Richard's Kingdom

The UK National Identity Card can be cloned and altered by IT security experts.
Colour me unsurprised.
The consultants who carried out this work are from the same community of experts who have been warning [pdf] that the cards would be cracked since the Home Office first disclosed the mechanics of the scheme.
The alterations can be detected [...]

Jacquie Smith is to step down as Secretary of State for the Home Department in the cabinet reshuffle that Gordon Brown is planning to make after the European elections on Thursday.
While the door to the Home Secretary’s office has revolved ever more rapidly since 2001 the authoritarian brief of its occupants has hardly wavered.
Somewhere in [...]

Last year I wrote about the ineffectiveness of mass CCTV surveillance and suggested that we should fix the broken way in which CCTV is used in the UK. Now a report funded by the Home Office has reached the same conclusion. It turns out that CCTV has almost no impact on crime. Except in car [...]

Last week reports surfaced that GCHQ – the UK signals intelligence agency – is developing the type of Internet spying capability Jacquie Smith had previously announced would not be built by the Home Office. It would be easy to infer a cynical deception by the government, however GCHQ issued a denial, stating that – unlike [...]

I’m disgusted by the Government’s new DNA database proposals being laid out as a “consultation” today. Jacqui Smith’s transparent attempts at spin are risible. So is any claim by this Government that it values freedom, civil liberties or the presumption of innocence.
SIX TO TWELVE YEARS. That’s the length of time Smith wants to keep the [...]