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British Cops Hack Into Government Computers
CmdrGravy writes "The British Police have hacked into Government computers as part of the on-going 'cash for peerages' investigation. They've uncovered evidence which has, so far, led to one arrest and charge of perverting the course of justice for a leading Labour party figure. This charge carries a potential life sentence. The British police have the power to hack into computer systems as part of an investigation. On previous occasions they have said they did not believe the government was providing them with the information they had been asking for and had warned that they would seek other methods to gather evidence. The police won't say what tools they have used. From the article: 'The investigators did not have to notify No 10 if they were "hacking" into its system. One legal expert said: "In some cases, a senior officer can give permission. In other cases, you might need the authorization of an independent commissioner, who is usually a retired judge appointed by the Home Office."'"
Nothing like hot state-on-state action, eh?
I wonder who the British police hired to do this, according to the article they used "computer experts" to do the job.
But now that these "computer experts" have done this once with police blessing, had a nice look at the systems I wouldn't wonder if they could do it again without the blessing or knowledge of the police.
From the article it doesn't look like the sys-admins at Downing Street have been all that involved in this, I sure hope they have now been notified of how this was done and whatever way was used to get into the systems have been closed.
One could suspect that with the police having known these/this "computer expert(s)" it might be an indication that it wasn't a white hat they got hold of, but really that is just speculation, it might also have been a white hat person.
Anyhow I know nothing but what it says in TFA, which really isn't a lot, but for the sake of british security I sure hope this has been done in a sensible way.
Yeah, how dare someone be able to get a peerage because of wealth. Everyone knows that's not how it's supposed to work. If this were to continue, well ... completely undeserving people could get one!
Apology to Ubuntu forum.
Eclipse PDE and Me
I'm guessing that the "hacking" that is being described is actually a standard analysis of the hard drive after the computer has been taken by the police as evidence. There's nothing unusual in this at all. They'll be looking for deleted files and examining the disk on a sector by sector basis. The Government (or a stupid journalist) is defining this as "Hacking" when in fact it's what the police do with all seized computers.
Training monkeys for world domination since 1439
all the passwords were "NigellaDoMe"
---- Teach Peace. It's Cheaper Than War.
>Who was it cracked Enigma without a computer again?
I think I'm safe in saying it wasn't the Metropolitan or City Police.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
My sources tell me that, as usual, the most serious charges are related to secondary offenses.
In the present case what is terrifying Government Ministers and senior figures in New Labour is that they may be charged with anti competitive behaviour and market manipulation - distorting the free market in peerages and other honours, and colluding with other honours suppliers. If the police start to suspect something like this has gone on, the Office of Fair Trading and the European Commission could get involved, and you know that when the Competition Directorate moves, terror strikes.
It is truly tragic. Britain was always famous around the world as the country that operated the most open and transparent market for honours of all sorts. Its a great pity it has come to this.
>a nuclear missile launch VB app
Worringly, I would say it's quite likely there's a compiled VB4 package somewhere that runs under Win95 on an old Compaq 486 (DX, yay!) that has a tickbox marked 'Have you asked the Americans if it's OK?' that then enables a big red button that does the deed. Worse still, it's 30 lines of code, a 3rd party OCX (From the 'Custom Nuclear Controls Corporation') and cost £3.5bn to develop by a consortium of consultancies. Oh, and they lost the source code and the PC isn't backed up.
I want a list of atrocities done in your name - Recoil
A longer and more accurate answer would be:
It was the Poles who cracked the first two rotors of Enigma without computers.
It was the British Navy who captured the rest of the rotors and the code-books.
It was Turing and Flower who built the first electronic programmable computer that enabled a theoretical crack to be actually used in real-time to read German traffic and produce ULTRA.
You're American, aren't you? In england we have wonderfu;l laws meaning the police aren't part of the government, and MPs and the PM can be prosecuted.
You're American, aren't you? In england we have wonderfu;l laws meaning the police aren't part of the government, and MPs and the PM can be prosecuted.
Yes, the British system of government is fabulous.
Especially if you want to buy a peerage.