FC: More on Senate votes for warrantless taps -- the U.K. experience

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

Previous message:

"Senate votes to permit warrantless Net-wiretaps, Carnivore use"
http://www.politechbot.com/p-02511.html

**********

From: "Caspar Bowden" <cb () fipr org>
To: <declan () wired com>, "'Ukcrypto'" <ukcrypto () chiark greenend org uk>
Subject: RE: Senate votes to permit warrantless Net-wiretaps, Carnivore use
Date: Sat, 15 Sep 2001 00:34:00 +0100

> http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,46852,00.html
> Senate OKs FBI Net Spying
> By Declan McCullagh (declan () wired com)
> 12:55 p.m. Sep. 14, 2001 PDT
>
> WASHINGTON -- FBI agents soon may be able to spy on Internet users
> legally without a court order.
>
> On Thursday evening, two days after the worst terrorist attack in U.S.
> history, the Senate approved the "Combating Terrorism Act of 2001,"
> which enhances police wiretap powers and permits monitoring in more
> situations....

(snip)

> Warrantless surveillance appears to be limited to the
> addresses of websites visited, the names and addresses of
> e-mail correspondents, and so on, and is not intended to
> include the contents of communications. But the legislation
> would cover URLs, which include information such as what Web
> pages you're visiting and what terms you type in when
> visiting search engines.

Declan,

Politech readers might be interested that there was an eloquent and
substantial debate about search engine parameters and individual web
pages in the analogous portions of the British RIP Act.

See
http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/ld199900/ldhansrd/vo000612/text/00612-21.htm

And
http://www.parliament.the-stationery-office.co.uk/pa/ld199900/ldhansrd/vo000619/text/00619-28.htm

Circumstances obviously not comparable, but FYI - because of the
attention focussed on this issue, RIP traffic data definition was
amended after major climbdown so that it excluded these:

"traffic data ... includes data identifying a computer file or computer
program access to which is obtained, or which is run, by means of the
communication to the extent only that the file or program is identified
by reference to the apparatus in which it is stored."
RIP Act S.21(6)
http://www.hmso.gov.uk/acts/acts2000/00023--c.htm#21

(...unless our new Home Secretary is cooking up a way to rectify *that*)
--
Caspar Bowden                           www.fipr.org
Director, Foundation for Information Policy Research
Tel: +44(0)20 7354 2333

-----Original Message-----
Sent: 22 June 2000 09:28
Subject: ComputerWeekly 22/6/2000: "Government forced to rewrite RIP
definitions"
(dead URL, search www.cw360.com)
http://www.computerweekly.co.uk/cwarchive/news/20000622/cwcontainer.asp?
name
=C2.HTML&SubSection=1
Government forced to rewrite RIP definitions
John Riley

The Government admitted this week that its definition of "communications
data", which underpins its controversial Regulation of Investigatory
Powers
(RIP) Bill, is so flawed that it will have to be rewritten.

Government spokesman Lord Bassam said he will be taking into account the
industry's views in coming up with a new definition.

However, despite this last minute climb-down, Lord Bassam refused to say
whether the intent of the new definition would exclude search engine
requests and logs of individual Web pages from being intercepted without
a warrant.

"It was not clear from what the minister said whether Web sites that
people consult and follow through are intended to be included in the new
definition. We shall have to wait for the report stage to find out,"
said Conservative spokesman Lord Cope.

This means that the RIPBill could still require IT departments to hand
over encryption keys to law enforcement agencies, without informing
company directors - a practice that could breach commercial
confidentiality.

Bassam, speaking in the committee stage of the Bill, also refused to
deny that the use of black boxes to acquire communications data directly
and without the knowledge of ISPs would be unlawful.

"It is now abundantly clear that the Government is making this Bill up
as it goes along," said Caspar Bowden, director of the Foundation for
Information Policy Research. "The consequences for the Internet industry
and e-commerce for Britain will be apocalyptic unless these incompetents
are stopped," he added.

Next week sees more discussion of the Bill, which has gone through its
third reading in the Commons. The Bill goes into the report stage in
about three weeks, at which point the Government will have to compromise
or bounce the Bill back to the Commons.

The RIP Bill has been roundly criticised by all sectors of industry,
which fears that it threatens to undo the Labour government's policy to
make the UK the best place in the world to do e-business.




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