Facebook/Twitter etc "bans"

[Roger Hayter]

In message 
<CAN2jWyjSfq4fEYjda0nj0QQr1e48vuQJJLWx029ty91p+HC2jA at mail.gmail.com>, 
Adrian Midgley <amidgley at gmail.com> writes
>On 11 August 2011 12:23, Ian Batten <igb at batten.eu.org> wrote:
>
>>> So we are working with the Police, the intelligence services and 
>>>industry to look at whether it would be right to stop people 
>>>communicating via these websites and services when we know they are 
>>>plotting violence, disorder and criminality.
>
>RIPA already gives powers at least sufficient for reading their comms.
>Surely it is more useful to read, and record, them and be inside their
>decision-action loops and able to intercept them on the ground than
>....
>
>Perhaps it was conscious disinformation.


There is already a system for the instant,  progressive, selective 
shutting out of users from the mobile phone networks.  A quoted reason 
for this is network overload, and reserving the system for officials, 
but this could have been dealt with by prioritisation rather than 
exclusion.  Equally, they have CleanFeed (or whatever) which can be used 
by BT and its downstream customers to block IP addresses, presumably 
instantly.  So they have the machinery to block both mobile and fixed 
line Internet messages.  They would no doubt find this more important in 
large political demonstrations rather than local looting where, as you 
say, it may be more useful to know where people are going.
-- 

Roger Hayter