BBC News Online: 'Snoop' plans put on hold

[Andrew Marlow]

ukcrypto@chiark.greenend.org.uk writes:
>>"If I can start again, get a consensus, all those people who have
>>criticised now come forward with what they believe to be an
>>acceptable way forward"
>
>[snip]
>
>Part of the solution would be to limit the rights of any wider group of 
>bodies
I disagree. What has happened recently with RIPA seems to me to be
comparable to a tactic used by the US when it wants to pass a bad law.
It's called the 'good bill-bad bill' tactic. They pass an awful bill then
propose a watered down version which is still bad. People call it good
because it is good compared to the other one. What I think we have here is
a situation in which people are now basically agreeing to the premise of
RIPA and are now arguing about who should be on the list of people that
are permitted access to the information. Wholescale snooping, fishing, and
massive storage of all electronically transmitted information, however
infeasible it may be to do it, seems to have been accepted by the public,
thanks to the 'climbdown'.

IMO we should be trying to get RIPA scrapped. Just arguing about who
should be on the list is admitting that RIPA is ok in principle. I don't
think it is.

-Andrew Marlow.