Re: Mission Shift
"The mission shift presumably happened because of the threat shift”
But when the mission shifts to spying on your own population, that suggests a government that regards its own people as the threat.
“[the terrorists] killed less than the weekly toll from smoking, but so what? The victims didn't choose to risk their lives, as smokers essentially do.”
The victims of reckless drivers didn’t choose to risk their lives either, and they also outnumber the victims of terrorism. If you want to save innocent lives, there are better ways of doing it than blanket surveillance.
“I can't imagine they could even attempt to listen to or read that many phone calls, emails and banal facebook postings.”
That only proves you have a limited imagination! Sorry, that was a cheap shot, but how much resource is required to hold a picture of who communicated with whom, or to apply Bayesian analysis to flag communications as “interesting” (in a similar way to spam filters) and then focus on the communications between groups of “interesting” people, where “interesting” could mean paedophiles, terrorists, or peaceful protesters being a thorn in the side of a corrupt and authoritarian regime.
“I don't give a stuff if they hold metadata on me, after all the [assorted corporations] do”
How private companies collect, store and use data about you is subject to various legal protections, you generally have to opt in (sometimes just by using their services) and are free to opt out. I never opted in for state surveillance and I’d like to know how do I opt out?
“The cops have ANPR to read my number plate as I drive around. So what? I'm glad they do - those systems bin the info as long as it's no longer needed”
As I recall, the cops also have a DNA database with a sample from everyone ever arrested for a recordable offence, even if they were never charged, let alone convicted and they are VERY reluctant to “bin the info”. I would wager they have the same attitude about any data they collect.
"I guess it's hard to find a needle in a haystack unless you're actually allowed to look in the haystack.”
Adding more hay doesn’t make finding the needle any easier, and asking for permission to look for the needle would be fine. The problem is the security services don’t want the oversight of asking for permission, justified by probable cause. They want the ability to go on warrant-less fishing trips, where they can redefine the needle based on whatever they find.