FW: [Apc-euroir-ws] "RIP Act" could result in massive surveillance -- BBC

[Caspar Bowden]

> In article <002d01c1372a$5ebca520$5100a8c0@aki>, Caspar=20
> Bowden <cb@fipr.org> writes
>=20
> >> Richard Clayton
>=20
> >> ISPs pass their traffic over telco wires, which are
> >> agglomerated into a small number of physical cables. If=20
> >> you've got the mythical kit=20
> >
> >So you don't think GCHQ doesn't/isn't planning to have that ability ?
>=20
> Doubtless they write imaginative budget proposals (and hope=20
> that Moore's Law keeps up with transmission capacities) just=20
> like everyone else...

Well NSA is pretty bullish. Read "Body of Secrets" (James Bamford) ?
=20
> > So
> >what was Bassam talking about ?
>=20
> It might be hard to be sure without access to the briefing=20
> notes that he sometimes seemed to stray from.

When I said "talking" I was of course referring to "his" letter.
Ministers who get into deep water in debate are supposed to use this
device so that the letter can be drafted by officials.=20

> I think that underlying much of his responses there was some=20
> concern not to block off any avenues; which was not to say=20
> that it was practical to wander up and down their pavements=20
> in the near future.

One might as well say that they chucked in Pt.III not because they
intended to use it, but thought it might be nice to keep that option
open.

> I think you (and indeed people at GCHQ) seriously=20
> underestimate the amount of data that is currently flowing=20
> through ISP networks and quite how much bandwidth is flowing=20
> from one network to another.

Refer you to Bamford again - it's clear the selectivity is what they are
after, and the more fine-grained and local you can do the filtering,
allows you to be more selective than you could be amongst that torrent
of aggregrated data. You're making my case for me.=20
=20
> ... it is not necessarily true that it is cheaper to place=20
> kit in <n> different places in order to choose which=20
> particular link you wish to monitor today.

Yes it is necessarily true, because price/performance increases with
absolute performance. That's as true of Concorde as it is really big
supercomputers. It's just completeley obvious that GCHQ would get better
selectivity cheaper by processing locally at ISPs and shunting the
result around, than (trying to) shunt everything to Cheltenham (or
Menworth or wherever) for processing once it's all been mixed together
(never mind the allure of getting access to S.16(3) traffic which
otherwise might never leave LINX).

--
Caspar =
Bowden=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=A0=
=A0=A0=A0 www.fipr.org
Director, Foundation for Information Policy Research
Tel: +44(0)20 7354 2333=20

=20