UK Government To Monitor All Internet Use 446
nk497 writes "The UK government has further detailed plans to track all communications — mobile phone calls, text messages, email and browser sessions — in the fight against terrorism, pedophiles and organized crime. The government said it's not looking to see what you're saying, just to whom and when and how. Contrary to previous plans to keep it all in a massive database, it will now let ISPs and telecoms firms store the data themselves, and access it when it feels it needs it." And to clarify this,
Barence writes "The UK Government has dropped plans to create a massive database of all internet communications, following stern criticism from privacy advocates. Instead the Government wants ISPs and mobile phone companies to retain details of mobile phone calls, emails and internet sites visited. As with the original scheme, the actual content of the phone calls and messages won't be recorded, just the dates, duration and location/IP address of messages sent. The security services would then have to apply to the ISP or telecoms company to have the data released. The new proposals would also require ISPs to retain details of communications that originated in other countries but passed over the UK's network, such as instant messages."
Porn Database (Score:5, Funny)
Re: (Score:3, Informative)
And guess whose partner/husband may have a use for such a database.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/apr/07/jacqui-smith-mps-expenses [guardian.co.uk]
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article5999287.ece [timesonline.co.uk]
Re:Foolish thought. Not enough space for that. (Score:5, Insightful)
Wholesale surveillance is not limited by good will, it's limited by technology.
Technology works for everyone (Score:5, Interesting)
While technology is becoming cheaper for them, it's becoming cheaper for us also.
If this trend of recording everything becomes a nuisance, people could have programs doing random web accesses all the time. Get address lists from spammers and make your system send fake emails at random. With enough broadband, this would create an unmanageable amount of traffic for the surveillance systems.
Making it worse, the true criminals could use steganography on top of all that. If a machine sends a million emails and browses a million websites, what kind of surveillance would find the few messages that contain hidden information?
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
I wish that were true: goodbye spambots...
Re:Technology works for everyone (Score:4, Interesting)
Webcam, lava lamp.
Re:Technology works for everyone (Score:4, Insightful)
(We would like the right to free beer, but even if we brew it at home for our own use, the government has the right to tax it, and indeed everything else.)
Re:Foolish thought. Not enough space for that. (Score:4, Insightful)
Oh, thankyouthankyouthankyou sir, you are too kind, your generosity overwhelms me. Would you like to lash me with that nice whip you have there?
Like the old saying (Score:2, Funny)
Nothing can go wrong, wrong, wrong, wrong...
1984 (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:2, Interesting)
The irony is that it was written by a Brit.
Re:1984 (Score:5, Insightful)
The irony is that it was written by a Brit.
I hope we can stay away from the temptations to localize this behavior to one country. Let's face it, it is going on pretty much everywhere now. It's just a matter of degree and how much information about it has been leaked out to the public.
Re:1984 (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:1984 (Score:5, Insightful)
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What I don't get is why mostly conservatives support this kind of thing. They don't trust the gov't to monitor banks, to manage trade, to run healthcare, etc. YET they trust it to snoop fairly?
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Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Re:1984 (Score:5, Insightful)
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
Dude, you might have been tagged Troll by the Kosdot mods who dislike any assault on the political elite, since "progressives" are the ones in power now.
and swords.... (Score:3, Informative)
I'm pretty sure quite a lot of the British elite is still due to being good at killing other people and invading their land, as much as market forces.
David Cameron is a direct descendant of William IV for example and his family got to be kings by either invading England or being invited to rule by the nobility, depending on your reading of history. "Down with the kids and the people" Dave might come over as chummy and merely rich through his ancestors financial dealings and connections to the Rothschilds bu
Re:1984 (Score:5, Insightful)
It's because what they aim to conserve is all that is parochial, small-minded and nasty. The trouble is, Britain's Labour party used to have a policy of supporting social justice. Now that has been totally abandoned, and they are dominated by raving Thatcherites. No bloody wonder the actual "Conservative" party hasn't a clue what to do to regain power - their philosophy has been entirely subsumed by their opponents.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
That's wrong. The US federal government has not allowed banks to collapse since 1933 [fdic.gov]
[citation needed]. Have you tried getting some hard data [measuringworth.com] to back this claim?
I recently gave a course on Python programming to some coworkers and used data from that site in my examples. It's weird how you can plot data of wages vs. cost of living for centuries
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Let's see, from your link, counting from 1797 until 1927, there were ten recessions in 130 years, an average of one recession every 13 years. After 1929, not counting the great depression, there were eight recessions. From 1939 until 2009, there was one recession every 8.75 years.
13 > 8.75
If you wish, count the great depression in the old system, making it 14 recessions in 142 years, 10.1 is still more than 8.75. The
Re:1984 (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually, the British writers seem to have only recently caught on. People from countries that are or have been under English rule have been aware the true character of Westminster governance for some time.
Re:1984 (Score:5, Funny)
Actually, according to our govt database, George Orwell turned over twice within an hour of this slashdot posting.
Good news for the Royal Mail (Score:2, Insightful)
So now the only method of sending data without leaving a trace is the British Postal Service. Providing they don't loose you mail of course...
Re:Good news for the Royal Mail (Score:4, Funny)
Maybe the e-snoop plan is a ploy by the postal service to boost revenues. Very clever, those Brits.
Re:Good news for the Royal Mail (Score:5, Funny)
Please, as anyone who does sorting in RM will tell you, losing stuff is damned rare.
Most mail that doesn't reach its destination is because the public is apparently too damn stupid to write a proper address.
Hell, just last week I had two letters to Dublin, United Kingdom; three to West Germany and a couple of dozen with no town or city...
Never mind the people who just make up post codes.
Re:Good news for the Royal Mail (Score:5, Funny)
I'm sorry, but if I want to write my address as "1337 Drive, Leetown, HAX X0R" simply because it sounds a lot cooler than "123 Main Steet, Liverpool", I bloody well will and it's your job to make sure it gets there!
Re: (Score:3, Funny)
int main Street?
USA-style solution: (Score:4, Insightful)
{sarcasm} It's cheaper to just waterboard the suspect rather than save all that data {/sarcasm}
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Laugh all you want but here in the US our Government can't compel us to turn over an encryption key and detain American citizens for 45 (or is it 90 now?) days without charges. And we still have our guns ;)
Re:USA-style solution: (Score:5, Insightful)
"And we still have our guns ;)"
Yeah, how's that working out for you?
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Pretty well, actually.
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Yeah, how's that working out for you?
It's working out great. Surprisingly, you can abuse your citizens to great length, so long as you leave their shiny gun toys to them, and they get keep that delusion that "if things really go bad, we're gonna revolt and overthrow the evil government". It's funny how the revolt never happens, but the theoretical possibility alone already keeps the steam vented off.
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Laugh all you want but here in the US our Government can't compel us to turn over an encryption key and detain American citizens for 45 (or is it 90 now?)
So what? 90% of what they want to know is who you communicate with and how often. Encryption won't help you much there.
Re:USA-style solution: (Score:5, Insightful)
Laugh all you want but here in the US our Government can't compel us to turn over an encryption key and detain American citizens for 45 (or is it 90 now?) days without charges.
The US can't torture prisoners either. Oh wait...
Your argument assumes the government is constrained by the laws it passes. Given that its happy to exceed those constraints at will, and is not held accountable even after the fact, even after a change in administration, its a pretty false sense of security.
And we still have our guns ;)
They will be worthless until the revolution comes. And even during a revolution you'll be relying on the military fragmenting (both to weaken the state and to arm your side). That will be far more important than your personal small arms. To put it bluntly, if the military doesn't fragment it won't be much of a revolution. (And you'll need to pray NATO/UN allies... etc, etc doesn't send additional forces to bolster the state side.)
And if you pull that gun out by yourself before the revolution you are just a criminal shooting at the police. That will just compound your problems... and you won't get much public sympathy either.
More false security.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
That's because, quite simply, British people do not consider owning firearms a right any more than we don't consider it a right to own nerve gas. And no, there is no qualitative difference between these examples, it really is just a question of scale.
Actually, yes, there is. I can defend myself using a firearm with minimal risk to my neighbors. I don't think you can make the same claim for nerve gas.
What confuses me is the fact that the 'right' to bear arms is actually enshrined in the constitution.
Because the framers suspected that eventually some jackass politician would come along and try to disarm the population for their "protection"? Because the people of the time had just fought and won a war of independence using their own firearms?
The right has no pragmatic value, and it certainly isn't morally self-evident like the 'right to clean water'. It is entirely arbitrary
Self-defense isn't a morally self-evident right?
Counterproductive (Score:4, Insightful)
When will governments figure out that pushing big brother tactics on their constituents doesnt help them find the badguys in fact all it does is make the law abiding masses paranoid and pushes the ones they are after further underground into darknets, and other more nefarious methods.
In the end the only thing this will be used for successfully is kowtowing to corporate interests and eroding the rights of citizens.
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And that's different than everything else the UK and US governments do?
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Kowtowing is the primary goal. Eroding rights makes it easier to kowtow later.
Surely you do not think this was done for the benefit of the people?
Oh, you did? Hahahahahahahahahahahahahaha
Re:Counterproductive (Score:4, Insightful)
If big brother tactics weren't pragmatically useful(albeit not for their stated purposes) they wouldn't be nearly so popular.
Re:Counterproductive (Score:5, Interesting)
Oh pffft.
In national surveys in the US, MORE THAN 50% of people subscribe to the "If I'm not doing anything illegal, what do I have to hide?" theory.
Did you know that in a recent survey, only 22% of British people surveyed could properly name the 3 countries that makes up Great Britain.
On an unmarked map, almost 90% of Americans could not identify any of Iraq, Iran and Afghanistan. 51% could not find New York State. 68% could not find Japan and 20% could not actually find the Pacific Ocean.
Sure, the number of people who are actively opposed to database surveillance has risen from 5% to 20%, but that doesn't mean the "general public" deserves anything.
I do notice the western countries with the strongest privacy laws happen to also be the countries with the highest test scores amongst kids.
Places like Finland, Belgium, New Zealand, Switzerland, Canada.... They aren't known for government surveillance or overbearing police forces.
I don't know, is this ironic? Or a result of the "liberal agenda" in these places? :-)
sorry to turn that into a political rant, but... It's just too easy.
Re: (Score:2)
doesnt help them find the badguys in fact all it does is make the law abiding masses paranoid
Except that they will never find that out, because the masses don't care, and it doesn't matter if laws are effective or not.
n the end the only thing this will be used for successfully is kowtowing to corporate interests and eroding the rights of citizens.
Which is all that matters to them.
Re:Counterproductive (Score:5, Insightful)
Where did you get the idea that this has anything to do with catching the bay guys? ^^ ;)
And why do people always equate politicians not doing what you expected with them being stupid?
I don't think they are stupid. It just looks that way, because their actions are so completely counterproductive of what they say are their goals.
Well, every person that has lived trough the change in tone before and after an election, should know not to believe one word of that.
So... if they are lying, and if they are not stupid, then why do they do this?
Simple: Everything people do, because someone has someone has something to gain from it.
Find that one, and you got your reason.
But I guess we all knew this before. :)
Encryption (Score:3, Informative)
Problem ( mostly ) solved.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
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Which part of "We're not looking inside the packets*, just where they're going to" escaped you...?
[*] Yet.
If you want safety, add a bit of extra information to the JPG files on your innocent-looking blog.
Re: (Score:2)
V for Vendetta? (Score:4, Insightful)
Yeah, yeah. I've heard the movie and book don't mesh but the overall theme is still the same: Complete access to what anyone and everyone is doing, thinking or writing.
On a related note, the following quote from Sneakers isn't too far off either:
There's a war out there, old friend. A world war. And it's not about who's got the most bullets. It's about who controls the information. What we see and hear, how we work, what we think... it's all about the information!
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A world war. And it's not about who's got the most bullets. It's about who controls the information. What we see and hear, how we work, what we think... it's all about the information!
How do you control information without bullets? "Hmm, I see you have some information there.... [cocks gun]" ;) Even in the movie the bad guys used guns....
That's probably my favorite geek movie :)
At least its for the Children!!! (Score:5, Funny)
Well, I am not going to feel safe until *everyone* is in jail. That is the only way to make sure there is not a criminal free somewheres.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Well, I am not going to feel safe until *everyone* is in jail.
I agree. Let's start with every member of the British Parliament and American Congress. I could even make a think of the children [wikipedia.org] argument to justify it.
So they want to be Big Brother (Score:4, Insightful)
But in the most incompetent way possible. Letting the ISP's store the data? So you're telling me that tracking the communications of the worlds most dangerous terrorists is so incredibly important that it can potentially be left in the hands of a 20 year old intern charged with swapping the backups tapes? Hyperbole of course, but come on, if you (the UK gov) aren't storing the data, do you really know it will be available when you need it?
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
It's not at all clear how the system is going to work either. For example, if I send an email using an overseas SMTP server, will it be intercepted by my ISP? What if I use a secure SSL connection?
The sad fact is that this kind of data is only useful for catching idiots who join the "Jihad against the UK" group on Facebook and spend all day watching Americans getting shot on YouTube. Security via things like Tor and anonymous email/IM is so easy now you can bet it's on page 1 of the Terrorist's/Paedophile's
Easy to spot (Score:2, Funny)
AC1: I'm thinking to get a new car next week
AC2: Sweet, what colour are you getting?
AC1: Dude? "colour"?
AC2: I didn't put that 'u' there...
Great (Score:5, Insightful)
I'm honestly sure who I trust less to securely maintain a database containing large amounts my of private data. The government have consistently proven themselves incapable of managing large scale IT projects, or of taking privacy seriously. On the other hand, I don't trust my ISP either - will they be prevented from outsourcing any part of the chain involved in collecting and storing this data, for example, or is my data going to be available for $1 in Delhi anytime soon? It's a lose-lose situation.
Re:Great (Score:5, Insightful)
I imagine the only way to end up with some privacy is to buy your MP's or PM's browsing history, and have The Daily Mail run it on page 1.
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In other news.... (Score:2)
You know, these stories don't shock me anymore. (Score:4, Insightful)
I no longer have any hope for Great Britain.
The country that spawned the magna carta is on an irreversible spiral into a police state.
They will continue to erode the rights of people in the name of "terrorism" and "child pornography."
And the general populace seems happy to let it happen.
Re:You know, these stories don't shock me anymore. (Score:4, Insightful)
And the Labour Party seems happy to let it happen.
Fixed that for you. I know lots of people in the UK that are aghast at what's happening.
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I agree. Loads of people in the UK are quietly sitting there agahast. Stiff upper lip and put up with it, its the British way.
Not since the poll tax riots in the 80's has anyone actually got off their asses and done anything about even the worst atrocities by the gov on the people.
I seriously can't imagine the people of absolutely any other country putting up with this crap.
The real problem is not the government, who are politicians therefore by nature are all a bunch of powergrabbing self-serving sleezy ba
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Then how does the Labour party stay in power??
Because more than 50% of the population either work for the government or collect benefits of some kind, and they only need 22% of the votes to get a majority in parliament.
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Ah. Same problem the U.S. has now fallen into. :(
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We only get a general election every five years. In the last two elections, the main opposition party have behaved like idiots. (Who the hell came up with "It's not racist to restrict immigration" - no one said it was and they made themselves look like pricks.)
Additionally, while this has been going on a while, the worst of it has been in the last few years. ID cards have fallen by the wayside as has extending the length of time someone can be held as a terrorist suspect without charge to 42 days.
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I don't think the British government is doing anything in the name of terrorism and child pornography. Well, okay, maybe terrorism...
How does it even work? (Score:4, Interesting)
Let's talk about IM. I run an XMPP server which a few of my friends use. Everyone that connects to it used TLS. If they did enough traffic analysis, they might just about be able to tell who I was talking to, but are they really expecting ISPs to correlate every packet anyone sends to that machine (which is not located on their network) and communicate this data to all other UK ISPs so that they can try to work out who I am talking to? And what happens when I talk to someone using a busy server like jabber.org or gmail.com? They see some encrypted packets going from my machine to that server (well, they don't, because my server is outside the UK, but let's pretend that they do). Then, a second or so later, they see a few million packets going out to various other people. Are they just expecting Google to turn over their logs, or do they expect the ISPs to magically work out who I am talking to be analysing every packet going everywhere?
The same applies to email. My mail server is set up to use TLS, and so most of the time they can't do deep packet inspection to learn the destination, all they know is that my machine has delivered a mail to the recipient's mail server, and that a lot of people later on have checked their mail on that machine.
It seems that this will only stop terrorists who are stupid enough to use their ISP's mail servers, which surely isn't a huge number.
We all love SPAM! (Score:3, Interesting)
Re: (Score:2)
Perhaps they only need to keep one copy of each mail and a list of who it went to.
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Need someone to write a program... (Score:3, Interesting)
Ok, someone out there needs to write a program that will randomally access web sites. It should contain a list of reprehensable sites, as well as use randomally generating site names. It should do accesses on some randomzed time schedule, not continuously. You don't want it to run often enough to significantly slow down your own browsing.
This is how you poison their database, fill it full of useless data. Go ahead, and track this!
Re:Need someone to write a program... (Score:4, Interesting)
Paranoid Linux is an operating system that assumes that its operator is under assault from the government (it was intended for use by Chinese and Syrian dissidents), and it does everything it can to keep your communications and documents a secret. It even throws up a bunch of "chaff" communications that are supposed to disguise the fact that you're doing anything covert. So while you're receiving a political message one character at a time, ParanoidLinux is pretending to surf the Web and fill in questionnaires and flirt in chat-rooms. Meanwhile, one in every five hundred characters you receive is your real message, a needle buried in a huge haystack.
translucent illusion (Score:2)
>> Contrary to previous plans to keep it all in a massive database, it will now let ISPs and telecoms firms store the data themselves, and access it when it feels it needs it."
Likely the only reason for this decision is that the government have probably just realised how much hardware and infrastructure they would need to buy in order to store, maintain and efficiently search all that info themselves. Consequently they have just pushed it off onto the ISPs/telcos instead.
It also gives a very transluce
Illegal to Photograph Cops in Britain (Score:5, Interesting)
It's recently been made illegal to photograph the police in the UK because the pictures might be useful to terrorists - it doesn't matter if you intend to use such pictures for terrorism, only that a terrorist might possibly want to have one of the pictures.
This new law has predictably led to such Kafkaesque situations like this story [wordpress.com] as reported by an actual constable there.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
So now terrorists are following tourists who take pictures of those "bobbies on bicycles, two by two" and stealing the images right out of their cameras? Why bother? Just cut the middleman and pose as a tourist yourself. And since the police presumably wear uniforms and are thus identifiable even without photos, what's the benefit?
The only benefit I can see is to police who are acting outside the law and don't want any evidence recording that.
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
Actually, its not illegal to photograph the police - only if its provably of use to terrorists (or whatever is no longer flavour of the month for our esteemed Home Secretary). However, in typical British fashion, nobody is entirely sure of what is allowed/not-allowed, and that includes many officers on the beat.
The British Journal of Photography (http://www.bjp-online.com/ - just search for police on there) is littered with cases where overzealous officers have declared taking pictures of such-and-such an o
So, make it hard (Score:2)
If everyone started connecting to many other random other services on the network all the time, you could effectively hide in the crowds. Just make sure that the connections last long enough to be meaningful. Something like a web spider that constantly probes at a specific data rate. Throw in some sophistication with regards to data transfer, repition of connnections, etc and you may be able to hide. Also, if enough people do it, it will cost the ISP much to store the information and make it irrelivant.
How about another approach (Score:2)
People have been complaining to England about human rights and liberties for hundreds and hundreds of years and they have a track record that shows they simply don't care.
Has all of their "big brother" work been effective though?
If people who wish to argue against these measures want to prevent or change where things are going, perhaps a new argument is in order. "It won't work" and "it doesn't work!"
Escaped Nazis rename Third Reich to 'New Labour' (Score:5, Interesting)
Jacqui 'Jackboots' Smith is definitely a Nazi. This moron is one of the most stupid, ignorant, and illiberal people ever to assume power in the UK (with a feeble minority, it has to be said)
New Labour have done more to dismantle the fundamental fabric of British society than any previous regime. Even the Tories under Maggie 'Madcap-Psychobitch' Thatcher never did such damage to people's fundamental rights (although she was probably more evil in other ways)
What does it mean to be British?:
- The right not to have to carry papers or ID cards
- The right to privacy, and to know that it is illegal for the state to spy on me.
- The right to protest anywhere I like, without being confined to a police cordoned area to keep me away from the war criminals and terrorists who are running this country.
- The right not to be beaten to death by the police.
- The right to be able to venomously criticise all religions, without them being granted 'special rights', just because certain religions (islam, and judaism) seem to be particularly prone to particularly psychotic levels of violence, and can't accept that their behaviour and beliefs should be scrutinised by sane people.
- The right to access to good public services, unpolluted by private sector profiteers, greedy lobbyists, and corrupt public private partnerships.
New Labour have taken all of these rights, and are consequently anti-British Enemies of The People, who have granted victory to terrorists worldwide, by curtailing the rights of our people in the name of 'fighting terrorism'.
I suspect that their attack on our rights, in reality, has much more to do with protecting the status-quo, as any terrorist can just mow down a busy street in a stolen car, if they really want to kill, without resorting to elaborate bomb plots, or mixing chemicals in the basement.
Fortunately for us, most terrorists are nearly as stupid as New Labour (they'd have to be, to be infected with religion!)
Let me be the first to say... (Score:2)
Soca (Score:2)
Oh, it must be serious then.
Why, I thought her views would only be echoed by Mr. William Jones, chairman of the "Disorderly Conducts & Petty Theft Agency"
Or maybe the "Drunkards Peeing Anywhere Watch Committee".
Or, who knows, that renowned subcommittee of PETA, the "Vigilante Agency Against Backwards Cat Petting"
Seriously, now. What's wrong people these days ?
I think we need a modern version of th
Moore's Law (Score:3, Insightful)
The government said it's not looking to see what you're saying, just to whom and when and how.
There is only one reason that a government who spies on you only spies on you a little: it's not cheap enough yet to spy on you a lot.
Re: (Score:2)
>And in other news hundreds of people dressed up as Guy Fawkes
And, the "New American Tea Party" in the US - http://newamericanteaparty.com/ [newamericanteaparty.com]
And Americans stocking up on guns and ammo: http://www.ocala.com/article/20090426/ARTICLES/904261015/1001/NEWS01?Title=Ammo-scarce-after-many-stock-up/ [ocala.com]
What could possibly be wrong with this picture?
Re:And in other news (Score:5, Insightful)
And Americans stocking up on guns and ammo:
That would end if people didn't believe that Obama and the Democratic leadership were itching to infringe on their 2nd amendment rights. Most sportsman are extremely annoyed by the run on ammo and firearms because it's driving up prices for everybody -- but it isn't going to end until some sanity comes out of Washington.
Re:And in other news (Score:5, Interesting)
That depends on the issue, doesn't it? The last eight years seemed pretty sane for gun rights -- Clinton's gun ban expired, Heller was rightfully decided, DoJ issued memos saying that the 2nd amendment protects individual rights, retired law enforcement officers can now carry in any jurisdiction, etc, etc, etc.
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Any particular right you have in mind there? I can't quite see your argument here. There's been a gradual erosion of civil liberties throughout the last decade or so, but I can't think of a single major breakthrough that led to all of the rest.
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That's because enabling corruption started more like 30 years ago [wikipedia.org] in a variety of forms.
Re:you set the precedent..... (Score:4, Insightful)
You have a short memory. I was living in England at the peak (or nadir) of Thatcher's reign, and she had everything well set on its present course.
I think his point was that even during the Thatcher years, you at least had Labour as an alternative. But when Tony Blair took control of the Labour party and sent it down it current Thatherite course, British politics effectively became varying shades of conservatism.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
First Northern Ireland, a majority of the population wants the be part of the UK a plebiscite could be held and nothing changes.
Second, why in the world would you think evicting British Muslims would stop religious fanatics to continue spreading their terror in Europe (yes the UK is part of Europe)?
With such a thought pattern I'm surprised you managed to log on.
Re: (Score:3, Insightful)
No. First, the Muslim terrorists we've had problems with mostly weren't immigrants, they were born in Britain. Second, the north of Ireland isn't a significant terrorist threat any more, since most of the terrorists are now in the regional government; a couple of splinter factions have taken to shooting people again lately, but for pra
Re:Alternate solution (Score:5, Informative)
The devil is always in the details.
1) what do you do with the 1.6 million muslims [bbc.co.uk] (most of whom are peaceful & law-abiding) who are presently living in the UK (many of whom are not first-generation)? If you just throw them out, won't that make the previously peaceful ones very angry with you?
2) what do you do with the 53% of all residents of Northern Ireland [bbc.co.uk] who are protestant (and therefore want to stay where they are)? If you just evict them, doesn't that risk starting yet *another* war in that region?
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Ya know, I can't find a thing to disagree with there. If you let your country be taken over by foreign interests, the enemies of those foreign interests become YOUR enemies as well, and voila, terrorism.
Tho considering the death toll is a lot higher from ordinary household and auto accidents, maybe it's time to just ban people. Problem solved! :/
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We haven't even got our bins back :(, it's not Islamic terrorists MO to put bombs in bins anyway! Also northern Ireland isn't occupied, so "giving it up" would spark up unionist terrorism, and even without the US funding the IRA got, that's still a lot of trouble.
Re: (Score:2)
Re:Alternate solution (Score:4, Insightful)
And you think group foo won't violently resist such a thing? And make the problem far far worse. And won't it make it very dangerous for British tourists to travel just about anywhere where members of group foo may live?
Re:What stops the ISPs ignoring the government? (Score:5, Informative)
That EU regulation is now used as an 'excuse' by the same British government to tell the ISP's and Telco's to retain the data.
As usual the tabloids will blame Europe.
The EU regulation does only specify some minimum requirements like 6 months retention but the UK government will no doubt go for the maximum of 24 months, that was the minimum they wanted of Europe with unlimited as an option.