ACPO publishes "The National DNA Database Annual Report 2004/5"

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The Association of Chief Police Officers website has now published the

"The National DNA Database Annual Report 2004/5" (.pdf)

There is little in this report which addresses the privacy and security worries which we have about the unprecedented growth of this National DNA Database.

This report actually lists the main recommendations of the various independent reviews of DNA database policy over the years. It then goes on to reject all the most important privacy safeguards that Parliamentary Committees and others have recommended.

The third strategic objective of the National DNA Database is:

3. To maintain public confidence in the security and integrity of The National DNA Database and its use

This is something which the Home Office, the Police and the National DNA Database Board have failed to do in regard to the DNA profiles and tissue samples of children and of adults and children who have not been charged or convicted of a crime or who have volunteered a DNA sample for whatever reason.

One other area of concern which has not had much media attention is

Consent for DNA samples to be used for research purpose

The legislation specifies that any sample taken under PACE can be used for purposes related to the prevention and detection of crime. No consent is required for the taking of most samples and no separate consent is
required for the samples and any data derived from the samples to be used for these legitimate purposes.

[...]

The Board thus sees no need to request consent for the DNA samples to be used for research purposes.

This refers to the re-analysis of actual full DNA tissue samples, not just the processed 12 point SGM Plus "DNA fingerprint" data.

Another controversial area:

Ability of volunteers to withdraw consent for their profiles to be added to The National DNA Database

The rationale for not permitting a volunteer to withdraw their consent to their profile being retained on The National DNA Database is to avoid a return to the situation prior to the CJPA, where consent had been given and then withdrawn, but for whatever reason the profile remained on the Database and it was found to match that taken from a crime scene, leading to arguments as to the admissibility of such evidence in subsequent criminal proceedings.

Note the presumption of guilt by volunteers

Surely seems perfectly reasonable that people who might have volunteered a DNA sample. might wish to withdraw their permission, after the particular case in which they were helping to catch a suspect has been concluded ?

The information held on the Database is only used if a stored sample is matched with a sample recovered from a crime scene. As with individuals acquitted of an offence for which DNA was taken and those whose prosecutions are not proceeded with, a law abiding person has nothing to fear from having their profile on the Database.

Only if the people operating the system are ethical and can be trusted.

Why should individual citizens trust the Government and the private sector with their very personal data, when there are no criminal sanctions against such abuse by petty bureaucrats ?

Value of retaining in The National DNA Database profiles from persons who have not been prosecuted or have been acquitted

There is a need to balance the interests of society against the right to privacy of the individual and the Government believes that that balance should be tipped in favour of the victims of crime and the protection of individuals against crime. In this respect, the Government firmly believes that the measures taken to retain the samples and fingerprints of persons who have been arrested, albeit not prosecuted or convicted, for a recordable offence are proportionate and justified. That view has been thoroughly tested and supported by the Law Lords in the case of R v Chief Constable of South Yorkshire ex parte S and Marper.

Although it was acknowledged that some persons who have not been convicted of an offence sometimes felt aggrieved that this biometric information is retained, the Law Lords in the quoted case rejected the suggestion that this group of people are somehow stigmatised as a result. Persons who do not go on to commit an offence have no reason to fear the retention of this information.

Rubbish ! The Government has given no assurances whatsoever that, for example, the DNA samples and profiles collected from the victims and other innocent passengers at the crime scenes of the London Tube and Bus bomb attacks in July 2005, is not forever going to be retained and linked in terrorist suspect database lists, which are then around the world to other police and intelligence agencies, without any background explanatory information.

This is not a direct risk due to the core National DNA Database itself, but of its automatic data sharing links with the Police National Computer and with other systems through which genetic profile data is linked.

How many victims and innocent travellers will be tagged as "possible terrorist co-conspirators" as a result ?

It is estimated that there are roughly 186,900 records from different individuals on the Database that would have been removed under the legislation prior to the CJPA . To date, the Database has been able to link some 7,591 (5%) of these individuals to approximately 10,754 offences. These include 88 murders, 45 attempted murders, 116 rapes, 62 other sexual offences, 91 aggravated burglaries, 94 the supply of controlled drugs and a number of serious assaults. It is not known how many of these might otherwise have gone undetected

The report (and the Parliamentary Answers which repeat these statistics) is very carefully worded not to make the direct claim that all of these figures refer to crimes which would not otherwise have been solved by other means, but that is the impression that it seeks to portray.

However, viewed in percentage terms, over the period of operation of the NDNAD, these are a statistically insignificant number of crimes relating to "innocent " DNA profiles., given the hundreds of murders, and tens of thousands of rapes, out of the tens of millions of crimes over that period.

This is hardly surprising since the report also says:

Although having a very significant impact where it is used, The National DNA Database only features in about 0.8% of all criminal investigations. There are a relatively small number of crime scenes from which DNA samples can be recovered, and even where it could be recovered it may not be relevant (e.g. DNA is of very little value where the identity of the suspect is not in doubt and the issue is otherwise, such as alleged consensual intercourse or rape).

"Am I my brother's keeper ?"

Yer another other controversial topic is that of

Familial searches

A one-off speculative search approach is also used for conducting familial searches of the Database to identify offenders through possible close relatives of an offender whose profile is not on the Database.

The Office of the Information Commissioner has no way in which to ban such searches, given the loopholes in the Data Protection Act and the Human Rights Act for "the prevention or detection of crime"

However, they commented that such use of the data is intrusive and has the potential to raise embarrassing and awkward questions which may relate to sensitive issues unrelated to policing, such as paternity, which had not previously been in doubt.

Since there are no criminal sanctions available against any officious bureaucrat who does instigate a speculative familal DNA search, or any easy way to tell if one has been conducted against your family, then the assurances about Codes of Best Practice are simply not good enough., and must be strengthened.

Remember, that with Familial DNA database trawling, not everybody in the whole country needs to be on the NDNAD, only one person per family, for the whole population to be treated as criminal suspects.

UPDATE: Adam Holloway, the Conservative MP for Gravesham in Kent, secured (by lottery) an Adjournement debate on Thursday 30th March 2006 on the topic of National DNA Database, which meant that Home Office Minister Andy Burnham had the opportunity to quote the same dubious statistics about the alleged justification for retaining innocent people's data on the database. He made no justification for retating innocent people's physical Human Tissue Samples as opposed to the DNA profiles on the database..

Andy Burnham did claim that the Government had no plans for putting the DNA of everyone in the country onto the current system, but neglected to mention the Familail DNA specultaive database trawling which only needs one identifiable person per family on the system to make evetyone into a suspect.

He also repeated the claim that

There is no material disadvantage or cost to the individual simply from being on the national DNA database—it is not a criminal record. A cost arises only if a further crime is committed.

This neglects the whole issue of secret re-sampling of DNA tissue samples for scientific and possibly commercial research, without the express informned consent of the people from whom theose samples were obtained. Some of this research will be anonymised , but some may well be commercial research with the aim, perhaps of selling improved DNA testing kits or equipment, and possibly for other lucrative biotech product development.

The people whose DNA has been used for such commercial product development should be entitled to be informed thatthis is happening, and to a share of the profits.

We we really like to believe what Andy Burnham was claiming about "no ulterior motive" and "openness" and "public debate", but after the way in which he has twisted spurious statistics, , manipulated the press and the media, personally attacked the integrity of independent academics and others who are far better informed on technical issues than himself, etc. over the Identity Cards national database scheme, we simply do not trust him or his Labour colleagues.

3 Comments

Junior Home Office Minister Andy Burnham is replying to the Adjournement debate initiated by Adam Holloway, the Conservative MP for Gravesham in Kent, about the National DNA Database.

Burnham has re-iterated his promise that the Government is not planning to put everyone on the NDNAD - but then they do not have to, they only need one record per identifiable family.

We may have missed it, but there did not seem to be any debate about the diffrenece between DNA human tissue sample retention and the lack of informed consent for future re-anlaysis, perhaps using different techniques, and perhaps for commercial purposes (e.g. producing "better" DNA testing kits or equipment) and the processed SGN Plus DNA profiles which are just a string of numbers on the database.

We were not convinced by the repetiton of the "statistics" of how useful the retention of uncharged and unconvcted people's DNA profiles, including those of Children was.

We simply do noty trust Andy Burnham and his fellow Home Office Ministers, given their weaselly record on lying about other policies and legislation e.g." Identiy Fraud" and ID Cards

We will provide a link to the transcript of this when it is published later.

@ Jake - thanks for this link

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/west_midlands/4837206.stm

Having to go to the High Court for a Judicial Review in order to get your DNA taken off the database when you are clearly innocent is a huge barrier to natural justice.

What if you get stucjk with the legal bills for High Court barristers who can easily charge £1000 an hour ?

I'm on the police DNA database, as I was under investigation. I was given little choice in the matter, as I was told that it would be the only way to prove that I was not involved in the allegation made.
There's no way I can fund a legal case, so despite being found completely innocent of the allegations, and never arrested - they now have my information.

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This United Kingdom based blog attempts to draw public attention to, and comments on, some of the current trends in ever cheaper and more widespread surveillance technology being deployed to satisfy the rapacious demand by state and corporate bureaucracies and criminals for your private details, and the technological ignorance of our politicians and civil servants who frame our legal systems.

The hope is that you the readers, will help to insist that strong safeguards for the privacy of the individual are implemented, especially in these times of increased alert over possible terrorist or criminal activity. If the systems which should help to protect us can be easily abused to supress our freedoms, then the terrorists will have won.

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BlogSafer - wiki with multilingual guides to anonymous blogging

Digital Security & Privacy for Human Rights Defenders manual, by Irish NGO Frontline Defenders.

Everyone’s Guide to By-Passing Internet Censorship for Citizens Worldwide (.pdf - 31 pages), by the Citizenlab at the University of Toronto.

Handbook for Bloggers and Cyber-Dissidents - March 2008 version - (2.2 Mb - 80 pages .pdf) by Reporters Without Borders

Reporters Guide to Covering the Beijing Olympics by Human Rights Watch.

A Practical Security Handbook for Activists and Campaigns (v 2.6) (.doc - 62 pages), by experienced UK direct action political activists

Anonymous Blogging with Wordpress & Tor - useful step by step guide with software configuration screenshots by Ethan Zuckerman at Global Voices Advocacy. (updated March 10th 2009 with the latest Tor / Vidalia bundle details)

House of Lords Constitution Committee - Surveillance: Citizens and the State

House of Lords Constitution Committee 2008-2009 session - Second Report: Surveillance: Citizens and the State

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Cryptome - censored or leaked government documents etc.

Identity Project report by the London School of Economics
Surveillance & Society the fully peer-reviewed transdisciplinary online surveillance studies journal

Statewatch - monitoring the state and civil liberties in the European Union

The Policy Laundering Project - attempts by Governments to pretend their repressive surveillance systems, have to be introduced to comply with international agreements, which they themselves have pushed for in the first place

International Campaign Against Mass Surveillance

ARCH Action Rights for Children in Education - worried about the planned Children's Bill Database, Connexions Card, fingerprinting of children, CCTV spy cameras in schools etc.

Foundation for Information Policy Research
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Technical Advisory Board on internet and telecomms interception under RIPA

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Digital Rights Ireland - legal case against mandatory EU Comms Data Retention etc.

Blindside - "What’s going to go wrong in our e-enabled world? " blog and wiki and Quarterly Report will supposedly be read by the Cabinet Office Central Sponsor for Information Assurance. Whether the rest of the Government bureaucracy and the Politicians actually listen to the CSIA, is another matter.

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Committee to Protect Bloggers - "devoted to the protection of bloggers worldwide with a focus on highlighting the plight of bloggers threatened and imprisoned by their government."

Reporters without Borders internet section - news of internet related censorship and repression of journalists, bloggers and dissidents etc.

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Parliamentary Opposition

Home Office Watch blog, "a single repository of all the shambolic errors and mistakes made by the British Home Office compiled from Parliamentary Questions, news reports, and tip-offs by the Liberal Democrat Home Affairs team."

UK Government

Home Office - "Not fit for purpose. It is inadequate in terms of its scope, it is inadequate in terms of its information technology, leadership, management systems and processes" - Home Secretary John Reid. 23rd May 2006. Not quite the fount of all evil legislation in the UK, but close.

No. 10 Downing Street Prime Minister's Official Spindoctors

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UK Statute Law Database - is the official revised edition of the primary legislation of the United Kingdom made available online, but it is not yet up to date.

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They Work For You - House of Commons Hansard made more accessible ? UK Members of the European Parliament

Read The Bills Act - USA proposal to force politicians to actually read the legislation that they are voting for, something which is badly needed in the UK Parliament.

Bichard Inquiry delving into criminal records and "soft intelligence" policies highlighted by the Soham murders. (taken offline by the Home Office)

ACPO - Association of Chief Police Officers - England, Wales and Northern Ireland
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Online Media

Boing Boing

Need To Know [now defunct]

The Register

NewsNow Encryption and Security aggregate news feed
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Ideal Government - debate about UK eGovernment

NIR and ID cards

Stand - email and fax campaign on ID Cards etc. [Now defunct]. The people who supported stand.org.uk have gone on to set up other online tools like WriteToThem.com. The Government's contemptuous dismissal of over 5,000 individual responses via the stand.org website to the Home Office public consultation on Entitlement Cards is one of the factors which later led directly to the formation of the the NO2ID Campaign who have been marshalling cross party opposition to Labour's dreadful National Identity Register compulsory centralised national biometric database and ID Card plans, at the expense of simpler, cheaper, less repressive, more effective, nore secure and more privacy friendly alternative identity schemes.

NO2ID - opposition to the Home Office's Compulsory Biometric ID Card
NO2ID bulletin board discussion forum

Home Office Identity Cards website
No compulsory national Identity Cards (ID Cards) BBC iCan campaign site
UK ID Cards blog
NO2ID press clippings blog
CASNIC - Campaign to STOP the National Identity Card.
Defy-ID active meetings and protests in Glasgow
www.idcards-uk.info - New Alliance's ID Cards page
irefuse.org - total rejection of any UK ID Card

International Civil Aviation Organisation - Machine Readable Travel Documents standards for Biometric Passports etc.
Anti National ID Japan - controversial and insecure Jukinet National ID registry in Japan
UK Biometrics Working Group run by CESG/GCHQ experts etc. the UK Government on Biometrics issues feasability
Citizen Information Project feasability study population register plans by the Treasury and Office of National Statistics

CommentOnThis.com - comments and links to each paragraph of the Home Office's "Strategic Action Plan for the National Identity Scheme".

De-Materialised ID - "The voluntary alternative to material ID cards, A Proposal by David Moss of Business Consultancy Services Ltd (BCSL)" - well researched analysis of the current Home Office scheme, and a potentially viable alternative.

Surveillance Infrastructures

National Roads Telecommunications Services project - infrastruture for various mass surveillance systems, CCTV, ANPR, PMMR imaging etc.

CameraWatch - independent UK CCTV industry lobby group - like us, they also want more regulation of CCTV surveillance systems.

Every Step You Take a documentary about CCTV surveillance in the Uk by Austrian film maker Nino Leitner.

Transport for London an attempt at a technological panopticon - London Congestion Charge, London Low-Emission Zone, Automatic Number Plate Recognition cameras, tens of thousands of CCTV cameras on buses, thousands of CCTV cameras on London Underground, realtime road traffic CCTV, Iyster smart cards - all handed over to the Metropolitan Police for "national security" purposes, in real time, in bulk, without any public accountibility, for secret data mining, exempt from even the usual weak protections of the Data Protection Act 1998.

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RFID tag privacy concerns - our own original article updated with photos

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Position Statement on the Use of RFID on Consumer Products has been endorsed by a large number of privacy and human rights organisations.
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Surpriv: RFID Surveillance and Privacy
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RFIDBuzz.com blog - where we sometimes crosspost RFID articles

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DNA Profiles - analysis by Paul Nutteing
GeneWatch UK monitors genetic privacy and other issues
Postnote February 2006 Number 258 - National DNA Database (.pdf) - Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology

The National DNA Database Annual Report 2004/5 (.pdf) - published by the NDNAD Board and ACPO.

Eeclaim Your DNA from Britain's National DNA Database - model letters and advice on how to have your DNA samples and profiles removed from the National DNA Database,in spite of all of the nureacratic obstacles which try to prevent this, even if you are innocent.

Miscellanous Links

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freetotravel.org - John Gilmore versus USA internal flight passports and passenger profiling etc.

The BUPA Seven - whistleblowers badly let down by the system.

Tax Credit Overpayment - the near suicidal despair inflicted on poor, vulnerable people by the then Chancellor Gordon Brown's disasterous Inland Revenue IT system.

Fassit UK - resources and help for those abused by the Social Services Childrens Care bureaucracy

Former Spies

MI6 v Tomlinson - Richard Tomlinson - still being harassed by his former employer MI6

Martin Ingram, Welcome To The Dark Side - former British Army Intelligence operative in Northern Ireland.

Operation Billiards - Mitrokhin or Oshchenko ? Michael John Smith - seeking to overturn his Official Secrets Act conviction in the GEC case.

The Dirty Secrets of MI5 & MI6 - Tony Holland, Michael John Smith and John Symond - stories and chronologies.

Naked Spygirl - Olivia Frank

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e-nsecure.net blog - Comments on IT security and Privacy or the lack thereof.
Rat's Blog -The Reverend Rat writes about London street life and technology
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David Mery - falsely arrested on the London Tube - you could be next.

James Hammerton
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Chris Lightfoot
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Liberty Central

dropsafe - Alec Muffett
The Identity Corner - Stefan Brands
Kim Cameron - Microsoft's Identity Architect
Schneier on Security - Bruce Schneier
Politics of Privacy Blog - Andreas Busch
solarider blog

Richard Allan - former Liberal Democrat MP for Sheffield Hallam
Boris Johnson Conservative MP for Henley
Craig Murray - former UK Ambassador to Uzbekistan, "outsourced torture" whistleblower

Howard Rheingold - SmartMobs
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Roland Piquepaille's Technology Trends

Vmyths - debunking computer security hype

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The Practical Nomad Blog Edward Hasbrouck on Privacy and Travel
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Martin Stabe
Longrider
B2fxxx - Ray Corrigan
Matt Sellers
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Ilkley Against CCTV
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W. David Stephenson blogs on homeland security et al.
EUrophobia - Nosemonkey

Blogzilla - Ian Brown

BlairWatch - Chronicling the demise of the New Labour Project

dreamfish - Robert Longstaff

Informaticopia - Rod Ward

War-on-Freedom

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The Red Tape Chronicles - Bob Sullivan MSNBC

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panGloss - Innovation, Technology and the Law

Arch Rights - Action on Rights for Children blog

Database Masterclass - frequently asked questions and answers about the several centralised national databases of children in the UK.

Shaphan

Moving On

Steve Moxon blog - former Home Office whistleblower and author.

Al-Muhajabah's Sundries - anglophile blog

Architectures of Control in Design - Dan Lockton

rabenhorst - Kai Billen (mostly in German)

Nearly Perfect Privacy - Tiffany and Morpheus

Iain Dale's Diary - a popular Conservative political blog

Brit Watch - Public Surveillance in the UK - Web - Email - Databases - CCTV - Telephony - RFID - Banking - DNA

BLOGDIAL

MySecured.com - smart mobile phone forensics, information security, computer security and digital forensics by a couple of Australian researchers

Ralph Bendrath

Financial Cryptography - Ian Grigg et al.

UK Liberty - A blog on issues relating to liberty in the UK

Big Brother State - "a small act of resistance" to the "sustained and systematic attack on our personal freedom, privacy and legal system"

HosReport - "Crisis. Conspiraciones. Enigmas. Conflictos. Espionaje." - Carlos Eduardo Hos (in Spanish)

"Give 'em hell Pike!" - Frank Fisher

Corruption-free Anguilla - Good Governance and Corruption in Public Office Issues in the British Overseas Territory of Anguilla in the West Indies - Don Mitchell CBE QC

geeklawyer - intellectual property, civil liberties and the legal system

PJC Journal - I am not a number, I am a free Man - The Prisoner

Charlie's Diary - Charlie Stross

The Caucus House - blog of the Chicago International Model United Nations

Famous for 15 Megapixels

Postman Patel

The 4th Bomb: Tavistock Sq Daniel's 7:7 Revelations - Daniel Obachike

OurKingdom - part of OpenDemocracy - " will discuss Britain’s nations, institutions, constitution, administration, liberties, justice, peoples and media and their principles, identity and character"

Beau Bo D'Or blog by an increasingly famous digital political cartoonist.

Between Both Worlds - "Thoughts & Ideas that Reflect the Concerns of Our Conscious Evolution" - Kingsley Dennis

Bloggerheads: The Alisher Usmanov Affair - the rich Uzbek businessman and his shyster lawyers Schillings really made a huge counterproductive error in trying to censor the blogs of Tim Ireland, of all people.

Matt Wardman political blog analysis

Henry Porter on Liberty - a leading mainstream media commentator and opinion former who is doing more than most to help preserve our freedom and liberty.

HMRC is shite - "dedicated to the taxpayers of Britain, and the employees of the HMRC, who have to endure the monumental shambles that is Her Majesty's Revenue and Customs (HMRC)."

Head of Legal - Carl Gardner a former legal advisor to the Government

The Landed Underclass - Voice of the Banana Republic of Great Britain

Henrik Alexandersson - Swedish blogger threatened with censorship by the Försvarets Radioanstalt (FRA), the Swedish National Defence Radio Establishement, their equivalent of the UK GCHQ or the US NSA.

World's First Fascist Democracy - blog with link to a Google map - "This map is an attempt to take a UK wide, geographical view, of both the public and the personal effect of State sponsored fear and distrust as seen through the twisted technological lens of petty officials and would be bureaucrats nationwide."

Blogoir - Charles Crawford - former UK Ambassodor to Poland etc.

No CCTV - The Campaign against CCTV

Barcode Nation - keeping two eyes on the database state.

Lords of the Blog - group blog by half a dozen or so Peers sitting in the House of Lords.

notes from the ubiquitous surveillance society - blog by Dr. David Murakami Wood, editor of the online academic journal Surveillance and Society

Justin Wylie's political blog

Panopticon blog - by Timothy Pitt-Payne and Anya Proops. Timothy Pitt-Payne is probably the leading legal expert on the UK's Freedom of Information Act law, often appearing on behlaf of the Information Commissioner's Office at the Information Tribunal.

Armed and Dangerous - Sex, software, politics, and firearms. Life’s simple pleasures… - by Open Source Software advocate Eric S. Raymond.

Georgetown Security Law Brief - group blog by the Georgetown Law Center on National Security and the Law , at Georgtown University, Washington D.C, USA.

Big Brother Watch - well connected with the mainstream media, this is a campaign blog by the TaxPayersAlliance, which thankfully does not seem to have spawned Yet Another Campaign Organisation as many Civil Liberties groups had feared.

Spy on Moseley - "Sparkbrook, Springfield, Washwood Heath and Bordesley Green. An MI5 Intelligence-gathering operation to spy on Muslim communities in Birmingham is taking liberties in every sense" - about 150 ANPR CCTV cameras funded by Home Office via the secretive Terrorism and Allied Matters (TAM) section of ACPO.

FitWatch blog - keeps an eye on the activities of some of the controversial Police Forward Intelligence Teams, who supposedly only target "known troublemakers" for photo and video surveillance, at otherwise legal, peaceful protests and demonstrations.

Other Links

Spam Huntress - The Norwegian Spam Huntress - Ann Elisabeth

Fuel Crisis Blog - Petrol over £1 per litre ! Protest !
Mayor of London Blog
London Olympics 2012 - NO !!!!

Cool Britannia

NuLabour

Free Gary McKinnon - UK citizen facing extradition to the USA for "hacking" over 90 US Military computer systems.

Parliament Protest - information and discussion on peaceful resistance to the arbitrary curtailment of freedom of assembly and freedom of speech, in the excessive Serious Organised Crime and Police Act 2005 Designated Area around Parliament Square in London.

Brian Burnell's British / US nuclear weapons history at http://nuclear-weapons.info

RIPA Consultations

RIPA Part III consultation blog - Government access to Encrypted Information and Encryption Keys.

RIPA Part I Chapter II consultation blog - Government access and disclosure of Communications Traffic Data

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UK Legislation

The United Kingdom suffers from tens of thousands of pages of complicated criminal laws, and thousands of new, often unenforceable criminal offences, which have been created as a "Pretend to be Seen to Be Doing Something" response to tabloid media hype and hysteria, and political social engineering dogmas. These overbroad, catch-all laws, which remove the scope for any judicial appeals process, have been rubber stamped, often without being read, let alone properly understood, by Members of Parliament.

The text of many of these Acts of Parliament are now online, but it is still too difficult for most people, including the police and criminal justice system, to work out the cumulative effect of all the amendments, even for the most serious offences involving national security or terrorism or serious crime.

Many MPs do not seem to bother to even to actually read the details of the legislation which they vote to inflict on us.

UK Legislation Links

UK Statute Law Database - is the official revised edition of the primary legislation of the United Kingdom made available online, but it is not yet up to date.

UK Commissioners

UK Commissioners some of whom are meant to protect your privacy and investigate abuses by the bureaucrats.

UK Intelligence Agencies

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Intelligence.gov.uk - Cabinet Office hosted portal website to various UK Intelligence Agencies and UK Government intelligence committees and Commissioners etc.

Anti-terrorism hotline - links removed in protestClimate of Fear propaganda posters

MI5 Security Service
MI5 Security Service - links to encrypted reporting form removed in protest at the Climate of Fear propaganda posters

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Secure Your Fertiliser - advice on ammonium nitrate and urea fertiliser security

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Centre for the Protection of National Infrastructure - "CPNI provides expert advice to the critical national infrastructure on physical, personnel and information security, to protect against terrorism and other threats."

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Secret Intelligence Service (MI6) recruitment.

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Government Communications Headquarters GCHQ

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Serious Organised Crime Agency - have cut themselves off from direct contact with the public and businesses - no phone - no email

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Defence Advisory (DA) Notice system - voluntary self censorship by the established UK press and broadcast media regarding defence and intelligence topics via the Defence, Press and Broadcasting Advisory Committee.

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National Extremism Tactical Coordination Unit - keeps a watch on animal extremists, genetically modified crop protesters, peace protesters etc.
(some people think that the word salad of acronyms means that NETCU is a spoof website)

Campaign Button Links

Watching Them, Watching Us - UK Public CCTV Surveillance Regulation Campaign
UK Public CCTV Surveillance Regulation Campaign

NO2ID Campaign - cross party opposition to the NuLabour Compulsory Biometric ID Card
NO2ID Campaign - cross party opposition to the NuLabour Compulsory Biometric ID Card and National Identity Register centralised database.

Gary McKinnon is facing extradition to the USA under the controversial Extradition Act 2003, without any prima facie evidence or charges brought against him in a UK court. Try him here in the UK, under UK law.
Gary McKinnon is facing extradition to the USA under the controversial Extradition Act 2003, without any prima facie evidence or charges brought against him in a UK court. Try him here in the UK, under UK law.

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FreeFarid.com - Kafkaesque extradition of Farid Hilali under the European Arrest Warrant to Spain

Peaceful resistance to the curtailment of our rights to Free Assembly and Free Speech in the SOCPA Designated Area around Parliament Square and beyond
Parliament Protest blog - resistance to the Designated Area restricting peaceful demonstrations or lobbying in the vicinity of Parliament.

Petition to the European Commission and European Parliament against their vague Data Retention plans
Data Retention is No Solution - Petition to the European Commission and European Parliament against their vague Data Retention plans.

Save Parliament: Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill (and other issues)
Save Parliament - Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill (and other issues)

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Open Rights Group

The Big Opt Out Campaign - opt out of having your NHS Care Record medical records and personal details stored insecurely on a massive national centralised database.

Tor - the onion routing network
Tor - the onion routing network - "Tor aims to defend against traffic analysis, a form of network surveillance that threatens personal anonymity and privacy, confidential business activities and relationships, and state security. Communications are bounced around a distributed network of servers called onion routers, protecting you from websites that build profiles of your interests, local eavesdroppers that read your data or learn what sites you visit, and even the onion routers themselves."

Tor - the onion routing network
Anonymous Blogging with Wordpress and Tor - useful Guide published by Global Voices Advocacy with step by step software configuration screenshots (updated March 10th 2009).

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Amnesty International's irrepressible.info campaign

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BlogSafer - wiki with multilingual guides to anonymous blogging

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NGO in a box - Security Edition privacy and security software tools

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Home Office Watch blog, "a single repository of all the shambolic errors and mistakes made by the British Home Office compiled from Parliamentary Questions, news reports, and tip-offs by the Liberal Democrat Home Affairs team."

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Reporters Without Borders - Reporters Sans Frontières - campaign for journalists 'and bloggers' freedom in repressive countries and war zones.

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Committee to Protect Bloggers - "devoted to the protection of bloggers worldwide with a focus on highlighting the plight of bloggers threatened and imprisoned by their government."

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Icelanders are NOT terrorists ! - despite Gordon Brown and Alistair Darling's use of anti-terrorism legislation to seize the assets of Icelandic banks.

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No CCTV - The Campaign Against CCTV

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I'm a Photographer Not a Terrorist !

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Power 2010 cross party, political reform campaign

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Cracking the Black Box - "aims to expose technology that is being used in inappropriate ways. We hope to bring together the insights of experts and whistleblowers to shine a light into the dark recesses of systems that are responsible for causing many of the privacy problems faced by millions of people."

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Open Rights Group - Petition against the renewal of the Interception Modernisation Programme