Privacy and the State

[french frank]

This is the kind of reason why, in many countries, so many people have lost faith in what's presented as democracy but is in truth nothing of the kind. Which in turn is the reason why (returning to the thread topic) there's so much emphasis on social media both as an instrument of real democracy and (therefore) as a theatre of action that state governments are attempting to control.

But in what sense does 'real democracy' differ from rule by the people; or if that is what you mean, would you accept that 'rule by the people' would, on every policy, be desirable, or that it is a safeguard that the majority will always vote for what is best in the wider context?

I don't refer specifically to Afghanistan, capital punishment &c, but I mean in a general way. Vox populi, vox dei?

[Beef Oven]

That's all very well but we are supposed to be talking about Privacy & The State and the fact remains there has to be a high level of secrecy in the security services and a certain amount of trust in government for both to operate effectively on our behalf.

Does anyone seriously believe that the members of the security services have so much time on their hands that they are currently snooping on everybody's texts and e-mails? I don't. If they are they must be all in very grave danger of dying prematurely of excruciating boredom.

However, I am perfectly prepared to believe that they may monitoring some people who are already under suspicion of being involved in or encouraging terrorism. Like Mr Pee, I am rather keen that they do!

So it is indeed true to state that anybody going about their normal, lawful business, and not getting involved in or promoting such activities, has very little to fear.

A free society does not mean a complete license to do exactly as we please including violent, murderous attempts to destroy it!

:ok: Spot on Scotty.

I think that the business of government is about balancing factors, not necessarily resolving them perfectly.

Ten years ago, today's proposed Communications Data Bill would have been anathema to me. Today, a different balance is required. The bringing of the internet within the same scope as mobile 'phones and land-lines, may well be proportionate to the current circumstances.

[Beef Oven]

But in what sense does 'real democracy' differ from rule by the people; or if that is what you mean, would you accept that 'rule by the people' would, on every policy, be desirable, or that it is a safeguard that the majority will always vote for what is best in the wider context?

I don't refer specifically to Afghanistan, capital punishment &c, but I mean in a general way. Vox populi, vox dei?

Take Turkey right now. A governing party and popular leader with an irresistible mandate from the population and a massive majority in the Ankara parliament.

Yet, the democratic process, including an open press, radio and TV is missing.

Social media is the only democratic 'process' at play here; and look at what it achieved. Stopped Erdogan and the AK Party in their strident stride and caused them to re-think their intended course of action within 18 hours!

[Richard Barrett]

The current system is obviously failing large numbers of people and generally benefitting only those who are already wealthy and/or powerful; that would seem to be uncontroversial in view of the kind of news we regularly see - today, for example, the IFS report on falling wages since 2008. The officially-sanctioned "democratic" channels allowing, as scottycelt quaintly asserts, a change in "hue and human representation", presents us with no more than a flimsy illusion of representation. Part of that illusion is the idea that the "wider context" isn't something that should be borne in mind, or even known about, when deciding who to vote for. Being in possession of the facts, for which in the present context we can thank Mr Snowden rather than any of the (elected/unelected) officials who purportedly have our interests in mind, enables a debate of these issues to take place. Whether people here or elsewhere agree or disagree about the necessity of the policies under discussion, it's nevertheless incontrovertibly true that our rulers would much prefer that this discussion were prevented from taking place at all. That should surely be food for thought even for the more credulous among us.

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

it's nevertheless incontrovertibly true that our rulers would much prefer that this discussion were prevented from taking place at all. That should surely be food for thought even for the more credulous among us.

perhaps but in my experience it is political embarrassment not criminal shame they worry about most .....

the real point is that once the mechanism exists some blighter will use it and they must be restrained and monitored .... the abuse of RIPA by local council officials was/is appalling ....

it is not re-assuring to keep banging on about the threat to security, on any calculative basis it is rather a lot less than road traffic deaths, how about an absolute monitoring of speed and enforcement of 20mph in any urban area and 55mph everywhere else eh?

in the 60s i used to belong to that school of dope fiend that believed that the US Treasury DEA was one of the biggest entrenched self serving bureaucracies on the planet, i was wrong, it is not in any comparable scale of self interest [agency capture in that curiously apt phrase from economics] with NSA, GCHQ etc .... terrorism replaced the cold war eh, now they are on to the drug wars as well .... how beneficent for their budgets, resources and powers ... as Mr Flynn observed in parliament, there were a lot of spies in the security services but very few if at all in the general population in the cold war ...

we should insist in these austere economic times for a clear demonstration of value for £ from the MoD and security establishment ... there are other places where the money would demonstrably save the lives of our fellow citizens ... as well as a transparency of missions and operational process to parliament

it is worth bearing in mind that at the end of the day all those security and military types owe their loyalty [such as it might be] to the Crown and will and can tell us all to eff off .... and parliament too no doubt .... i once told a Group captain in the RAF that the Queen paid him to protect Arthur Scargill's freedom of speech .... his face coloured an imperial shade of deep pink .....

[ahinton]

That's all very well but we are supposed to be talking about Privacy & The State and the fact remains there has to be a high level of secrecy in the security services and a certain amount of trust in government for both to operate effectively on our behalf.

But we are talking about that - Privacy and the State - not Secrecy and the State which, while they can to some extent be related subjects, are by no means the same thing. Yes, there does have to be a certain level of secrecy in the security services for them to operate efficiently, but there are nevertheless two problems with this; firstly, technological developments increasing mean that the preservation of secrecy becomes ever more difficult to achieve and, secondly, with such secrecy as can still be maintained, the concomitant lack of accountability of the security services inevitably sits uneasily with the taxpaying electorate who fund them and accordingly deserve the kind of accountability that they have a right to expect of other government departments that they likewise fund.

Does anyone seriously believe that the members of the security services have so much time on their hands that they are currently snooping on everybody's texts and e-mails? I don't. If they are they must be all in very grave danger of dying prematurely of excruciating boredom.

Neither you nor I can be certain how each employee of the security services spends his/her time, but it is not whether they're "currently snooping on everybody's texts and e-mails" but the possibility that either future legislation
or past and current ruses to avoid current legislation could enable them to do so without first seeking and obtaining the formal written consent of those sending texts, emails, phone calls and the like; even the risks of the mishandling and misappropriation of such data (of the kind that we've already witnessed in many cases of government departments misusing and losing data, sometimes on quite a large scale) would alone cause many eyebrows to rise at the prospect that the security services could be given carte blanche to do what they like about personal and corporate data without even informing those concerned, let alone securing their permission for this.

However, I am perfectly prepared to believe that they may monitoring some people who are already under suspicion of being involved in or encouraging terrorism. Like Mr Pee, I am rather keen that they do!

That's all very well insofar as it might go and, in principle, I have no issues with this but, in practice, effective and successful monitoring of that kind is predicated upon first identifying who might fall into the category of "terrorist" or supporter of "terrorism"; the problem here is, rather as Sorabji once described people's definition of Fascism as "anyone else's Fascism but their own", the label "terrorist" is almost invariably affixed to "other" people, organisations and the like in utter disregard to home-grown terrorist activity (or support for it) against others.

So it is indeed true to state that anybody going about their normal, lawful business, and not getting involved in or promoting such activities, has very little to fear.

From what can you possibly derive your apparent confidence in this? If you accept that a certain level of secrecy is necessary for the effective running of Britain's security services - and if it can be achieved without leakages (which, as I've already pointed out, is becoming increasingly difficult in any case) - you cannot know what those services are doing or to what extent they might impact upon your own activities.

A free society does not mean a complete license to do exactly as we please including violent, murderous attempts to destroy it!

Indeed it doesn't but, likewise, it doesn't mean "a complete license to do exactly as we please including violent, murderous attempts to" interfere with other societies in countries that have not declared war on Britain or indeed a license to do any such thing without the majority support of Britain's taxpaying electorate.

[vinteuil]

... and why has our resident Simon not shared his informed views on these subjects with the rest of us on this thread?

[ahinton]

... and why has our resident Simon not shared his informed views on these subjects with the rest of us on this thread?

Only Simon could answer that -and I've not noticed him offering his informed view on an subjects of late on this board.

[french frank]

Only Simon could answer that -and I've not noticed him offering his informed view on an subjects of late on this board.

He intimated that he would be absent for some weeks.

[scottycelt]

The current system is obviously failing large numbers of people and generally benefitting only those who are already wealthy and/or powerful; that would seem to be uncontroversial in view of the kind of news we regularly see - today, for example, the IFS report on falling wages since 2008. The officially-sanctioned "democratic" channels allowing, as scottycelt quaintly asserts, a change in "hue and human representation", presents us with no more than a flimsy illusion of representation. Part of that illusion is the idea that the "wider context" isn't something that should be borne in mind, or even known about, when deciding who to vote for. Being in possession of the facts, for which in the present context we can thank Mr Snowden rather than any of the (elected/unelected) officials who purportedly have our interests in mind, enables a debate of these issues to take place. Whether people here or elsewhere agree or disagree about the necessity of the policies under discussion, it's nevertheless incontrovertibly true that our rulers would much prefer that this discussion were prevented from taking place at all. That should surely be food for thought even for the more credulous among us.

What is incontrovertibly true? Whether our rulers are understandably a little irritated or not by such a discussion the fact is that this discussion on personal privacy is all over the media at present and the politicians are being asked some very searching questions. If it is considered 'quaint' by some to point out that democratic governments tend to change in political outlook and personnel on a regular basis, then so be it! Of course, we can all claim that no political party truly represents our view of morality. I often do myself these days, but there's party political democracy for you, imperfect as it is.

As for being 'credulous' that is surely more than matched by others who appear to indulge in an automatic cynicism about what any UK government does or does not do?

[french frank]

1. Senior members of the police and MI5 have recommended caution over this Bill.

2. Information about a number of terror attacks that have been foiled since 7/7 seems evidence that current powers are adequate, not that more are needed.

3. Again MI5 has said that the proposed powers would not have prevented Woolwich, for example, and that it was a 'cheap argument' to suggest otherwise

4. Invading privacy to gain access to details about UK citizens is not a matter of whether people 'have anything to hide' or not: it is a question of what use will be or could be made of such information, especially (though not exclusively) by the politicians.

5, The political class is held in low esteem - perhaps never lower on the evidence of recent displays of venality and deception (to say nothing of people in other public services): what do they need to do more than they have done to shake people's trust and confidence in them? Not so much 'Trust us' as 'Why should we'?'

[Beef Oven]

1. Senior members of the police and MI5 have recommended caution over this Bill.

2. Information about a number of terror attacks that have been foiled since 7/7 seems evidence that current powers are adequate, not that more are needed.

3. Again MI5 has said that the proposed powers would not have prevented Woolwich, for example, and that it was a 'cheap argument' to suggest otherwise

4. Invading privacy to gain access to details about UK citizens is not a matter of whether people 'have anything to hide' or not: it is a question of what use will be or could be made of such information, especially (though not exclusively) by the politicians.

5, The political class is held in low esteem - perhaps never lower on the evidence of recent displays of venality and deception (to say nothing of people in other public services): what do they need to do more than they have done to shake people's trust and confidence in them? Not so much 'Trust us' as 'Why should we'?'

1. A Bill like this must be proceeded with, with caution, glad we all agree on that.

2. Terrorist attacks require more than 'adequate' measures. They need to be continually updated and improved (diminishing returns notwithstanding).

3. This is not just about the slaughter of Lee Rigby, RIP.

4. It is a relatively low level of invasion (not looking at content of emails etc, just activity) and with around 40 million internet users, the chances of an innocent 'individual citizen' being compromised is extremely low (see Scotty's earlier post).

5. Address the issue, not the people.

[french frank]

1. A Bill like this must be proceeded with, with caution, glad we all agree on that.

2. Terrorist attacks require more than 'adequate' measures. They need to be continually updated and improved (diminishing returns notwithstanding).

3. This is not just about the slaughter of Lee Rigby, RIP.

4. It is a relatively low level of invasion (not looking at content of emails etc, just activity) and with around 40 million internet users, the chances of an innocent 'individual citizen' being compromised is extremely low (see Scotty's earlier post).

5. Address the issue, not the people.

With respect, I thought all my five points addressed the issue. The weakest of your points is 4. I made it clear it was not simply a matter of guilt or innocence, but of what information could be accessed and what use could be made of it - including reading the content of emails, the only safeguard being that that will be illegal, not impossible

[aka Calum Da Jazbo]

local councils and ripa 1


2

3 including the BBC!

4

whatever the mechanism it will be misused, often on a rather banal quotidian basis but that just lulls us for the biggies ....

[Beef Oven]

With respect, I thought all my five points addressed the issue. The weakest of your points is 4. I made it clear it was not simply a matter of guilt or innocence, but of what information could be accessed and what use could be made of it - including reading the content of emails, the only safeguard being that that will be illegal, not impossible

With equal respect, I never said you didn't address the issue in your 5 points (point 5 takes it's strength from an attack on the people/group in the government rather than the issue, that's all).

In the abstract, I agree with you about the risk of 'what could be done with the information', but Scotty made the point very simply earlier on, that the risk is extremely small that the authorities would have the time, resources or even inclination to bother innocent/non-profile suspects. You kinda accept this point when you refer to MI5/police being unable to monitor and prevent the slaughter of Lee Rigby.