The Student Room Group

Government to monitor your emails, texts and web use

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Original post by Barden
Exactly... Why has everybody in this thread ignored the part that says that police will need a warrant to view such data?

It's merely a remote version of what can already be done anyway (physical seizure of hard drives). If anything this will just save time/money...


But it makes it too easy for them to monitor communications. History has taught us that whenever the government is given these sorts of crime-fighting powers, they abuse them. In one year, Section 44 of the Terrorism Act was used to stop and search people 150,000 times without the policeman having reasonable suspicion. Exactly the same thing will happen when this passes.
(edited 11 years ago)
Original post by Barden
Exactly... Why has everybody in this thread ignored the part that says that police will need a warrant to view such data?


That wasn't exactly what I meant. The list won't be just potential terrorists, but dissidents, known protesters, etc. It sounds extreme, but hundreds of people were arrested before the Royal Wedding and held for 24 hours because they had taken part in protests in the past. Obviously these people are under some kind of monitoring, and if a warrant is required, they're evidently not hard to obtain.
(edited 11 years ago)
Reply 42
Just to clarify they wont 'soon be able' to do anything as it hasnt been passed and isnt likely it will be.
wonder why this never made it in the lib dem/tory manifesto...
Original post by Guitarded
That wasn't exactly what I meant. The list won't be just potential terrorists, but dissidents, known protesters, etc. It sounds extreme, but hundreds of people were arrested before the Royal Wedding and held for 24 hours because they had taken part in protests in the past. Obviously these people are under some kind of monitoring, and if a warrant is required, they're evidently not hard to obtain.


And you're OK with all of this?
Original post by electriic_ink
And you're OK with all of this?


Far from it! It probably wasn't clear in my posts. No, the fact that people who question the Government can be monitored, detained, or have whatever done to them that the state decides necessary is in my opinion a huge step towards totalitarianism. I'm not a conspiracy theorist, I'm not suggesting that Cameron is part of the 'new world order' or any of that stuff, but you don't know what kind of people could be running the country in 10, 20, 50 years time. We've all seen the horrific acts of Governments all over the world in recent years - I'd rather not have any Government obtain this much control over it's own people. Hitler had it without all the technology, and look how much it took to bring him down.
Reply 46
Giving people freedom by taking it away...
Reply 47
Original post by Algorithm69
It has become a cliché, but whatever:

"They who can give up essential liberty to obtain a little temporary safety, deserve neither liberty nor safety." - Benjamin Franklin


No offence but that quote bores me.

There is only so far you can take a quote from the late 1770's and apply it to modern times where the whole world has literally completely changed and the most obvious related change is the internet. Applying this quote just takes it too far in such a way that makes it completely irrelevant because technology has changed, times have changed and most importantly threats have changed.
Does this mean, most people wont be able to download music and games and films ? :frown:
Reply 49
Original post by helpmekid
Does this mean, most people wont be able to download music and games and films ? :frown:


ISPs can already monitor this information.
Original post by helpmekid
Does this mean, most people wont be able to download music and games and films ? :frown:


That's probably closer to what it will be used for.

We must stop the THREATS. The THREATS are THREATENING your safety and security. We need to monitor these THREATS by storing everything you do on a database.

Scaremongering to suit some ulterior agenda if ever I saw one.
Original post by helpmekid
Does this mean, most people wont be able to download music and games and films ? :frown:


Proxies my lad. Proxies.
Original post by The_master616
Proxies my lad. Proxies.


Sorry :frown: not techy whats a " Proxies my lad. Proxies" :confused:
Reply 54


Say goodbye soon guys, we won't be able to think for ourselves shortly :frown:
oh yeah?

Lets look at the bill for this shall we...

Data centre 1

- God knows how many TB storage
- Employees and site managers who are responsible for the operation of this centre
- Runs on a backbone available to tier 2 ISPs
- Requires expensive construction of the building itself
- These include land taxes etc
- It will involve private and public companies (BIG MISTAKE)
- Private companies know how to milk the government purse


In short, you are looking at a lot of money and this is just ONE data centre in an average size city and I doubt even that will be enough to store/handle the data for more than 200,000 people.

Then you have the Data Protection Act which still exists believe it or not!
Reply 56
Original post by Guitarded
To where, may I ask? :biggrin: The whole worlds ****ed


I was thinking some lonely island in the Mediterranean...

China, America, Spain, Greece, all flipped through my head but as you said, everything's ****ed...
Reply 57
Original post by Barden
Exactly... Why has everybody in this thread ignored the part that says that police will need a warrant to view such data?


Because warrants are so hard to get hold of nowadays :rolleyes: takes them ages to get one printed off by the court clerk. Not like it has to be signed by an actual judge or anything anymore. What makes you think they'll bother getting warrants anyway when the information is right there in front of them?
Reply 58
Original post by helpmekid
Does this mean, most people wont be able to download music and games and films ? :frown:


downloading music and films is legal.
Original post by Stefan1991
Because warrants are so hard to get hold of nowadays :rolleyes: takes them ages to get one printed off by the court clerk. Not like it has to be signed by an actual judge or anything anymore. What makes you think they'll bother getting warrants anyway when the information is right there in front of them?


If things are as bad as you say, then this is a mere drop in the ocean surely?

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