Immediate 5th June 2013

A retired Edinburgh University Lecturer has become so frustrated with the political invisibility of the privacy problems of the Scottish Entitlement Card scheme that he has taken out a full-page ad in the Glasgow Herald to tell people about it [1].

Calling it “The Scottish Identity Card Scandal”, Dr John Welford points out that though Scots politicians opposed the UK Home Office ID scheme [2] in government they have for several years been enrolling millions of Scots in something very similar: a card to be used for a variety of official purposes, backed by a database of personal details. Anyone taking up a bus pass or Young Scot Card issued by the Scottish Government since 2006 has simply been added to the database [3]. Few will have realized.

There is some current alarm over unrelated Scottish schemes for data-sharing on citizens [4]. But the entitlement card scheme is much more open to abuse, should any future government decide to abuse it. People are waking up to threats to their privacy in a connected world.

Dr Welford says:

In fact, it’s a fully functioning Scottish identity card. And its covert and dishonest introduction has been a gross national scandal. I think it’s time at last for the Scottish people to know the truth.

Guy Herbert, General Secretary of NO2ID [5] says:

This is a classic database state scheme. It is not that the Scottish government has set out to destroy people’s privacy. It has just not bothered about any side-effects on privacy. It is time for a rethink.

-ENDS-

Notes for editors:
1) The Herald 6th June 2013 “An open letter to readers”
2) A “wasteful government folly” having “serious implications for the civil liberties of ordinary citizens”
Scottish Parliament resolution
http://www.scottish.parliament.uk/parliamentarybusiness/16468.aspx
3) “When an individual applies for a NEC they are given a ‘card-only’ Citizen’s Account […] The validation and verification process for setting up a Citizen’s Account also establishes a unique citizen reference number (UCRN). This is used to confirm the date of birth to prevent/detect duplicate or fraudulent applications and to automatically update some of the personal details on the record.”
Scottish Government answer to FOIA request
https://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/national_entitlement_card_manage
4) Eg, Scottish Express 2nd June 2013 “ID card plan to snoop on Scots”
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/404361/ID-card-plan-to-snoop-on-Scots
5) NO2ID is the UK national campaign against the database state, the tendency to try to use computers to manage society by maintaining state files on people. www.no2id.net

For further information, or for immediate or future interview, please contact:

Dr John Welford [Edinburgh] (idcardsscandal@jwelford.demon.co.uk) on
OR
Guy Herbert [London] (General Secretary, general.secretary@no2id.net) on 07956 544 308
OR
James Baker [Leeds/Manchester] (Campaigns Manager, campaigns@no2id.net) on 07817605 162

Immediate.

While highly critical of detail, the Joint Committee on the Communications Data Bill is too accepting of its central premise. No case has been made for push-button surveillance, NO2ID points out today.

The influential parliamentary committee describes Home Office evidence in numerous places as ‘misleading’ or ‘fanciful and misleading’, but its report accepts untested the motivating idea that the surveillance we already have is not too much, and not enough. Large sections encourage the expansion of data-sharing.

NO2ID points out that the question it asked at the beginning of the consultation remains unanswered. ‘What problem does it solve that cannot be handled already?’ In hundreds of hours of discussions the Home Office has not bothered to make the basic case, beyond a few cherry-picked and sensational anecdotes.

The core of the Bill is a proposal to make access to more information about everyone’s communications and internet use easier for a huge range of official purposes. By putting spy equipment into every significant communications loop, supervised not by a judge but by secret software, the ambition is to be able to collate a dossier on any citizen and his contacts at the push of a button.

NO2ID told the committee in written evidence:

It is our contention that surveillance powers as significant as the capture of communications data ought to cause the investigating authorities some time and trouble to use

Guy Herbert, General Secretary of NO2ID said today:

While we welcome the Committee’s detailed criticism, they are still too trusting. A massive increase in the Home Office’s powers needs substantial justification. While it may seem obvious to officials that giving officials more power is a Good Thing, our free society is founded on limiting their power. The case has not been made for push-button surveillance.

-ENDS-

Notes for editors:

1) http://www.parliament.uk/business/committees/committees-a-z/joint-select/draft-communications-bill/

2) NO2ID is the national campaign against the database state, the tendency to try to use computers to manage society by maintaining state files on people.

For further information, or for immediate or future interview, please contact:

Guy Herbert (General Secretary, general.secretary@no2id.net) on 07956 544 308
OR
James Baker (Campaigns Manager, campaigns@no2id.net) on 07817605 162

Immediate – 13th June 2012

It is reported that on Thursday morning (14th June) the Home Secretary will announce a ‘Communications Data Bill’, the heavily-trailed Whitehall plan to get automatic access to records of ALL online activity in the UK.

First openly proposed by the Labour administration in 2008 [1], the bizarrely secret-but-widely-canvassed programme would force internet and telephone companies to keep detailed records of all their customers’ communications, downloads and browsing, location data and contacts. In the final vision, machines and software controlled by the authorities would be live on the net at all times and have privileges to crawl through the vast masses of data collected on the public.

Campaign group NO2ID [2] has previously pointed out that this scheme is ‘leapfrogging China’ and will ensure Britain remains the most watched society on earth. [3]

This is pretended to be ‘maintaining capacity’ – but the vital difference is not just a hugely greater scope of surveillance, but that it would not be limited by the need to ask anyone for the information.

What will be maintained is the system established in 2000 where surveillance is initiated without a warrant or any kind of scrutiny of individual cases. The Surveillance Commissioners are called ‘watchdogs’ but only check the procedure by which hundreds of official bodies authorize themselves, not their justification for doing it.

Guy Herbert, General Secretary of NO2ID said:

This makes Coalition promises to ‘roll-back the database state’ laughable. A system of secret, silent, total surveillance that can be turned on and off at will: a free-for-all for every official with an itch to investigate any citizen.

If it is to stop short of tyranny, then the watchers must be brought under a real rule of law. Before talking about expanding these powers, we should establish a simple rule with judges protecting our privacy unless there is good reason to invade it: no surveillance without a warrant.’

-ENDS-

Notes for editors:

1) ‘Jacqui Smith plans broad new ‘Big Brother’ surveillance powers’ – Telegraph 15 Oct 2008
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/3202766/Jacqui-Smith-plans-broad-new-Big-Brother-surveillance-powers.html

2) NO2ID is the national campaign against the database state, the tendency to try to use computers to manage society by maintaining state files on people.

3) ‘Home Office prepares to announce total surveillance plan – NO2ID 19 Feb 2012
http://press.mu.no2id.net/2012-02/home-office-prepares-to-announce-total-surveillance-plan/
That release contains much more background information.

For further information, or for immediate or future interview, please contact:
Guy Herbert (General Secretary, general.secretary@no2id.net) on 07956 544 308 (London)
or
James Baker (Campaigns Manager, campaigns@no2id.net) on 07817 605 162 (Leeds)