Comment: Big brother's little secrets

By Stewart Mitchell

Posted on 19 Aug 2002 at 14:48

Government monitoring through technology gets a lot of flack, but should it be dismissed out of hand?

The problem with big brothers is that when they get involved, they're bullies. When they take a back seat, they're aloof and superior. Whether you're getting told not to play near the road, being 'grassed up' to mum or simply walked to school, you end up wishing they'd back off - at least until you need them to help you out in a playground punch-up.

The government, with its ability to reach into our lives, has a similarly omnipotent presence along with Orwellian overtones as it attempts to partner technology with law enforcement. Whether it's speed cameras, closed-circuit TV monitoring or mobile phone licensing issues, the government's flirtations with control technologies have proved anything but popular.

Nowhere is this more evident than in electronic surveillance legislation like the Regulation of Investigatory Powers (RIP) Act. Designed to give government officials access to public telephone, email and Internet records, the Act was launched more than a year ago, but the government, perhaps acting with post 11 September motivations, recently tried to extend those powers to include more governmental departments, quangos and local councils.

At present, only the police, intelligence services, Inland Revenue and Customs and Excise are allowed access to your records - and then only with strict controls. The proposed powers would have trampled those controls and enabled anyone with a passing interest to access detailed personal information on individuals.

Understandably, there was uproar from the Internet fraternity and civil rights campaigners, and eventually the debate was postponed until later this year, although many think it will be shelved permanently. Most IT users are rightly happy about this.

Home secretary David Blunkett said he'd been forced to rethink after listening to advice from his son. Despite images of a six-year-old influencing the home secretary's decision-making, it turns out said progeny is a twentysomething computer professional, who told Blunkett he'd be unable to do his job properly were the RIP powers extended.

Public pressure also played a part, but one might question the motivations behind the initial proposals. It wouldn't be hard to argue that the government's enthusiasm was based on developments across the Atlantic.

It may have escaped the notice of many, but the US government has just announced legislations that - wait for it - allow government departments to snoop on emails, phone and Internet records with impunity. No longer do officials have to prove 'reasonable suspicion' that subjects are involved in terrorism, or even minor traffic offences. Surveillance for the sake of it is acceptable.

The FBI has been given back the powers that were stripped in the wake of former FBI boss J Edgar Hoover's death, when it was revealed how these powers had been abused. High-profile politicians and public figures had been tapped, with little or no apparent reason. The consequences led to stricter controls and a weakening of the US intelligence-gathering machine.

Television interviews with John Doe on the streets of LA and New York suggest Americans are unperturbed by this potential invasion of privacy, saying they'd happily live without those rights if the changes protected against the threat of terrorism, and it's hard to criticise the sentiment.

But this, at least in part, is due to the Americans' greater acceptance of state intervention. In a country where alcohol sales to under-21s is illegal, US nationals have long had to carry photo ID just to buy a beer, even if such IDs were easy to fake.