Transparent Government?

Does anyone recall Labour’s e-petition site at the prime minister’s office?

Not that it was ever really much use, but it did at least allow people to blow off some steam and give the government some idea of what their more unpopular ideas and policies were. Maybe it did get them to back-pedal once or twice – who knows?

Well that was then and this is now. It was suspended before the general election, presumably because Gordon didn’t want any more heckling from the punters.

Dave and Nick the “Transparent Government” twins have apparently decided that, rather than be simply and quickly re opened, the e-petition site is to be moved to Direct Gov this year - some unspecified date this year, to be, er, imprecise. This came out in parliament in December.

It’s February now and it is still not working. Odd that, considering they already have a functional system that works fine bought and paid for out of our hard earned taxes. One wonders why they couldn’t just move the pages to Direct.gov?

Still if they had done they would probably be getting nasty e-petitions objecting to selling off the forests, or student fees, or scrapping the Ark Royal, or… maybe something upsetting like this.

What’s the betting they don’t hurry themselves too much to get it up and running?

Still nature abhors a vacuum as they say.

Drudge report risks coalition trops lives in Afganistan

The fact that Prince Harry has been serving with the UK’s armed forces in Helmand Province has been blown by the Drudge Report.

The fact is that he - and the troops he leads can only function effectively, at normal risk levels if he remains anonymous. Without that, the risk escalates astronomically.

So what is the difference between an enemy spy and Matt Drudge?

I am not sure what else you could call it - making sensitive military information available to enemy forces via the internet.

Information that affects the security of operations and could cost lives. It’s not as if there is even an overriding moral factor that might justify it. He knew it was going to be widely known once it was safe to release the information, but it was time sensitive.

He knew that, but apparently disregarded it, just to get a grubby scoop. But this isn’t really politics, or scandal, this is brave, mostly ordinary, people with integrity just trying to do a difficult and dangerous job.

At the very least it is dangerously irresponsible and done with little concern as to the possible ramifications, or the welfare of others.

So - The difference? Well Drudge makes a profit out of it, rather than doing it for merely ideological reasons.

He is reputed to be doing very nicely out of it, owning a luxurious Mediterranean-style home on Rivo Alto Island in Florida's Biscayne Bay, a condo at the Four Seasons in Miami and reportedly drives around in a black Mustang.

It is the way of the world that he will probably continue to enjoy them - and is unlikely to suffer any doubts, or be bothered by the consequences to others, such as troops who are just trying to do their jobs in difficult circumstances.

EU moves to tighten controls on movement and the internet

Franco Frattini, the EU Justice Commissar Commissioner has a plan, a cunning plan.


It involves ’tough new anti terror proposals’ – and we all know that’s good, don’t we?


Especially the, highly trained, crack BBC old lady interviewee squad. Who will generally enthusiastically approve anything, up to and including, summary executions on street corners, on the grounds that ‘if you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear’.

It seems one of the things they are looking at is based on the practice of gathering Passenger Name Record (PNR) data, adopted by the US post 9/11.

Frattini wants to make it obligatory for all EU states to collect 19 pieces of personal information about people flying to or from member states and store it for up to 13 years. Including a phone number, e-mail address and payment details.

The plan apparently also pays special attention to the internet…

Even some EU legislators have voiced privacy concerns over the proposals, but the steely Fratelli said: "There is no room for complacency - for letting our guard down,"

Some EU parliamentarians questioned the EUs enthusiasm for yet more and more anti-terror measures, when the effectiveness of those put in place following the Madrid and London have not even been properly evaluated yet.

They also pointed out that some of them, such as the restrictive rules limiting liquids allowed on EU-bound flights show no indication at all of having any positive impact on security.

Martine Roure, MEP for South East France, argued “We should look at the efficiency of the EU legislation in this area. Some extremely restrictive measures have been adopted. Some haven't had the results expected, and some might even lend a false sense of security."

TV & Internet ‘cold turkey’

From time to time one reads of people, who as an experiment, go without TV, the internet, etc. Sometimes they appear to make heavy going of it.

I am a pretty heavy user of the internet and I usually watch at least an hour of news per day, Plus there are the papers.

I do not see myself as a news and politics junky - but I do generally take a keen interest.

In any event I have just had a two week break from TV and didn’t even rally think about it ‘till the initial idea of technology withdrawal surfaced in my mind. Ditto the internet – and I am normally a heavy user. I must confess to having read a couple of newspapers though…

I just got by with convivial conversation, reading books, sight seeing, swimming, good food, drink and relaxation.

I suppose it may have been different if I had to go without them in my normal day to day routine, but I can honestly say, that I missed them so little on holiday that I didn’t even consciously notice their absence.

Amnesty's concerns over freedom on the net

Amnesty International are raising concerns about net censorship ahead of a conference they are organising on the subject.

Amnesty are highlighting that the internet, "could change beyond all recognition" unless action is taken against the erosion of online freedom . Getting into a computing (main) frame ;-) of mind they warn that the "virus of internet repression" has now spread to dozens of governments.

Amnesty also attack companies such as Google - particularly their presence in China, Microsoft and Yahoo of all being complicit in censorship.

Tim Hancock the campaign director said:

"The Chinese model of an internet that allows economic growth but not free speech, or privacy, is growing in popularity. From a handful of countries five years ago, to dozens of governments today, who block sites and arrest bloggers".

"Unless we act on this issue, the internet could change beyond all recognition in the years to come. More and more governments are realising the utility of controlling what people see online and major internet companies, in an attempt to expand their markets, are colluding in these attempts,"

Amnesty point out it’s not just filtering, increasingly it was seeing ‘politically motivated’ closures of websites and internet cafes, also threats and imprisonments. In February, Abdul Kareem Nabeel Suleiman, a young Egyptian blogger, was imprisoned for four years for insulting Islam and defaming the President of Egypt.

Amnesty's is re launching their website irrepressible.info to highlight freedom on the net

It seems that, sometimes, 'They' do listen

China is not exactly known for it’s willingness to allow the open and free exchange of information. For a start it blocks news websites and regularly blocks websites that do not agree with government views.

However this is hopefully some good news. The Chinese government had been planning to force millions of Chinese bloggers to register their real names. It is estimated there are some 20 million bloggers in China and the idea mooted last year provoked enormous objections from Chinese internet users, rejecting the idea as a move by the government to control information.

The government had attempted to justify the compulsory scheme by suggesting that it would make bloggers more ‘responsible for their behaviour’ and that real-name registration would ‘protect’ users from libel, pornography and other ‘harmful’ information.

Now the Chinese government has backed away from actually forcing bloggers to register and are bringing in a voluntary code instead. It will encourage bloggers to register with their real names and personal details, offering improved services as an incentive to those who register.

Blogs in China have developed into an informal way of spreading news that can not be got through mainstream media - popular blogs get millions of hits every day.

Keeping in mind that they were facing a compulsory system, it seems as if bloggers are cautiously welcoming the new voluntary code.

Big Brother is censoring you

Here is something a little disturbing.

A recent report , from the Berkman Centre for Internet and Society, indicates that state-mandated internet filtering is being introduced by a growing number of states around the world.

John Palfrey, at Harvard Law School, said that the report was an attempt to shine a spotlight on filtering to make it more transparent.

He indicated that in the last five years net filtering has risen from a couple of states doing it to twenty five. "There has also been an increase in the scale, scope and sophistication of internet filtering."

The filtering has three main justifications: politics and power, security concerns and social norms. Apparently it almost always happens in the shadows and the levels of censorship are expected to increase.

He said: "What's regrettable about net filtering is that almost always this is happening in the shadows. There's no place you can get an answer as a citizen from your state about how they are filtering and what is being filtered."

Rafal Rohozinski, a Research Fellow of the Cambridge Security Programme stated that "Few states restrict their activities to one type of content.". Apparently once a state starts filtering, it does it on a broad range of content.

States carrying out the broadest range of filtering included Burma, Iran, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Syria, Tunisia, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen. No real surprises there then.

States the survey detected censoring the net are: Azerbaijan, Bahrain, Burma/Myanmar, China, Ethiopia, India, Iran, Jordan, Libya, Morocco, Oman, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, South Korea, Sudan, Syria, Tajikistan, Thailand, Tunisia, Turkmenistan, UAE, Uzbekistan, Vietnam and Yemen.

Before you feel all warm, smug and safe though keep in mind that the report also said that the US and a number of European States were not tested because the private sector tends to carry out filtering, instead of the Government.