UK to Monitor All Communications

This is a load of crap. Those who need to speak to each other for any kind of immoral reasons can use something like 128 bit encryption with their own shared keys.

These sorts of things take the people at Sony months to breakdown.

How do u break that down, know to be following it back'n'fore between the users and think they'll use the same key everytime.

This is just allowing them to know ur trends.

U will get the growth of encrypted ircs and the like. U can already use keys for emails.
 
From what I read of that article, I don't think they are actually going to be logging the actual contents of any conversations or visits to websites, merely the fact that you visited X website or went on X chatroom at a certain time during the day. In which case encryption is going to help you in most scenario's.

The way i see it, its no more of a privacy breach than BT keeping logs of what numbers you've dialed.
 
"monitoring of telephone conversations and interception of other communications currently being used by security agencies"

That's more than just logging when they took place. And thinking about it, my IRC is already SSL 128 encrypted, so they won't get that ^^
 
All this crap about the privacy laws gets me mad. So what if our security forces had no means with which to monitor criminals and terrorists? Would you all be happy that these scumbags had carte blanche to communicate freely, without having to worry about tripping themselves up? How much easier would it be for these scumbags to do what they do?

We need laws in place that make life harder for the terrorists and criminals, and if that means that we need a way to be able to trace electronic comms then so be it. It may not provide a guaranteed way to secure convictions, but as proven in the past, some dumb ****s do get caught out by electronic comms monitoring. It's another vital tool in our security forces arsenal.

As for electronic encryption, do you honestly think that our security forces would allow a means to encrypt data anywhere near the open market without having some way to defeat the encryption? Hardly likely I reckon! Also, it's worth thinking about where all the latest tech comes from and is bankrolled by. The tech that the military and security forces have is normally a generation ahead of what the consumer can get their hands on, and I can see no reason why encryption tech would be any different.

And at the end of the day, you all do have the option NOT to use the services which would be logged if you feel your privacy is being invaded, try pen and paper, or maybe the phone. Oh wait those calls you make are logged too:D
 
I'm a little bit annoyed about this invasion of privacy, but I can see why they would want to do it. I'm afraid though that everything that is important will just be done with 128 bit+ encryption, and they can take ages to crack.

Also, if I've had a few nights researching bioterrorism, terrorism, and building your own explosives and bombs, I really don't want to be woken in the middle of the night by some armed police.
 
Yet another way for the government to make money, you honestly dont think if this gets passed they wont sell the information? it would certainly make up for the 15billion missing from this years budget
 
@StuartPB: I see what you're saying about how it's hard to catch terrorists and anything else they can do to help secure convictions being a good thing, but, why bother.

THIS link shows some statistics about what I mean. "Terrorism" is one of the smallest threats to our life, yet we are spending an extra £728,000,000 on defeating it this year, with a total of 3.5 billion by 2011 (Source).

Also, the UK has a way of breaking your encryption, it's called a court order. You either give them the password or they leave you to rot in jail. They probably could also just break into your house and set up a worm on your computer.
 
name='Pseudonym' said:
@StuartPB: I see what you're saying about how it's hard to catch terrorists and anything else they can do to help secure convictions being a good thing, but, why bother.

Would love to hear you say that to someone who's lost someone close from a terrorist event.

If i have to let the government snoop at what websites i've visited for the possibility of stopping a terrorist attack, then let them. I really do not care!
 
This argument has gone on since electronic communications became common place.

Read a book by Dan Brown called Digital Fortress... fantastic novel.

Think of it this way if someone had an uncrackable means of communication and terrorists got it, how would any service monitoring terrorism FBI, MI5 etc be able to follow their movements and plans.

Pseudonym mentioned the cost of fighting terrorism. My families life is priceless.

how much is anyones families lives worth?

I dont mind the cost if it saves one life be it from terrorism or stops abuse from pedophiles then every penny is well spent.
 
What about the thousands of people that are dying every day that they are doing nothing to try and stop? (That link Pseudonym posted has some great 'lets put this in perspective' figures).

Dan
 
I do think that, at this stage, the money could be better spent. I do agree, monitoring terrorism is a vital process BUT... statistically, sat here in a room of colleagues, am i more likely to be victim of a terrorism attack or, for example, swine flu.

If there we're evidence of an increase in risk of attack then fine but at the moment, I think theyre just using it as an excuse.
 
name='nathan' said:
Would love to hear you say that to someone who's lost someone close from a terrorist event.

name='lasher' said:
Think of it this way if someone had an uncrackable means of communication and terrorists got it, how would any service monitoring terrorism FBI, MI5 etc be able to follow their movements and plans.

Pseudonym mentioned the cost of fighting terrorism. My families life is priceless.

how much is anyones families lives worth?

I dont mind the cost if it saves one life be it from terrorism or stops abuse from pedophiles then every penny is well spent.

Couldn't agree more with you guys!

Look at the London bombings back in 2005. After these bombings, the government, and the security agencies, came under harsh criticism for not doing enough to prevent the bombings. It's a case of you are damned if you do, and damned if you don't! We do need measures in place to make the life of the terrorist and criminal that much harder, and if it means that records are kept of what I do electronically, then so be it as far as I am concerned.

Cost cannot become an issue in my eyes, as how would you like to explain to the victims and their families of any future attack that this attack could have been prevented, but it wasn't because we had to quantify in ££'s, how much it was worth to prevent attacks? It isn't just terrorists that these new laws are aimed at though, it's paedophiles, organised crime syndicates and just about every other form fo low life scum that utilises electronic comms.

I grew up in and around army camps until my early teens in the 70's and early 80's, as my Dad was in the Army. We had to live with the threat of the IRA every day. So to a lesser extent than my Dad, I knew how it felt to be a potential target, and it wasn't nice. Every time there was the threat of an attack, or there had been an attack, it was scary times indeed.

This was in a time when the intelligence agencies and police were reliant on informants for the information gathering, which has never been reliable at the best of times. Now we have the means to combat terrorists and criminals in a more effective way, and I say bring it on! I don't feel like I am restricted in what I do, who I talk to, or what I say, because I act within the law. If I was a criminal or a terrorist, then maybe I would be worried, but I'm not so I don't.
 
I'm not making light of the situation; losing a loved one is horrible in any situation, having them murdered by some fanatical scum is worse than most, but it's still a bad use of public money.

Your families' lives are priceless and terrorism is bad, but that doesn't mean you should waste the money that could be used to save them from something far more statistically likely to kill them.

Top ten killers of 2005 (A bit old, but I didn't want to sift through the latest mortality statistics). If you pumped a lot of that money into stem cell research, I would expect you to save many more lives. If you could cure diabetes, you would reclaim almost 10% of the NHS budget (a saving of around 10 billion this year.) Think of how many families that could save.
 
You are still focusing on the terrorist aspect of this though. There is the fact that criminals can, and are being caught out by electronic eavesdropping and counter measures. The range of crimes is very wide too, from paedophiles, right up to organised crime syndicates. Now when you consider this, is it really a waste of public resources?

Look at the paedophile rings that have been exposed in the past few years, due to our security forces being able to utilise technology to their advantage. What's worrying is that we have probably only scratched the tip of the iceberg, and with more advanced methods, I am sure our security forces would be able to detect and prosecute many more of these scumbags.

Yes the initial cost is going to be very high, but we have to ask ourselves if it will be worth it in the end? As a taxpayer, I wouldn't mind paying a few pence more every week to fund this scheme, because even if it just caught out one paedophile a year, or prevented one terrorist attack every few years, it would be money well spent.

I do agree that there should be more funding available to medical researchers, but the threat from terrorists and criminals is still a pressing one which requires radical solutions.
 
name='stuartpb' said:
You are still focusing on the terrorist aspect of this though. There is the fact that criminals can, and are being caught out by electronic eavesdropping and counter measures. The range of crimes is very wide too, from paedophiles, right up to organised crime syndicates. Now when you consider this, is it really a waste of public resources?

Where are we thinking they're intent on poling info about tho ?

Just the fact that "a" communication is being had, or the content of the communication ?

I can send u a brief email that would take Sony 6 months to have any chance of decoding - just a chance, not actually decode it. If ur highly organized with criminal intent, u should be aware of these things.

Or we thinking they're after stupid criminals ?

The other thing being is the data storage required to hold such information without targeting someone 'known'.

I feel without knowing prior that an activity is in place, there isn't a great chance of success.

If they are 'knowing', things are already in place to allow them to get the information they need.
 
name='Rastalovich' said:
Where are we thinking they're intent on poling info about tho ?

Just the fact that "a" communication is being had, or the content of the communication ?

I can send u a brief email that would take Sony 6 months to have any chance of decoding - just a chance, not actually decode it. If ur highly organized with criminal intent, u should be aware of these things.

Or we thinking they're after stupid criminals ?

The other thing being is the data storage required to hold such information without targeting someone 'known'.

I feel without knowing prior that an activity is in place, there isn't a great chance of success.

If they are 'knowing', things are already in place to allow them to get the information they need.

That 'knowing' bit reminds me of the US war chief doing the "There are known knowns and known unknowns " speech :)
 
I dunno if this is relevant but when i used to work for the police if we / they took your pc off you weather you like it or not we / they had the tools to find out every thing they needed to know with out you even knowing. as far as the law was concerned you under arrest and they have your pc so they will do what ever they will with it.

All so again weather you like it or not the police can request a court order to trace / tap / ghost /follow your every on line move , your bank accounts and so much more it would make your head dizzy. this has been going on for years ... so this law doesn't change any thing that isn't all ready in place. The only thing it does is make there life more easy and less paper work ...

Did you care before you knew this probably not, do you have any thing to worry about , not relay as they only target people whom have a reason to be targeted.

Does it make the world any safer who the hell knows. Do all these statistics mean any thing .... do they hell .... they are never the whole truth and they are all ways a one sided view ...

Even the police have there own police and would you believe it or not a IT contractor has more right than any bobby on the beat and can access more than people would care to say.

mind you the less ppl know the better to be honest ... because at the end of the day its all scare mongering ...

life goes on and we all have better things to worrier about.

i forgot to add .. most copper's as dumb as **** and couldn't find a crim if they were stood in front of them and the same goes for the CID. The real brains lay with there contractors and the people who you never see.

trust me from first hand experience ... alot of it is just guess work.
 
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