UK Stop and Search by Police, Snoops, Teachers and Children in Your Pubs, Schools, Streets, Homes and Virtual Reality

[Deathaniel]

(04-17-2010 06:47 AM)h3rm35 Wrote:  I had an invitation to move over there a couple years ago, but the more I looked into it, the more I realized that it was more Orwellian there than it is here - I was in NY then, and I'm in SF now... I feel much better about that than I would about being in Britain. It's gotten so bad now that the person who had invited me is considering coming out here!

good so both of you can enjoy the ocean view

problem solved!

[TriWooOx]

Quote:A comedian has won compensation from the police after he was stopped and searched.

Mark Thomas, 47, was returning from a rally against the arms trade in 2007 when he was confronted by police.

He was detained for 12 minutes by officers who believed he might have been carrying weapons because of his 'overconfident attitude'.

He has been awarded £1,200 after the Metropolitan Police admitted falsely imprisoning and illegally questioning him.

A spokesman said the officer who searched him has received 'formal advice'.

Yesterday Mr Thomas said: 'If over-confidence is a reason for a stop-and-search Jonathan Ross should never leave his house.'

The Met plans to use Mr Thomas's case as an example when training officers.

Thomas plans to donate some of the money to the Miscarriages of Justice Organisation.

Late last year it was revealed Mr Thomas was among the activists whose details and photographs had been collected by police officers and passed to a central 'domestic extremism' unit for storage and analysis.

The database features people seen at public demonstrations including anti-war rallies and environmental protests.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...olice.html

[TriWooOx]

Quote:A Top-secret US unmanned drone used to locate Al Qaeda and Taliban hideouts in Pakistan and Afghanistan could soon be patrolling over British cities to search for hidden terror cells.

The controversial move would allow MI5 and GCHQ, the Government's eavesdropping centre, to step up surveillance operations over the UK. Until now, the £23million Global Hawk aircraft has not been available for foreign sale.

However, US policy has been quietly changed and Britain is now negotiating to buy the drones. America is keen to supply them for British patrols after a string of terror plots threatening the US and its citizens.

These include the attempt in 2006 to detonate liquid bombs on aircraft flying to American cities from the UK. It is not known how many drones the UK wants from manufacturer Northrop Grumman, but earlier this year a senior Ministry of Defence procurement official visited the Pentagon to begin negotiations.

Britain would not need to use the drones in Afghanistan and Pakistan because the US already provides full air coverage in the region. Instead, it is believed they will be used mainly for domestic surveillance.

The drones are also being deployed by the US Navy in the Caribbean and off the Florida coast to combat drug smuggling. In Britain, MI5 and GCHQ already use three planes based at RAF Northolt in North-West London to spy on citizens.

The three Britten-Norman Islander aircraft are all fitted with sophisticated surveillance equipment. They have been used to track down terror cells and to locate former Afghan veterans who may have returned to Britain to plot terror attacks.

The aircraft are able to identify suspects using 'voice-prints' of insurgents with British accents that were picked up by spy planes monitoring Taliban radio signals in Afghanistan.

One stumbling block is that permission from the Civil Aviation Authority would be needed to fly the drones in already congested UK airspace. Although the CAA gave the MoD permission to fly another drone over parts of Wales earlier this month, it is understood to be against regular flights because of safety fears.

However, the Global Hawk recently became the first drone to be certified by the American Federal Aviation Authority for use in civilian air corridors with no advance notice.

The drone can stay airborne for 30 hours without refuelling. Last night, MoD sources said the Global Hawk was being looked at for possible military use but any decision to buy the drone would depend on funding.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-...cells.html

[TriWooOx]

Quote:More than 5,000 security guards in London's financial district have been instructed by police to report people taking photographs, recording footage or even making sketches near buildings, the Guardian has learned.

City of London police's previously unseen advice singles out people who may appear to be "legitimate tourists" to prevent reconnaissance by al-Qaida.

The document, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, helps explain a number of recent cases in which photographers have been stopped and searched by police using section 44 of the Terrorism Act, after first being approached by security guards.

There has been concern over the misuse of section 44, which allows officers to stop and search anyone without need for suspicion in designated areas. It has been repeatedly used to question tourists, photographers and film-makers. Cases have also been documented where artists have been stopped from painting in the street.

The police advice to security guards states: "In this period of heightened alert, we must report possible reconnaissance to the police and develop a culture of challenging suspicious behaviour."

Under "examples of suspicious behaviour", the document lists people spotted in stationary vehicles watching buildings or who ask "detailed or unusual questions" about a location. It was warns about people seen "loitering at or near premises for long period" and advises guards to be alert to "overheard conversations that indicate suspicious intent".

Another category of suspicious behaviour is described as: "People using recording equipment, including camera phones, or seen making notes or sketches for no apparent reason". One line in the document, marked in bold, states: "The person you think is a legitimate tourist may be somebody else!"

There is no reference to the legal rights of photographers, or the need to treat members of the public cordially.

The advice is part of Project Griffin, a police initiative to ensure private security personnel function as their "eyes and ears" to combat crime and terrorism. Most police forces and several ports across the UK have co-opted the scheme. City of London police alone have held 67 training days under the initiative.

Both the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo) and John Yates, Britain's most senior counter-terrorism officer, have warned that police risk losing the support of the public through the inappropriate use of section 44.

Earlier this year, the European court of human rights ruled that the "arbitrary" stop and search under section 44 without suspicion was illegal.

But while many senior police officers have sought to rein-back the use of the powers by encouraging their officers to use "common sense", City of London police, which has jurisdiction of London's Square Mile, has sought to defend the action of its officers and highlight the importance of vigilance.

In December the architectural photographer, Grant Smith, was stopped while photographing the spire of Sir Christopher Wren's Christ Church. This week he was stopped again as he took images of the skyline at One Aldermanbury Square.

He said two uniformed officers detained him, one by grabbing his arms behind his back, and they refused requests to record the stop and search on his camera. On both occasions, Smith was first questioned by a security guard who asked him not to photograph a nearby building.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2010/may/13...tographers

[h3rm35]

they better be careful - they'll lose a lot of tourist money if they start publicly popping photographers.

And what's the deal with this shit anyway? since when is the government the only one who can use a fucking camera? Isn't the raping of history text-books a bad enough version of revisionism?

[kevlar]

we have been saying it is a police state for years now. you know there is nothing wrong with telling security guards to watch out for suspicious photographers, something i would think is apart of their job with out the police sending out fucking memos.

But the problem comes when they take terrorist legislation and start harassing tourists taking pictures of st pauls cathedral etc.

They write the laws so that you can get arrested taking pictures in your own back garden ffs.

[h3rm35]

The Nanny State is Using Children: EU Search Engine Snooping Mandate Sneaked Into Child Protection Declaration

June 16, 2010

in Science/Tech

(EFF) — A controversial, surreptitious proposal to compel search engines to store everything that European citizens search for on the Internet has been introduced by a few members of the European Parliament. The veiled mandatory data retention proposal was sneaked into a broader declaration called “Written Declaration 29,” which ostensibly seeks to promote the protection of children by developing an early warning system (EWS) to fight against pedophiles and sex offenders. But hidden within the text of the Declaration is obscure language mandating the storing of searches on a massive scale:

Ask the [European] Council and the [European] Commission to implement Directive 2006/24/EC and extend it to search engines in order to tackle online child pornography and sex offending rapidly and effectively.

The Directive 2006/24/EC, more widely known as the European Data Retention Directive, is an unpopular framework that compels telecommunications service providers operating in Europe to store all communications traffic data between six months and up to 2 years, for possible use by law enforcement. European Privacy officials had previously stated that “search queries themselves would be considered content rather than traffic data and the Directive would therefore not justify their retention.” But in spite of that advice, Written Declaration 29 seeks to extend data retention to search engines.

The campaign promoting Written Declaration 29 focuses only on the goal of protecting children online, and is otherwise silent on the extension of the Data Retention Directive to search engines. The successful hiding of this controversial provision is likely what led 324 European Parliamentarians to sign the Declaration, coming close to the 369 member signatures that it would take for the Written Declaration to be adopted as an official position of the European Parliament.

But when Cecilia Wikström, a member of the European Parliament, learned that the Declaration, in fact, seeks to violate EU citizens’ search privacy by extending the Data Retention Directive to search engines; she publicly withdrew her support, and boldly spoke out against the proposal, seeking to clarify any possible misunderstandings for her colleagues:

Both of the two e-mails sent to [Members of the European Parliament] focused on the early warning system and neither mentioned the Data Retention Directive. The website set up to support the written declaration also does not mention Data Retention, at least not in an obvious way. Even the written declaration itself does not mention the Directive by name, but only refers to its reference number.

Parliamentarian Wikström also said:

The Written Declaration is supposed to be about an early-warning system for the protection of children. Long-term storage of citizens’ data has clearly nothing to do with ‘early warning’ for any purpose. The ‘data preservation’ system established by the Council of Europe Cybercrime Convention was designed specifically for cases requiring urgent preservation of data in relation to ongoing investigations.

In the last few days, several members of the European Parliament have already withdrawn their signatures. Written Declaration 29 is well-intended, however, the blanket surveillance proposal completely undermines the campaign to protect children. No measures should be implemented that cause damage to other human rights. If you live in the EU and want to help prevent search engine surveillance, visit the We Rebuild “Smile 29″ campaign page for instructions on how to contact your member of the European Parliament.

[prisma]

These people always try to use childrens safety as a vehicle for intrusive legislation. In reality proposals like these have nothing to do with catching pedophiles but is intended to create an early warning system for state security. The ultimate purpose is to flaging dissidents for security services and police nothing else. What is worse is that the public knows something is wrong but still compromises with the legislators and in time still gives them all the amendments that they requested.

[TriWooOx]

Quote:Human rights judges have rejected a Government appeal against a ruling that police 'stop and search' powers under UK terrorism laws are illegal.

The right to question people without grounds for suspicion was granted by the Terrorism Act of 2000.

But last January the power was declared a breach of the Human Rights Convention.

Yesterday the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg has rejected an appeal launched in April.

Isabella Sankey, director of policy for Liberty, which supported the original court action, commented: 'This appeal was always doomed.

'The objectionable policy of broad stop and search without suspicion was wrong in principle and has proven divisive and counter-productive in practice.

'The Great Repeal Bill promised by the new Government provides the perfect opportunity for the UK finally to comply with this common sense judgement.'

The ruling came in a case brought by two Londoners who were stopped and questioned by police near an arms fair in the city in 2003.

Kevin Gillan and Pennie Quinton were both stopped and search on the same day in the area of a Defence Systems and Equipment International Exhibition at the Excel Centre in Docklands, where there had already been protests and demonstrations.

Nothing incriminating was found on either of them and they went to court questioning the legality of stop and search powers.

The High Court and the Court of Appeal said such powers were legitimate given the risk of terrorism in London.

But the Human Rights court disagreed.

January's verdict stated: 'The (Human Rights) Court considers that the powers of authorisation and confirmation as well as those of stop and search under sections 44 and 45 of the 2000 Act are neither sufficiently circumscribed nor subject to adequate legal safeguards against abuse.

'They are not, therefore, 'in accordance with the law' and it follows that there has been a violation of Article 8 of the Convention.'

Article 8 says that 'everyone has the right to respect for his private and family life'.

It adds: 'There shall be no interference by a public authority with the exercise of this right except such as is in accordance with the law and is necessary in a democratic society in the interests of national security... or the prevention of disorder or crime... or for the protection of the rights and freedoms of others.'

The human rights judges awarded Mr Gillan and Miss Quinton more than £30,000 in legal costs.

Mr Gillan had been stopped near the arms fair while riding a bike and carrying a rucksack. He had been on his way to join a demonstration.

He was told by two police officers that he was being searched under section 44 of the Terrorism Act for articles which could be used in connection with terrorism.

Nothing incriminating was found, although computer print-outs giving information about the demonstration were seized by the officers.

Mr Gillan was released after being detained for about 20 minutes.

Later that day Miss Quinton, a journalist wearing a photographer's jacket, carrying a small bag and holding a camera in her hand, was stopped close to the arms fair.

She was said to have emerged from some bushes and was planning to film the protests.

She was searched and told to stop filming. Nothing incriminating was found.

The police record of the search showed she was stopped for five minutes, but Miss Quinton said she thought it was 'more like 30 minutes'.

She claimed to have felt so intimidated and distressed that she did not feel able to return to the demonstration although it had been her intention to make a documentary or sell footage of it.

A Home Office spokesman said: 'The Government has already committed to reviewing counter-terrorism legislation, which will include the operation of the Section 44 stop and search provisions.

'We are currently giving full consideration to the judgement and its implications.'

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/worldnew...court.html

[TriWooOx]

Quote:Plainclothes police patrolled trains from London and key flights into Newquay airport while sniffer dogs were deployed at the local railway station as officers sought to intercept drugs and alcohol carried by under age drinkers.

Dozens of teenagers were searched by police as part of a bid to create a “ring of steel” around the Cornish surf resort.

The clampdown is part of Devon and Cornwall police’s Operation Brunel that is aimed at eradicating anti-social problems currently blighting the beach town.

The move is also designed to prevent a repeat of last year’s mayhem, during which two teenagers fell to their deaths from cliffs at the resort.

While figures were not available for Friday's part of the operation, over the past week police have randomly searched dozens of teenagers arriving at the train station with 10 people arrested for drugs offences.

Throughout the town over the past few weeks, police have confiscated hundreds of cans of alcohol, sent 21 children home and cautioned dozens of others.

An estimated 3,000 16-to-18-year-olds are believed to be currently staying in Newquay at present as the town becomes known as the “party capital” of the south.

Police are concerned the invasion has become a summer “ritual” and have criticised parents for allowing teenagers to visit the resort unsupervised.

Officers are particularly alarmed to discover that some parents were dropping under-age teenagers off with alcohol and then going home.

Sgt Ian Drummond-Smith, the officer in charge of the operation, said annecdotedly that the resor was "much quieter".

He said many teenagers were aware of the police operation and were not risking making trouble.

"It is a lot quieter throughout Newquay now and it is fairly different from last year," he told The Daily Telegraph.

"Last year there was a lot more booze on the trains and throughout the town but people now know we will be out in force so don't want to risk it and we hope the message is getting through."

Police promised to take “tough and robust” action in the wake of the deaths last year of Paddy Higgins, 16, and Andrew Curwell, 18, who fell from cliffs after nights out in Newquay.

The family of Paddy, from Wokingham, Berks, later released a photograph of him drinking spirits a few house before his death, and called for parents and youngsters to boycott the town until it tightened its policy towards under age drinking.

Operation Brunel is also run in conjunction with Cornwall Council and partner agencies.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/l...viour.html

[h3rm35]

Ixquick: Search Engines Should Become Government Spies, Says EU Parliament
Ixquick and Startpage will fight "Big Brother" data retention clause in Declaration 29

June 28, 2010 03:33 AM Eastern Daylight Time

BRUSSELS & NEW YORK & ZEIST, Netherlands --(BUSINESS WIRE)--A draconian proposal to retain all Internet search traffic, known as "Written Declaration 29," was adopted by the European Parliament last week. Framed as a measure to crack down on paedophiles, the controversial Declaration calls on the EU to require that search engines store all search traffic for up to two years for possible analysis by authorities.

Search engine Ixquick (http://www.ixquick.com), widely regarded as the world's most private search engine, has built a strong privacy reputation by storing no search data on its users. The company believes it has been singled out by the data retention proposal, and it has vowed to strongly oppose the measure becoming law.

"Since Google, Yahoo, and Bing already retain users' search data, this proposal is clearly aimed at Ixquick and our English-language subsidiary Startpage (http://www.startpage.com)," said Robert Beens, CEO of Ixquick. "We have worked hard to create a privacy-friendly search engine that embodies the spirit of EU Privacy Protections, in line with the strict recommendations of the EU Article 29 Data Protection Working Party. This Declaration is evidence that the left hand of the EU does not know what the right hand is doing."

Mr. Beens fears that if the measure becomes law, it will vastly undermine the privacy of over 500 million law-abiding EU citizens. Storing everyone's search data, rather than restricting surveillance to known or suspected offenders, would give the government access to a rich trove of political, medical, professional, and personal data on virtually every person in Europe. And critics say it will do little to stop child pornography.

"Sex offenders exchange files through underground networks. They don't find this stuff through search engines," said Alex Hanff of Privacy International, an advocacy group that is launching a campaign against the measure. "I spent eight years helping law enforcement track down online sex offenders and never once did we see a case where search engine data was useful."

Ixquick will join the public campaign started by Privacy International to stop the provisions of Written Declaration 29 from becoming law.

"Privacy is a fundamental right and the basis of a free society. The phenomenal success of Ixquick and Startpage proves that people don't want to be watched by their governments," said Mr. Beens. "Spying on law-abiding citizens is not the way forward, and we will stand by our principles to protect the public's ability to search in privacy."

About Ixquick and Startpage

Ixquick is an international, award-winning search engine with an industry-leading privacy policy. Ixquick has been awarded the EU Privacy Seal by the independent certification authority Europrise. Further information can be found at http://www.ixquick.com and http://www.startpage.com.

For press inquiries, please contact:

EU Media Relations, Ixquick
Alex van Eesteren, +31-30-6971778
alex@ixquick.com

OR

U.S. Media Relations, Startpage
Dr. Katherine Albrecht
877-434-3100 (U.S. toll free)
+1-973-273-2125 (for International access)
kma@startpage.com

[Packrat]

Thankyou for the post!

[Deathaniel]

does anyone here believe they were not already? this is just disclosure for the sheeple!

i search fucked up shit all the time to fuck with 'em, I'm curious what kind of bio they have on me

[TriWooOx]

Quote:A total of 101,248 stops and searches were made under section 44 of the Terrorism Act 2000 in 2009/10, but only one in every 200 led to an arrest and none of these were terror-related, the figures released by the Home Office showed.

Theresa May, the Home Secretary, ordered a review of the controversial stop and search powers earlier this year, saying she wanted to correct ''mistakes'' made by the Labour government which, she said, was allowed to ''ride roughshod'' over civil liberties.

The powers allow officers to stop anyone in a specified area without the need for reasonable suspicion.

Across Great Britain, 506 arrests were made after people were stopped and searched under section 44 of the Terrorism Act, 0.5 per cent of the 101,248 stops and searches, compared with 10 per cent of stops carried out using non-terror powers.

But the use of the stop and search powers fell by 60 per cent compared with 2008/09, the figures showed.

Anti-terrorism chiefs ordered an escalation in the use of the powers after the failed bomb attack against the Tiger Tiger nightclub in London's Haymarket in 2007.

That resulted in more than a quarter of a million people being searched in 2008/09 - the highest on record and more than twice the level of the previous year.

But after a public outcry over the use of searches, which have a disproportionate effect upon minority groups, Metropolitan Police Commissioner Sir Paul Stephenson ordered them to be scaled back in London.

The review of the Government's counter-terrorism policy, which will report shortly, is being carried out by the Liberal Democrat peer Lord Ken Macdonald, who led changes in the way terrorists are prosecuted.

It involves police, spies, public officials and campaigners and will focus on control orders, stop-and-search, pre-charge detention, deportation of terror suspects and the use of surveillance by local authorities.

Of all the stops and searches, four out of five of these were made in the Metropolitan Police area, with almost a fifth being made by British Transport Police.

Overall, 59 per cent described themselves as white, 17 per cent as Asian or Asian British, 10 per cent as black or black British and 2 per cent as mixed ethnicity, the figures showed.

For the first time, the statistics also included an overview of the number of passengers who were examined while travelling through the UK's air and sea ports.

One in every 30,000 passengers was examined last year, 0.03 per cent of the 220 million passengers going through the ports.

Of these exams, 97 per cent (82,870) took under one hour while 2,687 (3 per cent) were more than an hour.

The figures come the day after Martin Broughton, the British Airways chairman, said airport security checks needed an overhaul.

He said some parts of the security programme were "completely redundant" and that the UK should not "kowtow" to the Americans every time the US wanted something done.

The number of terrorism arrests also fell last year, down to 173 from 190 in 2008/09, separate figures showed.

But the majority of the 52 charged were charged with offences that had nothing to do with terrorism.

A total of 27 people were charged with non-terror related offences, including perverting the course of justice, placing or dispatching articles to cause a bomb hoax or knowingly obtaining another person's identification documents with intent.

Of the others, 12 were charged with offences under terrorism legislation, including the collection of information useful to terrorists, preparation for terrorist acts and fundraising.

And a further 13 were charged under non-terrorism legislation with an offence the authorities considered to be terrorism-related, including acting with intent to cause, or conspiring to cause, explosions likely to endanger life.

Since the September 11 terror attacks in the United States in 2001, 261 suspects have been charged under terrorism legislation, 199 (76 per cent) prosecuted, and, of those prosecuted 64 per cent (127) convicted. A further seven were awaiting completion of their trials.

A further 143 were charged under non-terrorism legislation, including conspiracy to murder and conspiring to cause an explosion, the figures showed.

Of these, 133 (93 per cent) were prosecuted, and, of those prosecuted 83 per cent (110) convicted. A further seven were awaiting completion of their trials.

Of the 46 terrorism-related trials completed last year, 65 per cent of defendants were convicted, of which two in five pleaded guilty.

They were given five life sentences and one in four custodial sentences handed down were of 10 years or more.

New figures also showed 51 appeals against terrorism convictions were heard in the three years between 2007/08 and 2009/10, with seven convictions being quashed. In all, 20 of the appeals led to a shorter sentence and four resulted in a longer sentence.

As of March 31 this year, there were 102 terrorist-related prisoners in England and Wales, of whom 76% were UK nationals and four in five (83 per cent) classified themselves as Muslims. There were no prisoners classified as terrorists held by the Scottish Prison Service.

And 25 terrorist-related prisoners were discharged from prison last year, including 10 who had served sentences of four years or more.

Shami Chakrabarti, director of civil rights group Liberty, said: "These Home Office statistics highlight what a crude and blunt instrument stop and search without suspicion has been.

"It costs us dearly in race equality and consent-based policing with very little return in terms of enhanced security."

Alex Deane, director of Big Brother Watch, which campaigns against intrusions on privacy, added: "This is no surprise. Rather than a genuine counter-terrorism tool, random stop and search has been a way of bullying and hassling our increasingly abject population.

"We have to decide what kind of society we want to live in. Random stop and search allows the state to confront the individual in the street, without cause, and demand your papers. It's wrong."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/t...rches.html

[FastTadpole]

Terrorism Act, RFID, RealID, Biometics, CCTV, iWatch, CYBERCOM, NSA + Windows, ACTA, SmartDust, DNA Databank, Body Scanners, Public Education, the Patriot Act. Police who do this are prostituting their values if they haven't been indoctrinated into the line of thinking that this is serving and protecting the people.

This is a result of instilled paranoia dealt with in a reactive way in treating every man, woman and child as a suspected criminal threat.

Where are YOU going to draw the line. When are YOU going to stop feeding this corrupt system. It's an abusive relationship that has zero respect for you as a human being - but we keep paying tribute to it with your time, talent and labour.

Dugg: http://digg.com/news/world_news/uk_terro...or_arrests