On the London Underground at the moment there are huge eye-catching posters for a virtual private network (VPN) bearing the words: “Some might say they have nothing to hide.”
VPNs, as you may know, help you stay anonymous while using your computers or phones. They are the friend of privacy.
“Go and tell it to the whistleblowers and the dissidents, to the journalist and their sources, to the activists, lawyers, doctors,” the text on the poster continues. “Tell it to everyone who just wants to live in a free and open society without authorities and big tech companies mapping their lives.”
Privacy has now gone mainstream. We have—gradually, then suddenly—woken up to the realisation that someone, somewhere may be watching over our every thought, deed, question and movement. Vast databases are capturing whatever data they can lay their hands on.
A VPN might indeed help a little.
The plundering of our personal information by Big Tech involves a kind of bargain. We get lots of free services in return for surrendering wheelbarrow loads of our personal information: where we are, who we speak to, what we buy, what medical conditions we search for in the middle of the night, what help we seek or need.
With the state there is a similar bargain. We reluctantly accept that in order to keep us safe the police, security and intelligence agencies must have a defined and controlled right to intercept and store our communications. But we have all read our Orwell and know the Big Brother dangers that can lie in wait. So we insist on proper oversight of this extraordinary capacity of the state to pry into more or less any aspect of our lives.
So it came as something of a shock to read last week that the Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC)—which is there to oversee Big Brother on our behalf—is effectively hauling up the white flag and admitting they can no longer effectively monitor the work of the main agencies they oversee. They include MI5, MI6 and GCHQ.
The admission came in an extraordinary press release which was, oddly enough, little noticed. The language was, for anyone who has followed the hush-hush work of the ISC over the years, remarkably blunt. “In simple terms,” it said, “there is now around £3 billions of public money being spent for which there is no oversight capability.”
Not only is there not enough money for the committee to do its work of overseeing the agencies, but there is also a fundamental question of its ability to do so independently.
The press release continued: “The committee in the last Parliament became greatly concerned that the vital scrutiny which the ISC provides was being undermined by continued interference by the Cabinet Office in the Committee’s Office ... it does in fact go to the very heart of Parliament’s ability to hold the Government to account for those actions being taken in secret, behind closed doors, funded by the public purse.
“An oversight body should not sit within, and be beholden to, an organisation which it oversees.”
The ISC normally speaks in the reserved tones of a well-mannered city lawyer. This is the ISC breaking the fire alarm glass and bellowing at the top of its voice.
A little history is required to understand the gravity of these charges. You may remember the NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden and his warnings 12 years about the remarkable ways in which digital technologies allowed states to mount forms of mass surveillance on, effectively, entire populations. Now imagine how, in the intervening dozen years, AI tools will have enhanced those powers by an order of magnitude.
Following the Snowden revelations, the UK government moved swiftly to put all these capabilities onto a legal footing. Passed in 2016, it was colloquially known as “the Snooper’s Charter”.
The British security agencies could now legally make bulk collection and interception of our communications. The Act required Big Tech companies to retain for a year records of all the websites we visit so that authorities can access them without a warrant. You’ve secretly browsed PornHub or looked for an STD clinic? Not so secret now: it’s all there.
The act allowed the targeting and bulk hacking of electronic devices. And so on. It permitted the state unprecedented access to our lives and secrets.
Smooth words were uttered by the Charter’s supporters: “If you’ve nothing to hide, you’ve nothing to fear”—much as today’s underground posters now parody. But in America today we’re witnessing a president put his most loyal cronies in charge of the security and intelligence apparatus. There’s no secret about his wish to target enemies and see vengeance for perceived wrongs. British spooks are already wondering how much Russian intelligence to share with the Putin-friendly new intelligence chief in the US, Tulsi Gabbard.
Something similar is happening in Israel, where prime minister Netanyahu has removed the head of that country’s internal security agency, Shin Bet, at the very time when his organisation was investigating criminal allegations against him.
There is no guarantee that a populist leader in the UK wouldn’t seek similar influence over the intrusive capabilities of the modern security state.
In terms of interference in the UK there is already an unhappy precedent in the way Boris Johnson delayed the publication of the ISC report into alleged Russian influence in British police for 10 months—until after the December 2019 election. The former chair, Dominic Grieve, described the delay as “entirely untenable”, noting that the usual time between approval and publication was around 10 days. Johnson also tried to impose his own chair on the committee.
The ISC, which is a statutory committee, is not the only oversight body for the spies and buggers—but it is the only way parliament itself can feel it has a direct handle on what’s going on in the shadows.
Its chair, Lord Beamish, told me that the committee’s staff, which should number 15, are down to seven. That’s just seven people overseeing the work of thousands of agents, officers and analysts working round the clock across the three main intelligence and security agencies.
The budget for the committee hasn’t increased since 2013 despite the exponential growth of the work of the agencies; despite the vastly changed geopolitical landscape; despite the greatly expanded powers of the spooks; despite the new world of AI. No prime minister has met with the ISC since 2014.
Beamish was blunt in his assessment of the future of parliamentary oversight: “If the committee does not receive an increase in resourcing then it will not be able to keep the doors open.”
At the time the controversial Snoopers’ Charter was passed Shami Chakrabarti, then director of the civil rights group, Liberty, described the ISC as “clueless and ineffective… a simple mouthpiece for the spooks”.
“No doubt it would be simpler if we went along with the spies’ motto of ‘no scrutiny for us, no privacy for you’—but what an appalling deal for the British public.’”
Even she can’t have imagined that a government of which she was a member would take the motto literally.
It may be time to invest in that VPN.
