Police seek new powers to prevent paedophiles hiding data

By Richard Ford, Home Correspondent

THE Government is proposing new penalties to stop terrorists and other criminals using technology that prevents police accessing information on a suspect’s computer.

Terrorists do not use encryption to hide their data. This is a lie. This is why the laptop that was aledgedly found by security forces was able to be read. Remember the ‘terrorists using steganography’ hysteria from a few years ago? Read it:

The rumors about terrorists using steganography started first in the daily newspaper USA Today on February 5, 2001.

The articles are still available online, and were titled “Terrorist instructions hidden online”, and the same day, “Terror groups hide behind Web encryption”. In July of the same year, the information looked even more precise: “Militants wire Web with links to jihad”.

A citation from the USA Today article: “Lately, al-Qaeda operatives have been sending hundreds of encrypted messages that have been hidden in files on digital photographs on the auction site eBay.com“. These rumors were cited many times – without ever showing any actual proof – by other media worldwide, especially after the terrorist attack of 9/11.

For example, the Italian newspaper Corriere della Sera reported that an Al Qaeda cell which had been captured at the Via Quaranta mosque in Milan had had pornographic images on their computers, and that these images had been used to hide secret messages (but no other Italian paper ever covered the story).

The USA Today articles were written by veteran foreign correspondent Jack Kelley, who in 2004 was fired after allegations emerged that he had fabricated stories and invented sources.

In October 2001, the New York Times published an article claiming that al-Qaeda had used steganographic techniques to encode messages into images, and then transported these via email and possibly via USENET to prepare and execute the September 11, 2001 Terrorist Attack.

Despite being dismissed by security experts [3][4], the story has been widely repeated and resurfaces frequently. It was noted that the story apparently originated with a press release from “iomart” [5], a vendor of steganalysis software. No corroborating evidence has been produced by any other source.

Moreover, a captured al-Qaeda training manual makes no mention of this method of steganography. The chapter on communications in the al-Qaeda manual acknowledges the technical superiority of US security services, and generally advocates low-technology forms of covert communication.

The chapter on “codes and ciphers” places considerable emphasis on using invisible inks in traditional paper letters, plus simple ciphers such as simple substitution with nulls; computerized image steganography is not mentioned.

Nevertheless public efforts were mounted to detect the presence of steganographic information in images on the web (especially on eBay, which had been mentioned in the New York Times article).

To date these scans have examined millions of images without detecting any steganographic content (see “Detecting Steganographic Content on the Internet” under external links), other than test images used to test the system, and instructional images on web sites about steganography. […]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steganography

And there you have it. This story is yet another lie trolled out by brainless journalists with nothing to write on a slow day. There is no counter argument, no real information, just rabid whipping up.

Senior police officers have warned ministers that their investigations into serious crime are being thwarted by safety technology, which conceals data held on computers. Terrorists and paedophiles are using devices available on the internet for as little as £20 to keep data on their computers hidden from the authorities.

This is proof that the journalist who wrote this doesn’t know what he is talking about, and did not take the time to consult someone who does know what they are talking about.

No one with a single brain cell uses ‘devices available on the internet for as little as £20’ this is a lie. Everyone who encrypts their data does so with free software tools like PGP. None of these people are terrorists.

The encryption technology is being used by “terrorists and criminals to facilitate and conceal evidence of their unlawful conduct so as to evade detection or prosecution”, according to a Home Office consultation paper.

This is another lie. If the police have reason to think that a crime has been committed, they will not need new powers to demand the keys to decrypt someones photos in order to catch them. All they need to do is to clandestinely break into the users house and install keystroke capture dongles or software on the criminals machine. They will then be able to capture any password that they need to decrypt the criminals files.

This would mean that law abiding citizens will not be penalized for putting their email into an envelope, or encrypting their laptop drives to prevent data theft should the laptop go missing.

The people who wite these consultaiton papers and the unqualified journalists who unquestioningly report the stories are computer illiterate to a man. It is absolutely sickening.

Encryption enables plain text to be turned into a non- readable form. The person who receives the encrypted text uses a “key”, or password, to return it to its original form. By refusing to disclose that to police, suspects can conceal any criminal behaviour.

No, by encrypting your information you can keep anyone from getting to it. This has nothing to do with ‘concealing criminal behaviour’. Once again, if the police have enough evidence to go to a man’s house and confiscate his computer, they should have enough evidnce to arrest and charge him. Chicken and egg anyone?

The consultation paper said: “Over the last two to three years, investigators have begun encountering encrypted and protected data with increasing frequency.”

What were the methods of encryption? Without this information, it is hearsay and computer illiterate nonsense. For all we know they may have come across password protected word files, and interpreted this as ‘encryption’. Reports without details are totally useless, except if your aim is to whip up hysteria.

The Home Office is planning to introduce powers that will require a person to turn encrypted information into a readable form, and is proposing harsher penalties for those suspected of child sex abuse.

If I am correct, we already have the dreadful RIPA could it be that this journalist is talking about the introduction of clause three?

Under the current law a person suspected of possessing indecent photographs of children faces only two years in prison for failing to disclose to police the key to encrypted material. But they could spend up to ten years in prison for possessing the indecent image.

Police say that the low maximum jail term for failing to hand over the key provides an incentive to plead guilty to that offence as, with early release, the suspect could be free after a year.

If the police already have a reason to suspect someone is guilty of this heinous crime, they should put in place an operation to intercept the perpetrators computer in a state that will allow them to read everything, ie, by logging his keystrokes in advance of any raid. The stupidity of these people is staggering, but not at all surprising; look at what just happened to those two poor saps who had their house turned over and one of them shot for no reason at all? How can we expect these keystone kops to be able to use keystroke loggers and surveillance equipment to catch bad guys? We cant. But what we can expect is more miscarriages of justice as they bumble their way into the 21st Century, and the last thing we need to do is give them more power than they can handle.

David Davis, the Shadow Home Secretary, said that he welcomed the consultation paper on increasing the sentence. He said: “What the criminal is trying to do by using this encryption is to avoid the full sentence. In essence, the failure to provide the encryption key is an admission of guilt.”

Computer illiteracy – its not just for labour anymore!

Honestly, the tories are still as thick as shit, and its a great pity and a big PITA that we have to support them thanks to the NIR.

Ray Wyre, a child protection expert, said: “If people really intend to get away with it then the move to encryption was always going to be the next issue for the police and government”.

This is nonsense. This moronic journalist should have consulted a COMPUTER AND ENCRYPTION EXPERT not a child abuse expert, since this paper is about encryption and not child abuse. How totally pathetic!

He said that police used software known as Encase, which allowed them to look at images on the computer, but with encryption they are unable to access the data. “In technology the offender has always been ahead of the police.

Take a look at the first google result for ‘Encase‘ (clearly a distortion of ‘In Case’). It costs $425. What the HELL are they doing using crappy software like this? Its is astonishing; you mean to say that they do not have a single person on their staff that can mount a windoze drive under linux and then run a simple perl script to sort all the files into directories for inspection? Is it really that hard? And just imagine, these are the guys who will be bringing evidence against totally innocent people!

“Encryption is a problem for the police because, if you cannot access the data, you cannot find out the extent of a person’s criminality or the danger they pose to society.”

So, the secure wipe features of the many free tools out there should be immediately outlawed, since a perpetrator could use this to completely erase evidence from their drives. Oh, I’m sorry, you’ve never heard of secure erase!

Margaret Moran, the Labour MP for Luton South, cautioned that the development of encryption would provide further opportunities for criminals. She told MPs when the Sexual Offences Act was being debated: “The concern is that the advent of strong encryption technologies gives criminals the opportunity to hide their criminal activities or to conceal other evidence.

Here comes new labour, same as the old labour.

“If a paedophile has on his computer files, e-mail messages, pictures or other material that discloses a serious sexual offence against a child — an offence for which he knows he could face a prison term of ten years or more — he could encrypt the lot and, if investigated by police, simply refuse to hand over the key to decrypt the files, thus making unavailable evidence of a serious offence.”

If one of these monsters has been sending email, the police should have been collecting the evidence while it was in transit, or by posing as monsters (of that type) so that they can have the evidence delivered to them directly. How stupid people like Margaret Moron are, how deep is the well from which they draw their stupidity?

Until the internet was invented, encryption was rarely used by the public. Encryption garbles data using irreversible mathematical functions. It is the encoding of data so that it cannot be read by anyone who does not know the password that decodes it. […]

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,29389-2221574,00.html

Didnt he just say this? Clearly this is a cut and paste article done whilst rushing off to lunch. Bad journalism. Bad journalist.

Hi.

I was browsing through through some of my regular blogs and saw this. It made me think of you.

From the comments section in response to a post in the Policeman’s blog.

http://coppersblog.blogspot.com/2006/05/mainline.html

“The point of having things like ASBOs is to have as many things as possible against the law. This moves all the discretion into the hands of the government.

In a reasonable system, one could simply avoid sanctions by not stealing/murdering/raping and all would be well. Under the “nearly everything is illegal” system, most crimes are not punished. However, since one cannot avoid illegality, the state can come after you whenever you displease it. It becomes a system for enforcing loyalty to the powers that be rather than a neutral system of justice that protects life, liberty and property. The resulting epidemic of crime is seen as inconsequential- it does not threaten the established government – it even makes people more dependent upon it for protection.

In earlier times, this would have been called “tyranny.””

In the mighty France, all of the workforce, Civil Service and even the police have refused to obey the abolition of the bank holiday that would have not occured today.

When the police of this country finally grow some grapefruits and decide that ‘enough is enough’, and that they will only enforce the laws that directly affect the population that they serve, ie, crimes against the person and crimes against physical property, THEN we can take posts like this seriously.

Like we saw in the CCTV footage from the TPB raid, it only takes a handful of swine to disrupt the activities of millions of innocent people. The real policemen, the ones that are not swine, filth, ‘le flick’ etc, the ones that are there actually doing the true work of policing are all damaged by the actions of these dirty pigs, who don’t even bother to wear a uniform while they stomp on you with their boots.

That they recieved a direct order to raid that ISP is not an excuse to do it. Niether is it an excuse to violate the TPB lawyer by DNA swabbing him. They, all police, must have an intact moral compass that allows them to say, “no, I will not obey this order, because it is illegal”, or at the very least, compells them to call a neutral lawyer before carrying out orders that are clearly dubious if not totally bogus. Should they be ordered to carry out a raid on an emergency basis, they should have recourse to the law, where they can sue their superiors for leading them into an illegal action. Where there was ample time to check the legality of a raid, like the TPB one, all the officers should be liable for punitive damages. The police MUST BE GOT UNDER CONTROL, and if they dont have a moral compass, then they must either be sacked or put in fear of their livelyhoods so that there is a real disincentive to carrying out illegal orders, like the animals who raided TPB, and simultaneously took out the websites of 300 people UNRELATED TO TBP.

The US said the deal was essential after the 9/11 attacks

The European Court of Justice has ruled illegal an EU-US agreement that allows European airline passenger data to be transferred to the US authorities.The court said the May 2004 agreement did not ensure privacy protection for European travellers.

European airlines have been obliged to give US authorities passengers’ names, addresses and credit card details.

The measure – opposed by the European Parliament – was designed to help prevent acts of terrorism.[…]

I nearly choked on my cornflakes when I read this. Amazing.

Now watch as Bliar twists and bends OUR law in an attempt to appease his US ringmasters. You know he will do it, and those opposed will be painted as lily-livered liberati collaborators.

Reds under beds are back in fashion.

Yesterday, in a discussion on “Britishness”, I heard a commentator say one of the characteristics she found so adoring about the British is that they are so apathetic that there will never be another civil war.

She will have plenty of time to reconsider her position on the Isle of Wight Gulag, comrades!

Blair and his bitches underestimate the British at their peril.

I am reminded, somehow, of John Selwyn Gummer, forcing his child to eat a beefburger to downplay the threat of BSE.

Let’s see Bliar frog-marching his sons into Basra without the correct equipment if he wants to demonstrate his resolve and conviction that his war is worth the sacrifices.

Goshdarn it, how I got here from there I don’t know. It’s Tuesday but it’s a Monday feel and my brain is confused.

On 22 May the German Constitutional Court has declared illegal under the German Constitution the practice of screening data across several private and public databases in order to find potential terrorists (“sleepers”). Several federal states will now have to change their police laws. The decision does not make data screening (“Rasterfahndung”, literally: “grid investigation”, usual transliterations: “dragnet investigation” or “data trawl”) completely illegal, but binds it to very narrow conditions. The measure is still legal for investigations in specific criminal cases, as it was used against the left-wing guerrilla RAF in the 1970s, when the “Rasterfahndung” was invented. But for crime prevention purposes, it can only be done in the presence a concrete danger for the lives or liberties of persons or for the existence of the Federal Republic of Germany or a federal state (Land). This requires factual indicators for an imminent attack. A general threat condition or foreign tensions like after 9/11 2001 are not sufficient.

The future UK Bill of Rights will similarly protect the population against State-sponsored data trawling, of course it will in fact go further than the German Constitution as the Bill of Rights will only contain attestations of our Rights and not the rug pulling of their Constitution.

Even so you can see that a Constitution that protects peoples rights ‘works’ when the State isn’t allowed to disregard it into oblivion (c.f. USA)

As their website seems to be unresponsive I shall blockquoth the rest for you below (at least read the very last line.), incidentally there is another article about German Greens are questioning the legality of the EU directive on mandatory retention of communications traffic data, you should subscribe!

subscribe by e-mail
To: edri-news-request@edri.org
Subject: subscribe.

The Federal Police Agency (Bundeskriminalamt) had coordinated such screenings, in cooperation with the state-level police authorities after the terrorist attacks of 11 September 2001. Universities, private companies, private security firms, public transport institutions, facility providers, municipal authorities, and the Federal Register of Foreign Residents were required to submit comprehensive information they had on anybody matching a set of criteria (male, aged between 18 and 40, student or former student, country of origin mainly Muslim) to the state police agencies. The latter did a screening run for matches across the different submitted databases that combined included more than 8 million people. The 31 988 hits were stored in a central file called “sleepers” and again screened by the Federal Police Agency against a database that included up to 300 000 persons who held a pilot license, were supposed to be dangerous, or matched some other criteria. The remaining several thousand persons (matches) was manually reviewed by the state police agencies. The whole exercise did not lead to a single terrorist suspect or prosecution.

The plaintiff, a Morrocan citizen who studied in Germany in 2001, argued that his right for informational self-determination was breached, that the screening was an especially severe breach of fundamental rights because it took place unbeknownst to the people affected, that it was not proportionate because of the lack of factual indicators for an imminent terrorist attack in Germany, and that the criteria were discriminating him and fellow Muslims on the basis of religion. The lower courts had overturned his arguments.

The official data protection commissioners, the opposition parties Greens, Liberals and Socialists, and civil liberties groups applauded the court decision and demanded an immediate stop of plans for similar measures like communications traffic data retention, license-plate screening, or the creation of new investigative powers for the Federal Police Agency for the prevention of crimes. A spokesperson of the federal Ministry of the Interior said that in international terrorism, there was only a thin line between a general and a concrete threat condition, making it difficult to apply the decision. The Bavarian Minister of the Interior, Günther Beckstein, called the decision “a black day for the effective fight against terrorism in Germany.” The association of student representatives, which had supported the plaintiff, demanded a “personal apology” from the responsible authorities for the illegal and unconstitutional discrimination of foreign and Muslim students in Germany.

Up to eleven federal states will now have to change their police laws and criminal procedures acts. The decision will also have an impact on the discussion about the legality of mandatory communications data retention in Germany. The Constitutional Court explicitly re-emphasised in the reasons given for the judgement the “strict prohibition, beyond statistical purposes, of the storage of personally identifiable data on stock.” (“auf Vorrat”). “Vorratsdatenspeicherung” – literally: “data storage on stock” – is the German term for data retention.

Maryland is one of eight states with no so-called legal presence requirement — a law requiring applicants for licenses to prove they are in the country legally — according to the Coalition for a Secure Driver’s License, a pressure group that advocates for such measures and for increased document security features.

Since the Sept. 11 commission recommended tightened national standards for drivers’ licenses, legal presence requirements have been slowly spreading.

“The problem is, if you are issuing licenses to illegals, you don’t know whether there are terrorists among them,” said Gadiel.

There are about 595,000 foreign-born residents of Maryland, according to the U.S. Census Bureau, and nearly 135,000 mother-tongue Spanish speakers without proficiency in English.

Under current law in Maryland, “the (Motor Vehicle Administration) may not deny a license to an individual because he or she is unable to prove lawful presence in this country,” according to a legal opinion from state Attorney General J. Joseph Curran, Jr.

But the opinion also says the agency can ask for immigration-related documents as a form of proof of identity. “Although lawful residence status is not a pre-requisite for a driver’s license, the (Motor Vehicle Administration) could determine that official immigration-related documentation is helpful in establishing a person’s identification and, when other satisfactory documentation is unavailable, could require such information,” says the opinion.

The agency’s Web site lists “Valid out-of-country passport with visa,” and several other immigration-related documents as one of the so-called primary sources of identity. But there are more than a dozen other primary sources, including baptismal certificates and foreign drivers’ licenses. […]

http://www.postchronicle.com/news/security/article_21218745.shtml

The attack on the Twin Towers has manufactured a massive army of moronic shock troops who are pushing for authoritarianism left right and centre.

Driving lilcences are only there to prove if you have passed your driving test. That is all. When your examiner says you have passed your road test, and you pass your written test, then you are safe to drive. That is all all all Hassan Saba. Any secondary use of driving licences is totally wrong. The above ‘debate’ is synthetic.

Look at the apalling website of the ‘Coalition for a Secure Driving licence’. It is the very definition of absurd. Driving licences, ‘secure’ or ‘insecure’ whatever these buffoons think that means cannot control or predict the intent of someone. The grief of these sad people mixed with thier out of control fear of ‘terrorism’ is making them into idiots, and astonisingly, people are lisening to them like they have sense.

BIFF!

Bush bars arms sales to Venezuela and cuddles up to Libya to secure the oil stream

BAM!

The Iranian Oil Bourse starts trading (in Euros).

BASH!

Venezuela decides to trade all oil in Euros and buy arms from Russia/China

BLAM!

The US adds Venezuela to its list of ‘Rogue States’

KERSPLAT!

Venezuela suspends exports of oil to the US pending settlement of accounts in Euros

PLAMM!

US invades Iran tries to depose Chavez, Russia has had enough and fights to defend the Oil Bourse. Latin American countries put an embargo on US trade.

BOOM!

The end. Of something.

The title of this evening’s lecture is “Human Rights Under Attack” and 2005 is a particularly appropriate vantage point from which to view this topic.

[…]

But, of course, 2005 also marks 5 years since the Human Rights Act came into force. One of the most important pieces of constitutional legislation that any Government has introduced, It remains one of the government’s proudest achievements.

Yet if we are so proud of our record on human rights why, some of you will ask, why have we sought to distance ourselves from the Human Rights Act? Why have we not done more to push forward the new rights and the settlement it envisages?

And if we are so proud of our record on human rights why do we not do more to defend it from its critics, from reactionary voices like the Daily Mail which wrote last weekend of:

” Lottery money given to prostitutes but not the Samaritans… Gypsies allowed to breach planning laws… Human rights madness is destroying common sense, decency and democracy itself”

And why, some of you may ask, if we are so proud of our record on human rights, do we seem through our response to the threat of terrorism so intent on undermining the very human rights culture we were instrumental in bringing about?

I have not come here to dodge these accusations, as serious and uncomfortable as they are. We need to tackle them head on – and I will before this night is out.

We’ve heard all this so many times, I know, but it is easy to forget just how important this legislation was. Recall what the then Home Secretary, Jack Straw, said at the Bill ‘s second reading. He said:

” This is the first major Bill on human rights for more than 300 years. It will strengthen representative and democratic government. It does so by enabling citizens to challenge more easily actions of the state if they fail to match the standards set by the European convention. The Bill will thus create a new and better relationship between the Government and the people.”

[…]

Critically, these rights are for everybody. Nobody is more entitled to them than anybody else. They do not depend on popularity, or on background, or social class, or place of birth. You have only to be in this country to qualify for human rights protection under the Act. To add other qualifications is to claim that one person is more human than another – something akin to the evils we fought in the Second World War and fight against today.

[…]

David Lammey in 2005.

Of course you know why I post this, and they can only get away with this talk because the Human Rights Act is a bureaucratic concoction which tells the people what rights the State is prepared to uphold on their behalf. How quaint. A true Bill of Rights (as suggested by my Right Honourable Fellow) would be an attestation of rights by the people telling the State what its remit and duties to the people are. No Statesman worthy of the name would dare try to undo that sort of Bill.

This man:

… is now in charge of UK transport policy. He is “a professional politician, whose rise in Labour ranks has been relentless, from the moment he started to work as a researcher for Gordon Brown in 1990“.

A professional politicain. Uber-Gimp, he will dress in your favoured costume and perform un-nameable feats for your delight as long as it progresses his career.

He has no background in transport, knows nothing of running multi-billion pound turnover enterprises. Yet he now sets UK transport policy.

Uber-Gimp, most importantly, does not have the best interests of the public at heart. For one, he has no heart. And two, he does not believe he serves the public, despite being nominally a public servant. He believes, in fact, that the public are fortunate to have him to run their pathetic little lives for them.

Uber-Gimp believes only he can Make Life Better©.

And his first declaration is: to announce a £10m fund for the development of nationwide road charging schemes.

He hopes new technology will allow drivers to be charged by the mile.

[…]

What new technology, pray tell? Without even unwrapping our crystal ball we see through the swirling mists to a near-future Utopia, where your car is registered via the DVLA to your NIR entry.

In this heavenly, terror-free, fraudless hinterland every journey you make will be logged as your number plate is scanned at every junction.

Imagine the freedom that comes with such luxury! Imagine, some other upwardly-mobile Gimp sat at a console somewhere diligently refusing road access to all the undesirables. Imagine…

Addendum:

“A professional politician is a professionally dishonourable man. In order to get anywhere near high office he has to make so many compromises and submit to so many humiliations that he becomes indistinguishable from a streetwalker.”

Uber-Gimp.

H L Mencken said it better.

In 2002, Gary McKinnon was arrested by the UK’s national high-tech crime unit, after being accused of hacking into Nasa and the US military computer networks.

He says he spent two years looking for photographic evidence of alien spacecraft and advanced power technology.

America now wants to put him on trial, and if tried there he could face 60 years behind bars. […]

Profile – Gary McKinnon
“I found out that the US military use Windows,” said Mr McKinnon […]

The defence rests, m’lud!

See also: Hacker fears ‘UFO cover-up’ … with video interview from today.

Someone clever once said “That’s the way to do it!”

US counts cost of day without immigrants

· Protests force firms to close and hit industry
· More than 1 million take to streets over new bill

A sea of white-shirted protesters 300,000 strong, chanting “Si, se puede” (“Yes, it can be done”) surged through Los Angeles.
US immigrants stage boycott day 

Mass rallies were staged across the US as immigrants boycotted work or school and avoided spending money as a way of showing their worth to the economy.

Despite Monday being a normal working day in the US, many businesses were forced to close as workers in industries including agriculture, construction and leisure withheld their labour.

Goya Foods halted distribution for the day, while Tyson Foods, the world’s largest meat producer, shut nine of its 15 plants.

[…]

Of course, if they really want to make a difference, they could always try a petition.

(Ha, beaten to it while I was working! Darn you and your socks!)

It looks like the government are finally seeing what hatred their piratical mutiny of HMS UK propogates. You will see that not only the readers of the Guardian will not take the bullshit proffered by the Home Secretary but neither will the editor of The Telegraph, and let them be aware this is the tip of the iceberg, they would do well to remember they only have the ‘mandate’ of roughly 20% of the electorate.

Indeed not only does Hogwash peddle the same old lies about the impact of his legislation, he introduces misleading conflations about those who write agianst the government. He twists the comparison from history of the way the Nazis imposed ever increasingly authoritarian and discriminatory legislation into some spiel about the Holocaust, this is incorrect (google – holocaust and blair or clarke,…) and oversimplifies the tragedies of the Nazi regime to the killing of Jews.
The comparison stacks up – the (ab)use of the media is comparable, the cynical ‘populism’ is comparable, the creation of an ‘Other’ within our society is comparable, the inventorising of the people is comparable, the brazenly simplistic belief in ‘technology’ to cure society is comparable, the monomania of their policies is comparable.
The comparison is made not out of spite or delusion but because it is relevant, we can learn from history even if it isn’t exactly the same as our times. The people will not forget history no matter how much Neu Labour try to assert 1997 as year zero – to abolish history and in so doing try to remove the notion of a different future.
Talk of how the situation may worsen in the face of legislation and schemes that are poorly defined (Terrorism Act), spiteful (directed against Brian Haw ‘s demonstration), inefficient (ANPR, NIR, ID cards), counter to the UK way of life (NIR, ID cards) is not only legitimate it is absolutely necessary when the government steadfastly refuses to any voice against them – if it is the case that people only pay attention when ministers are called Nazis then that is what will be done.
If it the case that people need to refuse to cooperate then that is what will be done.

On BLOGDIAL we talk about the excesses of government, and in particular have said that specifically in the UK, government needs to be firstly constrained by a written constitution, and its activities should be constrained to removing legislation only, since the populaion is overburdened by too much law.

In any business or personal contract, the terms under which you deal with the second party are set out in advance and they cannot change witout re-writing the contract after negotiation and mutual agreement. If one of the parties does not agree to the changes, the original contract remains in force.

The same should hold for elected government. At the moment, government can create literally any law it likes, and the electorate is compelled to obey or face violence.

A relationship like that would be intolerable in any other sphere of human activity, but everyone accepts this as perfectly reasonable when the agressor is elected. When people outside of government do try and behave in this manner, for example La Cosa Nostra, using violence (the government uses war), extortion (the government uses taxation) everyone is outraged, and yet La Cosa Nostra, the ‘Mafia’, The Medellin Cartel, are less violent and disruptive by orders of magnitude compared to, say, the american government.

This imbalance, this unequal relationship needs to be corrected by instituting Fixed Government. By ‘Fixed Government’ I mean one that cannot change the rules of the game on the fly or a whim. One where the rules are literally fixed in advance and unchanging, so that we have long term certainty as to what the government can and cannot do.

Many people came to the UK because it was a great place to live. They came here with expectations of freedom, privacy and an old unchanging system that respected your rights as an individual. Now, late in the game when many of those people are completely settled, one set of bandits have decided to change the rules and make Britain a place that a free person would never consider as an option for a place to live; indeed, many people who are able are already planning to move because this country has changed so horribly. If Fixed Government was installed in the UK, this exodus of the great and the good and the barrier to entry for the great and the good looking for a decent country to live in would be prevented.
A well written constitution goes a long way towards this. A legislature charged with removing and not adding law will ensure that the contract cannot be changed in a way that has a negative on the electorate. Total obedience to the will of the electorate within the constraints of the constitution is essential; when we say not to war, ‘no’ means ‘no’, and it always means ‘no’. The removal of the nauseating ill judgement of the uneducated electorate will be the result of this, meaning no more war, no more law created by rabid newspaper editors, and government relegated to keeping the streets clean, settling disputes in courts and running the police as a public service.

In fact, Fixed Government means changing government into an obedient servant that is working under contract.

Anything less than this means a never ending, eternally growing Katamari Damancy style ball of legislative garbage whose only conclusion is the absolute control of every aspect of your life, down to the minutiae, and the draining of the UKs finest to other, more free shores.

From: Tony Blair To: Henry Porter Subject: Liberty

Dear Henry Porter,

Frankly it’s difficult to know where to start, given the mishmash of misunderstanding, gross exaggeration and things that are just plain wrong. A few explanatory facts might help.

I can’t wait.

You say I have ‘pared down our liberty at an astonishing rate’, then list a whole lot of fundamental rights, as if these had all been drastically curtailed. We are proposing that the right to trial by jury be changed in one set of circumstances: highly complex serious fraud cases. The reason is simple. The cases last for months, sometimes years – they are incredibly difficult for juries for time and complexity reasons; it is over 30 years since Lord Roskill recommended the change because otherwise such cases often collapse at huge expense and the guilty go free. The estimated number of cases per year is around 20, out of a total of 40,000 jury trials.

“Defenders of this practice say it is justified if a single murderer is prosecuted.” indeed. Then the same is also true about trial by jury. If even one person’s rights are reduced, then it is not worth it. Indeed, if one persons rights are infringed the entire society is damaged. To justify murder by saying “only 20 people out of the millions of living britons will be murdered, so it OK” is a mark of this Nazi inspired, venal gang of bloodsoaked murderers.

The right to silence was already restricted by the Criminal Justice and Public Order Act 1994 (Sections 34-38), which enables a court, if it wishes and in certain circumstances, to draw an adverse inference from a defendant’s failure to answer questions on any charge. The only change introduced by this Government was to clarify (in the light of subsequent case law) the circumstances under which inferences can be drawn from silence in cases where the charge is one of causing the death of a child or vulnerable adult. This again is in a tiny number of cases.

“We are already half way up your ass, we just pushed it in all the way; what is your problem with that?” Honestly, if this is the quality of Bliars thought we can begin to assume that he is not really in control, and is just going along with a flow pushed by people in the background.

You say people can only have blank placards outside Parliament and can’t protest. Go and look at the placards of those camped outside Parliament – they are most certainly not blank and usually contain words not entirely favourable to your correspondent. Outside Downing Street, virtually every day there are protests of one sort or another.

The one man who is camped there can only be there because he started his protest BEFORE the new legislation came into force. A person was arrested for simply reading out a list of people. inside your own devils gathering a man was arested for heckling, and the terrrorism act was the pretext. You are a LIAR and a destroyer of liberty Tony Bliar, and everyone knows it!

It’s correct that, again in a small number of cases, we have introduced unusual restrictions to combat terrorists. There are 12 control orders in place. But we did suffer the death by terrorism of over 50 of our citizens last July. In common with virtually every major nation in the world, we are tightening our restrictions but there are, in every case, elaborate mechanisms of scrutiny and oversight.

First of all, over 40,000 people have been arrested using the terrorism act. That is totally unnaceptable. Secondly, even if the terrorists killed 50,000 people, that is no reason to dismantle this nation. MILLIONS of men gave their lives to protect Britian and its way of life. That you think you have the right to throw away this countries rights because 50 people were killed by a random act by unafiliated and deranged students shows your complete and utter insane state of mind. What other nations may or may not do, this is BRITAIN and BRITIAN LEADS it does not FOLLOW. Especially into the abyss that you are trying to drag it. The Soviet Union had internal passports; did that mean that everywhere should also have them? This sort of ‘reasoning’ is beneath contempt.

And, of course, the reason why even these types of restrictions can end up in our courts and be struck down, is that this Government gave British citizens for the first time ever the power to challenge Executive action or legislation, through the incorporation of the European Convention.

Indeed! wonder if this means that we can strike down the ID cards bill? Shall we try?

We enter the realm of fantasy with your and others’ strictures on the Regulatory Reform Bill. This legislation is proposed for a straight-forward reason. Much regulation becomes redundant over time. It’s a real problem for business. It costs money and causes hassle, often in circumstances far removed from its original purpose. The problem is that if it is in primary legislation then only by formal Act of Parliament can it be changed. In a busy schedule where usually the legislation is very arcane, it can take years, if ever, for necessary change to occur.

The proposal is that in circumstances closely defined and expressly where it doesn’t interfere with people’s basic rights, ministers can propose removing the regulation by order. But before this can actually happen, first the order is subject to public consultation; second, it is scrutinised by independent committees of both houses of parliament; third, there is then a debate before the order is passed in Parliament, which can naturally refuse to accept it. To describe this as the ‘abolition of Parliamentary democracy’ – as some critics have – is more than a little far-fetched.

Firstly, the reason is bogus. Secondly, parilaiment, if it was doping its job properly, and as I have said on BLOGDIAL before, should be sitting and REMOVING legislation, not ADDING legislation. This bill allows parliament to ADD TO and AMEND existing legislation without oversignt, not REMOVE it wholesale. If it was there only to remove legislation it might be arguable that it could not affect rights since only the ADDITION of laws can remove rights from the person.

Next comes some vomit inducing electioneering wrapped in double tall:

When we talk of civil liberties, what about theirs, the law-abiding people; the ones who treat others with courtesy and good manners and expect the same back? Don’t theirs count for anything?

Bliar knows perfectly well that ‘civility and ‘civil liberties’ are two different things, and that he is masterfully conflating them in this piece of disgusting double talk. If there is an estate with a problem, send more police in there. Removing the rights of everyone in the UK because there are some crime hotspots is simply absurd, and he knows this, because he is not stupid.

You complain of the DNA database samples being retained. Since we allowed this, over 14,000 offences have been successfully matched to over 8,000 suspects including over 100 murders and 100 rapes – and as far as I am aware, no one is on the database for dropping litter!

There is nothing funny about this you Nazi piece of filth. Just as an 80 year old heckler was arrested using the terrorism act right in your face, this too will be done, and then what will you say?

And as for the murders and rapes that were solved, this is good, but that has nothing to do with KEEPING THE DNA OF THE INNOCENT ON RECORD. When someone is innocent of any crime, they should have no police record of ANY KIND. and the fact that the police are keeping the DNA of 24,000 INNOCENT children on file – which is child abuse – has nothing to do with the solving of the crimes you mention above. You are a devil, and not even a devil in disguise. Under your orders, 24,000 innocent british children have been VIOLATED, and that is a FACT.

You can’t deal with the levels of sophistication in today’s organised crime by traditional methods. That’s why we are giving the new agency new powers to force suspects to disclose information, to open up their accounts; to ensure that their advisers can’t conceal evidence; and to track their movements not just in Britain but abroad.

That is utter nonsense. The police have more than enough powers to detect any crime, and once again, this is no excuse for removing the rights of ALL the UK citizens. When Bliar says’ “to ensure that their advisers can’t conceal evidence” he is talking about the removal of lawer client privacy; see how he cannot even bring himself to say what he has done? Inside his insane head somewhere, he realizes just how fundamentally outrageous what he has pulled off is.

The issue of ID cards is a little different, because I think there are very good reasons of practicality why, in today’s world, people should be able to protect their identity from fraud or abuse. The figure of £10bn for the cost is ludicrous; and in any event 70 per cent of the cost is because of the move to biometric passports, happening round the western world.

People can protect themselvs from identity fraud primarily by not entering the NIR, ie refusing the ID card. The reality of this has been made crystal clear and soon, not one person in the UK will not have been informed about it. Just because the rest of the world is moving to biometric passports that doesnt mean that the UK should, and also, ‘biometric passports’ does not mean the UK NIR. The new passport standard sets a minimum level of security features which the UK is unilaterally exceeding to the most absurd of levels. Once again, a bald faced lie, from the mouth of a lying murderer!

Ultimately, for me this whole issue is not about whether we care about civil liberties, but how we care for them in the modern world. If the traditional processes were the answer to these crime and law and order problems that are an age away from Dixon of Dock Green and the stable communities of 50 years ago, then we wouldn’t be having this debate. But they’re not. They’ve failed. They are leaving the innocent unprotected and the guilty unpunished. That’s why we need them changed.

This is a total lie, and one he and his cohorts have repeated before form his liars clipboard. The innocent are unprotected because there are not enough police, not because the inadequate numbers have too few powers. This is everything to do with civil liberties, and thanks to Murder Inc, a permanent solution to this problem is around the corner, so that never again will the likes of this mass murderer will be able to single handedly destroy Britain.

[…]

Go and read this apalling exchange yourself. Sadly, Henry Porter doesn’t know how to thread email, otherwise, he could have taken that lying sack of shit apart line by line.

The Government began the whole sorry process by saying that the Bill would be valuable in the fight against terrorism; yet, to be fair to the Home Secretary—I am occasionally fair to him—on 8 July he said that identity cards would not have prevented the tube attacks on 7 July. We know that 9/11 would not have been prevented by identity cards. The people who committed those crimes had pilots’ licences and passports. Those who committed the crimes on 7 July were perfectly happy to be filmed by the railway station closed circuit television. The problem was not hiding their identity, but hiding their intention—[Interruption.] I am glad to see that Members on the Treasury Bench find the subject so tremendously funny.

When the Government lost their first argument they said, “Oh, perhaps we’ll try benefit fraud”. However, we know that benefit fraud will not be dealt with by the possession of identity cards or by the information in the national identity register. Then they said, “Well, let’s try immigration, that’s bound to help”. The Home Secretary is trying that again this evening, but the problem is that one does not have to register on the national identity register or hold an identity card if one is in the country for less than three months. When a person enters the country as a tourist, how are the Government to know that they have not remained beyond the permitted time?

There is the problem of the free travel area between the UK and the Irish Republic and the free travel area in the European Union. What will that do? Far from preventing immigration illegalities, it will exacerbate ethnic problems and cultural division in the UK. Do the Government want to give a free hand to the British National party? Anybody who thinks that is a good idea should vote for this sordid Government this evening.

The Government then said, and the Home Secretary repeated this evening, that the measure would deal with identity fraud. When the Bill began its passage in the summer, identity fraud cost the economy £50 million, but during the summer months the cost rose to £1.5 billion. I do not know why, and the Government have produced no evidence to support that fact. Indeed, we are having a Third Reading by assertion with an absence of proof. We cannot have legislation that is created in this form or pushed through in such a way, and we cannot tolerate a Government who have absolutely no understanding of the constitution of this country.

The Government moved on to say that the scheme would prevent other forms of serious crime. As the hon. and learned Member for Medway (Mr. Marshall-Andrews) pointed out on Second Reading, no serious criminal will be too bothered about whether he is required to register for, or have, an identity card. The money would be far better spent on police officers, gaining intelligence about the activities of criminals and producing a proper border control police.

The Government have blustered and demanded that we agree with all their assertions, despite the lack of evidence to prove them. Eventually, they have ended up saying that it would be more convenient for us all if we had identity cards and information was stored away on the national identity register. If the Government want to see the population of this country wandering around with a form of barcode across our foreheads, or with a mark to allow us to come out of our houses, they are not the sort of Government whom this country needs. We should certainly not be promoting such a society.

The Bill is obscene and absurd and it will do nothing but damage the country’s interests as a whole. It will do nothing to advance the causes that we all share: defeating terrorism; doing away with benefit fraud; and tightening up our immigration rules, which the Government have randomly let fall apart. Of course we want to deal with identity fraud and serious crime, but the Bill will not do that in its present form and would not have done that in its first form. It is a ridiculous and stupid Bill.

What will the scheme cost the citizen? All of us over the age of 16 will have to pay not only the £30 cost of buying the wretched card, but the travel costs of getting from the outer isles to the Glasgow centre at which one will be processed, as though one were in some gulag, or from rural parts of the country to other cities.

What will the scheme cost the country as a whole? We all know that the cost will be somewhere between £8 billion and £19 billion, but the Government say that the cost of a card will be only £30. The whole thing is utterly absurd, and the more one examines what the Secretary of State has to say, the more absurd it becomes and the more absurd the Government are.

Let us step aside from the practical arguments against the Bill and consider a matter of principle: the relationship between the citizen and state, about which the Government care little and know nothing. They have forgotten about constitutional history—if they knew anything about it—and the proper relationship between the Government, Parliament and the judiciary. All that is swept aside with great windy bluster from the Home Secretary and his junior Ministers. It is time for Parliament to stand up for what it is supposed to and to defend the liberties of the citizen, not to kowtow to this appalling Government and go down on bended knee and grovel as they pass more and more appalling legislation to destroy the rights of the citizen. It is no good for the Government to say that this is all exaggeration—just look at what they have done already and what they intend to do through this Bill and other legislation to eat into the liberties of the citizen.

This is a bad Bill from a sad Government. It is legislation by statutory instrument. The Government are providing 61 separate powers to enable the Home Secretary or his successor to produce secondary legislation. The Bill contains very little detail. It increases the penalty for misbehaviour. One could easily be fined up to £2,500 for what the Government politely call a “civil penalty”, and if one does not pay that, off one goes to prison.

The Bill amounts to little more than a denial of democracy. The House should be ashamed of it, and I trust that all people of honour in the House will increase the Government’s embarrassment by reducing their majority to way below 32—indeed, we should kill this Bill. […]

http://www.theyworkforyou.com/debates/?id=2005-10-18c.797.2

When the history of all this is written, it will not be possible to say that no one was warned, and that no one spoke up and stood up to be counted.

Are you inspired yet?

Chirac backs down on employment law

Staff and agencies
Monday April 10, 2006

The French government today bowed to weeks of protests and said it would replace a controversial employment law which made it easier to fire workers aged under 26.

Stunned by the biggest street demonstrations in almost 40 years, the office of the president, Jacques Chirac, said a new plan focusing on youths from troubled backgrounds would replace the “first job contract”.

“The president of the republic has decided to replace article 8 of the equal opportunities law with measures to help disadvantaged young people find work,” said a statement from the presidency.

[…]

And, of course, I know you haven’t forgotten this…

A few people deciding enough is enough, refusing to put up with an unfair law and doing something about it.

And the governments changed the laws. 

Gaby Hinsliff, political editor
Sunday April 9, 2006
The Observer

Rogue drivers are evading thousands of speeding tickets by exploiting a loophole in the law that enables them to ignore roadside cameras.

One motorist has been clocked speeding more than 100 times without being caught, while another has got away with driving at 119mph in a built-up area.

The phenomenon has prompted police to call for a change in the law. The scam involves offenders registering their cars at one of a network of ‘mass-mailing’ addresses used legitimately by businesses instead of at their own homes. When the driver triggers a camera, the penalty notice is sent to the mass-mailing address. Police seeking the motorist find only a shopfront where nobody lives.

Speed cameras generated more than £114m in fines last year and are credited by safety campaigners with saving lives. Figures released last week revealed that the speed of most drivers had dropped as the number of cameras had increased.

Tory frontbencher Andrew Selous, who is campaigning for a change in the law, said uncontrolled speeding by individuals with no fear of being caught risked deaths and serious injuries. ‘There is the danger, and there is the sheer injustice of it,’ he said. ‘If you or I are caught doing 35mph in a 30mph limit, we get three points on our licences and a £60 fine. People may resent that, but understand there is a reason for it.

But there are segments of the population who have wised up to clever ways of getting round this, which is extremely dangerous and downright unfair.’ […]

A Home Office spokesman said the national identity register being introduced to back up planned ID cards would help, and added: ‘We are examining how serious the issue is.’ A Department for Transport spokes-man said the DVLA database was ‘97.5 per cent accurate’. […]

http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,1750138,00.html

No no no, you fucking morons.

The ‘sheer injustice’ is that the cameras are there harvesting you in the first place, not that there are people who are smarter than you who have managed to evade the shears.

They are not doing it to ‘cheat’ speed cameras, they are doing it to drive freely on the roads that they own and pay for. Whose side are you on you idiots?! And once again, how this article is not related to the NIR and how people will corrupt, avoid and abuse it is staggering. They simply repeat unquestioningly a home orifice blurt of bullshit.

Let me spell it out for you; people will be using these tactics and more if the NIR is not stopped. They will be justified in doing so, and it will be only the stupid and the sheeple that will be caught out and made slaves by it.

It is time for new labour legislation in this province. At present, it is too one-sided. Individual rights are being totally ignored.

We have far too many strikes in Saskatchewan, which could have been prevented if we had some politicians with a little backbone. It appears they are only interested in the public at election time for votes.

Controversial issues are not touched or discussed.

Unionized employees of the Sobey’s grocery store on south Albert Street have been on strike for six months. It is a great store with honest, hard-working and self-reliant workers.

[…]

If joining a union is so good for its members, then way should they be forced to join? It should be voluntary, as in other organizations.

If a union member is not satisfied with the salary or working conditions, then he or she should look elsewhere for a job that fulfills all expectations and demands.

Compulsory unionism is called “the new slavery” because once a union has been voted into a workplace, there is no going back, especially for workers who didn’t want to join in the first place. Freedom of association is lost in the labour movement and in its place is coercion of its members. Coercion is contrary to all principles of freedom.

The Leader Post

[…]

You get the picture.

And in case you think I use that article because I couldn’t easily find harsh words about the UK government:

From time to time I, like many of us, muse on what is wrong with the people who run our country. Are they stupid? Are they naïve? Or are they actually downright wicked?

[…]

Consider, for example, the likely outcome of possibly the nastiest Bill to go before Parliament since the Six Acts of 1819, the Legislative and Regulatory Reform Bill. The Commons has given a second reading to this Bill, which would increase the already great ability of ministers to bypass Parliament in enacting, repealing or amending (according to Clause 2 of the Bill) “any legislation”. The Bill would especially be used, if enacted, to import EU law into our own without any parliamentary scrutiny, but could be used for even worse things besides.

[…]

Frankly, these plans are so absolutist that one could make a strong case that the Queen should abdicate rather than give her assent to either of them.

To obviate that horror she, Parliament and the British public must demand a straight answer to a straight and vital question: what is so wrong with our democracy that Labour wishes so ruthlessly to end it?

There have been quite a few views aired like this in the Telegraph recently, by ‘Establishment’ figures, it makes wonder whether there was a time when the nobs could simply ‘arrange an accident’ for ‘here today gone tomorrow’ political figures.

The notion that queen should abdicate rather than assent to the legislation talked about is interesting – is it a veiled call for her loyal subjects to oppose the proposed laws? Like I say interesting, and on a day when the Guardian publishes a piece explicitely citing Marx!