Private Security Industry Bill - latest Straw outrage

[Peter Fairbrother]

Hmmm. Fire Inspectors? Public Health Inspectors? Insurance Consultants?
Independant Financial Advisors? Surveyors? Building Safety Inspectors?
Building Site Inspectors? Doctors? Vets? Psychiatrists? Psychologists?
Social Services? Gas installers? The British Safety people?  Electrical
safety regulation writers? The Policemen who go around advising people what
locks to fit? Locksmiths giving advice to customers? People who sell burglar
alarms? People who sell personal alarms? Nuclear safety people?
Green-cross-code writers? Highway code writers? Lollipop ladies?
Schoolteachers giving advice on safe sex?  Alternative health practicioners
advising people to take it easy? Drug Counsellors? Anti-smoking campaigners?
Anti-child-porn campaigners who advocate educating children about risks?
Disaster relief charities?  Fire-drill supervisors? Anti-nuclear
campaigners? Whistleblowers? Agony Aunts?  People who write safety manuals?
The people who write warning stickers? People who sell products with warning
stickers? People who put up traffic signs? Barmen who say you've had enough?
Parents warning children that fire burns? Don't eat that yellow snow?

Ross for warning us? Anybody warning anybody about anything?

(I haven't read the bill)

Peter


> Ross Anderson at Ross.Anderson@cl.cam.ac.uk wrote:

> 
> If this bill passes, you will need a licence from the Home Office
> to consult on information security or cryptography. It introduces
> controls on `the giving of advice about the taking of security
> precautions in relation to any risk to property or to the person'
> (schedule 2, part 1, 5 (1) b).
> 
> There are exemptions for lawyers, accountants and management
> consultants. There's even a training exemption that might be
> interpreted as a get-out for academics teaching security courses.
> But there is no exemption for the ordinary systems analyst who has
> to specify information protection mechanisms as part of his job.
> (The directors of his company can go to jail, too.)
> 
> Some parts of the Bill have exemptions for journalists (e.g., the
> part on private eyes, schedule 2, part 1, 4). However, the part
> that deals with security consulting has no such exemption. SO even
> if material is destined for publication - newspaper articles,
> postings to ukcrypto, my next security book - it seems that the
> author may need to get a licence, if the bill is interpreted as
> meaning what it says.
> 
> Help may be at hand, though. The Home Secretary can change the
> schedules `for the purpose of adding or excluding any such
> activities as he thinks fit'. So perhaps IT people can all write
> to him and ask politely not to have to pay dues to his latest
> quango.
> 
> This bill was advertised as a means of licensing wheel-clampers,
> nightclub bouncers and private eyes. Nobody seems to have paid it
> much attention. My informant tells me that it's now cleared the
> Lords and if it isn't stopped in the commons, it could be law
> before the election
> 
> Ross
> 
>