UK intel agencies spy indiscriminately on millions of innocent folks

> like the man who argued with a Muslim woman and posted about it on Twitter) can get you arrested.

The important part is "argued with a Muslim woman" - in real life, AFK. Not "then posted about it on Twitter".

But the CPS were very clear that the police should not have arrested him, and that they definitely should not have charged him, and that the CPS would not prosecute.

Is that the Copenhagen Interpretation of spying?

Thank you, on a second thought it might should be the collector's duty to voluntarily share the same data about her activity she collects. After all she does not seem to have any problem with it. Transparency should go both ways, but I guess it would be disregarded claiming it is against national interests.

But there is a blanket exclusion for the purposes of 'prevention and detection of crime'.

It is widely used by the Police (obviously) but also by the likes of insurance companies (e.g. unsubstantiated suspicious of "suspect" insurance claims) and high street shops (the major stores operate a facial recognition database of 'known' and 'suspected' shoplifters which they use to target people on entry to stores and either eject or detain them as they determine they want to do).

All you need to do is construct an argument about preventing and detecting crime and you're pretty much free to store and process whatever and however you want. The only case I've heard of this failing was in the building industry blacklist (which GCHQ helped create and was run by Sir Robert McAlpine, Balfour Beatty, Costain and Skanska Construction [1]).

Databases like that are part of the 'bulk collection' being used here. It has gone on since at least 1984 (the Telecommunications bill instigated the legal framework for it).

In the mid-80's, I worked in the UK with someone who was in the middle of some business dispute (normal business stuff, nothing unusual or noteworthy). A lot of the business involved dealing with military type customers who generally worked at the 'discreet' end of the business. In casual conversation with one customer, the dispute came up and frustration was expressed at the lack of ways to resolve it. A few days later a large envelope arrived with a complements slip from said customer, containing a huge ream of printouts of extremely personal and sensitive details on the business competitor, their businesses, their family and some choice friends. My colleague had the sense to burn the paperwork ASAP (but did look through it!) and was always way more careful about what and with who he discussed things afterwards.

From that incident, I know that any sort of record in the UK is fair game for GCHQ and it was normal for your doctor visits, bank records, credit records (purchase details), any store accounts etc. - everything - to be sucked up, even in the 80's. Any sort of political activism (of any type) moved you way up the interest & monitoring list, especially things like donations or driving your car near any sort of demo or sensitive site.

The irony was that 1984 was the year the UK made legislation for it. But it got way worse under Tony Blair, who is often chastised for treating Orwell's 1984 as an instruction manual rather than a warning.

[1] http://www.theguardian.com/business/2012/mar/03/blacklisted-...

Obama uses it a lot so that's probably at least part of it.