7
ISSUES: Privacy
Chapter 1: What is privacy?
concerns and dangers. Other articles
about what the IPBill means have been
published by
The
Guardian
,
the Verge
,
Wired
, or
Computer World
among many
others.
You can help ensure that your
communications
are
technically
protected
by
practicing
good
operational security – and teaching
others how to do this. There are great
guides out there to get yourself up to
speed or help double check what is
good practice.
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The above information is reprinted
with kind permission from Don’t
Spy On Us. Please visit www.
dontspyonus.org.uk for further
information.
© Don’t Spy On Us 2017
What is the Snooper’s
Charter and should you be
worried? Here’s everything
you need to know
The Investigatory Powers Bill will be signed into UK law
later this year, but what is it?
By Jason Murdock
T
he Investigatory Powers Bill –
dubbed the Snooper’s Charter
by critics – will be signed into
UK law by the end of 2016. It will
enhance the spying powers open
to police, intelligence agencies and
public bodies and will provide strong
legal backing for “bulk” collection
(and hacking) of communications.
That means metadata about your
phone calls, text messages, Internet
browsing histories, voice-call records
and social media conversations
will be stored by communications
providers for at least 12 months and
handed over to law enforcement and
security services upon request.
It also will result in bulk interception
of communications, bulk hacking
and the collection of bulk personal
datasets being given legal backing.
Essentially, it legalises the slew of spy
programs that have been used by
GCHQ, MI5 and MI6 for years without
parliamentary oversight.
The proposals, spearheaded by
current UK Prime Minister Theresa
May, aim to bring together a
number of separate and outdated
laws – including the Regulation of
Investigatory Powers Act and the
Telecommunications Act 1984 –
under one piece of central legislation.
Yet the proposals have been roundly
criticised by technology firms, human
rights groups and even internal
government groups. The UK’s own
Intelligence Committee said the
Bill was rushed and lacked clarity.
The Open Rights Group said the
proposals were “draconian”. Privacy
International said it signified a “grim
watershed moment” for personal
privacy.
Bulk collection and
interception
One of the most shocking aspects
of the Snowden disclosures from
2013 was the sheer amount of
information being collected in bulk
by security agencies, including the
National Security Agency (NSA)
and Government Communications
Headquarters (GCHQ). Outed spy
programs, including Prism, XKeyscore
and Tempora, we discovered, allow
spies to sift through vast amounts of
communications data.
The Investigatory Powers Bill aims to
legalise most of this bulk collection of
phone records, web data and personal
messages − be it email or text. In each
case, “metadata” will be retained – this
is the “who, when, where and how”
info of a communication but not its
content.
The Bill features both bulk interception
and
bulk
collection.
The
first
involves “intercepting international
communications as they travel across
networks” and the second is data that
is “obtained from communications
service providers”.
If the collection of metadata and not
content appears to be a welcome
compromise, think again. Metadata
“can reveal a lotmoreabout thecontent
of your calls than the Government is
implying,” the Electronic Freedom
Foundation (EFF) claims, adding that
it “provides enough context to know
some of the most intimate details of
your lives”.
Internet records
The collection of Internet data –
Internet connection records (ICRs)
in the Bill – will be opened up to the
