Giant Database Plan 'Orwellian' BBC News (10/15/08)
as it appeared in the October 17, 2008 edition of ACM TechNews.
Britain has proposed creating a central database of all mobile phone and Internet traffic in an effort to fight terrorism and other crimes. Although critics have called the plan "Orwellian," the U.K.'s Secretary of State for the Home Department Jacqui Smith says the data warehouse is necessary to help police and security services deter crime. Smith says the content of conversations would not be stored, just the times and dates of messages and calls. Liberals say the idea is "incompatible with a free country," while the Tories say the government has to justify its plans first. Details on the times, dates, duration, and location of mobile phone calls, numbers called, Web sites visited, and email addresses used are already stored by telecom companies in the U.K. for 12 months under a voluntary agreement. That data can be accessed by the police and security services on request, but the government is looking to take control of the process in part to comply with a European Union directive. Information would be kept for two years, and would be held centrally on a searchable database. Smith says without increasing the capacity to store data, police and security services will have to consider a significant expansion of surveillance practices. "Our ability to intercept communications and obtain communications data is vital to fighting terrorism and combating serious crime," Smith says. Click Here to View Full Article
