A Snooper's Charter? An introduction to the Investigatory Powers Bill
Short personal introduction
Background to the Investigatory Power's Draft Bill
The Investigatory Powers Draft Bill is a new law on surveillance that was presented to parliament in November 2015. Unlike the last Draft Communications Data Bill (which was blocked by the Lib Dems), the IPB covers both the police and security services’ powers.
Replaces the fast tracked “emergency” Data Retention and Investigatory Powers Act of 2014, which is so vague it allows for pretty much anything.
We know due to the Edward Snowden documents that agencies such as GCHQ currently conduct untargeted mass surveillance (e.g. Tempora) and the data is shared between “Five Eyes” intelligence agencies. This is a fact.
It is clear there is currently no judicial oversight or transparency whatsoever, the only reason we know what these agencies are doing is due to the leaked documents. (reference intelligence committee redactions).
A new draft bill has been presented to the commons which is both very long (299 pages) and highly oblique.
What does the bill purpose?
Admits mass surveillance is carried out.
Legally compels Internet Service Providers (e.g. BT, Virgin, Sky) to store records of everything you do on the internet for 12 months.
This means a list of every site you visit. Teresa May has said this will only be a list of the sites you vists e.g. bbc.co.uk, not bbc.co.uk/news/snoopers-charter. This is technically not possible without the facilitating technology that scoops up everything you do.
It clarifies the powers of security agencies to break into our laptops and mobile phones, including powers for mass hacking. The Bill also forces “Telecommunications Operators” to help in hacking their customers. If they don't, they will go to prison for 12 months!
In practice this means that a company such as Apple will be forced to add a “back door” or security hole into their software. that allows the government to hack into and compromise their device without your knowledge. Unfortunately this will also allow anyone else to hack into the software also.
All of this will be done without any warrant, judicial oversight or transparency. We, as the public won't know who they are targeting even after any prosecution. The “double lock” safeguards proposed in the bill are too vague to be effective.
Any persons or target doesn't have to be suspected of any crime or any justification for the surveillance be provided.
This includes Journalists and their sources, Lawyer's and their clients, Doctors and their patients, Charities, MP's, Trade Unions, Large Companies (whether in the UK or not) and YOU.
The potential effects of the Snooper's Charter.
It is simply untrue that this bill is anything less than legal justification for the untargeted mass surveillance that we know is already been carried out.
A general chilling of democracy and free speech, if you know you're being watched, you won't be willing to speak out against injustice. This has been scientifically studied.
No one will be able to fully trust any digital technologies, there's no way of knowing if it's back doored or not.
There will be no oversight on what the security services are doing. From history, we know that these organisations often do not act in the interest of citizens.
It will not help to catch the “bad” guys. It hasn't recently and it won't in the future. Think of the “needle in the haystack” analogy. What actually works is well resourced targeted surveillance and leads that are actually followed up on.
It is not a question of having “nothing to hide”, it is a question of the fundamental human right to privacy. If anyone here thinks they have “nothing to hide” then I would ask if they would kindly volunteer up all their email account and social media passwords and allow all of us in this room to read though all of their messages.
What can we do?
Write to our MP
Attempt to convince Labour MPs and Lords why they should be against the harmful aspects of of the bill.
Join the Open Rights Group. At the very least, sign up to their mailing list to receive updates on the bill's progress (openrightsgroup.org)
Learn to use technologies that make untargeted mass surveillance too expensive to carry out on a large scale. An example of this is using Tor Browser (torproject.org) and end to end encrypted messaging Signal (openwhispersystems).
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