UK Minister: British Cabinet Was Told Nothing About GCHQ/NSA Spying Programs 85
dryriver writes "From the Guardian: 'Cabinet ministers and members of the national security council were told nothing about the existence and scale of the vast data-gathering programs run by British and American intelligence agencies, a former member of the government has revealed. Chris Huhne, who was in the cabinet for two years until 2012, said ministers were in "utter ignorance" of the two biggest covert operations, Prism and Tempora. The former Liberal Democrat MP admitted he was shocked and mystified by the surveillance capabilities disclosed by the Guardian from files leaked by the whistleblower Edward Snowden. "The revelations put a giant question mark into the middle of our surveillance state," he said. "The state should not feel itself entitled to know, see and memorize everything that the private citizen communicates. The state is our servant." Huhne also questioned whether the Home Office had deliberately misled parliament about the need for the communications data bill when GCHQ, the government's eavesdropping headquarters, already had remarkable and extensive snooping capabilities. He said this lack of information and accountability showed "the supervisory arrangements for our intelligence services need as much updating as their bugging techniques."'"
Graft, money. (Score:5, Insightful)
There's a reason these programs are kept secret (along with their budgets) from the general "civilian" government. It's because they're huge money pits. They're pork. Free money for security services contractors. It's not some boogeyman new world order shadow conspiracy for power.
It's a much, much, older and familiar monster. Greed.
Re:I'm shocked, shocked (Score:5, Insightful)
His own reputation might be less than exemplary at this point, but I don't see that his ministerial position was particularly relevant here. Any MP, minister or otherwise, is the highest directly elected representative of their constituents in our government system. As a basic principle of representative democracy, it seems very dubious to me that anything like this should be "off limits" to someone in that position, or to people in that position acting collectively by asking questions in Parliament. I can accept reasonable arguments for keeping the specifics of individual cases or ongoing operations on a need-to-know basis and not routinely disclosing them to a few hundred MPs, but not the underlying principles and the existence of systemic practices.
The easier path (Score:4, Insightful)
It's always easier to get forgiveness than it is to get permission.
Step 1) Run a secret, illegal surveillance program with no oversight
Step 2) When a terrorist attack is averted, locate actionable intelligence about it within the data previously gathered
Step 3) If and when the public face of the government (those little people who have to stand for elections) finds out about your secret, illegal surveillance program, show them the data from Step 2 and claim the attack would have succeeded without your secret, illegal surveillance program
Step 4) Accept some toothless, ineffective oversight measures and continue as you were
There's nothing complicated about any of this. Ignorant legislators behave like frightened masses of people when you frighten them. They'll do anything they're told to do by anyone who projects authority and control over a scary situation. Whether it's impending market collapse, terrorist attacks, or the next killer plague, frightened masses will let you do just about anything you want if you promise to keep them safe and convince them you can do it.
This is the ultimate flaw in every system of government.
Re:Graft, money. (Score:5, Insightful)
There's a reason these programs are kept secret (along with their budgets) from the general "civilian" government. It's because they're huge money pits. They're pork. Free money for security services contractors. It's not some boogeyman new world order shadow conspiracy for power.
It's a much, much, older and familiar monster. Greed.
Funny, no one has suggested a new world order shadow conspiracy for power.
While all this surveillance is partly about money, that's not the whole of it (as I suspect you already know). Knowledge is power. These surveillance powers have already been used to conduct industrial espionage, intimidate political activists, blackmail public office holders and to provide secret evidence in criminal cases (mostly related to the drug war). All of these things are beneficial to the powers that be. In short these powers are used by the existing power structures to increase and enhance their power. This is why they are kept secret even from the people supposedly providing oversight.
I agree that this is a huge money train for all kinds of defense and other government contractors, and their stakeholders in office. But it's also about increasing power. So it might not be a "new world order shadow conspiracy", but the result is not too far off from that.