Phone calls database considered

[Sweetpea]

Ministers are to consider plans for a database of electronic information holding details of every phone call and e-mail sent in the UK, it has emerged.

The plans, reported in the Times, are at an early stage and may be included in the draft Communications Bill later this year, the Home Office confirmed.
A Home Office spokesman said the data is a "crucial tool" for protecting national security and preventing crime.

BBC NEWS | UK | Phone calls database considered


Hmm! We have become the most watched society in the world, and we are to become the most listened to?

Do you think it will cover posts on forums?

Hel. They can not even keep track of dead people claiming disabled parking badges, what chance do you think they stand of monitoring MILLIONS of E-mails per day?

[poppy]

There was a 30 year old guy just recently claimed child tax allowance for 36 kids one for every year of his life and he managed 6 before he was born.
Only got caught when they sent him an extra £7,000 by mistake and he spent it.

The excuse of home security has worn so thin you cant even see t any more.
this is just plain Orwellian, and we a powerless to stop it. We cant even be sure they haven't already been doing it for years, and are just trying to make it legal before somone blows the whistle

[ambriel]

All this will result in is a big fat contract for some bunch of incompetents like EDS to spend several years developing a system that can't work and doesn't work and that will eventually be scrapped, after having consumed millions of pounds of taxpayers money.

Can you imagine the amount of data storage that would be required, just to store one month's set of telephone records, let alone a years.

And what use will it be, anyway? Any self-respecting terrorist is going to use a PAYG mobile that has been registered with false information, rather than an Orange monthly contract tied to a bank account in the name of Osama bin Laden.

As for forum posts, I've no doubt the US Secret Service analyse and log them already. It'd be a simple matter, given that all our phone lines are routed through Menwith Hill already. You just need to include a few keywords such as Echelon, Muslim, Plot, Kill, George, and Bush. Ooops!

Originally Posted by von Clausewitz

Hel. They can not even keep track of dead people claiming disabled parking badges, what chance do you think they stand of monitoring MILLIONS of E-mails per day?

maybe they want to find them?

[poppy]

Originally Posted by ambriel

All this will result in is a big fat contract for some bunch of incompetents like EDS to spend several years developing a system that can't work and doesn't work and that will eventually be scrapped, after having consumed millions of pounds of taxpayers money.

Can you imagine the amount of data storage that would be required, just to store one month's set of telephone records, let alone a years.

And what use will it be, anyway? Any self-respecting terrorist is going to use a PAYG mobile that has been registered with false information, rather than an Orange monthly contract tied to a bank account in the name of Osama bin Laden.

As for forum posts, I've no doubt the US Secret Service analyse and log them already. It'd be a simple matter, given that all our phone lines are routed through Menwith Hill already. You just need to include a few keywords such as Echelon, Muslim, Plot, Kill, George, and Bush. Ooops!

I am sure they do, as I say I think this has probably already been going on for along time anyway.

Originally Posted by ambriel

And what use will it be, anyway? Any self-respecting terrorist is going to use a PAYG mobile that has been registered with false information, rather than an Orange monthly contract tied to a bank account in the name of Osama bin Laden.

Aye. But the "Government" is relying on the fact that your basic Sun/Mail reader will not realise that.

[terrywit]

can't be arsed to do an essay,

but as mentioned RAF Menwith Hill snoops on electronic traffic anyway....

Pay you Go mobiles can be traced via triangulation & top up (IP addy, Debit / Credit Card or store)

Recall the black kid who got stabbed either taylor or lawerance where the court revealed defendant phone mobile records said the handset where miles away on some bridge?

also london bombing reports of mobile networks down? if I recall right (switched of for a reason)

[ambriel]

Originally Posted by terrywit

also london bombing reports of mobile networks down? if I recall right (switched of for a reason)

Not switched off, per se, just prioritised.

It used to be called the Telephone Preference Scheme (not to be confused with the anti-junk calls service).

Category 1 related to wartime and category 2 related to non-wartime emergencies. My copies are years out of date now but I'm sure the system is still in use and probably expanded.

[poppy]

when I bought my first mobile years ago, I actually read the blurb that came with it.
It stated there that the service could be with drawn for periods if needed by the MOD or the police. A longtime before 9/11 and the terrorism laws.