While reading about the recent cyberattacks revealed by Google I was struck by a sense of deja-view. Compare for example a recent times report with one from a year ago.
In the recent version China has been accused of hacking into e-mail accounts and planting trojans in order to spy on dissidents. This has sent shock waves around the Western world and is upheld as evidence of China’s human rights abuse. The trouble is that a year ago the EU initiated a plan to hack into its citizens computers in a very similar way.
The UK is well ahead of the curve when it comes to cyber surveillance with a suite of measures to monitor everyones activity, ranging from the legallisation of police hacking without warrants to the construction of a complete database of everyones online activity for police to access.
So what is the difference between China’s activity and that of the UK? Only that we have a different idea of the difference between a terrorist and a human rights activist, maybe. But in a country where councils use terrorist powers to spy on people who cheat to get their children into a good school, can we trust our authorities any more?
