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UK To Shut Down Social Networks?
Stoobalou writes "In a move worthy of China's communist regime, UK PM David Cameron wants to shut down social networks whenever civil unrest rears its head in Britain's towns and cities. Speaking in the House of Commons, Cameron said, 'Everyone watching these horrific actions will be struck by how they were, organized via social media. Free flow of information can be used for good. But it can also be used for ill. So we are working with the police, the intelligence services and industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people communicating via these websites and services when we know they are plotting violence, disorder and criminality.'" So far I haven't heard anyone blame the Rock 'n Roll music, but if social networks aren't a good enough culprit, you could also try blaming video games.
Worthy of China? Sure, but Egypt was the first time that came to mind while watching this disgraceful session live... that didn't work too well BTW.
Grammar nazis are to this community what excrements are to gold.
As soon as people started muting shutting down Blackberry Messenger, I had a bad feeling that this bullshit would follow.
The politicos don't understand the role that social media and internet communications play in people's lives. They wouldn't suggest shutting down the POTS network, or the postal service. Well, actually, that's giving them too much credit. They'd probably suggest exactly that.
"The dew has clearly fallen with a particularly sickening thud this morning"
It's gonna be happening here, too. We'd better start coming up with alternative ways to communicate, because I have no doubt in my mind that they'll be yanking our network down when the shit hits the fan on our shores...
Mr Cameron, the problem starts with the fact that those criminals can READ and WRITE. This is a risk we can no longer allow!
Please, for the sake of our lives, CLOSE ALL SCHOOLS IMMEDIATELY before they can release EVEN MORE CRIMINALS upon us!
...riots NEVER happened before the invention of social networking.
And you know, cutting off the ENTIRE INTERNET for Egypt totally stopped the riots there too.
I swear, is there some rule saying you have to be technologically retarded to get into politics?
What do I know, I'm just an idiot, right?
What on gods earth?
I was watching the debate live, and the feel of the speech was really not like this at all. Throughout twitter and facebook were praised, especially things like the london clean up efforts organized through twitter. In fact it was somewhat reassuring to see that they sort of knew what they were talking about. The measures talked about were primarily disabling masts in rioting areas so that communications would be ceased, nowhere near 'banning' social networks. Honestly, the feel of the speech was aimed towards leveraging them for good. It was said that they would be talking to them directly to see if together they could tackle issues, such as images/videos glorifying the acts.
...and route around it accordingly. If our PM were being slightly smarter than all the previous ones since the war, he'd attempt to identify and treat the causes of the unrest, rather than try to stop the channel through which it's operating. You know, fix the huge social imbalance that years of neglect have wrought on our society? No - that would take too long to have the kind of effect that he needs to keep him in power.
Wouldn't it be better to listen in to the messages and use the info to catch people in the act?
Even better, send false info, tell all the rioters to go to a certain place at a certain time ... where the police vans will be waiting for them.
No sig today...
we are working... to look at whether it would be right to stop people communicating via these websites and services
Article title:
Cameron threatens to shut down UK social networks
After all, phones can be used to organize opposition! So can copiers, and printers. Also cars and busses take people to protests, those must be stopped! In fact any item of technology ever invented can be used to oppose those in power, so we need a universal device that can kill all technology so the people in power will feel less threatened! Everyone can just sit on their hands until the threat passes.
http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2011-08/11/david-cameron-social-media "Prime Minister David Cameron has told parliament that he is investigating whether to stop people communicating via social networking sites ****if they are known to be planning criminal activity****."
first of all i would like to applaud westerner's hypocrisy - while promoting social media outlets for people on the east, they are strongly opposing them at home.
secondly i'd like to note that all those people using social media to organize looting and whatever not through unrest in the UK - police needs no face recognition, while they have CDRs and other logs from telecoms. all they need is to see who posted to twitter at a given time, and what IMEIs and phones were registered to gsm cells in the looted neighborhood.
surely, forensics behind this are wee bit more complicated, but all in all - if i was member of the crowd doing malicious deed - i would never use my own phone and gsm card to organize / coordinate something against the state. perhaps pre-paid card with disposable/old phone, but never my own smartphone with my own postpaid number.
.Play.Open.Minded.
What the fuck has happened to all the western governments and what do they think they'll be able to achieve with increasingly draconian police state style laws? It boggles the mind. What will the puppet masters do once they've finished stringing up the puppets. It's not as if they don't have all the power they need to do all sorts of nasty things as it is. Why do they keep pushing for more? It makes no sense. It'd be like Bill Gates with all his billions scheming to mug people on the way home from work to increase his wealth. Meanwhile they let the economy fail and public infrastructure, education and health crumble.Gated communities aren't much good to you if there's no one left to buy things from. Idiots.
And the goddamn tech-bashing? What the fuck? On the one hand money frittered away on Internet services no one needs (see Australia for a prime example) and on the other lock down the net with fucked up filters that make it useless and stifle the very freedoms that have made it a success. What have these people been smoking?
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
Sod video games, I've got the whole lot here in one handy wheel.
Simply give it a spin and there's your culprit.
Summation 2
It worked in Egypt, right?
Would David Cameron apologize for causing such a thing, or blame it on hooliganism?
Plus ca change, plus c'est les memes choses.
Why on earth would these people throw away free intel?
If anyone can join these social networks and see what is being planned then so can the government. The police forces can arrive early and be more than ready for all of the rioting idiots that show up. If I were in a position of power I would be thrilled to have such a vast amount of free intelligence available to me.
Love sees no species.
Between the three of them they don't have a brain cell to rub together about how the Internet works, how folks use the Internet or how services like Twitter, FaceBook, Linked-In, Google+, Flickr, Wordpress (or unpteen other publicly accessable websites) work. They weren't able to effectively block those sites in my son's secondary school (because the kids knew how to find and use an open unblocked proxy).
They are also clueless about how folks use those things from their mobile phones.
Quite simply this won't work unless they get a pair of bolt croppers and physically sever the cables across the Atlantic, English Channel and North Sea (which would take out the POTS with it). They'd also need to shoot down a few satellites while they're trying to disconnect things.
Sigs. We don't need no steenking sigs.
Aside from the obvious: "Why, yes indeed, a few million in property damage that our entire city worth of riot cops, grown fat on years of kettling peaceful protesters, are too feckless to stop is more than enough to make me do arbitrarily draconian things! It is my pleasure to offer ammunition to enemies of human rights everywhere!" aspect, this just seems enormously tactically idiotic. Social networks are only the most powerful development in the history of western civilization when it comes to suppressing the activities of dumb kids...
Why would you possibly want to shut down social networks or other electronic messaging systems? They are all run by relatively supine corporations, willing or eager to cooperate with police in turning over user data, and almost none of them(certainly none in common use) offer any security to users against operators(some, like BBM, offer pretty good security against 3rd parties, and even basic cellphones offer some; but all common electronic communication mechanisms are essentially transparent to their operators).
Why would you want to drive people away from the highly transparent, easily logged-for-evidence-purposes, often comes with realtime location data and strong correlation with unique ID, electronic communications and back to informal, somewhat inefficient to use; but damned difficult and time consuming to use for evidence, face-to-face or other informal systems?
In the moment, electronic communication is a boon to rioters, offering swift coordination that the cops seem incapable of matching. In the medium term, though, the state can simply sort through the records, systematically compiling compelling evidence of guilt, attached to timestamps, locations, and IDs, and then bag your ass at their leisure, any time before the statute of limitations, if any, runs out. Ma Bell and Mark Zuckerberg don't forget, and that "private" checkbox is pretty much cosmetic. You are Fucked if you coordinate your unlawful activity electronically.
Why does Cameron want to discourage this spontaneously constructed Benthamite paradise and encourage a return to coordination that will require enormous humint efforts on the part of the police(and I'm sure the Met cops have no shortage of agents who blend right in with disaffected minority youth...) to unravel, or (less probably; but even worse for the cops) some of the yobs actually learning something about communication security?
Note the (presumably subtle) distinction between peaceful protesters (such as Iran was cracking down on) and violent looters (such as the UK is thinking about cracking down on).
Note also that noone got upset when the Brits were peacefully protesting. It was the arson, robberies, assaults and such that upset people.
"I do not agree with what you say, but I will defend to the death your right to say it"
They should open a new site for the serious social looter. The CaseBook. It could index enhanced reality overlays ($$$$) to Google StreetView data.
And I wonder how long until football hooligans start organizing flashsbrawls? Anyone?
There is an issue here. I saw it the day I witnessed my first flashmob. My reaction was not, "Cool." It was "Uh oh, how long until others, with less scruples, target someone." This is new territory. Organized gang activity just got access to constant realtime intel. I pray that we (society) will figure out how to deal with it without shutting it all down. In the meantime, keep an eye on police brutality, kids. This is a deadly serious game.
"Four dead in Ohio" serious. Stay safe.
CCTV operated by law enforcement agencies is not nearly as prevalent as the press makes out.
Sure, there is a lot of CCTV per capita *in London* compared to, say, Iowa but even allowing for this, there is that whole messy business of being innocent until proven guilty.
A fuzzy CCTV image from 200 feet where the suspect is covering his/her head is next to useless in a prosecution case.
Looking at the evidence, that appears to be what happened. I realize the man was associated with a gang, but the police say they were in a shoot out with him because of a bullet lodged in a police radio, but the ballistics tell more truth than the police since that bullet was police issued ammunition. This of course mean they shot the radio. I do realize the man was a known gang member, but it doesn't appear from the evidence released that he discharged any firearm.
Just because you are wrong and I called you out on it doesn't mean I am a Troll.
Those situations have absolutely no baring on what happened here in the UK and you can't compare them. In those countries, they were actively uprising against a political struggle and the whole of the nation was behind the movement. In the case of the UK riots, it was essentially a load of complete reprobates wanting to cause as much trouble as possible and loot some free shit from houses and business. The feeling over here, on the whole, is one of utter disgust and I would imagine that most people in the UK would support any actions that could prevent the spread of violence if it can be justified. This might be a step too far, but as someone above me mentioned, it's only being discussed at the moment. Twitter was a complete nightmare throughout the ordeal, with fake and unsubstantiated reports being broadcast and getting people worked up for absolutely no reason.
There was nothing in his speech about shutting down networks, merely targeting those inciting violence and disorder.
In that respect, it's bringing social networking in line with other UK media which are also bound not to incite violence etc. It's certainly not a shutdown of a service in any way.
Everything I have listened to regarding the events in London show quite clearly the people in charge are delusional.
There has been no one talking about the larger issue, everyone is pretty much blaming parents.
You have a large disenfranchised segment of the population. Why? That must be addressed or you will have a large disenfranchised adult population. Putting restraint on the group as a whole for the actions of a few will only disenfranchise and anger more people in the group. They will become adults, and their kids will be disenfranchiosed. It will get worse.
Then ramrodding people through the system with little real evidence is just wrong.
Yes, they should be appropriately dealt with; however punishment through fines or jail time may not be the best response. It would be better to work with them so they feel they are part society. THAT is better for the larger society.
I'm not sure which member of parliament was talking, but his assumption was anyone pickup is guilty and should have any rights. I found that appalling.
And yes, parenting holds some responsibility, but you don't raise a child on an island. You and your child are impact an influenced by society.
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I would think law enforcement would be shooting themselves in the foot shutting down these networks. What more could they ask for then to have them advertise their intentions in public. It like when law enforcement was complaining about sex adds on Craigslist. It's got save on investigation time when all you have to do is go the Craigslist pick an ad and make an arrest.