THE Home Office has quietly adopted a new plan to allow police across Britain routinely to hack into people’s personal computers without a warrant.
The move, which follows a decision by the European Union’s council of ministers in Brussels, has angered civil liberties groups and opposition MPs. They described it as a sinister extension of the surveillance state which drives “a coach and horses” through privacy laws.
The hacking is known as “remote searching”. It allows police or MI5 officers who may be hundreds of miles away to examine covertly the hard drive of someone’s PC at his home, office or hotel room.
Under the Brussels edict, police across the EU have been given the green light to expand the implementation of a rarely used power involving warrantless intrusive surveillance of private property. The strategy will allow French, German and other EU forces to ask British officers to hack into someone’s UK computer and pass over any material gleaned.
Excuse me, but this just plain sucks!
# 14 Grimbo said, on January 4th, 2009 at 1:42 pm
Wow… I’m surprised how many people there are with things they want to hide!
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Everyone has something to hide, including you. Otherwise, please post your Social Security and credit card numbers, pictures of your wife/sister/daughter, the names of your kids and the schools they go to.
The argument that people with something to hide must therefore be criminals is ridiculous. Privacy and anonymity are crucial in a free society, even if the bad guys sometimes exploit them for their own ends.