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>> To me it makes little sense. It isn't supposed to make sense. it's suppose to reinforce the "you do whatever the police ask you or face the consequences." A

• jaclaz 9y ago
  >It isn't supposed to make sense. it's suppose to reinforce the "you do whatever the police ask you or face the consequences." Apparently the law backs them... I meant "make sense" as a deterrent for next occasion AND useful for counter-terrorism. If you are "innocent" and refuse to give away your passwords, you now know that you have serious chances to be punished in a non-trivial way.(losing your electronic device + fine + 12 months conditional) If you are "guilty" (of terrorism or contiguity with it) you now know that you can refuse to give away your password, effectively preventing the police to read your data and maybe in one year time you will get a slap on the wrist (when compared to the punishments for actual being part of a terrorist plot). So, "real" terrorists will surely continue not giving away their passwords to the Police, whilst most innocent people will be giving them - fearing the punishment[1]. The net effect will be that Police will have not access to relevant terrorism related material but it will lose a lot of time on analyzing gigabytes of - say - lolcat videos. [1] a few innocent people will anyway refuse to give away the passwords for this or that principle, so among the "non-answering" will be both innocent and possibly guilty people, so it doesn't even work as a "screening" method.
  • tryingagainbro 9y ago
    >>If you are "guilty" (of terrorism or contiguity with it) you now know that you can refuse to give away your password, effectively preventing the police to read your data and maybe in one year time you will get a slap on the wrist Actually I think is why the law was passed, so the cops can keep harassing the people on a likely terrorist cell hoping they slip. Time and time again. Slap on a wrist? Not if it's one after the other. It's not like London doesn't have the police manpower