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Leaked Document Reveals UK Plans For Wider Internet Surveillance (zdnet.com)
The UK government is planning to push greater surveillance powers that would force internet providers to monitor communications in near-realtime and install backdoor equipment to break encryption, according to a leaked document. From a report on ZDNet: A draft of the proposed new surveillance powers, leaked on Thursday, is part of a "targeted consultation" into the Investigatory Powers Act, brought into law last year, which critics called the "most extreme surveillance law ever passed in a democracy." Provisions in proposals show that the government is asking for powers to compel internet providers to turn over the realtime communications of a person "in an intelligible form," including encrypted content, within one working day. To that end, internet providers will be forced to introduce a backdoor point on their networks to allow intelligence agencies to read anyone's communications.
I'm thinking that if you are making things like this legal then you're well on your way to losing the right to call yourselves a Democracy.
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I think that's dangerously overconfident. By passing laws they can in fact make tech companies add backdoors and vulnerabilities. That will make the vast majority of the population, outside a tiny number of people who take extreme and possibly now illegal measures, even more subject to mass surveillance. It also grants permission for any level of governmental snooping, and can criminalize people found in possession of "circumvention technologies". Possession of GPG can be criminalized with the stroke of a pen, if it interferes with mass surveillance.
Furthermore it normalizes the entire idea that people should be allowed no privacy. A whole generation grows up with that as "normal". Do not underestimate the capacity of human beings to normalize reprehensible things.
It's foolish to think that just because there exists some encryption technology where the math can't be broken, that everything is OK. Everything is not OK.
US citizen here, not a Brit, but I am under no illusions. On this side of the pond we have just as many in our government who look at Orwell's warning as a thing to aspire to, rather than to avoid. If UK citizens allow this to stand, it's only a matter of time before it comes here too. Our countries have a long and rich tradition of adopting each other's worst and most harmful ideas. (We had American knockoffs of the Spice Girls, for instance).
Why do people keep referring to modern governments as "democracy"??? Have YOU voted on the issues? NO! Democracy is where We The People actually VOTE on issues.
Current modern governments are representative, and the problem is: We The People are NOT being represented. The best fix is to FIRE the bastards. We need much more frequent elections: I propose at least twice a year.
And we need either a People's Lobby, or shut down ALL lobbying.
Including backdoors is the government helping criminals ripp-off citizens. Encryption, block chain and other security measures will be needed more and more if we want to continue e-commerce in the future. Any law that forces backdoors to be included in code is a law that is creating an opportunity for hackers to bypass security and exploit the backdoor.
These laws should always be grouped under the idea: 'Your government helping criminals steal your money and ruin your credit'. Some of these criminal groups also fund terrorism, so these can also be grouped under the idea: 'Your government helping fund terrorism'.
These are exactly the kind of laws politicians should be supporting if they want to harm citizens, promote crime and financially support terrorist organizations. In the long run, the more we can do to strengthen encryption the more we will protect people from harm.