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UK Snooper's Charter, AKA The Investigatory Powers Bill, Passes Through Commons (betanews.com)
Mark Wilson quotes a report from BetaNews: The controversial Snooper's Charter -- or the Investigatory Powers Bill as it is officially known -- has been passed through the House of Commons by UK MPs. An overwhelming majority of politicians (444 to 69) voted in favor of the bill which has been roundly criticized by both the public and technology companies. The Investigatory Powers Bill grants the UK government, security, and intelligence agencies greater powers for monitoring internet usage, as well as permitting bulk data collection and remote hacking of smartphones. The law allows for the kind of mass surveillance that Edward Snowden warned about, and while the bill may have passed a majority vote, there are still those who fear not enough has been done to safeguard individuals' privacy. UPDATE 6/7/16: The title/body has been updated to clarify that the bill has been passed through the House of Commons. It will have to pass through the House of Lords before it becomes law. As one Anonymous Coward pointed out, the House of Lords may send it back for modification or reject it entirely.
Even the Doctor can't save you now.
What a surprise and go fuck yourself gov.
[deleted]
Modern app appers use APPS to app other apps without caring about LUDDITE privacy!
Apps!
Incorrect. It has been approved by the House of Commons vote. But it is not law, yet.
It has to pass the House of Lords, and they may send it back for modification or reject it entirely. If they reject it three times, it is finished. This has happened, and there are many signs the Lords do not approve.
It looks like the start of 1984!
This was only made possible by Labour voting with the Conservatives in a manner completely against what their party was meant to represent. I had high hopes that the Labour party under Corbyn would have reverted from the shallow, dishonest suits that had taken it over under "New" Labour. Here comes the new boss, same as the old boss. Facism by any other name would smell as vile.
This isn't law yet.
It has been passed, but it can still be pushed back by the House of Lords.
The Register has a more informative, but shorter article: http://www.theregister.co.uk/2...
I am not in favour of RIPA but why lie and say that it had been passed into law when it hasn't? It has passed the lower chamber and probably won't get substantially revised in the upper. Falsely claiming it's a done deal helps no one though.
An overwhelming majority of politicians (444 to 69) voted in favor of the bill which has been roundly criticized by both the public and technology companies.
Yet those same people keep voting the same idiots into office...
You only have yourselves to blame... we have the same problem in the US.
Section 48
Exclusion of matters from legal proceedings
(1) No evidence may be adduced, question asked, assertion or disclosure made or
other thing done in, for the purposes of or in connection with any legal
proceedings or Inquiries Act proceedings which (in any manner)—
(a) discloses, in circumstances from which its origin in interception-related
conduct may be inferred—
(i) any content of an intercepted communication, or
(ii) any secondary data obtained from a communication, or
(b) tends to suggest that any interception-related conduct has or may have
occurred or may be going to occur.
This is subject to Schedule 3 (exceptions).
Basically section 48 makes anything related to intercepted communications unable to be examined by legal proceedings other than those detailed in Schedule 3. However, when reading Schedule 3 its hard not to become overwhelmed at that byzantine listing of exceptions (which have exceptions to other exceptions to other exceptions listed in other laws), and it's not to far fetched to think that most interceptions could never be challenged legally under any circumstance.
So much lobbying from privacy groups, and it was all for nothing. They still voted their crappy law regardless of public opinion. :))))))))))
Choose to further stomp on those beneath them and encroach upon their rights and liberties.
News at 11.
The fifth of November,
The Gunpowder treason and plot;
I know of no reason
Why the Gunpowder treason
Should ever be forgot! . . .
I've been converted. I'm no longer Atheist. I've 'found god' and it is 'the Church of Privacy'. The first & only 'commandment' in this new religion is 'all communications amongst church members are considered private and sacrosanct above all else. No communication between church members can be shared with anyone outside the church'.
I further hear-by ordain all members of Slashdot as 'Privacy Advocates of the 1st order' (there are only 3 orders or levels) in my new Church.
(The point of this is the 'special protections for sensitive professions' encoded in this bill. Supposedly to 'protect informants' etc....yeah right. We get it "you're special" the rest of us aren't...I have a 'highly sensitive profession' myself...its called 'being human' but seeing as that's not a good enough argument for them I'm starting my own religion to become a 'Minister of Religion'...one of those 'protected classes of special people').
Look at that, a government grants itself even more tyrannical powers. See it wouldn't be so bad if the government could be trusted to use these powers only against "terrorists", but what they really want to use it for is to make an example of Mr. Smith because he's 200 pounds short on his tax return, Mr. Green because he posted something naughty about immigration, and Mr Blue because he happens to like midget porn and some bureaucrat didn't check and thought it was kiddie porn.
Seven puppies were harmed during the making of this post.
That's ok, I won't be buying or using anything from the UK anyhow. Technology without security has no value anymore except to people with nothing to lose.
If the ability to secure basic freedoms and protections for the press, media from constant domestic spying fails if new laws are finally passed... what can be done if everyone is been kept under a digital legal pre crime watch and internet logging?
The digital ability to watch people create computer content is about all most advanced nations have fully invested in. Staff and contractors with security clearances to watch one person wonder around per day in 8-12 team member shifts per interesting person can often be spotted in different inward looking communities. Have fun and be creative with linguistic analysis and a vast world of creative writing on a very average networked computer.
If your a member if the press, blogger, peace activist, academic, author, creative person that has become of interest to the security services....
Buy a new average Microsoft laptop with related productivity apps, keep the laptop internet connected 24/7, add in a UK based cloud backup service. Install some fancy foreign sounding consumer grade AV. Add in any applications needed to get work ready for a publisher or for upload.
Start been very creative in your chosen area of interest by creating publication drafts, folders names, search for and download a lot of background reading..
Go to archives and take out vast amounts of material on events around the 1980-2000's.
Invent a series of new informants with information going back to the 1970's with new stories they just have to get out about the political connected and the fun filled weekend parties, banking related gov funding, tax shelters... contractors, the wrong kind of political connections in the 1980's. Be very creative, add lots of names, times, dates. Leave an unexpected redacted space for code words of projects and operations but create paragraphs full of detail.
Fill back into the 1970's and get really creative on into the 2000's. Line up any created story with past official events. Newspaper clippings and notes help.
Load the draft files with political and banking bait, recreate old scanned documents by adding in unexpected names, meeting times with new informants. Ensure any and all documents are converted for easy digital searching. Add scanned paper files in a huge file format.
Slow the internet connection down and scan in vast amounts of documents creating many huge files with very interesting file names.
Add cryptic names (save some cyrillic names for later) but be very clear on details about all meeting with lists of a few fictional informants.
Create an actor with the ability to pass CCTV capture, smile for facial recognition on the way, get tracked by automatic license-plate recognition and set up a meeting.
Find a good voice actor with the correct professional sounding accent and tone for that decade to fill in the other side of the conversation with the cell phone on and the microphone well positioned to capture every word of their "story" that has to finally be told. Interact naturally and press for more details, create a heavy paper "file" or digital backup to be handed over with "everything" on it. Select a location that ensures a good voice print match and allows for acoustics that captures the sound of the hand over.
Drive, walk or bike to the areas mentioned with your cellular device on and with a full battery for the first of many meetings and file hand overs.
Take a rushed cell phone image of a created 'cover' page. Make sure it will pass layout analysis from that decade but only add to the mystery of the files origins or what could or should be very secret content.
Add to your your own digital dossier every weekend with amazing meetings with a live mic on, new "secret" digital files collected for the clandestine services to find and a growing laptop full of digital details.
Any real work do on a type writer, keep paper work only, keep paper copies to trusted friends and ensure the only time a digital version is made is at the time of publication. Give your cell p
Domestic spying is now "Benign Information Gathering"
The voters elected them. If they don't like the laws they are passing then they only have themselves to blame.
but in my neck of the woods (America) anyone with the word "Lord" in it's name usually isn't much for freedom and civil rights...
Hi! I make Firefox Plug-ins. Check 'em out @ https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/youtube-mp3-podcaster/
I am very new to ./ and didn't know what an AC was, so that last sentence elicited a bemused laugh.
*Haha, why use that phrase and why is it capitalized?*
"As one Anonymous Coward pointed out, the House of Lords may send it back for modification or reject it entirely."
"and while the bill may have passed a majority vote, there are still those who fear not enough has been done to safeguard individuals' privacy."
WTF? The text after the comma should be something about the opposite happening, compared to what was said in the text before the comma. Do you even understand what the words "while" and "still" mean, and how they should be used?
It's like saying "While the weather was incredibly cold, snow was still forecast."
Idiots.
A large proportion of British (I'm speaking as one, so cool yo' jets) people have the "I'm not doing anything wrong, so I don't care if they look at my stuff" mindset, which is the worst possible mindset to have, as they screw everybody over. It's incredibly frustrating, and makes me want to leave this country as soon as I'm able.
Technological Amish Giving up phone and soon only vpn laptop.
When that no longer works I will give up laptop no smart TV now or ever.
Snooping your citizens was once something only China and Russia did
It is not freedom. If they told us what was casing them so much fear they piss their pants like that I would put a monitor outside y house so everyone could see where and what I do on my machines.
But they don't so I assume it is us citizens they actually fear.