4 ms·

All of this just to infiltrate environmental protesters, and this is just the UK. I can't even imagine what the US government does with more serious threats.

rvense 11y ago
There's no reason to assume the US are worse than the UK.
- Synaesthesia 11y ago
  Activist groups were heavily infiltrated throughout the 60's and 70's by US police, there's every reason to believe they still are.
  - rvense 11y ago
    That much is obvious, I'm just saying that there's no absolutely no reason to believe that the Brits are or ever were any better. The comment I replied to seemed to suggest that if the Brits are doing this, then just imagine what the Americans are doing, because it must be worse. The Germans, too, have used similar tactics recently against environmental groups.
jacobush 11y ago
Just the UK?
ghubbard 11y ago
The FBI does the same sort of thing: https://theintercept.com/2015/11/19/an-fbi-informant-seduced-eric-mcdavid-into-a-bomb-plot-then-the-government-lied-about-it/ https://theintercept.com/2015/11/19/an-fbi-informant-seduced...
- jacquesm 11y ago
  You'd think there were enough real problems to have time, budget and man (ok, woman) power left over to create problems where those don't exist.
  - mdpopescu 11y ago
    Real problems are difficult to solve. Made-up problems are much easier.
DanBC 11y ago
A small number of environmental and animal rights groups are labeled "terrorist" by the US gov, so infiltration and human rights abuses are probably happening. UK Special Branch have said (in the 1980s) that they want an informant on every street. Duncan Campbell (who released information about eg ECHELON 30 years ago) has a great book about pervasive UK surveillance.
- lotharbot 11y ago
  A small number of environmental and animal rights groups have stated goals or methods that might be considered "terrorist" -- a willingness to destroy property and harm peoples' livelihoods, to intimidate people into changing their behavior, or even to directly harm those involved in actions they view as detrimental to the environment/animals. It does not surprise me that law enforcement would want to keep tabs on the more extreme elements of the environmental movement, any more than that they'd want to keep tabs on the more extreme elements of any other political or religious movement. (Unfortunately, it can be hard to filter the truly extreme from the loudmouthed-but-harmless, and there has probably been a lot of wasted effort over the years in infiltrating groups and surveilling individuals who weren't at all dangerous.)
- junto 11y ago
  The environmental and animal rights groups in the UK became a major target of the Security Services and Special Branch after the Good Friday Agreement. Essentially you had lots of surveillance teams and analysts who had nothing more to do, because the Irish terrorist threat had pretty much evaporated over night. They kept watching the Russians and some internal SOCA type targets (organised crime), but mostly there were lots of people twiddling their thumbs. Alongside this, the animal rights campaigners had done things that were vaguely "terroristic" in nature. Since the target of the animal rights campaigners were often the elite who hunted foxes, the hunt group lobbied to make sure these groups got Special Branch's attention. Special Branch like paid overtime, hence they got someone new to focus on. The hunt campaigners won however and hunting with hounds got banned. Though it must be pointed out that a large number of the public in general favoured the ban by 2004: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunting_Act_2004#Public_opinion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunting_Act_2004#Public_opinio... Now nearly everyone is working on the Islamic desks. Some Russian stuff still and maybe 1% on the Irish to keep an eye on them, but the large Irish informant network will have been left to rot. As a side note, the Security Services have traditionally had difficulties building informant networks inside the Islamic targets (inside the UK). The Irish responded well to payment in cash and drugs and "look the other way whilst we continue our Mafia-like activities", since for the most part, they were a well armed and well funded crime syndicate with a religious hard-core. Islamic fundamentalists haven't responded so well to offers of cash for information. Also in terms of putting officers inside these groups, the UK has a very small minority of officers that could actually blend in undercover, although the trend is increasing. Total minority ethnic police officers made up 5.5% of all officers on 31 March 2015. There were 6,715 Minority Ethnic police officers in the 43 police forces on 31 March 2014. This represents 5.2 per cent of the police officer total. Only a handful of officers become Special Branch officers and they are hand picked (I believe unofficially). The chances of a having a Muslim minority Special Branch officer, prepared to spy of other Muslims is therefore rather slight. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/police-workforce-england-and-wales-31-march-2015/police-workforce-england-and-wales-31-march-2015 https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/police-workforce-...
nefitty 11y ago
I doubt that the threats even need to be that serious. There is an anarchist organization called Crimethinc that smells a lot like a disinformation campaign to derail young liberal-leaning people. They propose unemployment, crime, hitchhiking, etrc as viable alternatives to the mainstream lifestyle. The thing they don't mention is that the deeper a person gets into that lifestyle the farther away the person gets from the opportunity to have a greater social influence. It just seems conspicuously ironic that some on the far left are self-selecting themselves out of active engagement in society. I may be reaching, but it seems that any government propaganda agency run by sufficiently intelligent and well funded people would inevitably stumble upon the idea of creating an entire disinformation campaign dressed as radical criticism.
padraic7a 11y ago
Well it's on the record that they also get into sexual relationships with people and then convince them to blow things up. And that's for relatively minor terrorism' that they sponsor. See ref role of "Anna" here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_McDavid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_McDavid

rvense 11y ago

There's no reason to assume the US are worse than the UK.

Synaesthesia 11y ago
Activist groups were heavily infiltrated throughout the 60's and 70's by US police, there's every reason to believe they still are.
- rvense 11y ago
  That much is obvious, I'm just saying that there's no absolutely no reason to believe that the Brits are or ever were any better. The comment I replied to seemed to suggest that if the Brits are doing this, then just imagine what the Americans are doing, because it must be worse. The Germans, too, have used similar tactics recently against environmental groups.

jacobush 11y ago

Just the UK?

ghubbard 11y ago

The FBI does the same sort of thing: https://theintercept.com/2015/11/19/an-fbi-informant-seduced-eric-mcdavid-into-a-bomb-plot-then-the-government-lied-about-it/ https://theintercept.com/2015/11/19/an-fbi-informant-seduced...

jacquesm 11y ago
You'd think there were enough real problems to have time, budget and man (ok, woman) power left over to create problems where those don't exist.
- mdpopescu 11y ago
  Real problems are difficult to solve. Made-up problems are much easier.

DanBC 11y ago

A small number of environmental and animal rights groups are labeled "terrorist" by the US gov, so infiltration and human rights abuses are probably happening. UK Special Branch have said (in the 1980s) that they want an informant on every street. Duncan Campbell (who released information about eg ECHELON 30 years ago) has a great book about pervasive UK surveillance.

lotharbot 11y ago
A small number of environmental and animal rights groups have stated goals or methods that might be considered "terrorist" -- a willingness to destroy property and harm peoples' livelihoods, to intimidate people into changing their behavior, or even to directly harm those involved in actions they view as detrimental to the environment/animals. It does not surprise me that law enforcement would want to keep tabs on the more extreme elements of the environmental movement, any more than that they'd want to keep tabs on the more extreme elements of any other political or religious movement. (Unfortunately, it can be hard to filter the truly extreme from the loudmouthed-but-harmless, and there has probably been a lot of wasted effort over the years in infiltrating groups and surveilling individuals who weren't at all dangerous.)
junto 11y ago
The environmental and animal rights groups in the UK became a major target of the Security Services and Special Branch after the Good Friday Agreement. Essentially you had lots of surveillance teams and analysts who had nothing more to do, because the Irish terrorist threat had pretty much evaporated over night. They kept watching the Russians and some internal SOCA type targets (organised crime), but mostly there were lots of people twiddling their thumbs. Alongside this, the animal rights campaigners had done things that were vaguely "terroristic" in nature. Since the target of the animal rights campaigners were often the elite who hunted foxes, the hunt group lobbied to make sure these groups got Special Branch's attention. Special Branch like paid overtime, hence they got someone new to focus on. The hunt campaigners won however and hunting with hounds got banned. Though it must be pointed out that a large number of the public in general favoured the ban by 2004: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunting_Act_2004#Public_opinion https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hunting_Act_2004#Public_opinio... Now nearly everyone is working on the Islamic desks. Some Russian stuff still and maybe 1% on the Irish to keep an eye on them, but the large Irish informant network will have been left to rot. As a side note, the Security Services have traditionally had difficulties building informant networks inside the Islamic targets (inside the UK). The Irish responded well to payment in cash and drugs and "look the other way whilst we continue our Mafia-like activities", since for the most part, they were a well armed and well funded crime syndicate with a religious hard-core. Islamic fundamentalists haven't responded so well to offers of cash for information. Also in terms of putting officers inside these groups, the UK has a very small minority of officers that could actually blend in undercover, although the trend is increasing. Total minority ethnic police officers made up 5.5% of all officers on 31 March 2015. There were 6,715 Minority Ethnic police officers in the 43 police forces on 31 March 2014. This represents 5.2 per cent of the police officer total. Only a handful of officers become Special Branch officers and they are hand picked (I believe unofficially). The chances of a having a Muslim minority Special Branch officer, prepared to spy of other Muslims is therefore rather slight. https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/police-workforce-england-and-wales-31-march-2015/police-workforce-england-and-wales-31-march-2015 https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/police-workforce-...

nefitty 11y ago

I doubt that the threats even need to be that serious. There is an anarchist organization called Crimethinc that smells a lot like a disinformation campaign to derail young liberal-leaning people. They propose unemployment, crime, hitchhiking, etrc as viable alternatives to the mainstream lifestyle. The thing they don't mention is that the deeper a person gets into that lifestyle the farther away the person gets from the opportunity to have a greater social influence. It just seems conspicuously ironic that some on the far left are self-selecting themselves out of active engagement in society. I may be reaching, but it seems that any government propaganda agency run by sufficiently intelligent and well funded people would inevitably stumble upon the idea of creating an entire disinformation campaign dressed as radical criticism.

padraic7a 11y ago

Well it's on the record that they also get into sexual relationships with people and then convince them to blow things up. And that's for relatively minor terrorism' that they sponsor. See ref role of "Anna" here https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_McDavid https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eric_McDavid