Civilian Police Powers and Bowler Hats

Posted on December 9, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Surveillance | 5 Comments

Earlier this week, the MP for North East Somerset, Jacob Rees-Mogg said that those council officials with the power to issue fines for minor infractions should have to wear blower hats to be easily identified, and avoided, by the public. This is in response to a plan under way in the London boroughs which may grant town hall officials the power to force offenders of minor misdemeanours to turn over their personal details so that they can be charged a fine. At … →

Restricting Public Demonstrations at London Olympics

Posted on November 30, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Civil Liberties, Home, Olympics | 3 Comments

In the wake of the Occupy movement, student protests and TUC rallies in London over the past year, the Home Office has ordered officials to draft plans for avoiding public protests during the London 2012 Olympics. Such protests can be seen as both a security threat and an embarrassment to the host country. Understandably, Government officials are keen to avoid tarnishing the much-awaited events of the coming summer with angry crowds or vocal protesters. However, the means by which they intend to … →

EU Commission Changing the Rules on Airport Body Scanners

Posted on November 15, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Body Scanners, Europe, Privacy | 13 Comments

Today, the European Commission is releasing new rules for the use of airport body scanners. The rules are meant to give airline passengers more choices when it comes to submitting to airport security measures before flying. The new proposals ensure that images from body scanners are not stored or copied and that security staff monitoring the images do so in a separate room. The proposals also means that passengers will be offered the option of an alternative method of screening … →

Selling Personal Data

Posted on November 11, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Data Protection, Home, Online privacy | 5 Comments

According to the ICO yesterday, a former gambling industry worker has plead guilty to committing three offences under section 55 of the Data Protection Act. For these offences, Marc Ben-Ezra was handed a three year conditional discharge and £1,700 fine in addition to just over £800 pounds in court fees. This is his penance for selling more than 65,000 individuals’ personal data for a profit of around £25,000. This case is a particularly blaring example of where the laws surrounding … →

Google’s New Good to Know Privacy Portal

Posted on October 20, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Data Protection, Mastering the Internet, Online privacy, Privacy, Social Networking, Technology | 4 Comments

This week, Google very quietly launched a privacy portal called Good to Know. In the UK, you may even have already seen their adverts on the London Underground or elsewhere last week, a campaign teamed with the Citizens Advice Bureau. The portal provides internet security advice, tips and privacy policy information on Google applications and pages to users worldwide. A huge first for the big players in the business. The Good to Know portal is made up of four main … →

Dumping private details in the Bin-Oliver Letwin, Champion of Data Protection

Posted on October 14, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Bins, Data Protection, ID cards | 4 Comments

It has emerged that David Cameron’s Cabinet Office Minister has been casually dropping papers in litter bins around St. James’s Park nearby Number 10. Photographed on his mobile phone and shuffling through papers, Letwin is shown to dispose of documents in the bins on at least 5 occasions. The documents, partly torn up before being dumped, consisted of emails, memos, letters and papers – some of which contained constituents’ personal details. A spokesperson for Mr. Lewtin stated that the documents were “not … →

Keeping up with Big Brother Watch at Conservative Party Conference

Posted on October 4, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Home | 1 Comment

So far, Big Brother Watch has been busy at Conservative Party Conference. Thanks to our Director, Nick Pickles, and former Director, Daniel Hamilton, our fringe events went excellently. We have heard a lot of interesting comments and support since the weekend as well. Yesterday, Conor Burns MP, took part in our fringe event on the Coalition’s track record with civil liberties. He discussed a policies including the limits the European Arrest Warrant places on the British system, a British Bill … →

10,000 Archived NHS Records Accidentally Destroyed

Posted on October 4, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Data Protection, Privacy, Technology | 2 Comments

The Information Commissioner’s Office released details today of a situation in Dartford and Gravesham NHS Trust where 10,000 archived medical records were accidentally destroyed. The records were placed in a disposal room rather than a storage space and mistakenly destroyed. Most alarmingly, it was not noticed that the records were gone until three months later. The level of carelessness with which personal medical details have been treated in the NHS is disgraceful. Unfortunately, this story has become all too familiar … →

NHS Loses Data- Again

Posted on October 3, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Data Protection, Privacy | 2 Comments

The East Surrey Hospital, local newspaper the Crawley Observer reports, has lost details from the medical records of 800 people held on an unencrypted data stick. And despite the data stick never being found, the 800 patients affected were not informed that the breach of data protection had taken place. The data lost included operation details, names and dates of birth. This is yet another blatant example of the NHS failing to grasp the importance of data protection. The security … →

Kent Dentist Tosses Patient Records in a Car Park

Posted on September 28, 2011 by Big Brother Watch Posted in Data Protection, Information Commissioner, Legal Action | 2 Comments

An Inquiry has been opened in the case of Seamus McCormack, a Kent-based dentist, who allegedly allowed the documents from patient records of an estimated 5,000 people. The records were dumped into a skip, 400 were rescued by a local couple, and the overflowing skip was taken to a recycling facility and the documents destroyed. Regardless of who is responsible for the files ending up in a skip, this is a serious case of misconduct and a gross violation of … →

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