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Nick Pickles

EU Commissioner backs ACTA legal review, eventually

Posted on February 16, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in Civil Liberties, Internet freedom, Technology | Leave a comment

In a statement today, Viviane Reding, Vice-President of the European Commission and EU Commissioner for Justice, Fundamental Rights and Citizenship, outlined a robust position on internet freedom. In it, she states “for me, blocking the Internet is never an option” and goes onto argue the current  situation “can and must not be changed by the ACTA agreement”. We have previously highlighted the secretive nature of ACTA and the potentially wide-ranging consequences of passing what is in places a dangerously vague … →

SOCA takes down RNBExclusive

Posted on February 15, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in Press Office | Leave a comment

Responding to the Serious and Organised Crime agency’s take-down of rnbexclusive.com: Nick Pickles, director of privacy and civil liberties campaign group Big Brother Watch, said: “I welcome targeted action against websites profiting from infringing content, but the message displayed by SOCA is potentially misleading to the public, along with the threat of putting your internet connection under surveillance. “It is fair to question whether the involvement of SOCA has diverted resources from investigating serious public threats such as people trafficking, … →

Who pays the price of failure?

Posted on February 13, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in Councils, Data loss, Data Protection, Data Protection Act, Information Commissioner, Losing data | Leave a comment

Another local authority data loss, another Information Commissioner fine. If there’s one thing Orwell didn’t factor into nineteen eighty four, it was quite how incompetent ‘big brother’ could be. Today the Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has issued fines totalling £180,000 to two councils for failing to keep highly sensitive information about the welfare of children secure. Croydon Council was fined £100,000 after a bag containing papers relating to the care of a child sex abuse victim was stolen from a … →

Three Million CRB Checks in 2011

Posted on February 10, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in Press Office | Leave a comment

Registered organisations made 2,981,958 checks in 2011 Equivalent to 1 in 17 of adult population being checked 13 of the 25 highest users are private companies 3,924 bodies are now ‘registered’ with the Criminal Records Bureau The figures, published under Freedom of Information law, have been highlighted by privacy and civil liberties campaign group Big Brother Watch as further evidence that the system has grown out of control. In 2011 the organisations, which include councils, private background check companies and … →

Your Facebook status is at risk if you fail to keep up repayments

Posted on February 8, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in Online privacy, Social Networking, Technology | Leave a comment

Meet Lenddo. The company claims to be “the first credit scoring service that uses your online social network to assess credit”and while only available in the Philippines, it raises some interesting questions. When you use the site, the first thing Lenddo asks for is a Facebook account; once that’s logged in it also asks for things like Gmail and Twitter. The idea is that where traditional credit scoring isn’t available (in developing economies, for example) this provides a better way … →

Robocop comes to Camden with shouting cameras

Posted on February 5, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in CCTV, Council snooping, Councils, London, Surveillance, Technology | Leave a comment

Please see the update below – Camden Council have issued a statement: Do you live in a restricted area? Probably not. Then again, that’s what we imagine residents of this Camden estate thought. Big Smoke has exposed how Camden Council’s latest local authority to join the shouting camera craze, following in the footsteps of Shepway District Council. Its ‘shouting lamppost‘ uses the same technology as deployed by Camden. Triggered by motion sensors, the camera plays a recording warning you that … →

No fine does not mean all is fine

Posted on February 3, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in Data loss, Data Protection Act, Information Commissioner, Losing data | Leave a comment

Data protection in numbers: 8 months – the time it took E*Trade Securities Ltd to notify the Information Commissioners Office of a serious breach of data protection. 608 – The number of customers whose personal data remains missing, including identification documents, proof of address and account application forms. £0 – The fine handed out to E*Trade.   Mistakes do happen, but waiting eight months to notify the regulator is unacceptable. It is still unclear if the company has deemed fit … →

Five Billion Dollars of personal information

Posted on February 2, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in International, Online privacy, Privacy, Social Networking, Technology | Leave a comment

Facebook’s IPO is expected to be largest ever sale of shares by a US web company, with the business looking to raise raise $5bn. That would dwarf Google’s float in 2004, which raised $1.67bn. The issue puts front and centre the commercial value of our personal information and raises some serious questions about the protection of privacy. We’ve blogged previously on the latest functionality change, the ‘timeline’ and how it impacts on privacy. The company is under investigation in several … →

Smart meters will not be compulsory says Minister

Posted on February 1, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in Privacy, Smart Meters, Surveillance, Technology | Leave a comment

“We believe people will benefit from having smart meters. But we will not make them obligatory.” Charles Hendry, energy minister.   The news today that smart meters will not be compulsory is an extremely positive step, but the issue is far from resolved. Smart meters have the capability to reduce energy consumption and help people beter monitor their energy spending. They also have the potential to give someone outside your home the ability to see if you are in, look … →

Euro MP quits saying ACTA is a secretive, un-democratic masquerade.

Posted on January 27, 2012 by Nick Pickles Posted in Civil Liberties, Europe, International, Internet freedom, Online privacy, Technology, Web blocking | Leave a comment

In a remarkable resignation statement, the man responsible for the EU’s ACTA negotiations has resigned, blasting the document as secrative and un-democratic. Kader Arif, rapporteur for ACTA in the European Parliament quit his role as rapporteur saying: ”I want to denounce in the strongest possible manner the entire process that led to the signature of this agreement: no inclusion of civil society organisations, a lack of transparency from the start of the negotiations, repeated postponing of the signature of the … →

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