Data Surveillance Legislation UK

Following the last post and comment re: Right To Reply, here are basic details of the legislation:

The Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA); the British government paves the way for total communications surveillance. Comment and explanation from the Guardian. The Act is currently being reviewed in the light of concerns that local authorities have been using its powers for inappropriate purposes.

Data Retention Directive 2006/24/EC from the EU laying down requirements for all ISPs and telephone companies to log and store personal data. Apparently the British government lobbied hard for this legislation.

Transposition of part of above Directive into UK law by Statutory Instrument, 2007 (the part covering telephone companies – the remainder, covering ISPs to be implemented in 2009). Further comment. The relevant Statutory Instrument.

Transposition of remaining part of above Directive concerning ISPs into UK law, 2009 (the part covering ISPs and all internet activity). Further comment. Schedule to relevant Statutory Instrument.

The Intercept Modernisation Programme, ie the government's own plan to create a central database of all recorded phone and internet data.

The government appears to drop plans for a centralised database, April 2009.

Any broken, incorrect links, please let me know. And any more direct links to the legislation.

British Crap Media Data Face Punch Modernisation

If there's one thing that's invariable about the British media it's that they're shit at their job. Which is why I have to keep repeating myself.

Read this:

Communications firms are being asked to record all internet contacts between people as part of a modernisation in UK police surveillance tactics.

The home secretary scrapped plans for a database but wants details to be held and organised for security services.

The new system would track all e-mails, phone calls and internet use, including visits to social network sites.

The Tories said the Home Office had "buckled under Conservative pressure" in deciding against a giant database.

Announcing a consultation on a new strategy for communications data and its use in law enforcement, Jacqui Smith said there would be no single government-run database.

"Communications data is an essential tool for law enforcement agencies to track murderers and paedophiles, save lives and tackle crime." Jacqui Smith, Home Secretary

But she also said that "doing nothing" in the face of a communications revolution was not an option.

The Home Office will instead ask communications companies - from internet service providers to mobile phone networks - to extend the range of information they currently hold on their subscribers and organise it so that it can be better used by the police, MI5 and other public bodies investigating crime and terrorism.

That's from the BBC.

Firstly, this makes it appear that the government has chosen getting ISPs to hold personal data as an alternative option to its proposed central database and that the whole project is simply a government policing initiative.

Secondly, it ignores the fact that the government has already instituted legislation requiring ISPs to store this data.

Thirdly, it ignores the fact that the government instituted the legislation in order to comply with the EU's directive on data retention (Directive 2006/24/EC).

Abd fourthly, the press (unless I am getting as stupid as them) are conflating and confusing existing EU legislation with the government's own extension of these requirements (the Intercept Modernisation Programme), and falling for government spin.

The government has been keeping very quiet about all of this and the media, unfortunately, have aided it by being useless at reporting things properly (or even reporting it at all).

Cabinet Face Punch Brown Spawn ID Card

The word on the street is that Labour cabinet 'rebels' want to block plans for the ID card system: Scrap ID cards now, say Cabinet rebels. Read what the article says and note they're only talking of 'shelving' plans, leaving open the possibility that once the economy began to improve they could re-start the project:

"My sense is that ID cards will not go ahead," a senior Cabinet Minister said. "We have to find savings somewhere, and it would be better to shelve schemes like this that aren't popular."

It's also interesting that the ID card scheme is acknoweldged to be'unpopular': Jacqui Smith has always been at pains to say how much people want ID cards, so much, in fact, that they keep coming up to her and asking when they'll be available. Not as many as the number of people who'd like like to print a big boot mark on her fat useless backside.

On an associated topic: some Swedish ISPs are resisting EU law and saying they will erase customer data instead of storing it for the state and its agencies. HT Chicken Yoghurt via Twitter.

Not a good week for the Spawn; first the catastrophe of his expenses plan (and that spectacular Youtube vid!) then the snub in Pakistan. For some people this will be the first time they witness a government ignominiously collapsing under the weight of its own ineptitude and arrogance and still grasping on to power without having a scrap of integrity.

Face Punch Innovation Spawn Labour Slime

Bra Boss Withdraws Support For labour: Labour are now officially a bunch of sagging tits

A punch in the face for Darzi, Labour's Apparatchik In Chief For Fucking The NHS, who has declared we need to improve efficiency within the service by more 'innovation'. No, we fucking don't. We don't need 'innovation' in anything; we need common sense and honesty. Further efficiencies could be secured by abolishing all quangos and associated semi-governmental cash drains, including Darzi himself. The Curmudgeon delivers his response.

A punch in the face and a kick in the knackers for Gordon Brown, Prime Mentalist, Spawn of the Manse, Bottler in Chief - everyone else is calling for signatures on the online petition, so why shouldn't I? - sign the petition for the twat to resign.

A punch in the face for the Labour Party: another defection (followed by bilious reactions), at Labourhhome. The party ceased to be Labour in any form once Blair, Brown, Mandelson and the others got hold of it after John Smith died. Those in the party who think it can be rescued and returned to its roots are deluded. It's a sack of poison, a piece of earth scorched and ploughed with salt. It's like some creature from a horror movie - everything it touches turns to filth and slime.

Are the others any better? Unfortunately not a lot. British politics is run by a rancid bunch of professional politicos who're told what to do by another bunch of rancid politicos in the EU. So a punch in the face for the lot of them as well.

And another punch in the face for the Spawn, as his panic measure to defuse the MPs' expenses row blows up in his his flabby face.

And a punch in the face for Mandelson, just because I feel like it.

Pirate Hordes Take Over Europe

David Cerny, artist of the controversial EU sculpture Entropa, has dismantled the artwork ahead of the deadline in protest at the new government in the Czech Republic.

Cerny has also made it clear he did not support the new government of Prime Minister Jan Fischer, because it included many former communists.

"I don't want to support them, they do not deserve to lead the European Union, this is as if a pirate horde has taken over Europe", Cerny said.

Gordon Brown ploughs on with his compulsory volunteering for young people: Youth Community Service. All part of the hectoring, self-righteous bossiness we've come to expect of the Spawn and his familiars. I note that these young people are only good enough to be groomed as servers and not as leaders, so no Common Purpose for them, then.

Brown talks about young people being able to 'make a difference'. Well, he could make a real difference by fucking off. It's a pity we'll have to wait till the election before we can defenestrate the bastard.

Anthem For Doomed Britain

Excellent appraisal of the disaster that is New Labour at Heresy Corner: Where Did It All Go?

Listen to a recording of the new anthem for England, as produced by the Arts Council and the BBC for yesterday's St George's Day. Cranmer has a copy of the lyrics. I don't think I need to say anything, do I?

The new headteacher at our grandson's primary school is not getting off to a good start with us. He's sent a letter to parents and it's full of typical New Labour newspeak with its 'whole child' 'wellbeing' guff. As soon as I saw the word 'stakeholder' the red mist rose and I had to sit down. He gave the main dinner lady a folder an inch and a half thick on how to be a dinner lady, something she wouldn't know about, having only done it for eighteen years. He's also had more shelves fitted in his office - no doubt to accommodate the extra files of useless data he'll be collecting. I think I may ask him about ContactPoint just to be awkward.

Punch In The Face Digital Progressive Blogging

Back from Australia, where I have managed to avoid UK news and newspapers...however, even in that enlightened country the Righteous are at work trying to snatch people's freedoms away from them under the guise of protecting the kiddies: Filtering (Censoring) the Net. Communications Minister Conroy is obviously a cnut of the most modern, correct kind. May he die from a long painful illness without a pension.

'Progressive' seems to be the new word on the block. It seems to be used a lot by the Lost Righteous - people who realise the New Labour project is a pile of steaming excrement about to go down the crapper but don't have the guts or understanding to reassert Old Labour values. In other words it stinks. If I encounter anyone who speaks this to me directly I shall punch them in the face.

Jackie Smith is still an ugly, stupid and incompetent disgrace squatting like a toad in government.

Pity for the Spawn of the Manse that his bravura performance at the G20 has now dissolved like piss in rain and been swamped by coverage of police (mis)behaviour, including photo footage that the cops somehow managed not to eradicate, despite their new-found laws.

Alice Mahon resigns from the party of the Terminally Righteous, taking a swipe at the EU as she does so:

That same manifesto promised a referendum on the European Constitution, we re-named it the Lisbon Treaty and reneged on that promise also.

If this Treaty is ratified we can say goodbye to any publicly owned services. Article 111-147 is clear, we will be handing over to private corporations, social services, education, transport and postal services. Even the NHS will be up for grabs.

Matthew Taylor finds himself on the panel of an NHS Confederation bash called ‘inequality, nudge and recession: is it time for a new approach to health politics?’ Taking the politics out of health care would be a bloody good start, and as for 'nudge', again I'd have to punch anyone in the face who used that word in front of me. Matthew's post is full of the usual 'progressive' bull: 'Building community resilience and capacity is central to improving public health, which is itself a more important determinant of health outcome and levels of health inequality than the health care system.'

The NHS Confederation bills itself as 'the voice of NHS leadership'. There we have it again, this obsession with leadership. Can't all be members of Common Purpose, can they?

Apparently Mandelshit has been blathering on about 'Digital Britain' (ht Muffled Vociferation). I haven't read the report but I can tell you with complete authority that it is absolute bullshit, the main aims being to promote the image of the government as an up-to-date administration (FAIL) and to act as a smoke screen for extending control over the internet (how's your plan to seize control of Nominet progressing, Your Lordship?). A lot of talk about broadband, no doubt, but I suspect that wireless/mobile access will overtake it within a few years.

Mandelson is also a cnut. May he, too, die of a long and particularly embarrassing disease before he can draw his unearned pension.

And Sunder Katwala sets out 'the ethic which informs the bloggers of the left' in his post: 'Why we blog: our ethic of progressive blogging'. I'm a bit tired and suffering from hallucinations brought on by jet lag, so I'll end with two comments on this: firstly, drawing up a list of 'ethics' for something like blogging just reveals the control-freakery and authoritarian nature of the righteous left (after all, the Spawn himself would create such a list if he knew what blogging was); and secondly, there's that word again, 'progressive'.

Don't fucking come anywhere near me, Sunder, unless you want a punch in the face.

Hitler Brown Voluntary Jugend

The insanity of Brown continues with compulsory voluntarism for young people (think I wrote about this one earlier): Community Work.

I'm in Australia at the moment and am not exposed to massive amounts of the BBC, which is a blessing.

I heard a recording of the interview with Draper on Sky and enjoyed the irony of him bleating on about the iniquity of his private emails being 'hacked' (as opposed to their details automatically being logged). Obviously he hasn't realised the implications of the legislation his own government has passed recently (under the direction of the EU).

Shove Your Social Engineering Up Your Jacksie, Brown

Oddly enough, I was thinking about this sort of thing as I was walking in this morning, ie when did something provided by the state change from being a straightforward service when required, to a piece of social engineering? My state of health is up to me. If I fall ill, for whatever reason, the NHS is there to save my life/cure me. That's all.

Everything promulgated by this government is now social engineering; nothing is the simple provision of a service. Every aspect of our lives is subject to their interfering, authoritarian naziness.

G20 Blah Demonstrations Blah Riots Blah (Not)

Not much real street action, then, yesterday. I wonder if today will be any better?

Did anyone else think there were far too many cameras in place outside RBS when the 'protestors' broke windows and 'stormed' the building (without actually doing anything once they got inside)? Pity that RBS hadn't had the foresight to board those windows up, eh?

The Society of the Spectacle, my friends. It's all bullshit (so far).

Also, a student of mine yesterday asked me if I knew exactly when this blagfest was on, since he will be travelling to London at the weekend. I told him to check on the G20 website. He said he had, and it didn't give the actual dates of the summit. I've checked. It doesn't. These useless fucks can't even get the basic info on their own website let alone come up with 'global' solutions to problems they themselves caused or allowed to happen.

Supersized Undemocracy EU Style

England gets supersized councils. These plans were slipped in while no one was paying any attention - as part of the EU's plans to regionalise the UK, though God forbid that anyone (especially the British media) should mention that fact. Decided by Brussels, implemented by our puppet government.

So much for democracy, since nobody wants them and where they have been given the choice have decidedly voted against them. So much for that fat, pie-eating democrat Prescott.

Another (later) article from the BBC website. Will it be on the main news? I doubt it.