

GCHQ use of Prism surveillance data was legal, say MPs - jgrahamc
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-23341597

======
rlpb
Whether what the Government did was legal or not is not particularly relevant
here, since the Government wrote the law, and in this case are even
interpreting it.

What matters is whether citizens support what the Government did, and whether
citizens think that what they did should or should not be legal.

I wish the media would spend more time focusing on the latter.

~~~
cmdkeen
What's different in the UK case is that a senior politician has to put their
name to specific actions and requests. So when a whistleblower, court case or
general finding out happens there is a head ready to go on the block.

When whistleblowers have come forward with specific things (bugging the UN is
a memorable one) the public response has tended to be significantly more
accepting than the whistleblower expected. Bugging foreigners is generally
seen as plucky secret agents at it again over here.

This report didn't just say it was legal - it explained the (rough) process
for obtaining the data. Warrants for requests, with requests based on specific
selectors relating to ongoing investigations sounds like exactly what the
citizenry does want.

~~~
mtgx
What selectors? They are given right for blanket surveillance:

> "Under a little known clause in the Ripa statute, GCHQ is permitted to
> collect vast amounts of data under a single warrant or a special certificate
> issued by the foreign secretary."

Do you find that "normal" or something you can support? A single warrant to
collect _everything_? Why even bother with warrants then? What both US and UK
are doing is the _bare minimum_ of legal paperwork to allow them to have a
surveillance state, and when they get caught, they can say stuff like this in
the media, and hope the public buys it. It's not even close to trying to
respect the _spirit of the law_ or of the constitution, or human rights.

> But Shami Chakrabarti, director of Liberty, said: "The painfully careful
> words of the ICS's report clear absolutely nothing up. There's nothing to
> allay fears that industrial amounts of personal data are being shared under
> the Intelligence Services Act and concerns that all UK citizens are subject
> to blanket surveillance under GCHQ's Tempora programme aren't even
> mentioned. This spin-cycle is marked 'whitewash'."

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/17/prism-nsa-
gchq-r...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2013/jul/17/prism-nsa-gchq-review-
framework-surveillance)

I would avoid stories on this from BBC. From what I've noticed they tend be on
their side, and won't report everything or make it sound as if what they're
doing is okay.

~~~
toyg
_> It's not even close to trying to respect the spirit of the law or of the
constitution, or human rights._

To be fair, our (unwritten but otherwise formalised) constitution basically
says Parliament can do whatever the hell it wants (except when limited by EU,
but that's debatable and anyway we're digressing), so as long as the current
crop of MPs are fine with a surveillance state, then it's all
_constitutionally acceptable_.

 _> I would avoid stories on this from BBC. From what I've noticed they tend
be on their side_

I agree that the BBC is far from impartial. It's always been pro-government,
to a variable degree depending on who is in charge at the moment. Ever since
Greg Dyke was booted by Blair for not supporting the Iraq invasion enough, and
even more so after the various rounds of cuts from the Con-Dem coalition, BBC
reporters have mostly stuck to the line that one doesn't bite the hand that
feeds one.

~~~
toble
Yep. I think you have to be especially cautious about absorbing BBC info
during a Conservative government. They have to be subservient because they're
a big target and it doesn't help that they keep tripping over their own feet.

~~~
yapcguy
Why only during a Conservative government, and not a Labour government?

~~~
toyg
Tories are particularly aggressive towards the BBC and regularly threaten full
privatisation / dismantling of what they see as a market-distorting entity.
This started when Maggie Thatcher and Rupert Murdoch were BFF, and continued
pretty much until Cameron's campaign to "tone down" the nastiness.

Labour are much more friendly and involved with BBC employees, historically
speaking; under New Labour the BBC newsdesk was largely left free to roam (and
criticise)... until Iraq and Kelly happened. Even then, once Blair left, they
started firing on Brown pretty much relentlessly, something they wouldn't dare
with the current boss.

------
sentenza
They say that GCHQ conforms with its statutory duties. Wasn't one of the
statutory duties of GCHQ also industrial espionage? [1]

So the mainstream political establishment of the UK confirms that they are OK
with having an intelligence agency that scrapes all available internet traffic
in order to steal trade secrets from continental European companies.

As a continental European I must ask: Why is the UK so insistent that the EU
is really about free trade when, at the same time, they are waging a covert
trade war against us?

[1] [http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/defence-and-security-
blog/2013/...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/defence-and-security-
blog/2013/jul/01/gchq-nsa-eu)

~~~
tome
Your outrage is valid, but your presumption of self-innocence I think probably
not. I don't know which european country you are from, but most likely it
tried or is trying to have a similar program.

~~~
sentenza
I'm from Germany and I am of course not certain of German self-innocence.
However, I would still be surprised if our intelligence agencies were involved
in industrial espionage against companies in other EU countries. There are two
reasons for this:

If such a thing were to become public, the backlash would be enormous. The
German political establishment, from the Bundestag down to village mayors, and
also a large part (most likely the majority) of the population are quite
invested in European unification. Having had bad experiences in the past, most
people here would like to get on with their lives without having to worry
about the dealings of nation-states. Such hostile acts against other EU
countries would be presumed foolish and dangerous.

The second and probably more important reason is that the German intelligence
agencies are not completely under German control. This is something we carry
around with us since the postwar occupation. Recently declassified secret
contracts specify that the German intelligence agencies have to work in close
collaboration (and sometimes on the orders of) the intelligence agencies of
the Western Allies. I'd be surprised if the French would let our agencies
engage in industrial espionage.

EDIT: Btw, I am aware of the traffic scraping that the BND does, I just assume
that industrial espionage, at this point in time , is not one of the many
(probably mostly nefarious) things they do with that data.

~~~
tome
That makes sense. Thanks for the explanation.

------
acqq
The whole thing is just a spin. They actually _intercept everything and store
everything_ according to the description of Tempora here:

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jun/21/gchq-cables-
secret-...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jun/21/gchq-cables-secret-world-
communications-nsa)

It looks that the idea is the same as in US. Once they introduce the
interpretation that "before you start a court procedure against somebody it's
not intercepting" then of course under that premise, they have warrants. Their
idea is that "all data intercepted, collected and stored is still just as
_nothing_ before we decide to use it. Only then we call that an _intercept._ "

See my other post here for the right question to ask. Ask about number of
packets that are in the storage at once, or how many packets contribute to the
data in the storage. From how many different users from UK and the rest of the
world. The answer is, according to Guardian, "from exactly all users from both
UK and the rest of the world." It's an impressive technological feat. It
certainly doesn't sound like "nothing."

------
jumblesale
It's ok because it's legal. It's legal because we've made laws allowing it. I
hope they find time soon to get round to addressing if it's ethical, or if the
people want it.

~~~
cmdkeen
Given they need warrants* for each interception it's pretty clear they aren't
blanket bringing back all UK records, just the ones they ask for based on
specific criteria.

So yes, I don't mind that at all. That seems like exactly how the system
should work.

* Though intelligence warrants work a little differently in the UK

~~~
acqq
They actually intercept _everything_ and store _everything_ according to how
Tempora is described here:

[http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jun/21/gchq-cables-
secret-...](http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2013/jun/21/gchq-cables-secret-world-
communications-nsa)

Tempora is described as storing _absolutely all packets_ traversing given
points for fixed number of days.

This claim "we have individual orders" is just based on the interpretation
that "before you start the court procedure against somebody it's not
intercepting" so of course under that premise, they have warrants. So they
collect everything, store everything and they simply don't name that
"intercepting and collecting."

The simple question for them is "is there a Tempora project, is it active and
how many individual records are in the databases in that project and how many
internet packets are on the storage at once?" \-- Just an order of magnitude
(the exponent of 10) of the packets is enough. If you have a millions of
billions packets stored, it's certainly not from any small number of
"targets."

~~~
cmdkeen
But consider how you tap a cable though: you need to be able to analyse it
offline to work out what the hell is going on, sift the data you need a
warrant for (UK stuff) and whether a warrant applies. Even if that could be
done in real time it would still be "storing" all the data.

Even Snowden's allegations put the maximum length at 30 days which makes it
sound much less like a database of everyone's activity online.

~~~
acqq
Everybody is spied on, all the data are stored. According to Guardian it's 3
days absolutely everything from everybody is stored and 30 days the metadata
from everybody. US, UK and foreigners. Everybody. And it's only the Tempora
project. More (perpetually) is stored at least for those with warrants under
different project names, but we don't know anything about these projects. The
numbers 3 and 30 are just constants that can be changed at any moment as soon
as there's more storage capacity. Because "they don't need warrants for that."

That they don't _use_ the collected data against everybody at once is clear.
But they certainly _spy everybody,_ everything else is a spin. They just later
decide on whom to use the data _they already intercepted, collected and
processed._ That interception, collection and processing they call "nothing"
and later usage they call "interception" with a warrant. It's a spin.

We also saw that a single warrant can order "everything." There are no
limitations.

------
jgrahamc
The most interesting statement to me in the ISC report is the following:

    
    
      Further, in each case where GCHQ sought information from the US, 
      a warrant for interception, signed by a Minister, was already in
      place, in accordance with the legal safeguards contained in the 
      Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000.
    

Now, unless there's something odd in RIPA giving blanket permission then this
sounds like individual warrants obtained prior to any interception.

~~~
cmdkeen
I think it depends what these "selectors" they used to query on were. If a
warrant read: "all communications where a participant is based in the UK"
signed A Minister

Then we'd have a problem. The example given is based on email addresses -
which seems perfectly sensible.

------
grey-area
_It also examined a list of 'selectors' (such as email addresses) that
requested information on a list of UK nationals or individuals who were under
surveillance in such operations._

This is of course misleading as it only talks about one process - using PRISM
access to US providers from the sound of it. The entire UK is under
surveillance under Tempora, and I don't trust our politicians or GCHQ not to
abuse this information in the short-term let alone in the long term. The BBC
doesn't have very good coverage of this issue unfortunately.

 _While the committee found that GCHQ had acted within the law,_

In what way is collecting the information of every UK citizen and passing it
to the NSA on demand within the law?

 _I see daily evidence of the integrity and high standards of the men and
women of GCHQ. The ISC 's findings are further testament to their
professionalism and values._

For a very good example of why we should be suspicious of the platitudes of
politicians and the security services about integrity, see the family of
Stephen Lawrence - their son was killed in the street in a racist attack, and
then the police used spies to follow the family and gathered intelligence on
them, just because they demanded a better investigation of the murder.

Another example is Katherine Gun, the GCHQ whistleblower, who revealed that
GCHQ was processing requests from the NSA to tap the telephones of UN security
council delegates in the lead up to the Iraq war. She was hounded out of her
job, prosecuted for whistleblowing, and finally all charges dropped after 8
months.

------
jgrahamc
Funny how the ISC report is hosted on Google Sites and so if you download it
while logged in your Google account is likely associated with it.

In fact, the entire ISC site is on Google Sites:
[https://sites.google.com/a/independent.gov.uk/isc/home](https://sites.google.com/a/independent.gov.uk/isc/home)

------
andy_ppp
Funny how the BBC have turned off comments on this story isn't it!

~~~
harrytuttle
Not really - this is normal for them if someone might actually be critical of
the reporting.

The BBC have their own set of agendas and biases just like any other
broadcaster or publisher.

People just seem to illogically shrug it off with the meme of "the BBC is not
biased" which is the result of a marketing campaign that has been running
since they were formed.

Not some tinfoil hat paranoia nutjob site btw:
[http://biasedbbc.org/](http://biasedbbc.org/)

~~~
phaemon
> Not some tinfoil hat paranoia nutjob site btw:
> [http://biasedbbc.org/](http://biasedbbc.org/)

Oh yes it is! First story: "Seems to me that those working on Today have an
issue with Israel, since on no basis can it be said to have “questionable”
human rights issues."

From the very report this story is about: "The human rights situation in
Israel and the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPTs) continued to be of
concern to the UK in 2012. Much of this stemmed from Israel’s occupation of
the OPTs and actions taken by the Israeli government in contravention of
international humanitarian law and international human rights law."

------
dspillett
UK.gov: "We most definitely did not have access to that information, ever, but
when we did it was perfectly legal."

