The Big Brother state–by stealth

Thousands of unaccountable civil servants given access to our most intimate personal information

Thursday, 4 December 2008

Personal information detailing intimate aspects of the lives of every British citizen is to be handed over to government agencies under sweeping new powers. The measure, which will give ministers the right to allow all public bodies to exchange sensitive data with each other, is expected to be rushed through Parliament in a Bill to be published tomorrow.

The new legislation would deny MPs a full vote on such data-sharing. Instead, ministers could authorise the swapping of information between councils, the police, NHS trusts, the Inland Revenue, education authorities, the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority, the Department for Work and Pensions and other ministries.

Opponents of the move accused the Government of bringing in by stealth a data-sharing programme that exposed everyone to the dangers of a Big Brother state and one of the most intrusive personal databases in the world. The new law would remove the right to protection against misuse of information by thousands of unaccountable civil servants, they added.

Thomas Hammarberg, the Council of Europe’s commissioner for human rights, said he believed Britain had gone too far in helping to bring about a “surveillance society”. In a report drawing on personal data infringements across Europe but “inspired” by Britain’s plan for a new internet, email and telephone database, he added: “General surveillance raises serious democratic problems which are not answered by the repeated assertion that those who have nothing to hide have nothing to fear. This puts the onus in the wrong place: it should be for states to justify the interferences they seek to make on privacy rights.”

He said he was “very worried about the downgrading of the protections of personal information”, adding: “Of course there has to be a balance to be struck. At the moment we have not got it right.”

David Howarth, the Liberal Democrat justice spokesman, added: “The Government shouldn’t try to sneak through further building blocks of its surveillance state. Unrestricted data-sharing simply increases the risks of data loss. This is particularly troubling since the Government has already shown itself entirely incapable of keeping our personal data safe.”

The data-sharing measure is referred to in the Coroners and Justice Bill outlined in yesterday’s Queen’s Speech. It could, for instance, pave the way for medical records to be sent to the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency to identify drivers who pose a health risk, or school attendance data being handed to the Department for Work and Pensions to verify social security claims made by parents.

But civil rights groups warned that the possibility of public records being transferred to private companies on a minister’s whim was of even greater concern. Under the existing system, public bodies require primary legislation to authorise the transfer of data to another agency. The new plans would end such parliamentary scrutiny by permitting ministers to use secondary legislation without a full vote of MPs. The Bill sets out how ministers would be able to sidestep data protection and human rights laws that prevent public bodies revealing private information.

NO2ID, a group which campaigned against government plans for ID cards and the associated National Identity Register, said the proposals went far beyond data protection and were intended “to build the database state, concealed under a misleading name”. The group’s national co-ordinator, Phil Booth, said: “This is a Bill to smash the rule of law and build the database state in its place. Burying sweeping constitutional change in obscure Bills is an appalling approach. Having proved – and admitted – they cannot be trusted to look after our secrets, they are still determined to steal what privacy we have left. Parliament needs to wake up before it has no say any more.”

Civil liberties groups said the new powers could be used in conjunction with the equally controversial plan for a giant database holding details of people’s emails, telephone calls and internet searches. The Communications Data Bill, which would contain this information, was set for inclusion in yesterday’s Queen’s Speech but will now be part of a consultation paper to be published in January.

Mr Hammarberg said Britain’s poor record on data loss had led to an EU-wide debate about the dangers of a surveillance society. He added: “Data protection is crucial to the upholding of fundamental democratic values: a surveillance society risks infringing this basic right.”

The Ministry of Justice said data-sharing was essential for the delivery of “efficient and effective public services, tackling crime and protecting the public”. “Any draft order would require parliamentary approval and a privacy impact assessment,” said a spokesman. “Additionally, the Information Commissioner would have been invited to comment on the proposals. This will ensure any potential privacy issues and risks are identified and examined.

“The power will be exercised only in circumstances where the sharing of the information is in the public interest and proportionate to the impact on any person adversely affected by it.”

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/the-big-brother-statendashby-stealth-1050576.html

Government black boxes will ‘collect every email’

Government black boxes will ‘collect every email’
Home Office says all data from web could be stored in giant government database

By Robert Verkaik, Law Editor
Wednesday, 5 November 2008

Internet “black boxes” will be used to collect every email and web visit in the UK under the Government’s plans for a giant “big brother” database, The Independent has learnt.

Home Office officials have told senior figures from the internet and telecommunications industries that the “black box” technology could automatically retain and store raw data from the web before transferring it to a giant central database controlled by the Government.

Plans to create a database holding information about every phone call, email and internet visit made in the UK have provoked a huge public outcry. Richard Thomas, the Information Commissioner, described it as “step too far” and the Government’s own terrorism watchdog said that as a “raw idea” it was “awful”.

Nevertheless, ministers have said they are committed to consulting on the new Communications Data Bill early in the new year. News that the Government is already preparing the ground by trying to allay the concerns of the internet industry is bound to raise suspicions about ministers’ true intentions. Further details of the database emerged on Monday at a meeting of internet service providers (ISPs) in London where representatives from BT, AOL Europe, O2 and BSkyB were given a PowerPoint presentation of the issues and the technology surrounding the Government’s Interception Modernisation Programme (IMP), the name given by the Home Office to the database proposal.

Whitehall experts working on the IMP unit told the meeting the security and intelligence agencies wanted to use the stored data to help fight serious crime and terrorism, and said the technology would allow them to create greater “capacity” to monitor all communication traffic on the internet. The “black boxes” are an attractive option for the internet industry because they would be secure and not require any direct input from the ISPs.

During the meeting Whitehall officials also tried to reassure the industry by suggesting that many smaller ISPs would be unaffected by the “black boxes” as these would be installed upstream on the network and hinted that all costs would be met by the Government.

“It was clear the ‘back box’ is the technology the Government will use to hold all the data. But what isn’t clear is what the Home Secretary, GCHQ and the security services intend to do with all this information in the future,” said a source close to the meeting.

He added: “They said they only wanted to return to a position they were in before the emergence of internet communication, when they were able to monitor all correspondence with a police suspect. The difference here is they will be in a much better position to spy on many more people on the basis of their internet behaviour. Also there’s a grey area between what is content and what is traffic. Is what is said in a chat room content or just traffic?”

Ministers say plans for the database have not been confirmed, and that it is not their intention to introduce monitoring or storage equipment that will check or hold the content of emails or phonecalls on the traffic.

A spokesman for the Home Office said that Monday’s meeting provided a “chance to engage with small communication service providers” ahead of the formal public consultation next year. He added: “We need to work closely with the internet service providers and the communication service providers. The meeting was to show the top-line challenges faced in the future. We are public about the IMP, but we are still working out the detail. There will a consultation on the Communications Data Bill early next year.”

A spokesman for the Internet Service Providers Association said the organisation was pleased the Home Office had addressed its members and was keen to continue dialogue while awaiting a formal consultation.

Database plans were first announced by the Prime Minister in February. It is not clear where the records will be held but GCHQ may eventually be the project’s home.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/government-black-boxes-will-collect-every-email-992268.html

1984 – Communication Sypware

The future was here! These wonderful programs monitor our communications.

Eschelon

Eschelon was created during the cold war with Russia in the 1960s. It is an “interceptor” software that is “capable of interception and content inspection of telephone calls, faxes, e-mail and other data traffic globally through the interception of communication bearers including satellite transmission, public switched telephone networks and microwave links. “

Reportedly created to monitor the military and diplomatic communications of the Soviet Union and its Eastern Bloc allies during the Cold War in the early 1960s, today ECHELON is believed to search also for hints of terrorist plots, drug-dealers’ plans, and political and diplomatic intelligence. But some critics, including the European Union committee that commissioned the EU report, claim the system is also being used for large-scale commercial theft, inter-nation economic espionage and invasion of privacy.

British journalist Duncan Campbell and New Zealand Journalist Nicky Hager asserted in the 1990s that the United States was exploiting ECHELON traffic for industrial espionage, rather than military and diplomatic purposes.[6]

In 2001, the Temporary Committee on the ECHELON Interception System recommended to the European Parliament that citizens of member states routinely use cryptography in their communications to protect their privacy.

The proposed U.S.-only “Total Information Awareness” program relied on technology similar to that supposedly used by ECHELON, and is believed to have been intended to integrate the extensive sources it is legally permitted to survey domestically with the “taps” already supposedly compiled by ECHELON. It was canceled by the U.S. Congress in 2004. It was later discovered in 2005 that the CIA was developing a data mining program with similar aims called “Tangram.” A United States Air Force procurement document stated that the system will build on work by the CIA and other U.S. intelligence agencies “developing systems, tools and algorithms to detect international terrorist activities and planned events” which have developed “methods of … efficiently searching large data stores for evidence of known (terrorist) behaviors.”[7] “
[http://itlaw.wikia.com/wiki/Echelon]

Total Information Awareness

The name was later changed to Terrorism Information Awareness before it was “disbanded.” There were two bones of contention:

“The first involved the Director of IAO, Dr. John M. Poindexter. Poindexter, a retired Admiral, was, until that time, perhaps most well-known for his alleged role in the Iran-contra scandal during the Reagan Administration. His involvement with the program caused many in the civil liberties community to question the true motives behind TIA.[11] The second source of contention involved TIA’s original logo, which depicted an “all-seeing” eye atop of a pyramid looking down over the globe, accompanied by the Latin phrase scientia est potentia (knowledge is power). Although DARPA eventually removed the logo from its website, it left a lasting impression.”
[http://itlaw.wikia.com/wiki/TIA]

Carnivore

“Carnivore is a system implemented by the Federal Bureau of Investigation that is analogous to wiretapping, except in this case, e-mail and other communications are being tapped instead of telephone conversations. Carnivore is a customizable packet sniffer that can monitor all of a target user’s Internet traffic. It is a form of policeware. Carnivore was implemented during the Clinton administration with the approval of Attorney General Janet Reno. U.S. government officials have neither confirmed nor denied much about the physical or logical workings of Carnivore, but there are some facts that are generally agreed upon.”
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carnivore_program]

Policeware

“Policeware is software designed to police citizens by monitoring discussion and interaction of its citizens. Within the U.S., Carnivore was a first incarnation of secretly installed e-mail monitoring software installed in Internet service providers’ networks to log computer communication, including transmitted e-mails. Magic Lantern is another such application, this time running in a targeted computer in a trojan style and performing keystroke logging. Oasis, software developed by Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), is designed for converting intercepted audio into searchable text. CIPAV, deployed by FBI, is a spyware/trojan allegedly designed for identification of a computer.”
[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Policeware]

List of Key Carnivor and Eschelon words
[http://www.rense.com/general66/scgh.htm]

Documentary: Zeitgeist – Addendum

Zeitgeist: Addendum

“Zeitgeist: Addendum, attempts to locate the root causes of this pervasive social corruption, while offering a solution. This solution is not based on politics, morality, laws, or any other “establishment” notions of human affairs, but rather on a modern, non-superstitious based understanding of what we are and how we align with nature, to which we are a part. The work advocates a new social system which is updated to present day knowledge, highly influenced by the life long work of Jacque Fresco and The Venus Project.”

This controversial documentary is composed of two parts. The first part explores the basic money mechanics behind the Federal Reserves’ monetary system that most of the world’s monetary systems are based on. The second part suggests a Thomas Moore style of resource based economy Utopia that acts as a possible alternative to the monetary system called The Venus Project.

The Monetary System

Debt based fractional reserve banking is counterfeit fraud and, as noted in the film, causes unnecessary inflation. In addition, charging interest on money that has been literary created out of nothing is absolutely criminal. The banking world has a monopoly on money and it’s time it stopped. We have been fooled and manipulated by the banksters that have been robbing us blind for the last hundred years. The question is, how much more of it are we going to take?

In the past, we didn’t know how money was created. We took the money on good faith from the banks without question. We just thought that the banks were doing there best and were looking after out best interest. We now know how money is created. We now know that the banks are not working in out favor. Change has to happen.

The Venus Project

Great concept, crazy transition. How we are going to get out of a monetary system to this resource based economy utopia is not fully explained in the movie. This is what The Venus Project’s website suggests for transforming the world into a resource based economy:

PHASE ONE

The first phase of The Venus Project’s long-term plans is already underway. Jacque Fresco, futurist, inventor, industrial designer and founder of The Venus Project and his associate Roxanne Meadows have completed the construction of a 25-acre research center in Venus, Florida to help present the proposals of The Venus Project. Videos, pamphlets, and a recently published book, The Best That Money Can’t Buy: Beyond Politics, Poverty, and War, have been created to help raise awareness about this project and its many proposals.

PHASE TWO

Phase Two includes the production of a full-length feature film that will depict how a world embracing the proposals advanced by The Venus Project would work. This film would provide a positive vision of a peaceful society in which all human beings form a global family on planet Earth. A civilization in which all people are engaged in the pursuit of a better understanding of the world they share. This film has been designed to be an entertaining and educational experience for both adults and children.

PHASE THREE

To test its designs and proposals The Venus Project is working towards putting its ideals into practice by the construction of an experimental research city. Blueprints for most of the initial technologies and buildings have begun. Fund-raising efforts are currently under way to help support the construction of this first experimental city. This new experimental research city would be devoted to working towards the aims and goals of The Venus Project, which are:

1. Realizing the declaration of the world’s resources as being the common heritage of all Earth’s people.

2. Transcending the need for the artificial boundaries that separate people.

3. Outgrowing monetary-based, nationalistic economies with a resource-based world economy.

4. Assisting in stabilizing the world’s population through education and voluntary birth control.

5. Reclaiming and restoring the natural environment to the best of our ability.

6. Redesigning our cities, transportation systems, agricultural industries and industrial plants so that they are energy efficient, clean, and able to conveniently serve the needs of all people.

7. Sharing and applying new technologies for the benefit of all nations.

8. Developing and using clean, renewable energy sources.

9. Manufacturing the highest quality products for the benefit of the world’s people.

10. Requiring environmental impact studies prior to construction of any mega projects.

11. Encouraging the widest range of creativity and incentive toward constructive endeavor.

12. Outgrowing nationalism, bigotry and prejudice through education.

13. Outgrowing any type of elitism, technical or otherwise.

14. Arriving at methodologies by careful research, rather than random opinions.

15. Enhancing communication in schools so that our language is relevant to the physical conditions of the world.

16. Providing not only the necessities of life, but also offering challenges that stimulate the mind while emphasizing individuality rather than uniformity.

17. Finally, preparing people intellectually and emotionally for the changes and challenges that lie ahead.

PHASE FOUR

After the research experimental city is built, a theme park is also planned that will both entertain and inform visitors about the possibilities for humane and environmentally friendly life-styles planned by The The Venus Project. It will feature intelligent houses; high-efficiency, non polluting transportation systems; advanced computer technology; and a number of other innovations that can add value to the lives of all people – in a very short period of time.

No one can actually predict the future. We can only extrapolate on present information and trends. Population growth, technological change, worldwide environmental conditions, and available resources are the primary criteria for future projections.

There is no single philosophy or point of view whether religious, political, scientific, or ideological, that someone would not take issue with. We feel certain, however, that the only aspects of The Venus Project that may appear threatening are those which others project onto it.

The Venus Project is neither Utopian nor Orwellian, nor does it reflect the dreams of impractical idealists. Instead, it presents attainable goals requiring only the intelligent application of what we already know. The only limitations are those which we impose upon ourselves.

To watch Zeitgeist: Addendum go here:
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=7065205277695921912

I don’t necessarily agree with all the concepts of The Venus Project, mainly because i haven’t fully explored this concept, but it’s a start in the right direction. Time to start thinking outside of the box.

Overall Score: 8

My Internet’s Gone Down