Begin forwarded message:
> From: dasg...@aol.com > Date: July 22, 2010 6:06:28 PM PDT > To: ramille...@aol.com > Cc: ema...@aol.com, j...@aol.com, jim6...@cwnet.com, christian.r...@gmail.com > Subject: Orwell's Nightmare of "Big Brother" Already Reality in England > > And consider the Washington Post series on our own MUCH LARGER > surveillance infrastructure ... > > Jacqui Smith's secret plan to carry on snooping > The home secretary vowed to scrap a ‘Big Brother’ database, but a bid to spy > on us all continues > > The (London) Sunday Times, May 3, 2009 > David Leppard and Chris Williams > http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/politics/article6211101.ece > Spy chiefs are pressing ahead with secret plans to monitor all internet use > and telephone calls in Britain despite an announcement by Jacqui Smith, the > home secretary, of a ministerial climbdown over public surveillance. > > GCHQ, the government’s eavesdropping centre, is developing classified > technology to intercept and monitor all e-mails, website visits and social > networking sessions in Britain. The agency will also be able to track > telephone calls made over the internet, as well as all phone calls to land > lines and mobiles. > > The £1 billion snooping project — called Mastering the Internet (MTI) — will > rely on thousands of “black box” probes being covertly inserted across online > infrastructure. > > The top-secret programme began to be implemented last year <in 2008!>, but > its existence has been inadvertently disclosed through a GCHQ job > advertisement carried in the computer trade press. > > Last week, in what appeared to be a concession to privacy campaigners, Smith > announced that she was ditching controversial plans for a single “big > brother” database to store centrally all communications data in Britain. To > grab favourable headlines, Smith announced that up to £2 billion of public > money would instead be spent helping private internet and telephone companies > to retain information for up to 12 months in separate databases. > > However, she failed to mention that substantial additional sums — amounting > to more than £1 billion over three years — had already been allocated to GCHQ > for its MTI programme. > > Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, said Smith’s announcement appeared to > be a “smokescreen”. > > “We opposed the big brother database because it gave the state direct access > to everybody’s communications. But this network of black boxes achieves the > same thing via the back door,” Chakrabarti said. > > Informed sources have revealed that a £200m contract has been awarded to > Lockheed Martin, the American defence giant. > > A second contract was given to Detica, the British IT firm which has close > ties to the intelligence agencies. > > The sources said Iain Lobban, the GCHQ director, is overseeing the > construction of a massive new complex inside the agency’s “doughnut” > headquarters on the outskirts of Cheltenham, Gloucestershire. > > A huge room of super-computers will help the agency to monitor — and record — > data passing through black-box probes placed at critical traffic junctions > with internet service providers and telephone companies, allowing GCHQ to spy > at will. > > An industry insider, who has been briefed on GCHQ’s plans, said he could not > discuss the programme because he had signed the Official Secrets Act. > However, he admitted that the project would mark a [quantum leap] in the > agency’s powers of surveillance. > > At the moment the agency is able to use probes to monitor the content of > calls and e-mails sent by specific individuals who are the subject of police > or security service investigations. > > Every interception must be authorised by a warrant signed by the home > secretary or a minister of equivalent rank. > > The new GCHQ internet-monitoring network will shift the focus of the > surveillance state away from a few hundred targeted people to everyone in the > UK. > > “Although the paper [work] does not say it, its clear implication is that > those kinds of probes should be extended to cover the entire population for > the purposes of monitoring communications data,” said the industry source. > > GCHQ placed an advertisement in the specialist IT press for a head of major > contracts to be given “operational responsibility for the ‘Mastering the > Internet’ (MTI) contract”. The senior official, to be paid an annual salary > of up to £100,000, would lead the procurement of the hardware and the > analysis tools needed to build and run the system. > > Ministers have said they do not intend to snoop on the actual content of > e-mails or telephone calls. The monitoring will instead focus on who an > individual is communicating with or which websites and chat rooms they are > visiting. > > Advocates of the black-box system say it is essential if the authorities are > to keep pace with the communications revolution. They say terrorists are > stateless, highly mobile and their communications are difficult to detect > among the billions of pieces of data passing through the internet. > > Last year about 14% of telephone calls were made using voice over internet > protocol (Voip) systems such as Skype. A report by a group of privy > counsellors predicts that most calls will be made via the internet within > five years. GCHQ said it did not want to discuss how the data it gathered > would be used. >
