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Alan Johnson on DNA retention - a quick fisk
,----[ Quote ]
| The Home Secretary Alan Johnson has today
| written a short defence of the practice of
| retaining innocent DNA on the national
| database for six years. You can read the
| article in full on the Guardian Comment is
| Free, but we thought we'd pick out a few
| choice cuts and show why his reasoning is
| faulty, unreferenced and internally
| inconsistent.
|
| "The most recent research supports the
| case for the retention of DNA profiles
| of those arrested but not convicted. It
| also shows that, after six years, the
| probability of re-arrest is no higher
| than for the rest of the population."
|
| [...]
|
| The Minister quotes several cases in which
| the DNA evidence was critical in securing
| convictions, but we all know that the police
| frequently solve crimes committed by people
| who have never given a sample. Yet again
| this is a policy driven by political
| expediency, research we can't read and the
| desire to be 'seen to be doing something'
| with little consideration of the wider
| consequences.
`----
http://www.bigbrotherwatch.org.uk/home/2009/11/alan-johnson-on-dna-retention-a-quick-fisk.html
Street Artist Cautioned and DNA taken
,----[ Quote ]
| Prolific and talented street artist Nathan
| Bowen was formally cautioned by the City of
| London police on 17th November for causing
| Â100 worth of "damage" to building boards in
| the City of London. He spent two hours at
| Snowhill police station being cautioned and
| having his DNA taken.
`----
http://dearie.me/street-artist-cautioned-and-dna-taken?c=1
A Proportionate Response to "Proportionate"
,----[ Quote ]
| It's the ultimate argument-killer when
| people raise the big issues like liberty to
| defend themselves from ever-more intrusive
| "security" legislation - which strangely
| always turns out to be "surveillance" of the
| little people like you and me. Yes, it seems
| to say, you're right, this *is* a tricky
| one, but we must find a compromise "to
| balance all these factors", as Alan Johnson
| puts it. And the way we do that is by making
| a *proportionate* response.
`----
http://opendotdotdot.blogspot.com/2009/11/proportionate-response-to-proportionate.html
IAB and Pinsent Masons try to confuse the public over new cookie rules
,----[ Quote ]
| IAB and Struan Robertson from Pinsent Masons
| (among others with a vested interest) are
| all over the press today claiming that the
| ammendments to Article 5(3) of Directive
| 2002/58/EC allow companies to continue to
| use Opt-Out. But today they have stooped to
| new levels of delivering misinformation.
|
| They claim that the new rules state that
| cookie management can be done through the
| browser (such as Firefox or Internet
| Explorer) and hark this as a triumph both
| for industry and consumers. Unfortunately
| for them, their claims are utter rubbish and
| Commissioner Reding has been quick to issue
| a clarifying statement to the press this
| morning
`----
https://nodpi.org/2009/11/25/iab-and-pinsent-masons-try-to-confuse-the-public-over-new-cookie-rules/
The Emperor's Codes: The Breaking of Japan's Secret Ciphers
,----[ Quote ]
| ...just like in today's GSM (A5/1) crypto
| attacks, even back then the importance of
| known plaintext could not be underestimated.
| The verbosity of Japanese soldiers
| addressing a superior officer and the
| stereotypical nature of reports on weather
| or troop movements gave the cryptographers
| plenty of known plaintext for many of their
| intercepted message.
|
| What was also new to me is the fact that the
| British even back then demanded that
| Cable+Wireless provides copies of all
| telegraphs through their network. And that's
| some 70-80 years before data retention on
| communications networks becomes a big topic
| ;)
`----
http://laforge.gnumonks.org/weblog/2009/11/25/#20091125-the_emperors_codes
Recent:
Schneier sticks it to surveillance
,----[ Quote ]
| Security guru Bruce Schneier has challenged the view that privacy and
| security are at loggerheads, suggesting the real debate is between liberty
| and control.
|
| [...]
|
| "Identity cards are just a temporary solution until biometrics take over. In
| five years or so these checks will happen in the background using RFID chips,
| you won't even know you are being checked."
`----
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/10/29/schneier_rsa_privacy/
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