UK Snooper's Charter To Extend Police Access To Phone and Internet Data (theguardian.com)

An anonymous reader writes with this news from the Guardian about a proposed expansion of UK government agencies' power to eavesdrop under the so-called "snooper's charter": Powers for the police to access everyone's web browsing histories and to hack into their phones are to be expanded under the latest version of the snooper's charter legislation. The extension of police powers contained in the investigatory powers bill published on Tuesday indicates the determination of the home secretary, Theresa May, to get her controversial legislation on to the statute book by the end of this year in spite of sweeping criticisms by three separate parliamentary committees in the past month. The bill is designed to provide the first comprehensive legal framework for state surveillance powers anywhere in the world. It has been developed in response to the disclosure of state mass surveillance programmes by the whistleblower Edward Snowden. The government hopes it will win the backing of MPs by the summer and by the House of Lords this autumn.

Comments

Re: We need kryptonite

[AmiMoJo]

My MP make a similar claim when I asked her about this a few years back. She said something along the lines of "in the past this helped the police get to a girl who was about to commit suicide, so you can see why it's so important a power." I pointed out that abuse of this power has lead to several suicides, but she did that standard MP thing of ignoring the point/question put to her and simply repeating her pre-prepared statement.