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UK's Most Secretive Court Rules GCHQ Mass Internet Surveillance Was Unlawful

Hammeh writes: Today marks the first time in its history that the Investigative Powers Tribunal (IPT), who are responsible for oversight and complaints relating to all of the UK intelligence agencies, upheld a complaint against GCHQ, stating that accessing data provided to them by the NSA was in breach of human rights. The ruling comes as the saga into online privacy continues to unfold. Last year, the same court ruled that internal surveillance of British citizens did not breach human rights. The difference: NSA data is claimed to have sidestepped the protections provided by the UK legal system. The tribunal also noted that although the UK government was willing to admit that Prism and Upstream existed (both NSA programs outed by Edward Snowden), they would not comment on the existence or non-existence of the Tempora program.

6 of 44 comments (clear)

  1. Very good by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    But is this going to have any consequences for those who violated the law on a massive scale?

    1. Re:Very good by ColdWetDog · · Score: 5, Funny

      But is this going to have any consequences for those who violated the law on a massive scale?

      I'm sure someone will send GCHQ a very stern letter of rebuke.

      --
      Faster! Faster! Faster would be better!
  2. They're traitors to their country by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Informative

    They KNEW they were targetting British people, they even had key journalists as targets. Not terrorists, or 'Jihadists' journalists.
    http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2015-01/20/gchq-journalist-emails

    They KNEW they didn't have legal authority to do a full take on our data. The bill to legalize it was repeatedly pushed by Jacqui Smith and Theresa May and neither got the Snoopers Charter passed.

    It failed to pass again a few days ago, as traitors to their country pushed it through on an amendment:
    http://www.wired.co.uk/news/archive/2015-01/27/snoopers-charter-lords-rejected

    GCHQ spied on us for a foreign power anyway.

    They spied for the NSA on British communications and undermined our democracy. There needs to be f**ing prosecutions.

    Every politicians now has an NSA file filled with GCHQ provided information.
    Every potential poltician has an NSA file filled with GCHQ provided information.
    Every journalist has an NSA file filled with GCHQ provided information.

    They undermined us, there needs to be criminal prosecutions and the man who went ahead with this despite the law failing to pass, he needs to be prosecuted as the spy he is. He's a spy just as if he was a Russian spy working for the Russians or a Chinese spy working for the Chinese.

    And when the NSA/CIA/US Politicos use that data to leverage UK politicians to keep GCHQ spying on Brits, you GCHQ staff will know you are traitors to Britain. YOU DID THIS. You created those files that let them leverage the UK political machine. Where is the Snowden among you, that had the balls to stand up and tell us of all this illegal activity??

    And as for the US, now you can see that General Alexander sent staff to the UK to get around the US laws and spy on Americans using Tempora. He's walked away from this free as a bird, even has a consultancy, he flat out lied about spying on Americans too.

    Read this:
    http://boingboing.net/2015/02/05/ron-wyden-to-eric-holder-befo.html

    Understand that Wyden is telling you that he cannot discuss these secret commercial deals that were struck between US corporations and the NSA to hand over all their private data. US citizens too, and no doubt all of Europes.

    So all the 'cookies' nonsense, the EU got stuck with, meanwhile the NSA was cutting financial deals with the Facebook/Google/Yahoo/Microsoft/DropBox/Apple's of this world to get all of the private data. THEY got a business subsidy, and NSA got everyone's private data.

    So everyone of you now has a leverage file against you, and we cannot trust our politicians to act for their countries because of it. That goes for US politicians too, because the files will be used to prevent politicians that don't fit the military industrial complex from rising up to rule.

  3. And the mass surveillance will continue unabated by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 4, Insightful

    National espionage agencies operate outside the law these days anyway.

    --
    "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
  4. Re:obvious answer by Rosco+P.+Coltrane · · Score: 4, Insightful

    No, it's time to apply the law.

    --
    "A door is what a dog is perpetually on the wrong side of" - Ogden Nash
  5. Re:Wow ... by gstoddart · · Score: 4, Insightful

    The world isn't supposed to consent to being spied upon by the NSA. If the world did consent, there'd be no point in having an NSA.

    Well, allow me to make this clear on behalf of the rest of the world ...

    If the choice is between my privacy and liberty versus the lives of Americans ... I will choose that Americans have to die before I give up my rights. Because if you think your rights are more important than my rights I don't give a fuck about you.

    So America's sense of entitlement doesn't mean the rest of the world agrees.

    Stop acting like the rest of the world should simply be saying "well, if it's for the security of Americans it's alright". It isn't.

    There was a time when Americans would be outraged at this shit. Now they just say how it's OK because that's the job of the NSA.

    Honestly, America is a bigger threat to the liberties of more people in the world than any Jihadi is.

    And it's time we stopped pretending that a global surveillance state foisted on us by you guys is acceptable.

    --
    Lost at C:>. Found at C.