ICO concerned over interception modernisation programme
Commissioner worried over gov plans to keep our data
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Information commissioner Christopher Graham has said that he is concerned about government plans to allow enhanced storage of people's internet data.
Graham said his sceptical stance on the £2bn interception modernisation programme, which would allow the police and security services greater abilities to access the internet usage of everyone in Britain, remains the same as that set out in his 2009 consultation response.
Under the plans, internet service providers (ISPs) would hold information all of their customers' internet activities for a year, including webmail, messaging and social networking traffic, which would be made available to authorities and intelligence agents following a valid application.
This would require ISPs to install new technology, which they have said will be difficult and expensive. They already record "traffic data" on email and web usage, including the header information in emails and the domains of websites, which can be accessed by law enforcement organisations. In neither the new nor the existing plans would the content of communications be recorded wholesale.
A spokesperson for the Information Commissioner's office said: "On the face of it, the proposal seems disproportionate when any perceived benefits that might be gained from retaining this data are set against the risks to privacy involved.
"He looks forward to meeting with officials at the Home Office to establish whether or not his concerns have been addressed."
The coalition agreement promised to scrap the "surveillance state" plan and said it would "end the storage of internet and email records without good reason". However, the government's strategic defence and security review, published on 19 October 2010, disclosed its intentions to resurrect the Labour party's former project.
The defence and security review says that the programme is necessary to to keep up with changing technology and to protect the public.
The Labour government dropped a bill to set up the scheme last November after internet service providers and mobile phone companies expressed concerns about the strain of storing such a high volume of data, costs and privacy safeguards.
This article was originally published at Kable.
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COMMENTS
Yawn.
When the ICO have the balls to advocate serious sanctions against Google for their wifi spying expedition, -then- I'll pay attention to what they say to Google's partners about the IMP.
Lazy police
Wow, just how bad are the police? By their own reckoning they need various changes in the law to be able to detect and arrest crims, because the current laws are just too much hard work. The top brass have clearly been on some "fact finding" mission to Brazil/China/Zimbabwe and seen just how easy policing can be with the right policies....
Every change to police powers seem to involve either the unreasonable invasion of privacy of millions of civilians, or shifting the burden of proof from the police/CPS to the alleged offender. But hey, we've not been destroyed by terrorists yet so it must be working right?
Ugh, brilliant
Gives me such a lovely warm fuzzy feeling inside knowing that creepy state activities like this get shelved not because those involved found themselves some principles, but rather for reasons of political expedience and corporate financial practicality.
Name that quote:
I have this feeling that whoever is elected president, like Clinton was, no matter what you promise on the campaign trail – blah, blah, blah – when you win, you go into this smoke-filled room with the twelve industrialist capitalist scumfucks who got you in there. And you’re in this smoky room, and this little film screen comes down … and a big guy with a cigar goes, “Roll the film.” And it’s a shot of the Kennedy assassination from an angle you’ve never seen before … that looks suspiciously like it’s from the grassy knoll. And then the screen goes up and the lights come up, and they go to the new president, “Any questions?”
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