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UK Police Accessed Civilian Data For Fun and Profit, Says Report (vice.com)
An anonymous reader writes from a report via Motherboard: A report from activist group Big Brother Watch surfaced that says more than 800 U.K. police staff inappropriately accessed personal information between June 2011 and December 2015. Motherboard reports: "The report says some police staff used their access to a growing trove of police data, which includes personal information on civilians, for entertainment and personal and financial gain. In several notable incidents, one Metropolitan Police officer found the name of a victim so funny that he attempted to take a photo of the driving license and send it to his friend over Snapchat. A Greater Manchester Police officer tipped someone off that they would be arrested, and one from North Yorkshire Police conducted a check on a vehicle on his phone whilst off-duty. The report also includes incidents of staff distributing other types of police data. Someone from South Wales Police was dismissed after photographing and distributing restricted documents "for personal gain," the report said. Not only was some information not needed for official police work, according to the report, but was shared with third parties outside the police, including some organized crime groups, 877 times. In total, 2,315 incidents of inappropriate access or distribution of data were reported. The majority of incidents, 1,283, ended up with no disciplinary action taking place, while 297 ended in a resignation or dismissal, 258 resulted in a written or verbal warning, and 70 led to a criminal conviction or caution."
What is the IQ and EQ of an average policeman ?
In the police states that modern western nations are devolving into, there is less and less difference between the military and law enforcement. Therefore, the distinction between citizen and civillian is also becoming less important.
"Robust action": You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means.
They take no action in the majority of cases then wonder why people are skeptical of giving them more powers to see what ordinary people are doing.
The real "Libtards" are the Libertarians!
It can be argued that the offence should be taken more seriously, but there's some good news here.
The story seems to suggest that exactly 2,315 incidents happened between June 2011 and December 2015. Wrong: this is the number that were discovered. I would be highly surprised if there were more incidents that no one picked up on. How many more I will not speculate.
Surveillance systems are always abused in this way.
Second class citizen of the New Gilded Age
Police are civilians with no special powers over a citizen.
In the U.S. (generally - it is state level so may vary a bit) there is a distinction:
- Non-police citizens can only arrest for felonies.
- Police can also arrest, or issue citations, for misdemeanors and infractions (such as traffic offences).
Unfortunately, in some states (and to some extent generally, under federal law), modern gun restriction laws, and those pushing expansion of them, are creating, expanding, (and attempting to make general), zones where police may be armed and non-police citizens (absent a special permit) may not.
This trend is leading to the creation of a Samurai class, with a monopoly on being armed, a special relation to (and responsibilities toward) those in power, and the reduction of the remainder of the population to peasants.
Bantam Dominique roosters crow a four-note song. Once you've heard it as "Happy BIRTHday" you can't NOT hear it that way
Out of over 200,000+ police? My guess is this is "800 caught red-handed". Seems like the UK police are pretty OK with this too, with most offenders not getting in any trouble at all. Good show!
The use of the term 'cop' or 'copper' to refer to the police has a number of possible roots. From the Latin 'capere' meaning to catch, perhaps. Maybe from the Dutch 'kapen'. From the French or even Anglo Saxon. There's evidence of the use of the modern form 'cop' meaning to catch in the 1700s and the use of 'copper' as 'one who catches' about the same time. Suggestions that the term has to do with copper buttons or helmets, or that a copper-a-day was the wage of a policeman are fanciful, as are backronyms like 'Constable on Patrol' and 'Civilian Officer of the Peace'.
The word 'civilian' has meant different things at different times. The link Bruce66423 so thoughtfully provides gives a number of these, and being the OED, provides a history of examples of usage. I'm not sure what you mean by 'revisionist history'? 'Civilian' has variously meant someone who practices civil law, someone who is moral without being christian, someone who is not in the military and someone who is not in a specified professional group. That last, the definition you are objecting to, has examples that are all informal. I consider it a stylistic fault for an article to use a police/civilian split, but it's not incorrect. I think that in an environment of increased militisation of police that it's tasteless, but it's still not incorrect.
I'm not sure what you are getting at with insisting that the police are under 'civil law'. Certainly in my country (Australia) police have certain rights that differ from non-police as well as certain restrictions and obligations. I think the militarisation of police is a concern; I think that movements away from Peel's 'policing by consent' towards increased use of force, decreased transparency etc. are concerning. To the degree that you seem to be saying something similar, I agree.
And some - like doing a lookup of a vehicle while off-duty - might not be mis-use. If a cop sees a vehicle that seems to be involved in a crime, does he/she have to be on duty at a time to look up information?
Ah - the fun of blaming conspiracy theorists when the reality is the mere development of language.
Offering the OED quotes makes the point:
1946 J. Adams From Gags to Riches xiv. 221 Show gals are smarter and keener than most ‘civilians’.
1975 Sci. Amer. Feb. 6/3 The listening public—civilians, we call them—its composers, critics and conductors are indeed fortunate that so many excellent instrumentalists spend so much time practicing and producing music.
1986 New Yorker 17 Mar. 57/1 We spotted something up top of one of our highest towers..and we climbed up and found out it was a civilian.
2003 Metro (London ed.) 29 Dec. 8/2 When you're a football player, you're a football player, not a civilian.
The writers were obviously searching for a convenient term, and grab 'civilian'. It may be an abuse to do so, but surely all language development starts that way, and whatever else linguistics demonstrates, it does show that language shifts ALL the time. Which is why Chaucer is incomprehensible and Shakespeare is hard work.
Why won't you share your data? we're the police, the good guys!
Apparently if I don't share my data the terrorists win.
How many terrorists did sharing my data help apprehend? - bulk surveillance is useless for prevention there's just too much of it.
We don't need these reports to know the police and other organisations with access will abuse the data. We have human nature and history to teach us all we need on the subject.
Only share what you absolutely must. The reasons to obfuscate and purposefully give false information when possible are plentiful and sound. From protecting yourself from unnecessary span and "market research" firms to trolling and plain abuse by the government.
All these real ID and real name attempts by different companies and bodies will never convince me. If the police force that is supposed to be of a higher than average moral stature abuse it I have no doubt that companies like FB, MS and all the rest with no exceptions are doing things they should not.
My mail, email, social media, phone records etc. It's all my private information. Wanna read which amazing value loan offer I got yesterday? get a fucking warrant!
A 'singular oddity' is an event that cannot be explained and only happens when you are alone.
As in to "cop a feel" or "cop the blame" or even "cop it". The number of common words which started off as acronyms is staggeringly small (if any), so much so that it's very likely correct to instantly dismiss them.
So they are now looking for replacement of those people, right?
Because where I work if I would do that I would get fired on the spot with no rights to any unemployment benefits as it would be looked at as a serious offence similar to theft or fraude.
Here how that went down with an ex-cow orker:
Was asked into the office to explain what he did and why. This was his one and only chance to defend himself in the company. Answer was not satisfactory, so IT manager got the 'go' to press the button and remove all his access. Security guard and his N+1 escorted him to his desk so he could take his personal belongings and nothing else. It was verified what he took and then he was escorted out of the building.
He was not allowed to talk to anybody inside the building. Pay
A standard would be like this (to show the difference)
Get asked into the office and told you are let go. The company I work for has a policy to make it effective the day itself. You can get your at ease, write a farewell email if you so desire and chat a bit with your co-workers and leave when you want. Your severance pay will be paid with the next payment and will be between 6 weeks and much longer.
So as this is the police who are there to protect us (and our privacy) I assume they were all fired, right? (Holding my breath for a yes. Turning a bit blue now.)
Don't fight for your country, if your country does not fight for you.
"one Metropolitan Police officer found the name of a victim so funny that he attempted to take a photo of the driving license and send it to his friend over Snapchat."
Peter Ian Staker?
Chaucer is not incomprehensible. Difficult, challenging yes.
http://www.acetonestudio.com
It’s very disappoint when policemen use their employment status for racket. Every offending cop must be punished. How can we live in a world where civilians’ defenders break the low? Police officers don't all grow up in the same environments. There's many different reasons why a person may choose to become a cop. They come from different families and regions. And they are all different thoughts and needs. I suppose that dozens of police officers work for hide behind the badge and exercise power. And this percentage grows every year not only in UK, but on a world-wide.
Here is the US, the government should be made to follow the same privacy laws as the medical field. If anyone at a hospital (anyone from doctors and administrators to janitorial staff) releases private medical info they get in big trouble.