8 ms·
Companies to face criminal offence if they tip off U.K. users about snooping
- dang 11y agoUrl changed from http://www.techspot.com/news/63292-tech-companies-face-criminal-charges-if-they-notify.html http://www.techspot.com/news/63292-tech-companies-face-crimi...? to what appears to be a more substantive article.
- gremlinsinc 11y agoThis is absolutely retarded.. If I were apple, google, and facebook, and twitter - companies that ARE nations unto themselves in terms of user reach, I would start some sort of embargo, countries that enforce these kind of rules, simply ban all traffic from the country. Imagine the social upheaval and political capital the UK would lose if facebook, google, twitter, apple, bing, etc...all were no longer accessible. No more funny cat videos on youtube or facebook? Brits would go crazy, and get angry, and the politicians who made the rules, would get outted pretty darn fast and never be elected again.
- sago 11y agoYou'd like it if companies used their economic muscle to effect national security laws? I agree in this case, the law isn't a good one, the snoopers charter generally is a problem. But I don't want companies throwing their weight around more than they already do (and they do, but in a largely predictable capitalistic, profit maximising way). The road to companies becoming de-facto governments is paved with good intentions. Initially you invite the Roman Empire in to help secure your borders against regional powers, then before you know it you're a vassal state, then a prefecture, then Jerusalem is burning, and your country is gone for 1900 years. Or, to put it another way, you arm the Mujahadeen to help you fight the Russians, and then...
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- chatmasta 11y agoMultiple replacements for each company would appear within 24 hours. One would spread virally and gain an initial base of users, then press, and within a few months it would be in a dominant market position filling the void left by the American company it replaced. This is exactly what happened in China when Google left - Baidu exploded in popularity and now dominates the market so completely that it would be nearly impossible for Google to unseat it. The Chinese government does this on purpose to facilitate the growth of its own domestic companies. The Great Firewall serves as much of an economic purpose as a political one. By degrading service quality of foreign companies, it opens space in the market for domestic companies to establish themselves and gain market share. It would be impossible for any one of those companies to bootstrap its initial userbase if a giant American corporation already cornered its market.
- jacquesm 11y agoI don't think you'll be replacing Apple or Google overnight, Twitter and Facebook only work because of the network effects, a 'facebook or twitter for the UK' would fly just about as good as a lead balloon.
- 1971genocide 11y agoFound the brit !
- herbig 11y agoYou lost me at "retarded." Learn the laws of social decency and then come back and have a discussion.
- nly 11y agoThe problem with this idea is that media here in the UK (the red tops, Daily Mail, tv news etc.) would just turn on you, berate you, and then, eventually, ignore you. The headlines would start something along the lines of: "Arrogant American tax-dodgers refuse to abide by the law... and take it out on you!", or, "Facebook choosing terrorists over us!" Promptly follow that up with reports about the number of UK jobs at risk. All the focus would end up being on the social and economic consequences rather than the cause, and eventually the sheep would turn on you as well... or, worse, just learn to live without you while still being apathetic to the Governments assault on their liberty.
- Lawtonfogle 11y ago>being apathetic to the Governments assault on their liberty I wonder at what point do we just decide they don't deserve those liberties and work to try to ensure we are part of the haves and not the have nots. It is a shame for the children who won't get a choice, but for the adults who choose this, at what point do we stop them from getting what they want?
- AnthonyMouse 11y ago> I would start some sort of embargo, countries that enforce these kind of rules, simply ban all traffic from the country. I wonder how it would work the opposite way: Start redirecting google.co.uk to uk.google.com, hosted and operated by a non-UK corporate entity outside of UK jurisdiction. Make them block you. China would do it; would Britain?
- amlgsmsn 11y agoIt would never happen, the money from ads is too lucrative for management to do something like that.
- hamiltonkibbe 11y agoThe "unrelated" non-UK company would "license" some technology from google, and pay Google a "license fee" which is coincidentally equal to gross ad revenue less operating expenses. You know, basic undergrad-level tax dodging stuff.
- deleted 11y ago[deleted]
- SmileyJames 11y agoThat would lose Apple, Google and Facebook a lot of money and possibly market share, something they are not willing to do, it would be much easier for them to just add back doors, they pretty much already do anyway.
- SmileyJames 11y agoThat would lose Apple, Google and Facebook a lot of money and possibly market share, something they are not willing to do, it would be much easier for them to just add back doors, they pretty much already do anyway.
- michaelfeathers 11y agoIf this goes through Warrant Canaries will become much more popular.
- asuffield 11y agoI was actually thinking that this proposed law is precisely how you "solve" the warrant canary "problem". No need to order anybody to make false statements - but if you take the canary down, you've broken the law, and you created this problem for yourself.
- teddyh 11y agoI thought the idea of a warrant canary was that it had to be an explicit statement you make, multiple times, so that when you cease making the statements, it would mean something. I.e. a warrant canary would not be something you would actively “take down”, it would be a thing which you stop doing.
- Pitarou 11y agoThe warrant canary idea was bullshit from the start. If not reissuing a warrant canary will let a company's customers know that they are under surveillance, the proposed law will require that company to publish the warrant canary. It's a simple as that. And it is perfectly possible to prosecute someone for "acts of omission". As Wikipedia puts it: > In the criminal law, an omission, or failure to act, will constitute an actus reus (Latin for "guilty act") and give rise to liability only when the law imposes a duty to act and the defendant is in breach of that duty.
- tobbyb 11y agoThere are many who not only remain unconcerned but often seek to diminish or dismiss concern as hyperbole or exaggerated, often by pointing to the current status quo. No one is interested in you the individual, but they are certainly interested in building the capability to track all individuals and preempt anything that threatens any entrenched status quo. We are not currently a police state but we are certainly building the capability and the cultural language to justify it. The moral high ground and the entire framework of values that powered it have shown to be near meaningless by the alarming ease with which they have been discarded in favour of the language of security and paranoia. Everyone is safe in a cage. It will be naive to believe in the context of how modern states operate that a cluster of extreme right wing medievalists in the ME are bringing on this state of affairs, the bulk and most powerful of whom are paradoxically our best friends in the region. Surveillance states are not a on/off thing, you don't suddenly wake one day to a surveillance state. These capabilities take time to build, but once the infrastructure is in place it will inevitably get used. In this case we can see all the pieces being put in place methodically with language that makes George Orwell look astonishingly prescient. And its the self absorption of this generation who have inherited and enjoyed a relatively 'free' and equal state with 'hope for improvement' but are going to willfully pass on something more ominous.
- eternalban 11y agoKeep these 2 points in mind: (1) unlike previous police states, this one is machine mediated and pervasive. There will be no place to hide and it is hard to see how it will be dismantled once in place. (2) our children are growing up in a culture that no longer reflects the traditional values held sacred in the West.
- fao_ 11y agoWhat traditional values would those be? Could you clarify, because your second point depepnds largely on the generation within which you were born.
- littletimmy 11y ago
- PaulAJ 11y agoSo the security services can demand information and order the fact kept secret in perpetuity, with no appeal. How very reassuring.
- pjc50 11y agoThere's some of this present already in the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act from the early 2000s. And the all-pervasive Official Secrets Act. Those of us who are old enough to remember the bizarre half-censorship of Gerry Adams on TV know that free speech has never had an overriding legal status in the UK.
- cmurf 11y agoThe U.K. is a constitutional monarchy. There is no concept of "we the people" bottom up delegation of power to form a government; it's top down, the people are subjects. That members of parliament are elected means the monarch's power is limited, rather than the source of the power of government and its authority coming from the people. So it's a different system than in the U.S., so when talking about traditional values don't assume western democracies are all really pretty much the same thing. There are important differences. And in this case, I expect the vast majority of British will have no problem with this kind of surveillance. However, the company asserting it's not the surveillance branch of the government where it does business, is legitimate. Whether it'll make any difference is a separate question.
- clouddrover 11y agoNo, there are hardly any British subjects any more (if any left at all). They have become citizens. See both Wikipedia and the UK government's website for a history of the changes to laws around British citizenship and nationality. https://www.gov.uk/types-of-british-nationality/overview https://www.gov.uk/types-of-british-nationality/overview https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_subject https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/British_subject
- cmurf 11y agoYes these days legally they are citizens not subjects, but because of history, the connotation of the relationship with the state is one of a subject. Whereas from the outset there was a concept of citizens in the U.S. under the written constitutions (both of them).
- clouddrover 11y agoI'd say that because of history the connotation of the relationship with the state has become the exact opposite and the rule of law has been established. It started to change with Magna Carta: https://www.runnymede.gov.uk/magnacarta https://www.runnymede.gov.uk/magnacarta https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/medieval/magna-carta/ https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/education/medieval/magna... http://www.legislation.gov.uk/aep/Edw1cc1929/25/9/contents http://www.legislation.gov.uk/aep/Edw1cc1929/25/9/contents https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Carta https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Magna_Carta
- marcoperaza 11y agoImagine how useful a wiretap would be if the phone company immediately notified the target. I'm not sure there's anything unreasonable about this amendment. Something similar is probably already the case for telephone and postal surveillance, and this was just a previous oversight in the law. I think there's a case for having a time-limit after which the surveillance must be disclosed, unless a judge thinks there's a very good reason not to for a specific case. I believe that's how this works in the US. Unfortunately, the UK's version of surveillance oversight is typically ministerial oversight, which is not very encouraging.
- CamperBob2 11y agoImagine how useful a wiretap would be if the phone company immediately notified the target. No one would have a problem with this if there were even the vaguest semblance of due process. There isn't.
- s279 11y agoWould a company making an assertion that it wasn't being snooped on before they were actually snooped be guilty of fraud after the fact has changed? Given they can't say they are not being snooped on...