back to article MPs pass new UK spy law

UK MPs tonight voted 444-69 in favor of passing the Investigatory Powers Bill, aka the Snoopers' Charter, thus sending the proto-law off to the House of Lords to debate. The government-pushed IPB ramps up the powers granted to British spies, effectively legalizing the mass surveillance systems revealed by Edward Snowden – …

  1. edge_e
    Big Brother

    clowns to the left of me,

    Jokers to the right

  2. Version 1.0 Silver badge
    Big Brother

    444-69

    I guess the vote tells us which political parties expect the opportunity to use the new laws to their advantage.

  3. chris 17 Silver badge

    would be nice to know the timeline of what happens next and when

    1. diodesign (Written by Reg staff) Silver badge

      As the article says, it's off to the House of Lords next. When exactly isn't clear - that has to be scheduled.

      C.

      1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

        "it's off to the House of Lords next"

        Then, assuming it gets Royal Assent, it'll be off the ECHR which also can't be scheduled yet. After that, in the absence of an unlikely outbreak of sanity in Whitehall, we go for another iteration of the loop.

        Or, in event of a Brexit, the City will start screaming and lobbying as they realise that they can't meet EU requirements about personal data transfer.

  4. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Airstrip One has no choice but to comply.

    It doesn't matter if we're in the EU or not, our local overlords allegiance is to the US, who are also screwing their own citizens with unwarranted surveillance.

    And so the war on freedom continues.

    1. gus99

      Re: Airstrip One has no choice but to comply.

      This is far worse than anything done in the US or revealed by Snowden: mandatory deep packet inspection to create summary records ('ICRs' in their made-up terminology) of all our internet use, with revealing that you've been told to do it a criminal offence, for a start

      1. Mark 85

        Re: Airstrip One has no choice but to comply.

        It will, however, give a green light to our CongressCritters since we now have to catch up the UK. I'm expecting a new outburst of surveillance legislation from the likes of Feinstein in 5.....4.....3.....

  5. Oengus

    444-69

    That means that the Intelligence community need to up their efforts and get some dirt on 69 MPs.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Yesterday

    Yesterday my Android phone received a custom OS in the Uk. i.e. a hacked OS update stuck on the phone somehow. The phone warned me when I powered it up, that installing this custom OS was a serious security risk and did I really want to do it? Volume up yes, volume down no.

    But the phone had no sim, and the only wifi it connected to was that of a UKIP related politician.

    So someone had crafted a custom version of this phones OS, and installed it by Wifi targetting this UK political related IP address.

    Is that the Chinese or Russians? How would they have man in the middle access? Why would they care about such a low level political figure?

    Can you tell me what protects Britain from GCHQ? Wishful thinking? Happy thoughts? What actual mechanisms have you put in place to control your STASI? Its funny that the UKIP man thought I was being paranoid and it was just a bad update on the phone. I suspect many politicians underestimate the damage an out of control spy machines does in voting to send this bill forward. In a similar way to this man underestimating the steps needed to put a new OS remotely onto a phone.

    If there is an EFF or similar for analysing these phones? I'd like to send it in.

  7. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Time for ....

    Brexit........

    1. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

      Re: Time for ....

      Could you argue your case with a little more detail?

      1. Anonymous Coward
        Anonymous Coward

        "Could you argue your case with a little more detail?"

        The UK is joined at the hip with America not Europe. Its true in so many areas of policy including intelligence gathering and war mongering etc. So go and be the 51st State of the USA, ... We don't want you in Europe...

        1. Tommy Pock

          Re: "Could you argue your case with a little more detail?"

          Nice language you've got there. Where did you find it? :)

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Title Not Needed

    Labour cnuts

  9. Doctor Syntax Silver badge

    Why...

    ....is this hidden in these stupid fast-disappearing news bytes?

    Do any of the readership actually think this innovation is worth having?

  10. Tommy Pock

    1 Introduce outrageously invasive investigative powers bill.

    2 Outrage.

    3 Scale back bill so it's only as invasive as you wanted in the first place.

    4 The public breathes a sigh of relief as they're put under mass surveillance.

    By the way, the Conservatives' own 2009 white paper - "Rolling Back Labour's Surveillance State" - has been removed from their website.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      @Tommy Pock

      The white paper is available at: https://conservativehome.blogs.com/files/surveillance-state.pdf

      Just remember it was written by British politicians who have one set of rules for the little people and another for themselves, eg here.

  11. sysconfig

    Register going BBC style reporting?

    How can news about such important legislation only appear in those tiny news nibbles, which rotate all the way through in no time? IPB will take away over night the little privacy we had left, and turn all of us into subjects of surveillance, presumed guilty, while giving access to the information to a broad range of institutions and people with insufficient oversight and sign off procedures. Several committees and experts alike had doubts, which makes it even more outrageous and important, since you've got to wonder how it can receive such an overwhelming majority in the House of Commons.

    This should be kept in the headlines indefinitely, not be disappearing with other FYI-style bites.

  12. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So what's in this bill, out of interest?

    Is there a breakdown (not some gov't website) somewhere?

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