Telegraph article on RIP

[Ian Batten]

On 06 Jun 08, at 1354, David Hansen wrote:

>>
>> How do you think trading standards operated before RIPA?
>
> Presumably they asked British Uselesscom, providing them with enough
> information to justify release of the information.

Precisely.  But that process was informal, unaudited and we have no  
way of knowing if it was used once a minute or once a year.

> Did council officials ever stalk families and make detailed notes on
> children (notes which are probably illegal under all sorts of "child
> protection" laws and would probably land someone outside the tent in
> prison)? I doubt it.

But you have absolutely no way to know one way or the other.  There  
would have been no regulatory framework.  I'm aware locally of several  
admissions disputes of the late 90s in which precisely which house  
from several the child was living in: who knows by what mechanism they  
were ultimately resolved?

Which is better: a translucent (I won't go so far as to say  
transparent) process, or one which is entirely opaque.  You claim that  
the translucent process has increased the incidence over the opaque: I  
don't see how anyone can know that, and even if they do, it's not  
entirely obvious that 2X auditable events are worse than 1X secret ones.

ian