Home Office accused of blocking UK public's scrutiny of Snoopers' Charter The UK's Home Office has been accused of making "it near to impossible to provide a meaningful response" to the public consultations which campaigners fought legal battles to have included in the Investigatory Powers Act. In an open letter to Amber Rudd, the Home Secretary, lawyers and civil society campaigners complained that …
The watchmen watchers of course who are watched by the watchmen watchmen watcher watchers who are...
You get the idea.
It's actually supposed to be the electorate in a democracy as they have the power to vote in the people that serve the people and act in ways that are for the people.
What we actually have is 3/2 party system where laws that are not for the people and actually against the people traverse the parties leaving us with no power to stop it or get them reversed at the next election.
In summary politicians are self serving leeches who make the vogons look good.
The gummint is supposed to custard the tarts.
They're elected, so answerable to the electorate. But in the past 40 years or so, we've gruesomely undermined that accountability by looking over their shoulders all the time. When we put so much work into micromanaging the buggers, it becomes that much harder to blame them for fucking up.
Hell, look at Brexit. That's completely our mess. And we got it by "not trusting our politicians".
Not that it's, generally, a good idea to trust politicians too far. But it's also not a good idea to distrust them too much, because then they can't do their jobs, even if (outside chance) they're genuinely, honestly trying to. Just look at the US, anytime in the past 15 years, to see what comes of that.
She's searching it for those elusive Hashtags right now...
(I'm surprised we're even allowed to comment, every other Broadsheet has prevented comments on this topic. The 'new' post Rusbridger Guardian is a shameful imitation of its former self).
El Reg is a lone wolf, in this regard. Great informative article regarding the mess.
She was no better at the department of Energy and Climate Change. Needs to resign, she has no credibility left.
We need someone that has the intelligence and ability to play a harpsichord, not punch through it with their fists, at the first opportunity.
"Pfft - you've got to wonder whether or not Amber Fudd actually *knows* what's in that document, much less understands it."
The Home Office could give the Borg Collective a good run for its money. Every Home Secretary eventually "goes native", rolls over and becomes merely the latest mouthpiece for the same old policies and objectives. Which, I hasten to add, tend to regard such trivia as democracy, privacy and freedom more as inconveniences to be circumvented than values to be protected.
The real test of a politician in the job is not whether they are absorbed, but for how long they actually manage to retain any semblance of individuality and integrity.
Well spotted.
Do you expect anything different from a government that is openly considering Henry VIIIs powers to bypass parliament and enact legislation and is planning to set those powers in stone in a "Great Repeal Bill"?
Just in case they need it again to deploy the troops once the discontent at 10% inflation in a few years hits the streets.
Too much of the nation's infrastructure is vulnerable and in practice undefendable. You don't worry about the odd riot on a sink estate though God knows that puts the willys up the powers that aren't. You worry when the National Grid goes sideways at 2 am mid February and GPS and GSM are subject to hundreds of 10W jammers. Hell hath no fury like a middle class spurned - cause they knows how stuff works - or not.
You can demand that encryption is weak and record every damn phone call you like, but people who are smart enough to know they are likely surveilled are smart enough to route round it. How long did it take to find Osama? He may have been smarter than the average bear bullet, but how would he compare next to some of the nations' (sic) best gamekeepers turned poachers?
People who sneer at Snowden and label him a traitor are missing the point. The real traitors are those walling themselves in against being called on their own self-interest and public failures - and removing everyone's right to freedom and privacy in the process.
The stupid (you know who you are lady) taking bad advice from the power seekers and turning it into populist sound bites would do well better to STFU; instead listen to the much scourned real experts whilst they are still, actually, on the same side. God help all of us when there comes a time when they are not - it cannot end well so best not start it.
Hell hath no fury like a middle class spurned
They do not care. As far as they are concerned the technical middle class is bound by a sufficient number of shackles to be not worthy of their attention - mortgage, kids in university, etc.
They do have a point - In my student days I did not give a damn and I stood my ground for 40 days against the government security forces (in another country).
I will not do it now. The key word is NOW. It will take making the middle class a class of dispossessed for them to start doing what you describe. This is at least 3-5 years down the road and any one of us who can, will be gone somewhere else by hook or by crook rather than risk our families in this. That is the reality here - we would rather take our shackles elsewhere than break them and do something. The Tory government will fulfill their migration targets - do not worry about it. Not because of immigration decrease. Because of emigration increase.
By the way, what you are describing will happen not because of active action, but because there will be nobody left around to fix the infrastructure and run it. A grid designed by politicians will tank at 2am on a February night without an engineer sabotaging it.
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"The number of people willing to commit the crime is much higher than you would expect,[...]"
It worries me when people in law enforcement are happy to break laws for their benefit in their private lives. It does suggest an institutional malaise that presumably encourages such thinking.
While we are throwing sayings about - "Power corrupts - absolute power corrupts absolutely".
How Theresa May is wearing her religion on her sleeve is a sign of someone who will believe that "the end justifies the means".
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"While we are throwing sayings about - "Power corrupts - absolute power corrupts absolutely"."
Lord Acton: "All power tends to corrupt, absolute power tends to corrupt absolutely."
The old boy was an example of the way the British used to be - despite being a Roman Catholic (at a time when the Pope had just ruled that democracy, science and progress were evil) he was a social progressive who was appalled by over-reaching politicians. We need people like him today.
> "The modern day Michael Foot only without the conviction, charm and charisma."
That's exactly the point, he isn't charismatic or flamboyant. But if you actually listen to what he has to say, its obvious he isn't a lying toerag and actually gives a shit about the people of Britain.
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If the text was all version controlled, you'd be able to check the diffs at each revision, and easily spot the bits that had changed, and those that had been left alone, and so focus your attention efficiently.
Could we perhaps upload the drafts) of the Snoopers' Charter to Github?
You've just hit on a very important point.
Lets say someone decides to form a political party like UKIP (if you can call it that) did but on the basis of protecting peoples freedoms and privacy then the government now has the power to discredit any person who is trying to do it while making sure no one can use it against government.
I hadn't thought of it that way.
Sneaky bastards.
(soapbox)
If someone does this, its probably going to rival a Hollywood blockbuster as "Most downloaded .torrent"
Also why in hell are we as a society allowing a few people to decide something this important? This is the same Government that brought us classified patents where inventors end up living in abject poverty because they have to start from scratch each time.
IP laws are a total mess
(/soapbox)
It's too late,your not going to get anything changed,fuhrer May and her ilk have already decided,those who voted the Tories in at the last joke election knew precisely what they were voting into power,far too late now,.most of you will be on the list to get hit with the next set of tax rises,which will get pushed through no matter what they "promised" in their manifesto,the poor people in the UK are almost tapped out as an income source for the govt,so all you nice white middle class Tory voters are next on the list,and look at all the goodies and freebies you have to be taxed and to be cut..
If you thought 33% basic tax was bad in the 70's-80's,just wait until the govt decides that they cannot hang on an longer and push through massive grabs on your unearned,stolen wealth..
Have a nice day,sleep well (while you can)
Sometimes, we look for complex 'terrorist reasoning' why someone did something when it can be the simplest, the most straightforward reasons that can get overlooked.
Things that cause frustration and people to snap, and our daily reliance on technology to get things done.
Driving in London is frustrating, especially without working Sat-Nav.
If Khalid Masood was simply trying to find a particular location, one of the interesting things is that using Google Maps (in a web browser at least), just at that key point where Khalid Masood 'flipped' prevents you from crossing Westminster Bridge on that side of the road.
https://www.google.com/maps/place/WestminsterBridge
(Click the arrow one place forward on Google Maps/Street view, to see you are prevented from continuing on that side of the road). You have to move to the right lane, to use Google Maps/Streetview (traffic heading towards you to cross the bridge) using the mapping.
Maybe Google maps has being restricted to prevent showing the bridge since the incident.
An interesting anomaly, all the same.
If you go back to the map view and click on the little man, you see what routes have been mapped by their camera car and across the bridge there is only one route - they obviously haven't mapped it in both directions because what is the point? However their cars have had to negotiate the different lanes at either side of the bridge, so you get multiple pathways through the junctions. Not really suspicious, just Google mapping bollocks.
Didn't make it totally clear. I was accessing via an iPad/iOS earlier which does actually prevent you from continuing and does 'stump' you, i.e. it's not obvious how to continue across the bridge. On a laptop its less obvious, as it just switches lanes, to oncoming traffic. Just thought it was an interesting anomaly, as its exactly the point he got frustrated and flipped.
There is one lane in either direction across the Bridge for Cars, the other is for Buses/Taxes. The mapping just 'stops' at that key point on the bridge, towards Houses of Parliament. That shows it's being masked either by Google/Security Services (anyone can request this for Privacy reasons, though).
"Buy a map, learn to read it, plan your journey."
It's many years since I drove in London, but I did exactly that. (pre-satnav days anyway, so no choice). Not being a local, I chose what seemed like the most obvious and best route from NE outer London to SW outer London. It took most of the day to get there thanks to Vauxhall bridge and the surrounding routes being totally snowed under with barely moving traffic thanks to roadworks on the bridge.
I found out later there was a multi-year rolling programme to refurbish/resurface all the bridges and I'd picked the worst possible route. And no, the traffic news on the radio is fairy useless if you aren't a local because they almost always refer to local landmarks that I know F-all about.
Nowadays, my satnav would almost certainly have found a better route for me.
Buy a map, learn to read it, plan your journey.
FFS. A Paper Map? In London?
You'd be transgressing the white line into a bus lane/restriced lane before you could say boo to a goose, while at the same time, average speeds are being measured.
Italy is even worse, with their bollard style cameras at the entry/exit of villages. Try navigating around the outskirts of Venice, Italy without Sat-Nav, they have local vehicle access restictions/times on certain roads.
A paper map won't get you very far (without incurring fines) anymore, especially if the road layout is unfamiliar.
It's very easy to find yourself naturally driving at circa 80mph within free flowing traffic on UK motorways, yet lots of new Highways agency cameras are being installed as part of Smart Motorway upgrades and set to trigger at 79mph on M25/M4, without additonal notification (signage switched off).
Bad laws/legislation/right dodgy rules and regulations are always a mind field to be mined and full of absolutely fabulous opportunities for renegade rogue and second and third party exploitation. And those created in a closed shop environment are the greatest for ensuring and securing delivery of catastrophic goods/unforeseen unexpected events.
Such has always been the case …. since forever. Do the mentally retarded never learn seriously simple lessons?
Future problems will be suffered in-house and that is where the most carnage will be centred.
@amanfromMars 1
Did you by any chance write the stuff Theresa May was telling Andrew Neil earlier?
I take that back, you would have probably made more sense, and been more honest. Didn't mean to insult you with such a cruel suggestion.
@amanfromMars 1Did you by any chance write the stuff Theresa May was telling Andrew Neil earlier?
I take that back, you would have probably made more sense, and been more honest. Didn't mean to insult you with such a cruel suggestion. .... Anonymous Coward
Ms May does tend to hyperbolic waffle with not substance being readily made available to support the blusterous rhetoric ..... but what else would one expect from the Parliamentary Pantomime Mind.
Leaders that does not make, for all before and trailing after them is fake for media production direction into future sight and sound programs/sublime tele audio visual pogroms.
And no offence or insult taken, AC, for the suggestion is only cruel if never to be true, tried and tested and failed.
Further to Odd Odious Fish Out of Water are as Minnows in the Sees of FCUKing Great Sharks ......
Whenever your/one's view of worlds and these times is so easily made news and movies with sublime programming of/for reality, why ever do you tolerate the horrors and privations presented to you to make everything a struggle and so miserable. Such a nonsense is confirmation of a madness which intelligent imagination can conquer with alternative media tales and advanced virtual reality trails.
And whenever you yourself are intellectually challenged and compromised and unable to produce such novel goods, fear not, whenever the gift is within the easy grasp and remit of sundry A.N.Others who be not puppets crash testing dummies.
Would the fool following a folly find such a fabulous opportunity with myriad zeroday vulnerabilities to exploit, an existential threat with innumerable invisible and intangible Persistent Advanced Cyber Threats or a Surreal Treat to be enjoyed and enjoined?
What is IT to be for you in the near future and longer term? More of the same austere chaos or everything changed and greatly different?
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