https - hopefully not too stupid a question

[Roland Perry]

In article 
<CAEWR3ksu7bUqOUDfH3PsDXVLVzTU+BPA5dHZ-a13SFCJ3cLyMw at mail.gmail.com>, 
Francis Davey <fjmd1a at gmail.com> writes
>In fact the figures from the
>last Interception of Communications Commissioner show that less than
>2,000 requests were made in 2009 by local authorities, which suggests
>that they were not a particularly significant player in the Part II
>RIPA field anyway. Clause 11 is therefore not a particularly
>significant provision in the scheme of things.

There has been some bad PR for RIPA arising from local authorities 
"snooping" on school admissions cheats (which is, of course nothing to 
do with telecommunications data) and threatening to inspect the content 
of our bins.

I have a lot of sympathy for LAs that want to trace the "white van man" 
who is doing fly tipping, selling rancid meat at the market, or ripping 
of old age pensioners with dodgy building work [1].

Hopefully the courts will agree (under the new regime) to any requests 
for subscriber details (almost always reverse DQ on a mobile phone 
number) without wasting too much of our precious council tax in the 
process.

[1] Three non kiddy-fiddling horsemen for a change.
-- 
Roland Perry