Search
Content type: News & Analysis
Mass surveillance affects us all
The draft Communications Data Bill - known as the 'Snoopers' Charter' - will dramatically expand police surveillance powers if it is voted into law. Innocent citizens would have all their communications and online activity monitored, all of the time. The government would store information about who we're texting, what we're searching for on Google and who we're friends with on Facebook. Police and HM Revenue and Customs officers would be able to access this…
Content type: Press release
The government today published a draft version of a bill that, if signed into law in its current form, would force Internet Service Providers (ISPs) and mobile phone network providers in Britain to install 'black boxes' in order to collect and store information on everyone's internet and phone activity, and give the police the ability to self-authorise access to this information. However, the Home Office failed to explain whether or not companies like Facebook, Google and Twitter will be…
Content type: Press release
An internal Liberal Democrat briefing on Home Office plans to massively expand government surveillance was today passed to Privacy International. The document contains significant evasions and distortions about the proposed 'Communications Capabilities Development Programme' (CCDP), and is clearly intended to persuade unconvinced Lib Dem MPs to vote in favour of the proposal.
The document contains a section entitled 'Remember, under Labour' consisting of a list of the previous government's…
Content type: News & Analysis
Prime Minister David Cameron may not be quite the “pitiless blank-eyed hell wraith” Charlie Brooker portrayed in yesterday’s Guardian, but he does have some pretty frightening ideas about the Internet. This morning the Prime Minister announced, at a meeting with the Christian charity Mother’s Union, that four of the UK’s biggest ISPs will henceforth require users to opt in if they want to view pornographic material – thereby creating a commercially-owned and controlled database of…
Content type: News & Analysis
For the past couple of months we have been discussing with Google their transparency plans regarding governments accessing data held by Google. Last week Google released initial data on how many requests for data were coming from which governments.
We congratulate Google on this first step, and we believe that by seeking answers to some additional questions, greater clarity may yet emerge. Of course we have many more questions. We hope that this is the first step in an ongoing dialogue with…
Content type: News & Analysis
Last week the German Federal Constitutional Court overturned a law on the retention of telecommunications data for law enforcement purposes, stating that it posed a "grave intrusion" to personal privacy and must be revised. In their ruling the judges found that the law stands in contradiction to the basic right of private correspondence and does not protect the principle of proportionality, as it fails to balance the need to provide security with the right to privacy. All data on telephone…
Content type: News & Analysis
The European Commission is about to announce the compulsory fingerprinting of all visitors to the EU, both visa holders and non-visa holders, along with automated border checks of EU nationals through the analysis of fingerprints and facial scans.
The Communication from December 2007, available here on the PI site, outlines the plans. Below we summarise the plans. Also see PI's commentary in the Guardian CommentisFree section from February 11, 2008.
Critical Analysis
The Communication does…
Content type: News & Analysis
The European Parliament voted today to adopt a new directive allowing for the retention of data "generated by telephony, SMS and internet, but not the content of the information communicated". This data includes email addresses and location data from cell phones. The directive is highly controversial due to the impact it will have on the privacy of European Union citizens.
Also of concern is the broad discretion that is left to EU member states. For example, data may be accessed for the…
Content type: News & Analysis
The below letter was addresses to UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, Viviane Reding (Commissioner for Information Society and Media) and Franco Frattini (Vice President and Commissioner for Justice, Freedom and Security).
Your excellencies,
On behalf of European Digital Rights and Privacy International we would like to express our sadness and anger at the terrorist attacks in London on 7 July. We understand the difficulty of ensuring the daily safety of all citizens and residents…
Content type: Press release
A conference held today at the London School of Economics will hear new statistics showing that UK law enforcement and investigation agencies are demanding an unprecedented quantity of customer records from communications providers.
Privacy International has compiled figures based on estimates supplied by the Home Office, Ministerial statements, legal experts, the communications industry and the All Party Internet Group of MPs. The figures being released today indicate that police and…