Email and web use ‘to be monitored’ under new laws
The government will be able to monitor the calls, emails, texts and website visits of everyone in the UK under new legislation set to be announced soon.
Internet firms will be required to give intelligence agency GCHQ access to communications on demand, in real time.
The Home Office says the move is key to tackling crime and terrorism, but civil liberties groups have criticised it.
Tory MP David Davis called it “an unnecessary extension of the ability of the state to snoop on ordinary people”.
Attempts by the last Labour government to take similar steps failed after huge opposition, including from the Tories.
British police faces racism scandal
The policeman was suspended as he called the man a nigger. “The problem with you is you will always be a nigger, yeah? That’s your problem, yeah,” the recording showed the policeman as saying.
The 21-year-old was stopped in his car by police officers, arrested and then placed in a police car the day after last August unrest that spread across England after the police shot a young black man Mark Duggan in Tottenham.
The black man from Beckton in east London stressed that he was made to feel like “an animal” by the officers. He also accused a police officer of kneeling on his chest and strangling him.
The recording also showed that the officer, identified as PC Alex MacFarlane, subjected the man to racist insults, saying, “You’ll always have black skin. Don’t hide behind your colour.”
The Independent Police Complaints Commission passed the complaint to the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS) following the claims that three officers, including MacFarlane, were involved in the criminal offence.
200 Arrested in Germany Anti-Capitalism Protest
At least 200 people have been detained and many injured in clashes between riot police and anti-capitalism protesters in Germany’s financial capital, Frankfurt.
“There have been at least 200 arrests” and “many wounded” during the protest which was part of a European day of “action against capitalism,” an event organizer said on Saturday. “Lots of people have suffered bruising, there’s at least one confirmed fracture and many people suffered from the effects of teargas used by the police,” he added.
Neighbors Spying on You? New Program Spreading Across the US Takes Neighborhood Watch to Scary New Level
Crime in Los Angeles is a gritty enterprise, and donning an LAPD badge has historically involved getting your hands dirty. Long before the New York Police Department was spying on Muslim students, the LAPD was running a large-scale domestic spy operation in the 1970s and ’80s, snooping on and infiltrating more than 200 political, labor and civic organizations including the office of then Mayor Tom Bradley. Today, the LAPD isn’t quite so aggressive, but it still employs a directive titled Special Order 1, which permits police officers to deem what is “suspicious” and then act on it.
Recall Election for Wisconsin Governor Who Battled Unions
Wisconsin officials announced on Friday that critics of Gov. Scott Walker had met the requirements for a recall election, starting a bitterly contentious campaign cycle all over again. Mr. Walker, who has battled public employee unions since taking office last year, will become the first governor in the state’s history to face a recall election, set for June.
But Friday marked an ending, too: of unlimited fund-raising for Mr. Walker, who over the politically rancorous past year has raised more than $12 million, more than any candidate for governor has ever collected for a race in Wisconsin.
Poles Talk About CIA Prison, Breaking Silence
For years, the notion that Poland could allow the CIA to operate a secret prison in a remote lake region was treated as a crackpot idea by the country’s politicians, journalists and the public.
A heated political debate this week reveals how dramatically the narrative has changed. In a string of revelations and political statements, Polish leaders have come closer than ever to acknowledging that the United States ran a secret interrogation facility for terror suspects in 2002 and 2003 in the Eastern European country.
French Constitutional Court Bans Law Enforcement Use of National Biometric ID Database
Last week, the Conseil Constitutionnel, the highest authority on the French Constitution, declared the provisions of a law permitting judicial and police use of a centralized national ID database to be unconstitutional. 200 members of the French Parliament referred the law to the Conseil following the law’s adoption on March 6th. The Conseil determined that the use of the centralized database was incompatible with France’s fundamental rights, including the right to privacy and the presumption of innocence.
The proposed legislation mandated compulsory civilian ID cards containing a chip designed to store personal and biometric information, including home address, marital status, eye colour, and fingerprints. Proponents argued that the biometric ID card would be used to stop “honest folk” from becoming the victims of identity fraud. In fact, the law would have enabled the “honest folk” database to be used for criminal and judicial purposes. The Conseil correctly determined that such uses constituted a serious incursion into the right to private life, disproportionate to the law’s stated objective.
Ever wonder what a complete, undiluted moron looks like? He looks like this …
In the United States there is a marked and quite disturbing trend of law-abiding Americans being arrested, beaten or harassed by police simply for exercising their legal right to film a police officer in the course of their public duties.
Thankfully, as of late there has been some justice in the ruling of an Illinois judge who found their wiretapping legislation unconstitutional as well as a relatively small-scale victory in the case of Steve Horrigan.
Unfortunately, yet another example of this trend has emerged in a video posted on March 30, 2012, which you can see below (note: there is explicit language in the video).
Country Rises Up in Support for New Hampshire Hero
Dennis Fleming from New Hampshire fired one shot into the ground in the woods from his Smith & Wesson .357 which resulted in the capture of a serial burglar who had been terrorizing neighborhoods in his small New England town to satisfy his drug habit. Over ten crimes were solved due to his capture and the whole town hailed Fleming as a hero. The whole town that is except for the county prosecutor, who had the police arrest Fleming for reckless conduct, a felony, confiscate all his guns and prepared to bring him to trial and lock him up.
Only one thing stood in the prosecutor’s way; the entire country.
Outrage as Energy Boss Pockets £10 Million Pay Package While Families Struggle with Their Bills
The boss of British Gas owner Centrica scooped a £10million package last year despite plunging millions of families into misery with inflation-busting hikes in bills.
Sam Laidlaw, chief executive of Centrica, received a windfall large enough to pay the average family’s energy bill for the next 7,500 years. His ‘shocking’ package relates to the year British Gas – which provides power to 13million families in the UK – hiked household bills by 18 per cent for gas and 16 per cent for electricity.
The move sparked a swathe of price hikes by all of Britain’s energy providers that plunged an extra 2.8 million people into fuel poverty.
France Attemps to Cover Up Mohammed Merah Identity
In the wake of a multiethnic and multidenominational shooting spree in France come accusations that alleged killer Mohammed Merah was an informant for France’s domestic intelligence agency.
Italian daily newspaper Il Foglio has made a second unprecedented claim: France granted Merah freedom of movement across the Middle East and in France in exchange for information. The Italian journalist behind the claims is Daniele Raineri, who was an embedded journalist in Iraq and Afghanistan and is Il Foglio’s expert on Middle Eastern affairs.
In an extensive interview with Press TV Raineri described a vast cover up of the true identity of Mohammed Merah.
Greek PM Says Third Bailout May Be Needed
The Greek prime minister Lucas Papademos has conceded that the crisis-plagued country could require a third bailout only weeks after it secured a second package of rescue funds following months of hand-wringing in Brussels.
Athens may have received the biggest bailout in history but another lifeline could not be ruled out, the technocratic leader said in an interview. So far, the EU and International Monetary Fund have committed a total €240bn (£200bn) to the near-bankrupt nation.
“Some form of financial assistance might be necessary but we have to work intensely to avoid such an event,” Papademos told the Italian business daily Il Sole 24 Ore.
How DVLA Made £21 Million Selling Details of 4.85 Million Motorists… Including Passing on 7,000 Drivers’ Names to Convicted Criminal
Agency chiefs knew that Observices Parking Solutions and boss Douglas Harris (pictured) had been fined £29,850 after a court ruled it had been ‘recklessly unfair’ to drivers last year – but they still sold on the personal details. The Mail on Sunday can also disclose the DVLA has sold 4.85million drivers’ names and addresses to parking enforcement firms in the past six years at £2.50 a time.
Fuel Panic May Be Good, said Cameron as He Told Ministers He Would Not Be ‘Held to Ransom’ by Tanker Drivers
David Cameron told shocked Ministers ‘a bit of petrol panic may be no bad thing’ as he set out his determination to defeat the threatened strike by fuel-tanker drivers.
According to senior sources, his provocative remark was made at the end of a Cabinet meeting last Tuesday that was dominated by the dispute. Mr Cameron told Ministers that he refused to be ‘held to ransom’ by Unite, the union leading the strike call.
Current TV Fires Keith Olbermann Claiming Network Sabotage
Keith Olbermann, host of the progressive show Countdown with Keith Olbermann has been fired by Current TV.
He has been an outspoken critic of controlled media and both political parties with an extreme andalmost repugnant bias toward republicans.
However some of his special comment sections, like the video below, have been some of the greatest pieces I have seen and will be missed.
In fact, I wouldn’t not doubt if his outspoken political views are part of the reason for the fallout with the network.
Current TV founders Al Gore and Joel Hyatt say that Keith has been fired breach of contract claiming he “sabotaged” the network, according to a report from Politico.
Keith denies the claims stating implying there has been a pay dispute and the network though it would be more economical to relieve him of his contract promising to sue the network over the incident.
The network will be replacing Olbermann with former New York governor and CNN host Eliot Spitzer.
Lawmakers: Move Iraq equipment to Mexico border
Two Texas lawmakers are pushing the Pentagon to hand off surplus combat equipment from Iraq to local law enforcement agencies along the U.S.-Mexico border. The equipment includes Humvees, weapons and night vision goggles.
The Houston Chronicle reports Texas Reps. Ted Poe and Henry Cuellar have been joined by 17 border sheriffs from Texas, New Mexico and Arizona in a letter to Defense Secretary Leon Panetta requesting that he move up delivery of surplus equipment.
Clinton pushes new missile defense systems to the Arab Gulf states
The Obama administration is moving to strengthen its ties with Persian Gulf nations whose geography and oil resources have already made them key players in U.S. defense and energy security.
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Saturday will inaugurate a strategic dialogue with the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council that the administration expects will ultimately lead to a coordinated, U.S-supplied regional missile defense system and increased stability in international oil markets.
Clinton arrived here Friday for initial meetings with King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia, the GCC’s most powerful member and closest U.S. partner. The other members are Qatar, the United Arab Emirates, Kuwait, Bahrain and Oman.
Proposed by the administration last fall as a regular gathering, the first U.S.-GCC Strategic Cooperation Forum comes as the organization has become an increasingly powerful player in the turmoil that has shaken the Arab world over the past year.
Biosecurity advisory board reverses decision on ‘engineered bird flu’ papers
Two scientific papers that describe experiments with a virulent and contagious bird flu virus should be published in uncensored form, a committee of scientists advising the federal government said Friday.
That recommendation by the National Science Advisory Board for Biosecurity reverses one the committee made in January, when it asked two journals, Science and Nature, to hold off publishing studies about the lab-engineered strains of the H5N1 influenza virus.
Two facts appeared to sway the 18 voting members…
… One is that the papers don’t provide step-by-step directions for how to make the engineered H5N1 strain. Specifically, they don’t provide a final list of mutations that made the bird flu easily transmissible in mammals, which it isn’t naturally.
…. The second fact is that new surveillance shows that “wild” H5N1 viruses circulating in chicken flocks overseas contain mutations similar to ones in the lab-engineered strains. Consequently, publishing the papers would give public health officials information that would help them identify wild H5N1 strains evolving in an especially dangerous direction.
TSA Begin Takeover of Amtrack Stations Through ‘VIPR Teams’
Agents of the federal Transportation Security Administration conducted a joint security detail with the Alton Police Department at the city’s Amtrak station this week.
“We refer to these as VIPR operations; that stands for visual intermodal protection and response,” TSA spokesman Jim Fotenos said about Tuesday’s operation. “It was not in response to a specific threat.”
Fotenos said the TSA, which is a division of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, conducts thousands of these operations nationwide every year.
“They have multiple benefits,” he said. “It’s a visual deterrent and has security value. We’re working with local law enforcement and developing relationships, so that if there were an incident that we had to respond to, we have those relationships in advance.”
For security reasons, the TSA does not announce where such operations will be conducted in advance. However, Fotenos said the agency had carried out such operations at the Alton Amtrak station before, including one about a year ago.
“We’ve done them at Amtrak stations and multimodal operations throughout Illinois,” he said.
Although he said he couldn’t be very specific about the purpose of Tuesday’s operation, Fotenos said it was “passenger-based at the actual station.
“A good portion of that is done through the Alton Police Department and the use of their K-9 assets,” Fotenos said. “The TSA also has inspectors on hand. The visual deterrent is important, and also conducting security operations. Our inspectors are looking for a number of things, and the police are looking for a number of things.”
TSA has been conducting such operations for a number of years in the wake of the terrorist attacks on Sept. 11, 2001.
“Amtrak has always been a great partner, and so has local law enforcement,” Fotenos said. “Many passengers, especially those who ride the rails a lot, are more accustomed to seeing our folks and the local law enforcement there.”
Over 50 thousand Visa and Mastercard credit card stolen this week
Credit card data — enough to create counterfeit cards — has been stolen from Visa and Mastercard users, Visa confirmed today. The companies are doing damage control, alerting banks and affected card members.
According to security researcher, Brian Krebs, a group of individuals, have compromised the a payments processor, rumored to be Global Payments Inc. The group is believed to be New York-based, targeting the payment system in New York parking garages. Cyber criminals have gained access through the processor to “Track 1 and Track 2 data,” which gives them enough information to make fraudulent purchases on the compromised cards.
Visa and Mastercard have alerted a number of banks and credit unions associated with the cards, warning that they should be on the lookout for fraud.
“Visa has provided payment card issuers with the affected account numbers so they can take steps to protect consumers through independent fraud monitoring and, if needed, reissuing cards,” the company said in a statement, “As always, Visa encourages cardholders to regularly monitor their accounts and to notify their issuing financial institution promptly of any unusual activity.”
China cracks down after Internet coup rumors
China has shut down websites, made a string of arrests and punished two popular microblogs after rumors of a coup linked to a major political drama that led to the fall of a rising star.
Authorities closed 16 websites for spreading rumors of “military vehicles entering Beijing and something wrong going on in Beijing,” the official Xinhua news agency said late Friday, citing the state Internet information office.
Six people were arrested, while the country’s two most popular microblogs, run by Sina.com and Tencent, said they would stop web users from posting comments until Tuesday after being criticized by the authorities.
The crackdown follows a surge in online rumors about a coup led by security chief Zhou Yongkang, following the March dismissal of rising political star Bo Xilai.
2012: American Military’s Dependence on Space Technology
The United States may be falling behind in transportation, education and health care down here on Earth, but its military infrastructure is certainly way ahead when it comes to imagery and communications satellites armed with defensive and offensive capabilities out there in space.
That the United States leads in the militarization of space is apparent from House and Senate Armed Services subcommittee hearings this month on the fiscal 2013 budget of $9.7 billion for military space programs.
Like many Pentagon programs, these have had amazing successes but also billion-dollar overruns and costly failures.
A Government Accountability Office (GAO) report, released at Wednesday’s Senate hearing, showed major Defense space acquisition programs “have increased by about $11.6 billion — 321 percent — from initial estimates for fiscal years 2011 through 2016.”
Massive $17 Trillion Hole Found In Obamacare
Two years ago, when introducing then promptly enacting Obamacare, the president stated that healthcare law reform would not cost a penny over $1 trillion ($900 billion to be precise), and that it would not add ‘one dime’ to the debt. It appears that this estimate may have been slightly optimistic… by a factor of 1700%. Because coincident with the recent Supreme Court debacle, in which a constitutional law president may be about to find that his magnum opus law is, in fact, unconstitutional, someone actually read the whole thing cover to cover, instead of merely relying on the CBO’s, pardon Morgan Stanley and Goldman Sachs’, funding estimates. That someone is Republican Jeff Sessions who after actually running the numbers has uncovered that the true long-term funding gap is a mind-boggling $17 trillion, just a tad more than the original sub $1 trillion forecast. This latest revelation means that total underfunded US welfare liabilities: Medicare, Medicaid and social security now amount to $99 trillion! Add to this total US debt which in 2 months will be $16 trillion, and one can see why Japan, which is about to breach 1 quadrillion in total debt (yen, but who’s counting), may want to start looking in the rearview mirror for up and comer competitors. And while Obama may have been taking creative license with a number that is greater than total US GDP, he was most certainly correct when saying that Obamacare would not add a penny to US debt. Because the second the US government comes to market to fund a true total debt/GDP ratio of 750%, it is game over, and the Fed will have its hands full selling Treasury puts every waking nanosecond to have any time left for the daily 3pm stock market ramp.
