Goodlad

My interest in surveillance has always been large. I suspect because of my long marriage to Howard Marks aka Mr Nice (the infamous charismatic dope dealer).

Before the birth of our children Howard was a fugitive and we lived much of the time with phony passports, driving licenses and bank accounts.

The DEA alleged that Howard at one time had as many as forty-three aliases, eighty-nine phone lines and owned twenty–five companies trading throughout the world.

To find out more buy my book Mr Nice and Mrs Marks: Adventures with Howard

Surveillance today is far more pervasive than in the days of our escapades. The recent House of Lords committee report warns that it “threatens to undermine democracy” and that it “represents one of the most significant changes in the life of the nation since the end of the second world war”.

Civil liberties campaigners have warned about the risks of a “surveillance society” in which the state acquires ever-greater powers to track people’s movements and retain personal data.

Many would argue that surveillance and identity cards were needed to stop the likes of Howard and I continuing in a life of crime.

“There can be no justification for this gradual but incessant creep towards every detail about us being recorded and pored over by the state”

Lord Goodlad, chairman of the House of Lords constitution committee.

Do you agree with Lord Goodlad?

Huge Internet Spy Centre

SPY chiefs are forging ahead with secret plans to monitor all internet use and telephone calls in Britain. This is despite Jacqui Smith's announcement earlier this week that proposals for a central warehouse of communications data had been abolished on privacy grounds.

A mass internet surveillance system known as Mastering the Internet (MTI) will cost hundreds of millions of pounds. It will consist of thousands of deep packet inspection probes inside communications providers' networks.

MTI will grant intelligence staff in Cheltenham GCHQ complete visibility of UK Internet traffic. It will allow them to intercept and monitor all e-mails, website visits and social networking sessions in Britain. The agency will also be able to track telephone calls made over the internet, as well as all phone calls to landlines and mobiles.

At the moment the agency is able to use probes to monitor the content of calls and e-mails sent by specific individuals who are the subject of police or security service investigations.

Today these interceptions must be approved by a warrant signed by the home secretary or a minister of equivalent rank.

The new GCHQ internet-monitoring network will shift the focus of the surveillance state away from a few hundred targeted people to everyone in the UK.

Last week, in what seemed to be a concession to privacy campaigners, Smith announced that she was dropping the controversial plans for a single “big brother” database to centrally store all communications data in Britain.

Jacqui Smith said. “The government recognised the privacy implications of the move [and] therefore does not propose to pursue this move.”

Smith announced that up to £2 billion of public money would instead be spent helping private internet and telephone companies to save information for up to 12 months in separate databases.

She neglected to mention that substantial additional sums — amounting to more than £1 billion over three years — had already been allocated to GCHQ for its MTI programme.

Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, said “We opposed the big brother database because it gave the state direct access to everybody’s communications. But this network of black boxes achieves the same thing via the back door.”

Ministers have said they do not intend to snoop on the actual content of e-mails or telephone calls. The monitoring will instead focus on who an individual is communicating with or which websites and chat rooms they are visiting.

Supporters of MTI and IMP say they are essential if intelligence agencies are to preserve their capability to monitor terrorist and other criminal networks. GCHQ does not want to discuss how the data it gathered will be used.

Are they gathering this information to “protect us?” What do you think?

DNA Data Bank

The UK Forensic Science Service (FSS) established the world’s first DNA database in April 1995.

It is allegedly the largest in the world. It contains samples from more than 7% of the population. The database grows by 30,000 samples each month.

Police forces in the UK (excluding Scotland) can take DNA and fingerprints from anybody arrested on suspicion of a recordable offense and hold the samples indefinitely whether people are charged or not.

The privacy of samples stored in these data banks has become a major legal, political, ethical, and moral issue.

The potential for error and privacy violations become greater each day, and yet, many are quick to assume that the only people who have reason for concern are the guilty.

On 4th December 2008, 17 judges at The European Court of Human Rights unanimously ruled that keeping DNA samples of innocent people was unlawful. As a consequence, thousands of DNA samples on the UK DNA database may have to be destroyed.

The UK government has responded by saying, “The existing law will remain in place while we carefully consider the judgement."

In early 2007, five employees of Britain's national DNA database agency were arrested on charges of industrial espionage for allegedly stealing DNA information from the database and using it to set up a rival firm.

Civil rights activist Shami Chakrabarti said the alleged theft from the database, which houses DNA samples from nearly 4 million people, was cause for concern.

"This is hugely significant and should make every law-abiding person seriously worried. People are looking after these databases who have less and less of a public-service ethic,"

Civil rights groups have long been critical of the controversial database, arguing there are no real safeguards to prevent misuse.

Are you worried?