Local councils, health authorities and hundreds of other public bodies are to be given the power to access details of everyone’s personal text, emails and internet use under Home Office proposals published yesterday.Ministers want to make it mandatory for telephone and internet companies to keep details of all personal internet traffic for at least 12 months so it can be accessed for investigations into crime or other threats to public safety.The Home Office last night admitted that the measure will mean companies have to store “a billion incidents of data exchange a day”. As the measure is the result of an EU directive, the data will be made available to public investigators across Europe.To read this story in full in The Guardian, see www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/aug/13/privacy.civilliberties.UK councils get power to ‘spy’ on your e-mail and net use
Councils and health authorities are to be given the right to access e-mail and internet records under surveillance powers to be introduced next year, the Home Office said yesterday.Although first proposed to tackle terrorism and serious crime, powers have been extended to cover other criminal activity, public health, threats to public safety and even prevention of self-harm.The Home Office said that the move would involve internet service providers storing one billion incidents of data each day and storing them for a minimum of 12 months. Under the plans the taxpayer would pay £46 million to internet service providers for holding information, even though some already keep similar records for marketing purposes.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article4518226.eceZero privacy
The British government is taking extraordinary new powers to monitor everyone’s emailing, internet browsing and phone calls
The recent report by the Interception of Communications commissioner, Sir Paul Kennedy notes that 519,260 requisitions of communications data from telephone companies and internet service providers were made in Britain last year. It is very mysterious who is doing the bulk of this spying, since no statistical breakdown is offered. But Sir Paul suggests the procedures may be a bit much for local authorities and things ought to be made easier for them.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/aug/13/privacy.privacyUK government plans to log every call, text and email
The Home office has issued a consultation paper for a new law that would force phone companies, ISPs and network operators to record and store every phone call, web page request and text message.The information would have to be stored for 12 months by service providers and would be searchable by a wide variety of organisations, including local councils, health authorities, and even Ofsted and the Post Office.
http://www.vnunet.com/vnunet/news/2223898/uk-government-plans-log-every-web-email
uk: ‘Snooper’s charter’ to check texts and emails
Local councils, health authorities and hundreds of other public bodies are to be given the power to access details of everyone’s personal text, emails and internet use under Home Office proposals published yesterday.