UK Legislation could make Internet campaigns illegal
Continuing with a definition first brought in by the Thatcher government to allow police to tap the phones of union members in the 1985 British miners' strike, the proposed Regulation of Investigatory Powers (RIP) Bill specifically designates “conduct by a large number of persons in pursuit of a common purpose” to be “a serious crime” justifying an interception of their private e-mail correspondence.
Under the Bill, the police will be able to obtain facilities to spy on the private e-mail of people and protest groups, and Internet service providers (ISPs) will have to build “interception capabilities” into their systems. When served with an “interception warrant”, ISPs will be forced to intercept private e-mail and covey the contents to the police or various intelligence services. Refusal to comply with a warrant will carry a maximum prison sentence of two years. Tipping-off”someone that their e-mail is being read will be punishable by up to five years' imprisonment. This also applies to informing anyone not authorised to know about the interception warrant.
The warrant will initially be served on a named individual within an ISP. That person may inform only those other people whose help they need to implement the warrant; and those people, in turn, will face the same penalties for tipping-off.
A separate section of the Bill deals with encryption. This provides for “properly authorised persons (such as members of the law enforcement, security and intelligence agencies) to serve written notices on individuals or bodies, requiring the surrender of information (such as a decryption key) to enable them to understand (make intelligible) protected material which they lawfully hold, or are likely to hold”.
Such an order can be served on anyone who “there are reasonable grounds for believing” has an encryption key. They could face two years behind bars for not revealing the key, and are also subject to the same possible five-year prison sentence as ISPs for informing someone that attempts are being made by the authorities to read their e-mail. This section of the Bill has been widely condemned by civil liberties lawyers as reversing the fundamental right of a person to be presumed innocent until proven guilty, and will almost certainly be challenged using the European Convention on Human Rights.
The British Bill is part of long-term plans that have been in development since 1993, to give law enforcement bodies around the world the ability to intercept and read modern digital communications.
The RIP Bill represents a serious threat to the rights of those who use the Internet to campaign on political issues, both in Britain and internationally.
(Source: GreenNet statement, 22 February 2000)