We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people.
Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house]
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It is a common occurrence on this blog to point out how the Labour government blatantly pursues its socialist agenda. Yes, I am using the S-word in relation to the party that has been polished and spun by the likes of Peter Mandelson and Tony Blair for the public consumption. Today after reading the Sunday Telegraph, gloom descended upon me in an almost David-Carr-esque manner.
The Labour government, true to its socialist DNA, is making headlines again with its penchant for tax increases. The front page announces that inheritance tax is to rise to 50 per cent for those whose inheritance exceed a limit set by socialist bureaucrats or worse yet, a bunch of self-righteous lefties. Institute for Public Policy Research that came up with the scheme is indeed firmly wedged in the socialist utopia:
Inheritance tax needs to be made fairer, according to a new report from the Institute for Public Policy Research (ippr), published next week. The report recommends a tax cut for middle class families, with extra revenues raised from the wealthiest invested in assets for the poorest children.
Ah, children. Beware of ‘children’ mentioned in any political context.
A fairer inheritance tax would see the very wealthy, who are comfortably over the threshold, pay more, whilst the vast majority of families that are currently taxed would pay less.
Again, a fairer inheritance tax. Fairer to whom? To those who build up assets during their lifetime so they can choose to pass them on to their children? And, pray, what is that ‘threshold’, which the very wealthy are comfortably over?
The quotes read like passages from an old Marxist-Leninist textbook, the problem is that they originate from an institute whose former director, Matthew Taylor, is now the head of policy unit at No 10 Downing street. It has been suggested that the scheme may be a “big idea” for a third Labour term in power.
But the Labourites are not yet finished with the Middle England and with anybody who either owns a roof over their heads or stands to inherit one. Northern Ireland minister admitted there will be significant shifts in rate bills [local government tax], particularly at the top end of the market.
It is only fair that those who can afford to pay do pay a fairer share as soon as possible.
Here we go again, talk of fairness… fair to whom and fair by whose definition? Who are these guardians of fairness and equality that they feel confident to define how much I get to keep before I am forced to pay a fairer share? These are the very same people whose existence and – dare I say it – salaries depend on the money that are extracted from all of us to self-righteous noises about ‘schoolsandhospitals’.
For once, the Tories managed a sound-bite:
It is becoming clearer by the day that Labour are planning third-term tax rises to feed their appetite for fat government.
The only thing that is not clear to me is that how Labour’s propensity for taxation and fat government has not been clear to everybody all along.
New Scientist has an article looking at the US$312 million surveillance system installed for the 2004 Olympics in Athens. The eyes and ears consist of 1,000 high-res and infrared videocameras peppering the city. Cell and landline telephone calls are being recorded, converted into text, and “scanned for phrases that could be linked to terrorist activity.” The software’s developers say it speaks Greek, English, Arabic, Farsi, and other major languages.
John Pike [a defence analyst] believes other undisclosed measures are undoubtedly in place, such as face recognition from video footage. He says such surveillance technology has already proven its worth in intelligence gathering. “They’re basically the sort of stuff the National Security Agency has been using for some time,” he told New Scientist. “And they seem to place great faith in it.”
via Boing Boing
Biometric testing of face, eye and fingerprints could soon be used on every resident of the UK to create compulsory identity cards. BBC News Online’s Tom Geoghegan volunteered for a pilot scheme and looked, unblinking, into the future.
What was interesting about article that it is obvious that Home Office is trying to make the process as ‘palatable’ to people, so it is not too Big Brotherish…
This isn’t a test of the technology – that’s likely to change in the future as things move on – it’s the process. We’re looking for customer reactions and perceptions, and any particular difficulties.
Just don’t make it feel like Big Brother although that’s what you’ll be getting.
The Times reports that Britain’s information watchdog gives warning today that the country risks “sleepwalking into a surveillance society” because of government plans for identity cards and a population register.
Richard Thomas, the Information Commissioner, says that there is a growing danger of East German Stasi-style snooping if the State gathers too much information about individual citizens.
He singles out three projects that he believes are of particular concern. They are David Blunkett’s identity card scheme; a separate population register planned by the Office for National Statistics; and proposals for a database of every child from birth to the age of 18:
My anxiety is that we don’t sleepwalk into a surveillance society where much more information is collected about people, accessible to far more people shared across many more boundaries than British society would feel comfortable with.
Downing Street responded to warnings issued by Richard Thomas,
saying there would be a watchdog to prevent situations in which personal information gathered by one Whitehall department was made indiscriminately available to other civil servants without the individual’s knowledge.
We have made it clear that there are going to be guarantees about function creep. That is not what is going to happen. There is going to be proper oversight.
Oversight. Hm, so anyone trying to access the national database will be carefully monitored by CCTV and any other available surveillance technology. Phew, that really puts my mind to rest.
Also on BBC:
Watchdog’s Big Brother UK warning
Terry L. Heaton has a sound article on the realities of TV and internet as the news medium. The dynamics of local news reporting and news breaking have changed and the broadcast industry is in a situation where the first-mover can have the real advantage.
The “situation” is that the marketplace is ripe for a local station to have the balls to break stories online — when they have them — and not wait until their alloted broadcast time. If not, the local paper will do it, and if not them, then somebody else will. If yours is the “live, local, latebreaking” brand, you’d certainly better be adopting that same slogan online. Otherwise, you’re simply shooting yourself in the foot every time you wait until 6 o’clock to present the efforts of the day, because you’re not telling the truth.
And here comes the new, in the local newsrooms resisted medium:
Until we begin respecting the power of the immediacy offered by the Web — and especially RSS — we’ll be hopelessly left behind in the race to see who wins the local online news prize. Money follows eyeballs, and the eyeballs are abandoning broadcast in favor of the Internet at a speed that frightens every corporate broadcast executive on the planet. And yet, there isn’t a single station that will put the full weight of its news operation into feeding this explosive growth market. Why not? Because we think it would be self-destructive to spill our goodies online and that people wouldn’t watch our programs if we did. But is that really so?
- People already aren’t watching our programs.
- There is zero evidence to support this belief.
- It is actually self-destructive to NOT adopt such a strategy.
Moreover, and regardless of what’s going on around us, we seem to be the last to figure out that news is an ongoing conversation, not a program that appears when we say so. Old habits not only die hard; they can be dangerously deceptive.
Yes, news is a conversation. With those who are in the middle of it and those who are affected by it and those who have opinions on it. There have also been changes on the receiving end – the user (formerly known as consumer) is in charge.
Building an Internet strategy around this isn’t as difficult as it might seem, but it begins with fundamental changes in our attitudes and approaches to the Internet. The attitude adjustment is this: We meet the news and information needs of our community wherever they are, and meeting those needs is far more important than beating the competition.
The major media outlets have already adopted internet strategies that do not wait for the news hour. That is how it was possible for a group blog such as the Command Post to scour the breaking news from most of them and provide a useful one-stop information source about the Iraq conflict. It also starkly highlighted the different biases in the major media reporting that were embedded deeper than their reporters with the troops in Iraq.
The local news are closer to home and such inherent biases may be more obvious. So let them scoop the big media and each other beyond the box of the 6 o’clock news…
via Doc Searls
Washington Post reports that the State Department is moving ahead with a plan to implant electronic identification chips in U.S. passports that will allow computer matching of facial characteristics, despite warnings that the technology is prone to a high rate of error.
Under State Department specifications finalized this month for companies to bid on the new system, a chip woven into the cover of the passport would contain a digital photograph of the traveler’s face. That photo could then be compared with an image of the traveler taken at the passport control station, and also matched against photos of people on government watch lists.
But federal researchers who have tested face-recognition technology say its error rate is unacceptably high – up to 50 percent if photographs are taken without proper lighting.
They then proceed to make a case for fingerprinting that has a lower error rate. Yeah, that will make things much better.
While face recognition is set as a standard, countries could add one or two other approved biometrics: fingerprints and scans of the eye’s iris. Several European countries are considering adding fingerprints to their passports. And branding with fire. Oops the last one wasn’t in the news.
Rebecca Dornbusch, deputy director of the International Biometric Industry Association is quotes as saying:
The important thing to recognize is that it [face-recognition requirement] is an improvement. [The State Department should] continue to implement as many biometrics as they can, so they can ensure . . . the most secure protection.
Oh really, and how about the most secure revenue stream to the International Biometric Industry Association.
One German start-up has created an alternative to RFID that is likely to get under consumers’ skin.
Ident Technologies has dreamt up Skinplex – which could be used in all the same ways as RFID and Bluetooth – but uses a different transmitter: human skin.
Like RFID, Skinplex works by reading a unique identifier remotely using an electromagnetic signal, normally between a microchip and a reader. Unlike RFID, however, Skinplex uses the skin to transmit the signal and an identifier carried on a person. The signal is transmitted when the carrier touches the receiver.
Yeah, right. So much better than RFID then.
We have been following the British government’s treatment of the armed forces for some time, when we got hold of some important information…
A document was found in a briefcase left outside Samizdata HQ. We would like to offer it back to the MOD (Ministry of Defence) but in the meantime we publish it for all to see…We believe it offers the key to understanding the thinking behind the government’s recent defence cuts rationalisation of the Armed forces to produce a more efficient, effective and capable military….
Download file: STAFF GUIDANCE ON DEFENCE RESTRUCTURING
Computing is sceptical about about the government’s ID card proposals and its lurch to national database.
There is, however, a reason to be even more gloomy about government technology than the committee’s collection of mid-term backbenchers imply. The government – and particularly Home Secretary David Blunkett – have become dangerously obsessive about data-centric solutions to any social issue.
In the old days, political reaction to crime scares tended to be tough-sounding but often half-baked responses like boot camps. Now it’s to build a new database.
Computing deserves full marks for asking the right question:
Does the UK have the culture, the legislation or the infrastructure for such dramatic change? We think not.
Perhaps more importantly, there has been almost no debate about privacy, civil liberties, safeguards or security. Those who have been doing most of the shouting about IT government reform are obsessive techies.
The issue is not just whether the technology works – it’s why we are using it.
via Adam Smith Institute blog
For pictures and reporting from the Big Brother Awards check out Samizdata.net.
We went, we booed, we blogged.
CNET news reports that privacy advocates may not be the only people taking issue with the current crop of radio-frequency identification tags – merchants will likely have problems with a lack of security as well, a German technology consultant said Wednesday.
Low-cost RFID tags – many which are smaller than a nickel and cost less too -are already being added to packaging by retailers to keep track of inventory but could be abused by hackers and tech-savvy shoplifters, said Lukas Grunwald, a senior consultant with DN-Systems Enterprise Solutions GmbH. While the technology mostly threatens consumer privacy, the new technology could allow thieves to fool merchants by changing the identity of goods, he said.
This is a huge risk for companies. It opens a whole new area for shoplifting as well as chaos attacks.
While expensive RFID reader hardware and hard-to-use software have hindered security research in the area, Grunwald said that’s no longer a hurdle. The security expert announced during the session a new software tool that he helped create that can be used to read and reprogram radio tags.
When such tools become widely available, hackers and those with less pure motives could use a handheld device and the software to mark expensive goods as cheaper items and walk out through self checkout. Underage hackers could attempt to bypass age restrictions on alcoholic drinks and adult movies, and pranksters could create confusion by randomly swapping tags, requiring that a store do manual inventory.
Grunwald’s software program, RFDump, makes rewriting RFIDs easy. While there are significant malicious uses of the program, consumers could also use it to protect themselves.
Everyone should have the right, once they leave the store, to erase the RFID tags. Deleting information on the tags would allow people to stop RFID checkpoints in stores and other places from tracking which products they are carrying, or which have been inserted under their skin.
We have already been alerted to a website Preparing for Emergencies that, for some strage reason, the statists want dismantled immediately.
It is remarkably similar in domain name and style to the timewasting “offishal” preparingforemergencies.org.uk. Be quick to check it out as its death sentence has alreday been pronounced on Radio 4… They are not amused.
Thanks to Tony Millard for the link.
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Who Are We? The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling.
We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe.
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