Has the UK lost their god damned minds?
I'm sorry but between this and everything else lately...they seem pretty committed to "Security at any economic and/or personal cost! Security for everyone!"
In the real world, that never works.
I'm sorry but between this and everything else lately...they seem pretty committed to "Security at any economic and/or personal cost! Security for everyone!"
In the real world, that never works.
That basically means that it's up to a small group of people who are informed (like ourselves) to do what we can to stop this stuff. If we sit back and do nothing they won't have any problem implementing these laws.
Not only that, but it seems to me that there's been far less coverage of these issues in mainstream media than in the tech press, and most mainstream coverage seems to take the governments' side. People who get most or all of their news from TV likely won't hear anything about all this; if they do, their eyes will glaze over as they don't have a clue how encryption works, or why it's important. Or, it will just vanish in the news cycle and they never think about it again.
Edit: It also seems to me that most people just aren't going to care unless it directly affects them, at which time it's already far too late.
In many ways we're seeing history play out all over again - new, disruptive thing shows up, governments wet themselves in terror, and try to control it. The difference is what happens now; in the US this tends (excluding drugs) to lead slowly towards a more nuanced position where the reigns are gradually loosened. In the UK that seems to never happen, the arrow of control and government intrusion only ever points in one direction. It's very puzzling; I'm not sure what the source of it is but I think it's going to be a serious issue in the future. Specifically as the rest of the world forges ahead, either through the evolving view of attempting to control of the uncontrollable, or through sheer lawlessness in other countries where the control is never in place. In the middle will be the UK, clinging desperately to the belief that (as someone else in the thread put it) they can hold back the tide.
Welcome to any debate RE: technology and privacy.