Data protection: Angela Merkel proposes Europe network

Used to be a much greater proportion than it is today, largely thanks to the growth of places like the Amsterdam Internet Exchange.

At one point there was a building on the Isle of Dogs (former island in the Thames) through which an absolutely terrifying proportion of the network traffic for western Europe travelled.

I seriously doubt that Merkel's intentions are pure on this. For starters, we know that Germany has given some degree of cooperation in NSA spying, including allowing the US to build an army base that will be used by the NSA[1]. Secondly, we know that the BND used the NSA's systems for its own intelligence purposes[2].

Something tells me this is as much (if not more) an attempt to put European users' data within reach of European spy agencies as it is about protecting European users' privacy. I suppose the upside is that it ensures that peoples' data is in the hands of their own governments rather than being in the hands of governments they have no control over.

[1] http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/edward-snowden-acc...

[2]http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/german-intellige...

I was just reading the history of the EU. So UK was part of the outer 7 European states. On the enlargement of the pre-pre-cursor of the EU to the pre-cursor of the EU in 1960

"However, then–French President Charles de Gaulle saw British membership of the Community as a Trojan horse for US interests, and hence stated he would veto British membership." (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Inner_Six)

Ha, he was probably right. But you will never get rid of us now!

We begin therefore where they are determined not to end, with the question whether any form of democratic self-government, anywhere, is consistent with the kind of massive, pervasive, surveillance into which the Unites States government has led not only us but the world.

This should not actually be a complicated inquiry.

http://snowdenandthefuture.info/events.html

http://benjamin.sonntag.fr/Moglen-at-Re-Publica-Freedom-of-t...

You heard a lot of stuff from governments around the world in the last two weeks, but not one statement that consisted of “I regret subjecting my population to these procedures.” The German Chancellor, though triumphantly reelected with not a cloud in her political sky, is in no position to say “I agreed with the Americans to allow 40 million telephone calls a day to be intercepted in Germany; I just want them to stop listening to my phone!” The President of the United States is considering the possibility of not listening to thirty-five mobile phones around the world. The other several hundred million people we listen to are stone out of luck.

You understand what a charade this is, of course. The leaders of global societies do not conduct their classified business over their personal mobile phones. Our listening there is not gaining us important military intelligence. The President of the United States is publicly considering not listening to conversations that leaders of other countries have with their spouses, their siblings and their children. But the conversations nine hundred million other people are having with their spouses, their siblings, and their children remain fair game.

Nobody is talking about that; you’re not supposed to think about it.

Surveillance is not an end toward totalitarianism, it is totalitarianism itself.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/democracylive/europe-24385999

Shitshitshitshitshit! I knew that this would be the knee-jerk reaction of politicians. If this happens, we will get borders on the internet. And if there is anything which can wreck the internet, borders are it. Now for the first time I'm really scared about the future of the internet. Let's get involved politically now and educate these people about the foundations of the internet, and try to keep it a neutral piece of infrastructure. Curse the NSA for wrecking net neutrality, and other agencies for waging war here. The internet was international and neutral from the start, don't bring your territorial thinking here!