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[FYI] (Fwd) Snooping




------- Forwarded message follows -------
Date sent:      	Sun, 3 Dec 2000 18:26:46 -0500
To:             	cryptography@c2.net
From:           	"R. A. Hettinga" <rah@shipwright.com>
Subject:        	Snooping


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From: Somebody
To: "R. A. Hettinga" <rah@shipwright.com>
Subject: Snooping
Date: Sun, 3 Dec 2000 22:37:03 -0000

http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/uk/newsid_1052000/1052341.stm

Sunday, 3 December, 2000, 09:35 GMT
Spy plans 'threat to human rights'

Civil liberties campaigners have warned the government that granting
police and secret services greater snooping powers would be a breach
of human rights. It has been reported that British intelligence
services and the police are seeking powers to log all telephone calls,
e-mails and internet traffic in the UK.

The Home Office has confirmed a report in The Observer newspaper that
MI5, MI6 and the National Criminal Intelligence Service (NCIS) are
jointly requesting new legislation requiring communication service
providers (CSPs) to log phone calls and keep details for seven years.

But campaign group Liberty has warned the proposal would breach the
Human Rights Act and Data Protection Act and could see Britain hauled
before the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.

'Extraordinary idea'


John Wadham, director of Liberty, said: "The security services and the
police have a voracious appetite for collecting up information about
our private lives, but this is an extraordinary idea.

"This would violate the principles of the Data Protection Act and the
Human Rights Act and the government should reject this idea now.



Paul Boateng: "We must strike a balance"

"If it goes ahead we will challenge this in the courts in this country
and the European Court of Human Rights."

A Home Office spokesman said: "We are currently considering their
representations. However, no decisions have been taken at this stage."

Speaking on BBC Radio 5 Live's Andrew Neil Show, Home Office minister
Paul Boateng said the government would strive "to get the balance
right" between the demands of industry and the demands of law
enforcement.

It is said the new powers are needed to tackle the growing problems of
cyber crime, paedophiles' use of computers to run child porn rings,
terrorism and international drug trafficking.

'Unquestionably lawful'

The document, written by the deputy director general of NCIS, Roger
Gaspar, said the new demands were necessary.

He writes: "We believe that the Home Office already accepts that such
activity is unquestionably lawful, necessary and proportional, as well
as being vital in the interests of justice."

Mr Gaspar estimates that a database to store all the information would
cost about ?3m to set up and ?9m a year to run.

Politicians have condemned the proposal.

The Conservative peer and privacy expert Lord Cope told The Observer
he was sympathetic to the need for greater powers to fight modern
types of crime but had concerns about the proposal.

"Vast banks of information on every member of the public can quickly
slip into the world of Big Brother. I will be asking serious questions
about this," he said.

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-- 
-----------------
R. A. Hettinga <mailto: rah@ibuc.com>
The Internet Bearer Underwriting Corporation <http://www.ibuc.com/> 44
Farquhar Street, Boston, MA 02131 USA "... however it may deserve
respect for its usefulness and antiquity, [predicting the end of the
world] has not been found agreeable to experience." -- Edward Gibbon,
'Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'

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