Great Britain is going down the drain...hacking and exploitation of personal data

[jverne]

THE Home Office has quietly adopted a new plan to allow police across Britain routinely to hack into people?s personal computers without a warrant.

Under the Brussels edict, police across the EU have been given the green light to expand the implementation of a rarely used power involving warrantless intrusive surveillance of private property. The strategy will allow French, German and other EU forces to ask British officers to hack into someone?s UK computer and pass over any material gleaned.

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5439604.ece

The private sector will be asked to manage and run a communications database that will keep track of everyone's calls, emails, texts and internet use under a key option contained in a consultation paper to be published next month by Jacqui Smith, the home secretary.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2008/dec/31/privacy-civil-liberties



what's going on seriously? i've been hearing only bad things coming from GB lately.

 

[PimpinPenguin]

Oh great is this that massive database that's meant to hold everything like e-mails and texts. I wouldn't have minded but this government has a very poor track record at this, first they can't keep any data safe whatsoever, they've lost so many personal public records it's unbelievable not to mention top secret war documents on a train.
And the fact this power will be abused like the local council that trailed a family under the terrorism act to see if they were sending their kids to the right school.

But really what happened to innocent till proven guilty what happened to personal privacy? what is Labour doing.

 

[<RJMC>]

I toldya britains where crazy

now is time to learn to be a H4XX0RZ!1

 

[Solaris]

****ing Jacqui smith. Has anyone noticed every high level female labour politician as of late are complete ****ing retards. I really don't understand, at a local level in the party there are alot of very sensible and respectable male and female party memembers, seems only the wankers make it to the top with a few exceptions like the millibands and the old labour people.

 

[Laivasse]

Civil liberties aren't worth spit in Britain any more. There's only so much you can do to oppose this trend when so much of the electorate are passive enough to accept anything, so long as it comes packaged with enough scaremongering. It's an ideal time to emigrate.

Also inb4 'if you have nothing to hide, you've got nothing to fear'.

 

[Sulkdodds]

Holy ****ing goddamn. Not only surveiling everyone, but trusting the data to a PFI operator. It's like the two worst things New Labour does, combined.

 

[freakyflor]

Damn u Brits!

 

[No Limit]

I don't have time to read the entire article but does is that all they can do? Just hack a computer remotely without ever accessing it physically? If that's the case then they probably were already doing this if the opportunity presented itself. But it's not like this means they have access to every computer in the UK; computer hacking isn't what the movies made it out to be. Getting in to a computer would require a specific exploit to be open; targeting a specific computer would be extremely difficult for them to do.

 

[Sulkdodds]

Wait a goddamn minute

2007: Sulkdodds has a dream in which Gordon Brown runs him over in a horse and coach.

2009: Gordon Brown helps authorise new surveillance measures which opposition ministers are quoted in the times describing as "driving 'a coach and horses' through privacy laws".

 

[Gorgon]

http://www.truecrypt.org/

Done!!

 

[PimpinPenguin]

I don't have time to read the entire article but does is that all they can do? Just hack a computer remotely without ever accessing it physically? If that's the case then they probably were already doing this if the opportunity presented itself. But it's not like this means they have access to every computer in the UK; computer hacking isn't what the movies made it out to be. Getting in to a computer would require a specific exploit to be open; targeting a specific computer would be extremely difficult for them to do.

It's a bit more than that. They can hack into your computer without a warrant, so a police officer can decide to place a keylogger on your pc and monitor everything you do without going though to courts and without your knowledge. Police from the EU can ask for the UK police to hack into your pc and give them the data again without going though the courts.
So eventually it's now up to the police they have the power to do this without a judges approval.
They want private company to keep records on everything you do, all you e-mails phone calls,web surfing habits. Even if you never done anything wrong your still going to have all your personal data stored on the super database.

 

[Nitre]

They'll get nothing useful from me.

 

[No Limit]

It's a bit more than that. They can hack into your computer without a warrant, so a police officer can decide to place a keylogger on your pc and monitor everything you do without going though to courts and without your knowledge. Police from the EU can ask for the UK police to hack into your pc and give them the data again without going though the courts.
So eventually it's now up to the police they have the power to do this without a judges approval.
They want private company to keep records on everything you do, all you e-mails phone calls,web surfing habits. Even if you never done anything wrong your still going to have all your personal data stored on the super database.

But that's what I'm asking. Can they really access the computer physically to place a key logger without a warrant or would they have to resort to hacking remotely to do this? If they can only do it remotely this really isn't much to worry about.

 

[Bad^Hat]

Wait a goddamn minute

2007: Sulkdodds has a dream in which Gordon Brown runs him over in a horse and coach.

2009: Gordon Brown helps authorise new surveillance measures which opposition ministers are quoted in the times describing as "driving 'a coach and horses' through privacy laws".

You sly bastard. I'll have you done for withholding vital information I will.

*hacks Sulkdodd's brain*

Sorry, what now? The government is authorizing the police to hack people's computers at will? Goddamn, that's like something out of a dystopian sci-fi novelist's wet dream.

Big brother is alive and well in GB, it seems.

 

[Laivasse]

But that's what I'm asking. Can they really access the computer physically to place a key logger without a warrant or would they have to resort to hacking remotely to do this? If they can only do it remotely this really isn't much to worry about.

They are limited to doing it remotely, I suspect. How they would do this is slightly ambiguous - I read that they may try to break in on home networks by subverting wireless encryption or exploiting unencrypted wireless, or that they may send out malicious attachments containing trojans and keyloggers.

So practically speaking, not much problem for a technologically literate user. But that's not really the point, is it? For a start it means that security conscious people (eg. terrorists) won't ever be threatened by it and the technologically non-fluent, average Dave will be.

There is also the separate issue of the super-database. I can't see how it will ever materialise, personally, but I could be wrong about that and again, that's not the point anyway... The point is the UK has a government that is paranoid/insane enough not only to seriously consider these things, but to actually commit to implementing them.

Also, how is it that the EU has shot down the idea of the database, on human rights grounds, but has given the green light for this invasive PC-snooping in the same breath??

 

[No Limit]

Well that's a fair point. It shows just how idiotic these "intelligence" services are.

 

[PimpinPenguin]

But that's what I'm asking. Can they really access the computer physically to place a key logger without a warrant or would they have to resort to hacking remotely to do this? If they can only do it remotely this really isn't much to worry about.

It would be done remotely and in some cases they will park vans outside your home hacking into your wireless network but that's not the issue. The issue is how would you like for the police to place keyloggers on your PC snoop on everything you do without them having to get permission? Cause right now the police are being give a free ticket to hack into anyone computer they deem fit. And i guarantee it won't be long till you find some other department exploiting this law as the council did with the anti-terror law by placing a family under surveillance for non terror offence, they were checking if the child should be attending that particular school as they believe the family lived outside the area.

 

[No Limit]

It would be done remotely and in some cases they will park vans outside your home hacking into your wireless network but that's not the issue. The issue is how would you like for the police to place keyloggers on your PC snoop on everything you do without them having to get permission? Cause right now the police are being give a free ticket to hack into anyone computer they deem fit. And i guarantee it won't be long till you find some other department exploiting this law as the council did with the anti-terror law by placing a family under surveillance for non terror offence, they were checking if the child should be attending that particular school as they believe the family lived outside the area.

I would love to see them try to install a keylogger or any kind of sniffer on any computer I manage, they'd be in for quite the suprise . But I think you guys make a fair point.

 

[Atomic_Piggy]

This place is going down the toilet. Civil Liberties are worthless, Health and Safety laws are reaching ridiculous new heights, we have ****ing four year olds getting stress disorders, obesity, etc.

Honestly, the moment my education is done I am leaving this dump.

 

[Top Secret]

*Rattles on about America being the most free country*

 

[Farrowlesparrow]

They don't even paint lines on the road here. Yeah, Boyeeeee!

 

[Sulkdodds]

There is also the separate issue of the super-database. I can't see how it will ever materialise, personally, but I could be wrong about that and again, that's not the point anyway... The point is the UK has a government that is paranoid/insane enough not only to seriously consider these things, but to actually commit to implementing them.

Moreover, a database placed in the hands of a private operator. The interaction between government workers (who are often incompetent) and private enterprise (which is usually greedy and amoral) tends and has for the last decade tended to produce situations in which the government is completely blind to the fact that the operator is ripping them off for enormous amounts of tax money while providing terrible service. Further, as much as people accuse "this government" of being careless with its data, no organisations have properly figured proper data security yet. The rate at which keeping massive amounts of data has become more necessary must have outstripped the ability (or willingness) of industry to keep up with it, because private corporations have many, many of their own breaches. So we should not expect the database to be either secure or cheap - indeed, we should not expect the entire scheme to be anything but a clusterfuck.