Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

techradar.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

221–230 of 299 posts

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#221

Post by rvnx »

JoshTriplett wrote: post #195
flowerthoughts wrote: post #17

> He warns that developers of apps like Signal and WhatsApp could technically fall within the legal definition of "hostile activity" simply because their technology "make[s] it more difficult for UK security and intelligence agencies to monitor communications. Sounds like Let's Encrypt would also fall under that. This has got to stop. If you want to stop criminals, then focus on their illegal activites, not the stree…

> Today, someone can post a Telegram group message and make thousands of people rally to a town square. I see the dangers, and I see why governments think they are doing this to protect the people. Don't play into their propaganda. Governments don't like it because they're protecting themselves and their power; making it harder for people to find each other and organize and rally is one of many ways governments do th…

You don't even have to go that far, in Europe, to use a large social network (50M users), and the definition is very broad (WhatsApp is a social network, Telegram, Signal, TEMU, Aliexpress, etc), all users will have to provide their ID to that they are not a minor, otherwise the website can be blocked or fined.

This is to protect minors of course. Did you think about the children ?

Telegram, whether it's true or not, claims they are not a large platform (so if this is a lie, it may really pay off).

https://sumsub.com/blog/age-verification-on-social-media/

"WhatsApp is now a Very Large platform in the EU, and will face tougher regulation"

https://www.theverge.com/news/614445/whatsapp-channels-very-...

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#222

Post by omnicognate »

esafak wrote: post #220
omnicognate wrote: post #23

This is a terrible headline, despite being the original. The "watchdog" is a KC (senior barrister) officially appointed to review the legislation. He's warning that this could be considered hostile activity under the act, which would be a bad thing . In other words, he's criticising the act for being overly broad, a view that most on HN agree with, and his criticisms of it presumably carry some weight, given his offi…

What an Orwellian name, 'watchdog', for an organization that undermines privacy. They're watching, all right. edit: I misunderstood the poorly-worded headline. It should have been something like "Creating apps like Signal could be 'hostile activity' according to govt., claims UK watchdog".

(Deleted after your edit)

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#223

Post by nxm »

Kbelicius wrote: post #63
miroljub wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The UK arrests 12k people per year for social media posts, using vague laws to undermine free speech. Here's the citation from the EU parliament itself [1], since I doubt you'd believe non-government sources. > That is because Germany and UK are beacons of democracy when compared to the countries that you listed. Read my comment again. The fact that the UK and Germany are in some aspects still better than the ones I…

> The UK arrests 12k people per year for social media posts, using vague laws to undermine free speech. This doesn't mean anything in isolation. > Here's the citation from the EU parliament itself [1], since I doubt you'd believe non-government sources. Do we know each other? > The fact that the UK and Germany are in some aspects still better than the ones I mentioned doesn't make them beacons of democracy. No, but t…

No they’re not. Without free speech there is no democracy because only speech that is allowed is by those in power/who they direct money to police

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#224

Post by kevin_thibedeau »

debugnik wrote: post #139
gbil wrote: post #81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Curtains should also fall under the same category because they do make it more difficult for UK security and intelligence agencies to monitor suspect activities. Then of course you also have walls... The argument is so fundamentally stupid that they should be embarrassed just putting it down in writing!

Don't worry, WiFi sensing will eventually remove our walls and curtains for free in that respect.

Aluminum siding will make a comeback.

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#225

Post by wartywhoa23 »

flowerthoughts wrote: post #17

> He warns that developers of apps like Signal and WhatsApp could technically fall within the legal definition of "hostile activity" simply because their technology "make[s] it more difficult for UK security and intelligence agencies to monitor communications. Sounds like Let's Encrypt would also fall under that. This has got to stop. If you want to stop criminals, then focus on their illegal activites, not the stree…

> Today, someone can post a Telegram group message and make thousands of people rally to a town square. I see the dangers, and I see why governments think they are doing this to protect the people. No one wants civil war.

The solution for government is simple: stop being scumbags whose only purpose is making people's lives more and more miserable by optimizing for total control and corporate profits.

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#226

Post by [deleted] »

owisd wrote: post #132
omnicognate wrote: post #23

This is a terrible headline, despite being the original. The "watchdog" is a KC (senior barrister) officially appointed to review the legislation. He's warning that this could be considered hostile activity under the act, which would be a bad thing . In other words, he's criticising the act for being overly broad, a view that most on HN agree with, and his criticisms of it presumably carry some weight, given his offi…

Seems very coordinated, like whenever there’s an article on the Trump administration crushing free speech by cutting funding/sanctioning/suing anyone critical of it, it quickly gets flagged into oblivion, but anything the UK and others do gets spun out of proportion and hangs around on the front page for ages.

[deleted]

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#227

Post by joe463369 »

simianparrot wrote: post #118
flowerthoughts wrote: post #17

> He warns that developers of apps like Signal and WhatsApp could technically fall within the legal definition of "hostile activity" simply because their technology "make[s] it more difficult for UK security and intelligence agencies to monitor communications. Sounds like Let's Encrypt would also fall under that. This has got to stop. If you want to stop criminals, then focus on their illegal activites, not the stree…

They can’t even prosecute grooming gangs, the pretence it’s about “the children” rings completely hollow. The UK is a failing nation run by pedophile apologist imbeciles. This is just desperate flailing to hold onto power by any means.

The UK can and does prosecute grooming gangs.

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#228

Post by pksebben »

gbil wrote: post #81
flowerthoughts wrote: post #17

> He warns that developers of apps like Signal and WhatsApp could technically fall within the legal definition of "hostile activity" simply because their technology "make[s] it more difficult for UK security and intelligence agencies to monitor communications. Sounds like Let's Encrypt would also fall under that. This has got to stop. If you want to stop criminals, then focus on their illegal activites, not the stree…

Curtains should also fall under the same category because they do make it more difficult for UK security and intelligence agencies to monitor suspect activities. Then of course you also have walls... The argument is so fundamentally stupid that they should be embarrassed just putting it down in writing!

This cuts to one of the critical issues with governance globally in this era. For a really long time, we relied on social norms and mores to keep governments in check - and astonishingly it worked at least a little. Embarrassment was a good proxy for well constituted rules of representation.

What right-wing institutions have noticed all around the world is that you can just kind of ignore all that shit now. Centrists are flailing around begging for an explanation for "how this could happen" and folks on the left, marginalized for years in favor of free markets, are just kind of facepalming and saying we told you so.

You need to put it in writing somewhere that there's a limit on governmental authority and enforce the hell out of it. You need to do the same to clamp down on the power of special interests and corporations. More than anything, you need robust mechanisms that make government representatives vulnerable to the voting public. The people need to be the ones that they scramble to please and when we get mad that should be dangerous and difficult for those holding the reins of government. Their existence needs to depend on the mandate of the public.

Re: Independent review of UK national security law warns of overreach

#230

Post by dang »

There are quite a few comments below complaining about the headline - happy to change it, but I'm in a meeting trying to figure out more about https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46301921 for the next bit.

Can someone suggest a better title? Better here means "accurate and neutral, and preferably using representative language from the article".

Post reply on HN