Police from around Europe can now routinely hack into your PC and browse your data - without requiring even a warrant.
The Home Office has increased police powers to allow officers to monitor email and web activity. It also allows the plod (or le plod) to hack into computers in offices and even homes.
And it's not only the upstanding British bobby who can browse your machine. The EU has stated that police in all member states should be allowed to use ‘intrusive surveillance of private property' without a court warrant. In any other member state. On any other member state.
Naturally, not everyone is entirely chuffed with the situation. Shami Chakrabarti of human rights group Liberty said in a statement: "This is no different from breaking down someone's door, rifling through their paperwork and seizing their computer hard drive."
And if that's the view of leftie liberals, imagine what the Daily Mail brigade will make of horrible Frenchies and Nazis being able to look at your email.
Not least because - whichever way you look at it - 'remote searching' requires the infection of a suspect's PC. Keylogging, viruses spread by email... it's all legal if a copper does it.
With great power comes great responsibility, and you'd have to be pretty conformist to believe that such legal hacking will have only good consequences.
Comments
2bathred said: What if we all send each other an e-mail with the words GN AL-Q or BMB some where in the text Lets see them trying to track down 50million hits at a go on their snooping software
The Masterful Captain Of The S said: The police are becoming less effective by the week they just wanna be seen to be doing SOMETHING to justify their existence and keep the good and bad seperate Shame they never pick on the media for their provokation and meddling isnt it
Kingy_0 said: Whoops refreshed page and made a double post-0
Kingy_0 said: It would be nice to see some reference to where PCA got this information not that I dont trust them its just that this is a hot HOT topic As we can already see people feel quite passionately on this topic and are worried about their freedoms being violatedBut if this is something that the EU is passing I personally think its pathetic this was attempted by another Numpty politician in the Labour govt who wished for the monitoring of all emails and communications in PCs in Britain Which produced an uproar with the publicWhy do the govts keep trying to monitor us Im sick of it Thinking they can sheperd us to suitable material etc etc funny that these policies of internet amp digital control are sooo unpopular and our democratically elected government keeps wanting to push them further It stinks of 1984
Kingy_0 said: It would be nice to see some reference to where PCA got this information not that I dont trust them its just that this is a hot HOT topic As we can already see people feel quite passionately on this topic and are worried about their freedoms being violatedBut if this is something that the EU is passing I personally think its pathetic this was attempted by another Numpty politician in the Labour govt who wished for the monitoring of all emails and communications in PCs in Britain Which produced an uproar with the publicWhy do the govts keep trying to monitor us Im sick of it Thinking they can sheperd us to suitable material etc etc funny that these policies of internet amp digital control are sooo unpopular and our democratically elected government keeps wanting to push them further It stinks of 1984
Harry said: Well hello all you dear little innocents you repeating the innocent have nothing to fear mantra by rote Think a bit for a changeYouve obviously never read 1984 Yes it really can happen The Stazi and KGB come to mindThe Palestinians seem to be more important for some than the raped killed and abducted Congolese Been going on a long time now Isnt our media wonderful and selective Not to mention the brainwashed individuals among our citizenry
Christian Oldcorn said: Uncle Matt Please dont quote that Chakribati woman she makes my blood boil the only people in fear of this should be people doing things they should not be normal upstanding citizens have nothing to fear Ah well conformist I am then
moggy5 said: Good luck to these idiots I recently renewed my firearms licence and the copper handling the paperwork after finding out I repaired computers for a livingActually asked me how to open a PDF We will find a way of blocking and booting out their trojansnever fearSooner we send G Brown and his hairy Scots ass back over the border the betterBefore he causes civil war in our country
Matt Egan said: And a happy new year to you my always faithful but never bold enough to name himself blog trog Jon Guant is a right-wing radio hack who got binned for calling an elected official a Nazi and an ignorant pig live on air Slightly different from a woolly liberal using the term in an ill-advised attempt to lampoon holders of the very views that Mr Guant espouses But hey thanks for caring In other news Im not comfortable with law-enforcement agencies being legally allowed to hack my PC Fact
Matt on a hot tin roof said: As with Jon Gaunt if you worked on TalkSport Radio you would be getting the sack for cowardly pointing and proding a reflected Nazi fingerGood fun in Speakers Corner with Yesterdays PC Advisor Blog threadwwpcadvisorcoukforumsindeHappy New Year mate
Matt Egan said: She would for me - I have no idea what youre talking about Enlighten me
Dan said: Would a Daily Mail reader get away with saying that some PCAs writers may have more in common with the JC trumpeters
Claus said: Therefore one prays that all the innocent Palestinian families in Gaza are taking the most stringent of actions inorder to protect themselves and their innocent young childrenThroughout the world we all witness that the Nazi psyche continues to re-appear like a rapidly spreading toxic and deadly virus
Walter Wego said: It has been said There is such a thing as too much freedom Perhaps but to have none is a violation of liberties that many have laid down their lives and continue to do so is a gross violation of the past present and the future Perhaps before we lose too many of our freedoms we use one before that too is lost the freedom to vote out those who are trying to take them away
Weeble said: Intrusive surveillance of private property without a court warrantThats the worrying statement one more small step to a police stateIt took just a few months for the Nazi party to turn Germany from a democracy to a dictatorship the same could easily happen again
Matt Egan said: But Carl - are you comfortable with the police having the legal right to infiltrate your PC Thin end of the wedge innit guv
Carl said: You paint a dreamy water colour fantasia themeHowever Ill stick to the more realistic tv news pictures which depict plod physically removing suspects computers for analysisWhere is PCAs advice to aid the ordinary buffoon userWill it be the typical loaded monied toss up between Norton Beta and Kaspersky