Barbelith Underground > Switchboard > Police get sweeping access to net data

This is from today's Guardian (p9, probably full text at their site):

Sweeping proposals to give law enforcement agencies access to the communications records of every UK telephone and internet user will not be restricted to anti-terrorist investigations, despite assurances to the contrary from the home secretary........

...

Home office officials involved in implementing the proposals in a voluntary code of practice with the providers have confirmed there are no plans to limit access to cases involving national security.

This directly contradicts what appeared to be an assurance given by David Blunkett, the home secretary, two weeks ago in an attempt to soothe the fears of civil liberties campaigners about the privacy implications of blanket data retention.

And so it begins...