The Times: Tech column - Government snoops/Edge laws/Price rip-offs
By David Rowan
You can log on to buy a passport or file a tax return, so perhaps it is not surprising that spooks are now arranging secret surveillance online. Still, it is mighty disconcerting to see how simple the process is. Technobabble has downloaded a number of Microsoft Word forms, tucked away on an unprotected Home Office web server, that government snoopers can complete to monitor British citizens under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act. Covert surveillance is now a mere click away for public bodies ranging from your local council to the Egg Marketing Inspectorate.
The IT community lobbied hard against the law, arguing that it would make it far too easy for thousands of minor officials to intercept e-mails and phone calls, and to use informants and undercover agents to spy on us. These application forms, plus the accompanying detailed Home Office guidance notes, consider everything from acquiring "confidential journalistic material" to the use of "juveniles" and "vulnerable individuals" as sources.
The public-sector news site Public Technology, which discovered the documents, says they show "the extent of possible Big Brother investigations by a wide range of publicsector organisations".
Reading them in black and white, it is easy to foresee an imminent boom in petty state surveillance.
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ISAAC NEWTON had one, as did Michael Faraday and some chap called Murphy. What if you could distil your own sharpest observation into a scientific law that would bear your name? The literary agent John Brockman recently posed the question to the scientists, thinkers and technology innovators who visit his online salon at Edge.org. Now 164 of them have replied - and their insights make for wonderful reading.
Sir John Maddox, former editor of Nature, offers an immutable law of the peer-review process: "Reviewers who are best placed to understand an author's work are the least likely to draw attention to its achievements, but are prolific sources of minor criticism, especially the identification of typos."
Then there is Devlin's First Law, from the acclaimed mathematician Keith Devlin: "In the hands of a charlatan, mathematics can be used to make a vacuous argument look impressive." (His second law: "So can PowerPoint.") But the most precise formula comes from Kai Krause, the legendary developer of graphics software.
According to Kai's Exactness Dilemma, "93.8127 per cent of all statistics are useless". And who can argue?
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AFTER last week's item about Apple's impertinent overpricing of its latest iPod - £199 in the UK, but £137 in the US - we have a campaign on our hands.
A number of readers have asked why, when the dollar exchange rate is so favourable, British consumers tolerate these absurd price differentials. Even when products can be delivered digitally, such as software, we tend to lose out.
The music industry is particularly adept at exploiting UK consumers. And if you think you can cheat by ordering CDs from overseas web retailers, the British Phonographic Industry has news for you. The record labels' lobby group is taking legal action against stores such as Play.com and CD Wow, and is investigating Amazon, for what it claims are unlawful deliveries to UK addresses. Let me know of any further examples of unfair pricing and we can put the culprits on the spot.
(The Times, January 20 2004)
You can log on to buy a passport or file a tax return, so perhaps it is not surprising that spooks are now arranging secret surveillance online. Still, it is mighty disconcerting to see how simple the process is. Technobabble has downloaded a number of Microsoft Word forms, tucked away on an unprotected Home Office web server, that government snoopers can complete to monitor British citizens under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act. Covert surveillance is now a mere click away for public bodies ranging from your local council to the Egg Marketing Inspectorate.
The IT community lobbied hard against the law, arguing that it would make it far too easy for thousands of minor officials to intercept e-mails and phone calls, and to use informants and undercover agents to spy on us. These application forms, plus the accompanying detailed Home Office guidance notes, consider everything from acquiring "confidential journalistic material" to the use of "juveniles" and "vulnerable individuals" as sources.
The public-sector news site Public Technology, which discovered the documents, says they show "the extent of possible Big Brother investigations by a wide range of publicsector organisations".
Reading them in black and white, it is easy to foresee an imminent boom in petty state surveillance.
+++
ISAAC NEWTON had one, as did Michael Faraday and some chap called Murphy. What if you could distil your own sharpest observation into a scientific law that would bear your name? The literary agent John Brockman recently posed the question to the scientists, thinkers and technology innovators who visit his online salon at Edge.org. Now 164 of them have replied - and their insights make for wonderful reading.
Sir John Maddox, former editor of Nature, offers an immutable law of the peer-review process: "Reviewers who are best placed to understand an author's work are the least likely to draw attention to its achievements, but are prolific sources of minor criticism, especially the identification of typos."
Then there is Devlin's First Law, from the acclaimed mathematician Keith Devlin: "In the hands of a charlatan, mathematics can be used to make a vacuous argument look impressive." (His second law: "So can PowerPoint.") But the most precise formula comes from Kai Krause, the legendary developer of graphics software.
According to Kai's Exactness Dilemma, "93.8127 per cent of all statistics are useless". And who can argue?
+++
AFTER last week's item about Apple's impertinent overpricing of its latest iPod - £199 in the UK, but £137 in the US - we have a campaign on our hands.
A number of readers have asked why, when the dollar exchange rate is so favourable, British consumers tolerate these absurd price differentials. Even when products can be delivered digitally, such as software, we tend to lose out.
The music industry is particularly adept at exploiting UK consumers. And if you think you can cheat by ordering CDs from overseas web retailers, the British Phonographic Industry has news for you. The record labels' lobby group is taking legal action against stores such as Play.com and CD Wow, and is investigating Amazon, for what it claims are unlawful deliveries to UK addresses. Let me know of any further examples of unfair pricing and we can put the culprits on the spot.
(The Times, January 20 2004)
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