Espionage, Intrusion and Security

Years ago, long before countries entered the modern era of electronic surveillance through the Internet, Britain raised international eyebrows and criticism from its peer countries, let alone groups invested in issues of privacy and human rights for its move to install thousands of closed-circuit video cameras in public venues. That issue became the bane of civil liberties groups and other privacy social advocates. It was 'way ahead of the game.

British authorities remained unfazed and proceeded with the installation of those monitoring cameras in public venues, insisting that their installation represented a move forward in authorities' need to respond to the growing incidence of public crime. Police and public security had another tool to effectively follow the activities of social deviants who set out to destroy public property and to haunt the vulnerabilities of the law-respecting public.

Of course, long before the advent of those first closed-circuit video cameras there was the kind of human intelligence agencies, as security arms of the government that engaged famously in political and commercial espionage. To gain both political, military and industrial knowledge from both friends and foe, almost alike. To have an intelligence leg-up on what one's colleagues and adversaries were about. Admittedly that was before international terrorism entered the equation.

And now that Wikileaks surfaced on the global scene, along with its righteously determined Julian Assange and his multitude of supporters, we have additional intelligence leakers, like Army pcf Bradley Manning, and now private security contractor Edward Snowden, both believing that they were behaving in a responsible manner, alerting ordinary citizens and leaders of other countries alike, to the vast volumes of confidential secret data being acquired through espionage.

The United States intelligence community, so eager to portray China as the world's most egregious spies, revealed to have captured secret bulk data acquired through a massive U.S. surveillance project, spying on its allies like Germany, for example. Tapping into fibre cables to defy security of national interests, Internet access is eased by Five Eyes collaboration, an alliance of the U.S. Britain, Canada, Australia and New Zealand.

A TV screen at a shopping mall in Hong Kong shows a news report Saturday of Edward Snowden, a former CIA employee who leaked top-secret documents about sweeping U.S. surveillance programs. The Justice Department has charged Snowden with espionage for and has asked Hong Kong to arrest him. (Kin Cheung / AP) 

And, as much as the United States has gained massive data through its wide-and-deep covert espionage, according to Edward Snowden, now ensconced in Hong Kong with possible extradition to his home country on the near horizon to face serious espionage charges, it would appear through information he released to the Guardian that Britain's espionage network has surpassed even that of the U.S.

According to the Guardian, quoting Edward Snowden, the surveillance he has highlighted represented "not just a U.S. problem. The U.K. has a huge dog in this fight.... The (GCHQ) are worse than the U.S." Not a very happy endorsement for the state of privacy and security in either country. Where the ethics relating to espionage on citizens is raging.

By last year, according to Guardian accounts, GCHQ was handling 600 million telecommunications each and every day. When under attack, deny: "Our work is carried out in accordance with a strict legal and policy framework which ensures that our activities are authorized, necessary and proportionate", assured a GCHQ statement.

Sounds familiar, having heard the original of this clone previously.

It is simply our governments taking the initiative to protect us, and if we don't like it, well fellas, too bad. The world we all inhabit is a dangerous place.