Feel the fear

I don't think the HO is that stupid. The Snoopotron doesn't have to be practical, or even work very well. It just has to be convincing enough that Hoi Polloi believe Lady Teresa can see into their souls, which for the FB/Titter generation *is* their Internet traffic. A black box with a blue flashing light on top and a Minister on Sky News to say "there it goes, each beep is another Threat To Society Neutralised!" Of course it won't catch the tech-savvy and the really dangerous people, but it can be used to cover up whatever the plods did actually use to catch those, and there will be a steady harvest of minor offenders to deter the majority, provide the tabloids with reinforcement by random reward psychology and help cut down the traffic to "interesting" bits of the web to more manageable proportions - Big Data but not Very Big Data. The inevitable nasty mistakes? Well what do you think the secret trial proposals are for?