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By Douglas MacArthur
Londoners are being warned that increasingly local councils have the power to monitor phone calls, intercept emails and "spy" on citizens in legislation that has provoked according to The Independent "a senior Cabinet minister" to launch a "strong attack on public bodies that have the powers to conduct secret surveillance on the public.
Under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 which gives the power to public bodies to have "lawful acquisition and disclosure of communications data" the Act provides the following:
• "any traffic data comprised in or attached to a communication (whether by the sender or otherwise) for the purposes of any postal service or telecommunication system by means of which it is being or may be transmitted;
• any information which includes none of the contents of a communication (apart from any information falling within paragraph (a)) and is about the use made by any person—
• (i)of any postal service or telecommunications service; or
• (ii)in connection with the provision to or use by any person of any telecommunications service, of any part of a telecommunication system;"
Ripa powers as they are known, have also been attacked by Big Brother Watch and have called on the Government to force local authorities to seeks the permission by magistrates before monitoring civilians.
The public bodies known to be using powers under Ripa include the BBC, the Office of Fair Trading, the Royal Mail and the UK Trade and Investment Ofsted. Local authorities are also known to have used these powers.
During the Olympics the security services used drones to monitor the crowds, surveillance drones are already in operation by some of the UK's police forces including Staffordshire, Essex, Merseyside and British Transport Police – are known to have used or trialled drones, which are usually little more than a remote controlled mini-helicopter equipped with cameras.
The issue of governments monitoring their own citizens has come to prominence in the United States with drones or unmanned aircraft fitted with cameras designed to spy on civilians. The manufacturers of the drones have lobbied the Federation Aviation Authority to provide permission for the drones to be used more frequently over the United States.
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