sacked for lying on his CV hacked into systems to spy on his former colleagues and delete emails.
Julius Oladiran, 46, was dismissed from after his employers discovered his boasts of a master’s degree, and top Government jobs were all lies.
Desperate to know what people were saying about him, the conman installed spyware on the office network to track e-mail gossip.
But he also deleted e-mails delegating work between colleagues, which meant the company lost a month’s work on a project, which then collapsed, leading to the laying off of several workers.
The company is not named, but imagine the security risk if this was one of the numerous companies involved in the Government’s obsession with databases. This trickster proves just how easy it can be to gain access to private systems, with the right knowledge.
What protection has the Government put in place to reduce the risk of something like this happening with our own private data?
This blog post now featured on openDemocracy
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On 29 January the EEMA (European Association for e-identity and Security) and the Digital Identity Forum are holding a seminar entitled “The Business Use and Applications of the UK National Identity Card”
Have a read of this from their website:
Over a period of time, public opinion, as measured by opinion polls, appears to have shifted away from support for the scheme towards opposition. This appears to have become more of a concern since the disclosure of the loss of 15 million records by Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs.
However, this could change if a commercial and business value of this card could be established, what opportunities are there for this unique and accredited form of identity to be exploited?
It is rumoured that there are 250 commercial applications spawned from the introduction of the Belgian Identity Card from car insurance to Access and Identity Management (AIM), learn how some of these were introduced and of their success.
HOLD ON A MINUTE! Let me check the official Home Office website on ID cards:
The data will only be used to accurately determine your identity.
and
The information we would take about you, and what we would do with it, is strictly limited by laws designed to protect you.
Information will only be held for the purposes of proving identity. Sensitive information like medical records will not be held.
So what exactly is going on here? Is this businesses getting together on the off-chance the Government might change their minds at some point in the future? Or are there plans afoot to sell our private data once the ID card system is up and running?
We need answers.
Welsh Lib Dem AM Peter Black brings our attention to Cabinet Minister James Purnell who has misplaced important documents for a second time.
Rather than poke fun at the unfortunate Mr Purnell, I’d like to second what Peter Black says:
The purpose of this post is not to draw attention to Mr. Purnell’s double whammy, though he does appear to be particularly accident-prone, but to show how easy it is for valuable identification papers to be lost, even by Government Ministers.
If we were to be forced to carry ID cards it would be a simple matter for somebody to acquire one, clone it and use it. Where is the security in that? The fact is that an over-reliance on these plastic cards could lead to danger in itself. Not only would they not achieve the purpose they were designed for but ID cards could create new problems.
As I often need to point out to people, an ID card will in time become over-relied upon to prove you are who you say you are. Anyone who’s suffered a cloned credit card will know the difficulty in regaining control of your affairs. Imagine the nightmare if your ID card is cloned…
Tayside Police said systems installed in local businesses to protect staff and deter shoplifters are often not properly maintained.
Crime prevention officers are urging firms and shops with CCTV cameras to check their system is working properly.
Most large towns and cities have public CCTV monitored by police and supplemented by large stores and shops with in-house systems.
Crime prevention officer Donald Campbell said the hopes of police officers were often short-lived as vital evidence was lost due to in-house CCTV systems which were no longer fit for purpose. He said: ‘‘CCTV is not something that you fit and forget. It must be properly deployed and maintained before it can do the job it is designed for.
With the incredible number of CCTV cameras now watching Britain’s streets, you have to wonder how many of these are monitored and maintained.
Reports that police have been granted new powers to snoop on your PC without a warrant have been denied by the Home Office.
According to the Sunday Times report, the Home Office has quietly adopted a new plan via Europe to allow police across Britain to conduct “remote searching”. It allows police or MI5 officers to examine remotely and covertly the hard drive of someone’s PC.
Under the Brussels edict, police across the EU have been given the green light to expand the implementation of a rarely used power involving warrantless intrusive surveillance of private property. The strategy will allow French, German and other EU forces to ask British officers to hack into someone’s UK computer and pass over any material gleaned.
A remote search can be granted if a senior officer says he “believes” that it is “proportionate” and necessary to prevent or detect serious crime — defined as any offence attracting a jail sentence of more than three years.
Following our post yesterday on the police stopping 60,000 people near train tracks under anti-terrorism legislation, we at Barcode Nation have serious concerns that this could lead to another abuse of power. Who defines “proportionate”? Is it the same people that think stopping 60,000 people near train tracks under anti-terrorism legislation is proportionate?
The Home Office has denied any such plans:
A spokesman for the Home Office told the Reg that UK police can already snoop - but these activities are governed by the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act and the Surveillance Commissioner. He said changes had been proposed at the last Interior Ministers’ meeting, but nothing has happened since.
The German Interior Ministry explained at the time that “almost all partner countries have or intend to have in the near future national laws allowing access to computer hard drives and other data storage devices located on their territory”. But the Germans noted the legal basis of transnational searches is not in place and ministers were looking for ways to rectify this.
