Privacy

The UK Government believes that British people should sacrifice protection against internet scammers, spammers and thieves in the name of being able to scan people's messages looking for child porn.

Perhaps a little like unacceptably asking people not to use door locks so that the police can always drop in to people's homes to check for child abuse.

Now it seems that the government is going to extremes to forward their beliefs by setting up a fake campaign website to pretend that people are calling for the removal of their basic internet security of end to end encryption used in several messaging apps.

Rollin Stone magazine has revealed:

The Home Office has hired the M&C Saatchi advertising agency -- a spin-off of Saatchi and Saatchi, which made the Labour Isn't Working election posters, among the most famous in UK political history -- to plan the campaign, using public funds.

A Home Office spokesperson said in a statement.

We have engaged M&C Saatchi to bring together the many organisations who share our concerns about the impact end-to-end encryption would have on our ability to keep children safe/

In response to a Freedom of Information request about an upcoming ad campaign directed at Facebook's end-to-end encryption proposal, The Home Office disclosed that, Under current plans, £534,000 is allocated for this campaign.

Offsite Comment: Why we need End To End Encryption

...And why it's essential for our safety, our children's safety, and for everyone's future

18th January 2022. See article from alecmuffett.com by Alec Muffett

The legal basis of the statistics service Google Analytics is proving shaky across the EU. The Austrian data protection censor has determined that the use of Google Analytics' on websites in the European Union is not compatible with the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). Now the Dutch Authority for Personal Data (AP) has warned: Please note: The use Google Analytics' may soon be banned.

Google Analytics is a free service providing websites with detailed information about usage such as key information about how many users a site has and which pages they are reading. The websites allow Google to place cookies on their behalf that allow Google to track websites visits. It is that tracking that may transgress GDPR rules and note that it also one of the reasons for those silly cookie consent pop-ups that merely serve to train web users to mindlessly click on any pop-up that impedes their viewing.

The Dutch data protection censor has updated its Google Analytics privacy-friendly setup guide and has announced that it is investigating two complaints about the use of Google Analytics in the Netherlands.  The AP would like to conclude this investigation in the near future, namely early 2022. Then itwill be able to say whether Google Analytics is allowed or not.

Meanwhile Germany and Austrian data protection censors are also wrestling with a related case. A complaint about data usage by an Austrian website spilled over to Germany when the website withced to Germany. The censors are now debating both the data complaint and the jurisdiction issues.

France is being very aggressive over enforcing the silly EU cookie law that nags and trains internet users to blindly click on website popups.

By announcing fines of euro 150 million for Google and euro 60 million for Facebook, the French privacy watchdog CNIL went much further than other EU data protection censors have gone to rein in the trackers, which allow advertisers to target people with tailored ads as they move around the internet.

Under the e-Privacy Directive, the CNIL is free to take direct action against companies that otherwise would be overseen by the Irish Data Protection Commission, because the GDPR gives prime enforcement power to the country where the company is legally established. Many tech companies have their EU bases in Dublin.

The French data protection censor has so far zoned in on two key violations: failing to allow users to refuse cookies as easily as it is to accept them, and automatically placing cookies on people's devices before they even have a chance to accept or refuse them. These are widespread violations across the web, but so far only the CNIL seems serious about tackling them.