Slashdot Mirror

More information about opting out is here: http://www.bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/.

Great site, and they helped me to:

  1) Get off the commercially available electoral roll.
  2) Get my DNA out of the DNA database (yes, it can be done).
  3) Mark my medical records as excempt from sharing with 3rd parties.

Good luck!

Privacy in the UK is almost dead...but not quite.

"Only terrorists, criminals and spies should fear secret activities of the intelligence agencies", William Hague

`New research .. reveals that councils in Great Britain have authorised over 8,500 RIPA (Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act) operations in the past two years .. Authorities have used covert surveillance for reasons including spying on their own employees, dog fouling, people breaking the smoking ban and even the test purchase of a puppy'! link

* Five authorities have used their powers to spy on people suspected of breaking the smoking ban
* Suffolk County Council used RIPA powers to make a "test purchase" -- of a puppy
* Bromley Council spied on a charity shop to see people "fly tipping" donations at their door

* Investigation of unlawful plying for hire by private hire drivers

* Trading Standards exercise investigating allegations of underage alcohol sales
* Offences under Feed Hygiene Regulations
* Noise nuisance
* Alleged disabled blue badge fraud

* Ascertain if person is walking their dog cleaning up after it but then depositing poop bag in trees, grass or on road
* Carrying out graffiti ..

First hit on Google and at first glance other than the highly topical ICO-Google issue here it's all abuses of privacy by the government: http://www.bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/ . But really, to say the UK has a government that abuses the rights to privacy of its citizens is like saying "scissors cuts paper". That you don't know it either means you are in denial or have only just now started reading news. Why there's even plenty of articles right here: http://slashdot.org/index2.pl?fhfilter=british+privacy .

It would seem anyone running around painted this way would attract more police attention than just wearing a slouch hat. Perhaps it might be easier to just get (make) an Infrared LED Hat. Or maybe, take control of your government and vote them out until they remove the cameras.

It's only "tired out" because you refuse to listen to it. What is wrong with cameras in a public place? As I said above, would you prefer to switch off all logging on a server until after you start having problems? I doubt it. Seriously, what's your problem with having cameras in already very public places?

Would you also pay £200 million for your server logging, when it fails 999/1000 times?
Or if it logs the wrong thing or perhaps happens to murder the wrong person?

Look at the first link. It's costing TWO MILLION POUNDS to solve ONE CRIME. It costs about £5,000 for the Fuzz to solve a crime. And half of them move around less than a CCTV camera.

It isn't so much the CCTV, but what it is being used for, that the real crimes it records are being ignored, and that it is constantly misused due to a lack of controls.

Hope that helps you to understand.

Got any more stupid arguments you'd like to trot out as excuses so that nobody can watch you while you're shopping?

Sure, I'll bite.

I think you're forgetting that CCTV is used as evidence, and since it's "unbiased", it must be admissible, and 100% accurate evidence.

Of course, Judges and Police don't often realise that mistakes are often made with CCTV, nor that it's bloody expensive to keep it running, and would be cheaper to employ police instead.

I'd rather get arrested for climbing a wall, than have a mugger or rapist go free because there is no evidence.

That is, until they lock you up thinking you are a mugger/rapist?
That's not just your problem. Then we've got an innocent person in jail, and a mugger/rapist that the police has stopped looking for.

You know that when you step outside your door, other people can actually see you, right? Your Mak'tar stealth haze isn't working.

If you want to protect your privacy from prying eyes, you can wear a hoodie, burqa or that tiresome de rigueur V mask that all the cool paranoid kids are sporting, anywhere you like in public, without let or hindrance. The UK isn't France.

I think you're forgetting that CCTV is used as evidence, and since it's "unbiased", it must be admissible, and 100% accurate evidence.

Of course, Judges and Police don't often realise that mistakes are often made with CCTV, nor that it's bloody expensive to keep it running, and would be cheaper to employ police instead.