politics

Peers seek to delay lobbying bill for three months CORRECTED

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http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/nov/05/lobbying-bill-peers-seek-delay-three-months

Crossbench peer Lord Ramsbotham wants to refer part of bill on regulating charities and thinktanks to special committee

Image of a dog's breakfast in dog food bowlAn audacious attempt is to be made to delay the lobbying bill for three months in the Lords by putting its controversial plans for limiting the campaigning activities of charities into a special committee for detailed consideration.

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The call for a pause is being made by an alliance of charities, thinktanks, faith groups and unions.

It is being argued that a pause would allow the government to get the bill right, and to hold the consultation it failed to hold before the bill was published.

Ministers argue that they have already made substantial concessions in the Commons to meet the fears of charities and pressure groups, who say the bill will have a chilling effect on their campaigning ahead of the general election.

Simon Barrow, the co-director the Christian thinktank Ekklesia, has warned the bill is too weak in bringing corporate lobbyists to account but unjustifiably limits the freedom of expression on charities, civil society organisations and thinktanks – restrictions that amount to gagging orders.

The House of Lords constitution committee warned “effective parliamentary scrutiny matters in relation to every bill but it is of manifest importance where legislation is of constitutional significance. The present bill directly affects the ability of people and organisations to engage with the government and to participate in political and electoral campaigning.”

The committee asked whether part two was necessary.

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http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/nov/05/government-offers-concessions-lobbying-bill-charities-elections

Lord Wallace under pressure to delay bill, allowing fresh scrutiny, amid concerns over gagging of charities at election times

The coalition government started to offer concessions on the lobbying bill ahead of a vote on Tuesday afternoon that might lead to proposals for a three-month pause in the bill’s scrutiny and reference of the regulation of charities at election times to a special select committee.

Lord Wallace, the minister handling the bill, has written to coalition peers saying he is willing to raise the threshold substantially to ensure smaller charities are not covered by the bill’s provisions that restrict the campaigning activity of charities during an election period.

Ministers have also proposed that scrutiny of the section of the bill addressing charity campaigning could be deferred as long as six weeks, so long as the rest of the bill continued as normal.

Lord Ramsbotham, the cross bench peer pushing for a full three month delay, does not appear likely to be accept the compromise, and will push for delay to allow a fresh scrutiny of the bill.

Lord Ramsbotham’s plan, with Labour backing, would mean the referral of part two of the bill to a special select committee, which would also delay consideration of other aspects of the bill.

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Continue ReadingPeers seek to delay lobbying bill for three months CORRECTED

Blind old cnut Blunkett all of a sudden – many years too late – says that interception was too much

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Blind old cnut Blunkett all of a sudden says “Human nature is you get carried away, so we have to protect ourselves from ourselves,” he said. “In government you are pressed by the security agencies. They come to you with very good information and they say ‘you need to do something’. So you do need the breath of scepticism, not cynicism, breathing on them. You need to be able to take a step back. If you don’t have this, you can find yourself being propelled in a particular direction.”

I suspect that this is about spying on mobile phone users: In fact I suspect that it’s about governments demanding the ability to spy on mobile phone users is designed into the systems. This was on big C cnut Blunkett’s watch after all …

COUNCIL RESOLUTION of 17 January 1995 on the lawful interception of telecommunications
(96/C 329/01)
Official Journal C 329 , 04/11/1996 p. 0001 – 0006

[These demands from ‘law enforcement agencies’ are for every signal including location. Mobile phones signal their location continuously. Isn’t that a bug? … Blunkett, what do you have to say? You were home secretary after all … ]

[Later edit: Blunkett became Home Secretary in 2001. It should be recognised that mobile phones announce their location and much more.

[Later: It appears that there was no opposition by Blunkett to these demands from ‘law enforcement agencies’. Wasn’t there a scandal about this time about New Labour databases? –  Escalibur was associated with Mandy and Labour coming into power but it was more than that – have to research this.]

Don’t look at this Mobile phones are designed to be mobile bugs

Continue ReadingBlind old cnut Blunkett all of a sudden – many years too late – says that interception was too much

HS2 … the high-speed train route with the same old staggering fares

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http://www.theguardian.com/money/blog/2013/nov/02/hs2-train-fares-commuter

With commuter tickets already costing thousands of pounds, will anyone be able to afford to travel on it?

Image of channel tunnel trainThe government says its proposals for High Speed 2 “assume a fares structure in line with that of the existing railway”. So we can probably expect to fork out an absurd sum for a ticket unless we trawl through websites three months in advance, can be absolutely certain we are going to travel on the 3.42pm on a Tuesday afternoon, and we craftily split the journey half way to Manchester. Get any stage wrong and the inspector will haul you off the train and land you with a huge fine.

It is remarkable that in the debate on HS2 so little has been said about fares. Will taxpayers be expected to pump billions upon billions into a Mitterrand-style Grand Projet then find it’s out of the reach of anybody other than swish executives on expense accounts? The omens, despite the government’s reassurances, aren’t good.

Take the prices for travelling on our only existing high-speed track, HS1, that whizzes through the Kent countryside. If you live in Ashford, the opening of the line promised a huge improvement in train times into the capital. Sure enough, it now takes just 35 minutes into London St Pancras compared to the 61 minutes it takes on the former route into London Victoria.

But at what cost? A season ticket for commuters from Ashford to a London terminal using the old route, plus an onward journey on the tube, costs £4,996 a year. That’s a pretty staggering sum for a 54-mile journey (about the same as London to Brighton). But if you want to take the HS1 trains, and save half an hour, the cost rises to £6,360. A commuter paying 40% tax has to earn £10,600 a year just to pay to get into work (oh, and there’s a £700 to £900 a year bill to park at the station).

The Ashford example suggests that using HS1 costs 27% more than the fare structure of the existing railway, which I think we can rely on as a better indicator of what fares will be like on HS2 than what the politicians are telling us. The – so far – lacklustre economic gains that HS1 has brought to north Kent should also deflate some of the more ambitious claims about the impact of HS2 on northern cities. An analysis in the Economist this week suggests HS1 has brought benefits for London, but little elsewhere.

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Continue ReadingHS2 … the high-speed train route with the same old staggering fares

Conspiracy Theory Unofficial Narrative Fake Manufactured Terrorism The story of the London Bombings 7 July 2005 7/7 Jean Charles de Menezes Ian Blair Tony Blair

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I’m not sure about this and I’d like some feedback.

THIS ARTICLE IS TO BE REPEATEDLY UPDATED AND AMENDED. While I have a lot, I don’t have the whole story so I would appreciate help with the uncertain parts. Thanks.

[23/11/13 One of the problems I encounter is that people helping don’t realise what I’ve already got. For example, I got the ’empty’ lead years ago when I was ignoring it as it was repeatedly raised.]

It’s a good day (to start).

Context, Terrorism, 2005 election, Inquiries Act, Bristol Indymedia, G8 & Privy Council ruling, Dust explosions, London Bombings, Cobra meeting for G8 not 7/7, Jerusalem Post articles, Ian Blair, murder of Jean Charles de Menezes

START:

Terrorism is a godsend for governments. It provides a wonderful excuse for dodgy newly-developed airplanes falling out of the sky when their doors open at 30 thousand feet and it provides a wonderful excuse for dust explosions on the London Underground. It provides a ready excuse for shitty old Jeeps with documented faults crashing off motorways and bursting into flames. It provides for massive made for television sacrificial rituals to start already planned wars.

7/1/14 The magick is working, I’m making fine progress – it’s almost as if it was hidden in plain sight all along. It was.

Just a tiny piece today. On 7/7/2005 – the day of explosions on the London underground and the strange bombing of a double-decker bus an hour later – the boss of the Metropolitan police Ian Blair said “The most important message though however is just that it, while it is a confused situation it must be a confused situation in multiple sites like this, a co-ordinated effort is slowly bringing order out of the chaos.”

There are two issues about this statement. Firstly try finding it using a search engine. It’s almost as if I made it up. I didn’t of course but the web has been scrubbed. That takes the sort of power that only governments have.

Secondly, what is meant by the phrase ‘order out of (the) chaos’ which is explained very well here

The need to deter democracy by alienating public opinion from public policy, is one that has been long understood. Back in 1921, the highly influential political columnist and media analyst Walter Lippmann, wrote the book “Public Opinion”,where he discussed the need for the “manufacture of consent”; given the inherent pitfalls and barriers to an accurate and effective public opinion (democracy, essentially), it is necessary that this opinion is crafted by a higher sphere of influence. This was understood very well by Edward Bernays, who was the founder of Public Relations (he indeed coined the term), and the formulator of not just corporate, but also political PR. He sketches out his views on this in his 1928 work, “Propaganda where he states that “The conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses is an important element in democratic society”, suggesting like Lippmann, that democracy is a “chaos” that needs regulation from above. This “above” is a small section of elites: “We are governed, our minds are molded, our tastes formed, our ideas suggested, largely by men we have never heard of.” These are the people who will ensure that the masses are sedated, and free to run their daily lives, without participating in the broader picture of public policy, given the dangers that this would pose to the influence of said elites, and thus the smooth functioning of society. To paraphrase Bernays, a leader must serve by leading, not lead by serving.   Read more: http://u2r2h.blogspot.co.uk/2007/08/911-and-propaganda-model.html#ixzz2pkrbXafu

As explained in the quoted section above, bringing order out of chaos can be understood to be ‘manufacturing of consent’,  “the conscious and intelligent manipulation of the organized habits and opinions of the masses …”

Well-educated people – better educated than myself – politicians and the like, people who … for whatever reason … have come to realise the meaning of the term would, er … recognise the term and know what it means. That there was a manipulation of events to manufacture consent going on.

8/1/14 Just for fun since we shouldn’t take ourselves too seriously, … he know’s I’m right. I’ve seen the light, it’s been revealed to Me, etc.

Enjoy

 

Continue ReadingConspiracy Theory Unofficial Narrative Fake Manufactured Terrorism The story of the London Bombings 7 July 2005 7/7 Jean Charles de Menezes Ian Blair Tony Blair

An original geeky post for a change (because as well as a political activist I’m also a geek)

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OpenBSD is widely regarded as the most secure operating system. Today is the release date of the latest release OpenBSD 5.4. You’ll need to give it a few hours because it’s not yet 1/11 in Canada.

OpenBSD is secure because it is continually security audited. It is absolutely ideal for firewall/routers because of it’s advanced pf packet filter. It’s best suited for servers but also performs well on desktops and multimedia machines.

Other geeky things I’ve been doing lately

Learning C programming properly. C is all about pointers and indirection. It seems to be taught totally the wrong way. Pointers are key and all else follows …

I recapped a motherboard. You don’t need a new machine nowadays and I was pleased to revive a machine for a friend’s parents. It’s good to save a computer from the skip. I solder badly because I don’t do it often enough but I obviously solder well enough.

I replaced a Sempron LE-1150 with a really fast Athlon X2. Now it rocks.

[Cartoon of CMS learning curve implying that Drupal is very difficult to learn11/11/13  I’ve been trying to learn Drupal 7. Drupal is a Content Managment System (CMS) which also claims to be a CMS framework. A CMS is used to build websites and Drupal is used to build many of the most complex and advanced websites. As the diagram shows, Drupal is difficult to grok. My experience is that it’s counterintuitive and opposed to many of the principles of programming e.g. the use of global variables. But then it’s not programming of course – it’s an application for developing websites.

I did try Joomla and WordPress but it looks like Drupal is what I need to build the websites I want. I think it may be that you just have to learn the Drupal way. Just lately I’ve been doing some maintenance to this blog and realised that WordPress produces an awful lot of dead links which are no good to anyone. I’m thinking of converting this blog to Drupal soon and get some practice in.

There’s some weirdness about this post – not allowing me to edit it as I normally would. I’ve had to use a different browser because it simply appeared totally blank in the browser I normally use but yet it appears published fine. Weird.]

[9/12/13 I’ve been repairing analogue radios just recently. It’s surprising what some contact cleaner, compressed air and a vacuum cleaner can achieve. I still need to repair my favourite radio which was second-hand and well used when I got it about 1999. It will need some soldering but some radios are special.]

Some geeky tips

Use strong passwords. I particularly like long passwords because I know about brute-forcing.

Backup.

Get a real operating system. Linux livecds can help.

[More geeky tips. This could go on and on.

Firewall. Firewall on all interfaces especially on laptops and mobile devices. Lock it down.

Wireless should be considered insecure.

[6/11/13 The Guardian has published a Guide to Tor. The latest Tor browser bundle should be used and care should be taken. People have been caught-out accessing web-based email by not appreciating how it works. It should not be used for anything that divulges personal info and there’s not really much point in watching Youtube through Tor. If you’re in a repressive country it’s worth using. Basically, it hides what you’re looking at. [edit: It’s likely to get past broad political internet censorship. ]

If you have geek competence and spare resources please consider running a Tor relay as I do. There are certain dangers involved in running an exit node (relay) which do not apply to intermediate nodes.]

 

[4/11 What was I not thinking about? Mobile phones are designed to be mobile bugs.

… and here are the regulations from the ILETS / ENFOPOL affair of the 90s. These regulations are demands made by law enforcement authorities of the capabilities needed to infiltrate communications. Essentially, these law enforcement demands are design requirements for communication systems. You will notice that these requirements date from the mid 1990s. It’s probably safe to assume that they have been implemented by now. [Later edit: These regulations were intended particularly at mobile devices: phones at that time e.g. the reference to location. These regulations are bound to have been updated in the same culture of secrecy for technological developments since.]

COUNCIL RESOLUTION of 17 January 1995 on the lawful interception of telecommunications
(96/C 329/01)
Official Journal C 329 , 04/11/1996 p. 0001 – 0006

…

Annex: Requirements

This section presents the Requirements of law enforcement agencies relating to the lawful interception of telecommunications. These requirements are subject to national law and should be interpreted in accordance with applicable national policies. Terms are defined in the attached glossary.

1.Law enforcement agencies require access to the entire telecommunications transmitted, or caused to be transmitted, to and from the number or other identifier of the target service used by the interception subject. Law enforcement agencies also require access to the call-associated data that are generated to process the call.

1.1.Law enforcement agencies require access to all interception subjects operating temporarily or permanently within a telecommunications system.

1.2.Law enforcement agencies require access in cases where the interception subject may be using features to divert calls to other telecommunications services or terminal equipment, including calls that traverse more than one network or are processed by more than one network operator/service provider before completing.

1.3.Law enforcement agencies require that the telecommunications to and from a target service be provided to the exclusion of any telecommunications that do not fall within the scope of the interception authorization.

1.4.Law enforcement agencies require access to call associated data such as:

1.4.1.signalling of access ready status;

1.4.2.called party number for outgoing connections even if there is no successful connection established;

1.4.3.calling party number for incoming connections even if there is no successful connection established;

1.4.4.all signals emitted by the target, including post-connection dialled signals emitted to activate features such as conference calling and call transfer;

1.4.5.beginning, end and duration of the connection;

1.4.6.actual destination and intermediate directory numbers if call has been diverted.

1.5.Law enforcement agencies require information on the most accurate geographical location known to the network for mobile subscribers.

1.6.Law enforcement agencies require data on the specific services used by the interception subject and the technical parameters for those types of communication.

2.Law enforcement agencies require a real-time, fulltime monitoring capability for the interception of telecommunications. Call associated data should also be provided in real-time. If call associated data cannot be made available in real time, law enforcement agencies require the data to be available as soon as possible upon call termination.

3.Law enforcement agencies require network operators/service providers to provide one or several interfaces from which the intercepted communications can be transmitted to the law enforcement monitoring facility. These interfaces have to be commonly agreed on by the interception authorities and the network operators/service providers. Other issues associated with these interfaces will be handled according to accepted practices in individual countries.

3.1.Law enforcement agencies require network operators/service providers to provide call associated data and call content from the target service in a way that allows for the accurate correlation of call associated data with call content.

3.2.Law enforcement agencies require that the format for transmitting the intercepted communications to the monitoring facility be a generally available format. This format will be agreed upon on an individual country basis.

3.3.If network operators/service providers initiate encoding, compression or encryption of telecommunications traffic, law enforcement agencies require the network operators/service providers to provide intercepted communications en clair.

3.4.Law enforcement agencies require network operators/service providers to be able to transmit the intercepted communications to the law enforcement monitoring facility via fixed or switched connections.

3.5.Law enforcement agencies require that the transmission of the intercepted communications to the monitoring facility meet applicable security requirements.

4.Law enforcement agencies require interceptions to be implemented so that neither the interception target nor any other unauthorized person is aware of any changes made to fulfil the interception order. In particular, the operation of the target service must appear unchanged to the interception subject.

5.Law enforcement agencies require the interception to be designed and implemented to preclude unauthorized or improper use and to safeguard the information related to the interception.

5.1.Law enforcement agencies require network operators/service providers to protect information on which and how many interceptions are being or have been performed, and not disclose information on how interceptions are carried out.

5.2.Law enforcement agencies require network operators/service providers to ensure that intercepted communications are only transmitted to the monitoring agency specified in the interception authorization.

5.3.According to national regulations, network operators/service providers could be obliged to maintain an adequately protected record of activations of interceptions.

6.Based on a lawful inquiry and before implementation of the interception, law enforcement agencies require: (1) the interception subject’s identity, service number or other distinctive identifier; (2) information on the services and features of the telecommunications system used by the interception subject and delivered by network operators/service providers; and (3) information on the technical parameters of the transmission to the law enforcement monitoring facility.

7.During the interception, law enforcement agencies may require information and/or assistance from the network operators/service providers to ensure that the communications acquired at the interception interface are those communications associated with the target service. The type of information and/or assistance required will vary according to the accepted practices in individual countries.

8.Law enforcement agencies require network operators/service providers to make provisions for implementing a number of simultaneous intercepts. Multiple interceptions may be required for a single target service to allow monitoring by more than one law enforcement agency. In this case, network operators/service providers should take precautions to safeguard the identities of the monitoring agencies and ensure the confidentiality of the investigations. The maximum number of simultaneous interceptions for a given subscriber population will be in accordance with national requirements.

9.Law enforcement agencies require network operators/service providers to implement interceptions as quickly as possible (in urgent cases within a few hours or minutes). The response requirements of law enforcement agencies will vary by country and by the type of target service to be intercepted.

10.For the duration of the interception, law enforcement agencies require that the reliability of the services supporting the interception at least equals the reliability of the target services provided to the interception subject. Law enforcement agencies require the quality of service of the intercepted transmissions forwarded to the monitoring facility to comply with the performance standards of the network operators/service providers.

22/7/14 My stats show that this is the most popular post – probably because of the ILETS / ENFOPOL quote above.

Got a spares or repair box off eBay cheap and swaped the processor. It rocks – quad core, 2T hard drive and I only ever use a small part of the memory.

Learning django at the moment and hoping to build a site using it soon. Python is good.

Everything wireless strikes me as fantastically insecure. Normal computer users are going to be vulnerable to evil twins at public hotspots. What about wireless keyboards? That’s a keyboard transmitting what keys are pressed. I don’t know but would doubt that encryption is used.

Continue ReadingAn original geeky post for a change (because as well as a political activist I’m also a geek)