Investigatory Powers Bill

[Veggie Legs]

The 'snoopers charter' is back as of a couple of weeks ago, and back in the headlines after last week's attacks in Paris. I'm sure there are people on here who are very much against this from a civil liberties standpoint, but I'm also interested in whether anyone thinks this will actually work? I have no doubt that the UK's security forces do good work in terms of preventing terrorism in this country, but I'm not convinced that having more data from everyone is actually going to help them. If you're looking for a needle in a haystack, then surely the last thing you want is a bigger haystack.

 

[Dr Mantis Toboggan]

and it begins

i don't buy into the false flag attack hypotheses that come up every time an act of barbarism occurs, from 9/11 to sandy hook. but, terror attacks are good for the state. they allow u to squash civil liberties in the name of security, they allow u to attack minorities. what u lose from terrorism, innocent lives, is dwarfed by what society loses in its rush for an appropriate response.

i'm not sure if this new era of espionage, all SIGNIT and GEOINT and shit, is an ok replacement for human intelligence. i guess it's ok in responding to a threat, but i don't think it's appropriate in preventing threats emerging. hollande cut a policing programme, last year i think, in 'at risk' parisian neighborhoods, cause he didn't like seeing cops play football with hoodlums essentially. but it was exactly these kinds of programmes that worked to prevent threats appearing. showing the arm of the state as a collection of, at times, decent, approachable individuals rather than these hateful omnipotent watchmen figures. these same cops, who once used to get tip-offs, who could have done with a nudge in the right direction this year, now get stones thrown at them when they venture into those same hoods. food 4 thought

 

[Freakyteeth]

The last thing I want to see in the after effects of the Paris atrocity is that gaping c*** Theresa May trying to grab more power

Evil, evil bitch

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

and it begins

i don't buy into the false flag attack hypotheses that come up every time an act of barbarism occurs, from 9/11 to sandy hook.

The only theories I might give the time of day is the idea that they knew about it and did nothing, but even the numbers of people who would likely have been aware make that kinda implausible too.

 

[sl1k]

I think people often confuse the state possibly knowing about (sometimes going as far as indirectly facilitating) attacks with false flags. As difficult as it may be to stomach the thought, the ruling establishment gains alot from fear and pandemonium.

 

[AFCB_Mark]

Putting aside the politics and coming at this from the practical angle, I understand to a limited degree some of the technical concepts involved, although I don't profess to be an expert. But it appears to me that these measures will only allow the Police and Security Services to snoop on low level crime, and Joe Public. Quite crucially, the bill as it stands makes very little mention of legally allowing the Police or GCHQ to hack encryption. And so long as the legal framework only talks about regular traffic, the job is going to be very hard to catch anyone remotely serious.

Any criminal who is doing something that would appear on Government radar, would surely be serious enough to spend 5 minutes googling encryption platforms and techniques, or ways to route traffic to avoid these measures. It doesn't take any technical expertise to use a Tor browser, or a VPN, it doesn't take a rocket scientist to use peer to peer encryption like PGP. Then of course there's the Apple brag that their default device encryption and iMessage platform don't comply with the NSA's standards because Apple physically doesn't receive the cyrpto keys once the device creates them. And there's various similar messaging platforms available for all other mobile devices.

Now a cynic would suggest that there must be a way for the NSA/GCHQ to reverse engineer these if they really wanted to, all be it on dodgy legal ground. There's enough rumour mongering out there about it. But the NSA's constant loud whining tells you that it's at best a right pain in the arse for them. I guess their problem is not only the time it takes to decrypt the gibberish, but when so much of the average public is using these encrypted communications, they have to actually identify the right gibberish to decrypt in the first place.

So the big question is, what's the point? If the data captured by this bill, is going to be yours and my rather boring web browsing history. If I was stupid enough to go google bomb making without taking some measures to obfuscate first, then I'm obviously a rather shit terrorist.

The other massive pink elephant in the room, is how this pool of data about my Christmas shopping on Amazon, my browsing of 1FF, and my googling of funny dog videos, is all going to be stored and accessed. There is very little info (far as I've seen) that plans this out. Because as soon as you hook up a database, start pumping data into it, and setup certain people with methods of access into it, the database is up there to be shot at. If and when that goes live, it's going to be bombarded with hack attempts every second of every day.

Now I have every confidence it'll be designed and implemented in a clever and secure way, I'm sure it'll be one of the most secure systems in the world. Not built by some two-bit numpties recently sacked by TalkTalk. However the very fact that it exists creates the attack vector and if Police detectives have a route in, they are as human as anyone and open to manipulation like anyone.

Now maybe if this data would really help keep us all safe and would capture all the nasty plots in the world, and all the nasty pedos in the world. Then perhaps it'd be worth that risk of attack, and worth the loss of privacy. That's one debate to be had. But the fact is, as per my first point, I just can't see how this data will be useful in any case.

 

[Ebeneezer Goode]

They'll probably do it either way tbh. Or they'll have the Americans do it and pass us the data, as we've been doing for them.

 

[mowgli]

To be fair i'm not too bothered by this as i don't watch anything dodgy, in fact they might pull me up for using sports streaming sites to protect Murdoch's Sky empire but that's about it.

 

[AFCB_Mark]

Unfortunate timing for this case to occur. Naughty Police. If they have the powers, they will use them...

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2015/11/17/ipcc_ripa_whistleblower_cleveland/

 

[HertsWolf]

No matter the controls, central and local authorities will abuse it. From day one. A survey in 2008 illustrated this.

Half of all local councils use existing anti-terror legislation (RIPA) to monitor bins being overfilled and things like people living outside a school catchment area (long the scourge of Western civilization).
The authorities also used surveillance technology under RIPA to check for unauthorised fast-food delivery, misuse of blue badges for parking and the source of dog shit on pavements. Like you need £42 million quid's worth of high-tech fucking cameras to work that out.

After that FOI survey, Tory backbenchers were up in arms at proposed changes in legislation because...oh wait. No that's not right. Because it was Labour who were planning the changes.. Ummmmm. Now this is a bit of a fuck up. Oh well, let's hope everyone forgets that it was the Tories who were against all this when they were in Opposition. Because otherwise everyone would suspect they were a party full of fucking hypocrites.

"Under Labour, the rights and liberties of law-abiding citizens are being eroded through plans for ID cards, sinister microchip spies in bins and abuse of anti-terror laws by councils," said Eric Pickles, the party's communities spokesman.

I imagine Eric Pickles is much more comfortable with similar snooping plans from his own party.

 

[spireite]

Unfortunately the only way to stop acts of terrorism is to have the intelligence before hand. The only way to do that is to have access to information.

I've never been that bothered about surveillance and 'snooping'. Cameras etc are there to spot people breaking the law, if you don't break the law you're fine. It's whether or not the government can be trusted with data that's the question... our gov'm even loses USB sticks ffs

 

[HertsWolf]

Unfortunately the only way to stop acts of terrorism is to have the intelligence before hand. The only way to do that is to have access to information.

I've never been that bothered about surveillance and 'snooping'. Cameras etc are there to spot people breaking the law, if you don't break the law you're fine. It's whether or not the government can be trusted with data that's the question... our gov'm even loses USB sticks ffs

Evidence suggests that it's not particularly effective. The issue has rarely been with gathering the intelligence, it's with the analysis of it. Which is done by recruiting more specialists. So many instances of intelligence services having the information but not sharing it or not using it. You get the feeling in Belgium that the most cunning terrorists would need only to have a big bumper sticker saying "I'm not a terrorist" to escape the short arms of their law enforcement.

 

[spireite]

Evidence suggests that it's not particularly effective. The issue has rarely been with gathering the intelligence, it's with the analysis of it. Which is done by recruiting more specialists. So many instances of intelligence services having the information but not sharing it or not using it. You get the feeling in Belgium that the most cunning terrorists would need only to have a big bumper sticker saying "I'm not a terrorist" to escape the short arms of their law enforcement.

It's probably better to have the information and figure out how to analyze it than not have any information at all. We have no idea really how many horrible terror plots have been foiled by just catching the right phone call or email.

 

[HertsWolf]

It's probably better to have the information and figure out how to analyze it than not have any information at all. We have no idea really how many horrible terror plots have been foiled by just catching the right phone call or email.

Yes, but we do have a lot of information. Providing more data absolutely doesn't necessarily mean better information. We need more people analysing, not more powers to collect more data. It has been shown time and time and time again that surveillance powers are abused.

It's worth remembering that George Orwell wrote "1984" as a warning, not as a user manual.