Last week, the government sneaked into their Security Review a proposal to revive mass Internet surveillance.
Under the Kafka-esque title of the “Intercept Modernisation Programme”, this would mean interception of every online communication by every UK citizen, and recording who is talking to who.
Every email, website, Facebook message or chatroom message would be recorded.
If that sounds expensive and vastly difficult, then you are right. The review says the government wants to waste £2 billion despite massive cuts across vital services.
The coalition’s said they would aim to “end the storage of Internet and email records without good reason”. We need to remind them that they promised to protect our civil liberties. ORG and our friends at No2ID and Privacy International fought off these plans under Labour – we can fight them off again.
In just one day, yesterday, over 1,000 people signed our petition.
Please add your name here – and tell your friends.
Jim Killock is the Executive Director of the Open Rights Group
