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Legislation adopted by the UK government
in 2000 that increases its powers of electronic communications. the act has
been subjected to intense scrutiny by privacy and cyber-rights campaigners,
who object to the fact that under the new bill the government can
anonymously tap all electronic communications, thus, they say, infringing
the Human Rights and data Protection acts. Such infringements have yet to be
proved or even tried in the UK courts, but many organisations representing a wide rang
of commercial and consumer interests have mounted official objections to the
act's provisions.
Despite widespread opposition to the
original bill, it received the royal assent in July 2000, giving the
government many new ways to investigate users of the internet and other
technologies. In particular, it allows government agencies to monitor all
data traffic, allowing them to see which websites individuals have visited
and who they have communicated with. It can also force individuals to reveal
the contents of encrypted messages and transactions, which critics say
unfairly places the burden of proof of innocence on to people under
surveillance. Isps may be forced to install costly "black box" monitoring
equipment at the command of the home secretary, and may be legally required
to store data on customer behaviour for six years, an obligation which aol
claimed would require 360,000 cds each year in the UK and cost pound34m.
A report commissioned in 2000 by the British Chambers of Commerce
estimated that the loss of confidence in e-commerce resulting from the act
could cost businesses pound46 billion in its first five years of operation,
although this figure now looks somewhat inflated in view of recent
e-commerce trends. |
