Privacy and the State

[An_Inspector_Calls]

Why is it paranoia, A_I_C? :erm:

Paranoia is a clinical description of a severe psychiatric disturbance that is quite different from someone who just disagrees with you :winkeye:

Speaking personally, I'd exclude the latter before daubing someone with the former :biggrin:

Paranoia:
1 a mental disorder characterised by delusions of persecution or grandeur
2 a tendency towards excessive or irrational suspiciousness and distrustfulness

[ahinton]

We can expect any day/month now that Mr Snowden's reputation will be besmirched in some way, he will be accused in his absence of some extradictible offence, etc which will keep him on the run until he runs out of options or indeed until some mystery attack of remorse seizes him and he 'decides' to kill himself with the aid of assassination-by-proxy.:sadface:

Indeed; a perception of Assange Mk. II seems not entirely outside the realms of possibility.

[ahinton]

Really? In these days of Facebook and the like, where people seem determined to splash their private lives as much as possible all over the internet (the more the better, it seems), are you so confident that the majority share your paranoia about personal privacy?

And anyone with half a brain should be aware that using a mobile phone freely dumps their conversation into the public domain - if they're not, they haven't been to the movies enough.

Leaving aside the questionable appropriateness of your use of the term "paranoia" here, not everyone wants to splash their private lives thus and not everyone does, either; OK, those who do should indeed be aware of the risks that they might be taking or exacerbating, but joining social media and contributing personal information to such channels remains a matter of the personal choice of the contributor, which is a very different matter indeed to governments, large multinational corporations and the like removing or riding roughshod over that choice by acting in this manner.

[ahinton]

Especially when they have created 'snooping by proxy' which is what I understand Mr Snowden to have discovered. This enables Cameron to say, as he has done today, that our security services behave within the law - but he doesn't complete the sentence with 'because they receive the information on our citizens that our services wish to know via the security service of another state the activities of whose spooks are not proscribed by our laws'. :erm:

Indeed - the usual "it's someone else's fault, not ours", response which, whilst not necessarily entirely wrong, is about as much use as a chocolate teapot.

[amateur51]

Paranoia:
1 a mental disorder characterised by delusions of persecution of grandeur
2 a tendency towards excessive or irrational suspiciousness and distrustfulness

And your point is? :erm:

What's the technical term for 'a tendency towards excessive or irrational conformity and trustfulness'?

Ah yes, complacency :whistle:

[ahinton]

I thought Rifkind was quite clear, unevasive and straightforward on the Today programme.

You did? Well, I heard it, too and all that I found to be quite clear was his determination in advance to be about as evasive as we might have expected; what honest answers amenable to evidential corroboration did he provide that he would have had to provide in order for his responses to warrant your description "quite clear, unevasive and straightforward"?

[amateur51]

Ammy - it is of the nature of spooks that their activities are secret.

You may not see the point in this country having a secret service. I do. And in so doing I also accept that many of their activities will be covert, and not amenable to the open accountability which we require of normal servants of the state.

Oh I see the point of having a secret service alright (it makes for wonderful telly for a start :winkeye:) I just want to be assured that there are safeguards against mission creep, as it were :smiley:, that being the tendency to say "oooh look at what we've discovered here, I wonder what if ... "is it relevant to our current mission?" .. why Sir what a spoilsport you are ... send a Top Secret pigeon to The Express, Bill" :winkeye:

[vinteuil]

Oh I see the point of having a secret service alright (it makes for wonderful telly for a start :winkeye:) I just want to be assured that there are safeguards against mission creep, as it were :smiley:

... which is what the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) and the Intelligence and Security Committee are designed to do :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Intelligence_Committee_(United_Kingdom)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intelligence_and_Security_Committee_

[amateur51]

... which is what the Joint Intelligence Committee (JIC) and the Intelligence and Security Committee are designed to do :

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Joint_Intelligence_Committee_(United_Kingdom)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Intell...ity_Committee_

This would be the same JIC which signally failed in the run-up to the Blair/Bush invasion of Iraq; and the ISC which is chaired by Sir Macolm Rifkind whose wriggly performance gave rise to feelings of a certain lack of confidence amongst some Boardees when he was interviewed on BBC's Today programme this very morning? :yikes:

[vinteuil]

... given his position, Malcolm Rifkind of course will appear as 'wriggly'. It is an inescapable part of a job where you are in possession of information which you are not at liberty to disclose. I think, Ammy, you are looking for a "transparency" and "accountability" in these matters which is simply not possible.

My (uninformed) view of the intelligence débâcle preceding the Iraq adventure is that the seriously qualified intelligence reports of MI6 and others were outrageously manipulated by the political side, and 'forced' to provide what Blair 'needed' to hear. My opinion of John Scarlett is not fit for public consumption...

[amateur51]

... given his position, Malcolm Rifkind of course will appear as 'wriggly'. It is an inescapable part of a job where you are in position of information which you are not at liberty to disclose. I think, Ammy, you are looking for a "transparency" and "accountability" in these matters which is simply not possible.

My (uninformed) view of the intelligence débâcle preceding the Iraq adventure is that the seriously qualified intelligence reports of MI6 and others were outrageously manipulated by the political side, and 'forced' to provide what Blair 'needed' to hear. My opinion of John Scarlett is not fit for public consumption...

I'm sure that you're right vints but I don't want to see these reports published but I do want people who prepare them & people who read them to be competent. What happened at JIC prior to the Iraq war was venal incompetence personified from the politicians and craven compliance to the will of the politicians from Mr Scarlett. Blair attempted to create a veneer of competence and accountability via the Hutton Inquiry, and His Lordship obliged, shamefully in my opinion.

Has anyone read and formed an opinion on Jack Straw's memoirs yet? :erm:

[ahinton]

... given his position, Malcolm Rifkind of course will appear as 'wriggly'. It is an inescapable part of a job where you are in possession of information which you are not at liberty to disclose. I think, Ammy, you are looking for a "transparency" and "accountability" in these matters which is simply not possible.

Whilst in matters of genuine national security 100% transparency and accountability might simply not be deemed possible, or advisable, the trust invested by the populace in those who run departments charged with such matters must at the same time be neither compromised nor abused. With "I am not at liberty to disclose" inevitably goes the very real risk of "I can do what I like, including appropriating any personal or corporate information upon which I can get my grubby little hands and the law of the land exonerates me from any duty to tell you about it, let alone account for it"; surely the potential dangers inherent in that speak quite eloquently enough for themselves?

[An_Inspector_Calls]

And your point is? :erm:

That you seemed unaware of the correct definition of paranoia.

[scottycelt]

Obama got it dead right. There is no such thing as total security and total privacy.

It's a question of striking the right balance, and in times like these it's hardly surprising that the pendulum may be currently tilted towards rather more security.

If one single innocent human life is saved as a result that is surely justified?

Jack Straw's statesmanlike, non-partisan contribution in Parliament this afternoon was excellent. :ok:

[An_Inspector_Calls]

Leaving aside the questionable appropriateness of your use of the term "paranoia" here, not everyone wants to splash their private lives thus and not everyone does, either; OK, those who do should indeed be aware of the risks that they might be taking or exacerbating, but joining social media and contributing personal information to such channels remains a matter of the personal choice of the contributor, which is a very different matter indeed to governments, large multinational corporations and the like removing or riding roughshod over that choice by acting in this manner.

My use of the word paranoia was perfectly correct. Your point about choice in privacy is correct, but is by-the-by; I was merely using the observation to refute yet another of Barratt's statistical claims.