e-ignite

e-ignite has now opted out of Phorm / Webwise tracking so visitors to the site will have their privacy protected.  Please see the open letter below:

Email sent to: website-exclusion@webwise.com

Date / Time: 28 April 2009 / 7.18pm UK Time

Subject: Website Exclusion Request: e-ignite.co.uk [An open letter]

Content: To whom it may concern,

I own and operate the domain e-ignite.co.uk and all subdomains under this domain.  I wish this website and all its subdomains to be excluded from Webwise / Phorm for the benefit of the privacy of all visitors to the site.  I fundamentally disagree with the Webwise tracking practices and I also disagree with the policy that website owners have to specifically opt-out via email – a Webwise / Phorm specific entry in robots.txt should be respected.

Regards.

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A recent BBC News article discussed a new email law that is being introduced by the UK government.  This law means that all emails sent or received in the UK will have the details logged and stored by ISPs for a period of one year. Although the government say that this does not include the content of the message, only details such as date, time, from, to and presumably IP address, some critics think that it might not be a large stretch before we find that the content is being logged as well.

From a practical point of view, this means that ISPs have to store masses of data – bear in mind that this is all emails received, so this will include the details of tens of millions of spam messages sent each day in addition to legitimate emails. The UK Government are also going to have to pay the ISPs to record this information, with cost estimates ranging between £25 Million and £70 Million. With these costs in mind, perhaps it won’t be long before the government compiles all the email records into one central database – this is a real concern, not least because of the many highly publicised data breaches but for your privacy. The director of human rights group “Liberty” stated that you have a human right to privacy, and this right should be protected. It is very difficult to regain privacy after it has been removed.

So how would you feel knowing that details of every single email you sent or received had been recorded and monitored? Is this the kind of thing that should happen in a free and democratic society? Or do you find this sinister and of great concern?

According to a number of recent BBC News articles, the UK government are currently considering creating a massive database logging all phone calls and emails sent. As usual, the excuse for needing such a database is “Terrorism” or “serious crime”, but at what point must voters and members of the public say that enough is enough? It is inconceivable to think that each and every call that is made is logged and every email that you send is noted – with current mobile phone technology, it’s possible for your location to be pin-pointed (simply download the Google Maps java application to your mobile handset and see for yourself by clickong on “my location”) so does this mean that yourlocation at the time of the call would be logged? It’s absolutely possible.

We’ve seen the function creep of technologies like this already – for example, average speed cameras that use number plate recognition to catch those speeding were installed under the promise that they would only ever be used for the purposes of speed control. Now though, we see that they are used to track movements of “terrorists” or “serious criminals”. With a database of all calls made and received, will the function eventually creep so that your exact location is logged every fifteen minutes or so when your mobile phone “checks in” with the network? Email on the move is also susceptible to this form of tracking – the IP address that sends the email could be tracked and in the future, why would they not start logging all the websites you’ve visited recently?

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The Raw Story reports that the US are currently drafting a law that will allow them full access to examine any email, file or web search at any time. Currently the plans are at the draft stage, but if passed, this could essentially mean the end to any form of privacy on the internet. Consider that the largest email providers such as Gmail, Hotmail (Live Mail – run by Microsoft), AOL and many others are based in the US but they have international users on a massive scale. This is a frightening plan that has global consequences, and will really pave the way for essential cryptographic systems on email.

From the article:

National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell is drawing up plans for cyberspace spying that would make the current debate on warrantless wiretaps look like a “walk in the park,” according to an interview published in the New Yorker’s print edition today.

McConnell is developing a Cyber-Security Policy, still in the draft stage, which will closely police Internet activity.

“Ed Giorgio, who is working with McConnell on the plan, said that would mean giving the government the autority to examine the content of any e-mail, file transfer or Web search,” author Lawrence Wright pens.

“Google has records that could help in a cyber-investigation, he said,” Wright adds. “Giorgio warned me, ‘We have a saying in this business: ‘Privacy and security are a zero-sum game.’”

A zero-sum game is one in which gains by one side come at the expense of the other. In other words — McConnell’s aide believes greater security can only come at privacy’s expense. Read the rest of this entry »

The results of this year’s Privacy International report are in and it doesn’t make comfortable reading! Many countries including the USA, China, Russia and the UK have been described as “Endemic Surveillance Societies” – a sobering thought when you consider that China (widely criticised for its web censorship and monitoring of citizens) is in the same category as the US and UK!

The report can be found here on the Privacy International website and I’d recommend you take a look and see how your own country got on.

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It’s official: You have no right to the expectation of privacy when your computer is in for repair.

A recent Slashdot article told the story of a man from Pennsylvania who had his computer in for repair (a repair to the DVD burner of his PC). When the computer was in for the repair, technicians found illegal pornography on his hard disk, and he was reported to and arrested by the police. When it went to court, he successfully argued that the technicians had no right to be accessing data on his hard drive, but this decision was later overturned by a prosecution appeal.

In no conceivable way do I support his actions relating to the illegal material found on his computer, and I believe that people who make and access this material deserve to be prosecuted to the full extent of the law.

The fact the the material in question was found on the computer, however, highlighted the issue: do you or can you trust computer technicians with your data when your computer is in for repair?

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A recent ruling in a Federal Appeals Court in the United States has extended the rights of privacy to email. In short, the judge ruled that law enforcement agencies need warrants in order to gain access to a suspect’s emails.

The full story can be read at Wired.com, but I’ve summarised the main points in the quotes below:

“A federal appeals court on Monday issued a landmark decision that holds that e-mail has similar constitutional privacy protections as telephone communications, meaning that federal investigators who search and seize emails without obtaining probable cause warrants will now have to do so.”

“The case boiled down to a Fourth Amendment argument, in which Warshak contended that the government overstepped its constitutional reach when it demanded e-mail records from his internet service providers. Under the 1986 federal Stored Communications Act (SCA), the government has regularly obtained e-mail from third parties without getting warrants and without letting targets of an investigation know (ergo, no opportunity to contest).”

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The recent release of “iTunes Plus” has been over-shadowed by many users complaining about the fact that personal details have been embedded in the purchased track tags. Personally, I hardly find this surprising and I’d go so far to say that some users are citing “privacy concerns” as a reason to break the law, breach copyright and illegally share songs.

A bit of history: the Hymn Project is one of the oldest methods for users to remove the copy protection from songs legally purchased through iTunes (prior to version 7). This has been heralded as a “consumer champion” since it allows users to play their purchased songs on whatever equipment they like. Legalities aside, it is widely used and liked by many users. One of the key points in the Hymn Project, however, is that it removes the copy protection, but retains all the purchaser’s details on the track tags. The removal of the purchaser’s details was possible according to the Hymn site, but they saw no justification to do so.  The makers of Hymn rightly state that they do not condone piracy, they are simply exercising their rights to use their legally purchased content how they see fit without being guilty of piracy.

Now, with iTunes Plus offering DRM free downloads, several sites feature complaints that this “hidden user information” is a major breach of privacy. I don’t think so.

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The BBC reports that Google searches are now to become slightly more anonymous.  Put quite simply, Google have now clarified the length of time that they will keep traceable data such as IP addresses and Cookie details with each individual search term.  As I’ve previously reported, Google currently keep a detailed record of every single search term made with their search engine and log the IP address of the searcher along with other data that is held in a cookie on the user’s system.  Google could then call up all search terms entered by referencing either an IP address or cookie information.

Google have now announced that they will only retain this data for between 18 and 24 months before discarding it and making the historical data anonymous.  According to a Google spokesperson:

“By anonymising our server logs after 18 to 24 months, we think we’re striking the right balance between two goals: continuing to improve Google’s services for you, while providing more transparency and certainty about our retention practices”

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A recent Slashdot article has highlighted new official figures released by the UK government, claiming that between 2005 and 2006, 439,000 telephones and email addresses were monitored by UK agencies. Furthermore, it seems that the Interception of Communications Commissioner is looking for new laws to be passed that allows them to monitor the communications of various Members of Parliament (the country’s political decision-makers). Monitoring MP’s communications was outlawed in the 1960s.

You can read the full article on Slashdot and make up your own mind. However, the gaining momentum of the anti-privacy movement is becoming alarming.