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U.k. Ability To Monitor Data Declared Illegal By European Court

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lindapalmara | 09:02 Thu 22nd Dec 2016 | News
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On the day that Germany's ability to protect their people from Terror is exposed as woeful, our laws have been overruled by the EU Parliament. What a travesty.

https://www.pressreader.com/uk/daily-mail/20161222/281492160970205

We have the best intelligence services in the world and they are being undermined by the EU , yet again. Another reason for leaving the EU. They couldn't have picked a worse day to do this. I hope we can keep appealing this until we actually leave this woeful Bloc. Or maybe we can just ignore it like other EU countries do when it suits them.
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I haven't read all of this but as far as the original point goes (UK action declared illegal) once again the same principle applies. This should be a matter for the UK Parliament and not a foreign court.
11:32 Thu 22nd Dec 2016
"The appeal was originally championed by [the now] Brexit Secretary David Davis..."

So I guess he was pretty chuffed to see the ECJ support this, at least.
Why on earth would anyone think it’s sensible to attempt to fight our enemies to the best of our ability? Understanding, respect, and tolerance should do it.
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So let's hope David Davis will see things in a different light in view of what's happening in EU countries. Retaining data for a year does not mean people in the Intelligence services are sat listening to all our conversations, reading or texts and emails. It means they can go back and cross reference suspects to build up a bigger picture. This is crucial and as I said, we have the best Intelligence Service in the World.
I understand that even after we leave the EU it may not be possible for us to ignore the ruling in cases where we need EU cooperation as the EU will not recognise such evidence
They might be happy to play with one hand tied behind their back, but we shouldn’t capitulate to their stupidity.
I'm not sure it is necessarily stupidity unless you have far more knowledge than they do, but you could always write to them pointing out the logical, legal or other errors they may have made. I have not read the article but I assume they are just trying to balance the need for monitoring for security purposes with personal freedoms to go about our lawful business without excessive amounts of information being available for possible misuse by security forces or by others who could access data unlawfully perhaps
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FF believe me, the EU will want our expertise much more than we want theirs. This Berln suspect was a failed asylum seeker on the police terror watchlist who should have already been deported. He was not even monitored. Believe me it would not happen here. When his picture first came out most of his face was blacked out. What's all that about!
fiction-factory, it doesn't take a lot of common sense to understand that attempting to fight an enemy without employing methods that will enable you to do so to the best of your ability is stupid.
High time that the EU Judges retired to the loony bin from whence they obviously came.
Is it so stupid, though, if those methods compromise the freedoms that they are intended to protect?
Linda, last night’s London Evening Standard carried a picture of him with half his face obscured. I wondered what that was all about too. Today’s edition carries a recognisable picture.

http://www.standard.co.uk/news/world/berlin-attack-suspect-anis-amri-had-direct-contact-with-isis-and-set-fire-to-school-a3426166.html

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Jim, it depends on what you mean about Freedoms. The old adage is that if you have nothing to hide you need to worry.
Jim, extraordinary times call for extraordinary measures. In an effort to provide a level playing field for all, the people who are making these rulings are climbing up their own bottoms and moreover, putting lives at risk.
Fairly sure you've missed out a "don't" in that old adage, Linda...

But anyway. The broader point is what counts as "nothing to hide" anyway? Can any of us ever truly say that? Minor illegal activities, or perhaps legal but potentially career-destroying secrets, all would be laid bare. Perhaps even there are things that you would very much rather had stayed hidden, but forgot about until they were revealed.

As to Naomi's "extraordinary times", granted that can feel true and it may only be intended to be temporary, but there aren't exactly encouraging precedents for that either. Governments tend to be rather less keen on rescinding powers they hold, than they are on giving themselves new ones, so it's naive in the extreme to assume that this set of powers would vanish ten years or so down the line when the threat is judged to have disappeared (or at least reduced sufficiently).

At any rate, while I'm not saying I actually fear a slippery slope to totalitarian state control or something like that, in practice it's better to preserve freedoms and privacy than it is to sacrifice it. For sure, we should fight our enemies to the best of our abilities -- thing is, that our abilities are also constrained by what we're fighting to protect.
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Obviously the two things you talk about are unconnected.

The fiasco in Germany was not because the security isn't there, it was because someone didn't do their job properly. The suspect was supposed to be being watched, but wasn't.

The decision that keeping you or mine's internet history for a year being a breach of our privacy is a totally different matter. For a start, you are not a terrorist. And our data is available to a wide number of people unconnected with anti-terrorism agencies. For example, the Welsh Ambulance Service can inspect your internet usage for some unknown reason. It has been called the snoopers charter for good reason.


I'm not sure what goes wrong but i still can't open any of these Press Reader links properly, Linda- I just a get a big P (presumably logo for Pressreader) and the word OPTIMIZING in big green letters)- and then my Answerbank page won't open up again so i have to log out.
Gromit
So for the sake of losing a little privacy IS will be allowed to use the internet without fear of their messages being detected.
I think the argument is that we will all (not just IS) be able to use the internet without fear of our messages being detected. I can't open the link though so i don't know whether this means no usage can be monitored or only usage for a set period.
DannyK,
For about £2 a month a terrorist can use a VPN which takes their web history out of the UK and out of the juristiction of this law.
So in terms of preventing terrorism, it is completely worthless.

The rest of us who are not terrorists do not use VPNs they are targetting us, not terrorists.

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