The Labour Government has now published, without bothering to consult the general public, its first public UK Cyber Security Strategy …

Some obvious Spy Blog questions:

Does either the Office of Cyber Security or the Cyber Security Operations Centre

• have an elected Cabinet Minister directly responsible for it, and democratically accountable for its failures (or, in theory, responsible for its successes) ?
• have even a junior elected Minister directly responsible for it, and democratically accountable for its failures (or, in theory, responsible for its successes) ?
• have even a senior Civil Servant of Permanent Secretary rank directly responsible for it, and professionally accountable for its failures (or, in theory, responsible for its successes) ?
• have any independent budget to spend on Cyber Security ? If so, then how much ?
• replace any of the other existing bureaucratic agencies, offices, departments, quangos, non-departmental government bodies etc, ?
• have any planned strong statutory legal enforcement powers i.e. criminal prosecutions with fines and or prison sentences ?
• have any planned weak statutory legal enforcement powers e.g. like the Information Commissioner ?
• have the power to cancel or amend Government IT projects and IT contracts if they are fail the Cyber Security standards ?
• have the power to cancel or amend Government IT projects and IT contracts if they fail the Privacy and Liberty Proportionality criteria ?
• be easily and securely contactable by the general public via secure SSL/ TLS encrypted web response forms, or PGP encrypted emails or by (freephone) telephone ?
• be easily and securely contactable by the people who look after Critical National Infrastructure systems via secure SSL/ TLS encrypted web response forms, or PGP encrypted emails or by (freephone) telephone ?
• be easily and securely contactable by the general public or by Critical National Infrastructure people, most of whom work in the private sector, 24hours a day, 7days a week, including holidays ?

If, as we suspect, the answers to most of these questions is “no”, then this UK Cyber Security Strategy is worse than useless, and is just some more Must Be Seen To Be Doing Something political propaganda.

Source: Spy Blog

The European Commission is to investigate whether or not people have the right to disappear from the ever-more pervasive digital networks that surround them.

The Commission has expressed concern about the privacy implications of personally-identifying technologies such as radio frequency identification (RFID) chips. It said that it is important to discuss whether or not people should be able to disappear from networks.

Source: Out-law.com

Lord Carter is cross. The communications minister believes those who condemned the groundbreaking final report on Digital Britain he unveiled last week have simply not read it. Billed as the most comprehensive review of the country’s media and communications landscape for years, the report, which took eight months to compile, was widely dismissed as a lost opportunity resulting merely in a tax on telephone lines and a huge row with the BBC.

Source: guardian.co.uk

British ISPs will be required to cut illegal file sharing on their networks by 70% within a year under new powers set to be given to the communications regulator Ofcom, the Digital Britain report says.

The government will empower Ofcom to demand that ISPs collect data about alleged infringers of online rights – by downloading or uploading content without permission – and to notify them that their conduct is unlawful. Persistent infringers could see their details passed on to rights holders – principally music and film companies, but also games and software companies – which could sue them in court.

Source: guardian.co.uk

Culture secretary Ben Bradshaw has been outlining the main strands of the Digital Britain report in parliament.

It includes a “small levy” on all fixed telephone lines to establish a national fund for next generation broadband.

The government will legislate to curb unlawful peer to peer file-sharing with regulator Ofcom given new powers.

Source: BBC News

Teenagers who share music files could be criminalised under plans for a new ‘Rights Agency’ to target internet pirates to be unveiled in the landmark Digital Britain report.

The white paper to be launched by Ben Bradshaw, the Culture Secretary, will map out the future of the country’s creative and communications industries, which contribute £52 billion to the UK.

It is expected to include legislation to force internet service providers (ISPs) to help prosecute people illegally copying and sharing music and films over the internet.

Source: Telegraph.co.uk

Lord Carter’s Digital Britain review has been the most comprehensive examination of the media and telecoms landscape in the UK in recent memory. Its impact will reverberate across the industry for some time – regardless of how long the communications minister himself remains in government.

January’s interim report set out five objectives: upgrading and modernising the UK’s digital networks; encouraging investment in the digital economy; ensuring “UK content for UK users”; providing access for all to new digital technologies; and developing the skills needed to enable widespread take-up of public services online.

It also had 22 so-called action points; Carter’s final report tomorrow will have twice that number, spanning everything from digital literacy and protecting children on the internet, to solving Channel 4’s funding crisis and combating online piracy. Here are some of the main areas …

Source: guardian.co.uk

Every five years the EU adopts a five-year plan for justice and home affairs affecting many areas of EU citizens’ civil liberties – policing, immigration and asylum, criminal law, databases and data protection. The Tampere programme (2000-2004) was followed by the Hague programme[pdf] (2005-2009), which included the commitment to bring in biometric passports and ID cards, and a new programme will be adopted in Stockholm in December.

Source: guardian.co.uk

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. … The £1 billion snooping project - called Mastering the Internet (MTI) - will rely on thousands of “black box” probes being covertly inserted across online infrastructure. … Jacqui Smith announced that she was ditching controversial plans for a single “big brother” database … 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.

Source: The Times
Also more info from The Register

The Home Secretary today makes a delayed announcement of a consultation on proposals for the so-called Intercept Modernisation Programme. It has been widely reported for some months, and plans were acknowledged by Lord West the security minister last week, that this would place Home Office ‘probes’ in the datacentres of every British internet provider at an estimated cost of £12 billion.

This would allow direct skimming of all traffic, making it massively easier to intercept email and monitor individual’s web use using existing powers. The Home Office would become a clearing-house, able to provide data ad lib to other government agencies. It would also become possible for the first time to collect and store details of all communications by everyone in the country so that government agencies could investigate friendship networks and personal habits using data-mining techniques.

Guy Herbert, General Secretary of NO2ID said:

‘Just a week after the Home Secretary announced a public consultation on some trivial trimming of local authority surveillance, we have this: a proposal for powers more intrusive than any police state in history.

‘Ministers are making a distinction between content and communications data into sound-bite of the year. But it is spurious. Officials from dozens of departments and quangos could know what you read online, and who all your friends are, who you emailed, when, and where you were when you did so - all without a warrant. Tracking your your every move is more efficiently creepy than reading your letters.’

Source:NO2ID Press Release