[Chester LUG] Fwd: [lugmaster] [S0107981 at Cumbria.ac.uk: [admin] [Feedback] Press Release - Prost

Sat May 31 14:26:17 UTC 2008

CCTV and other such equipment is fair enough - they're spying on you in public!  Phorm spies on you in the privacy of your own home!  It's like a phone tap.

How would you like it if a film crew set up shop in your house, telling you that you wouldn't be famous or paid for the intrusion, but if they didn't like what they saw, you were in trouble!  Sounds extreme, but that's what it basically is.  What about your hidden stash of porn?  No more downloading for fear that the government will have that info on a file about you somewhere - that's like the film crew setting up in your bedroom and giving you points for originality!

Seriously though - I think it's a bad idea.  What possible gains do we - the public actually gain from this investment in time, money, resources, and bandwidth (surely there will be some loss due to monitoring??) 

Date: Sat, 31 May 2008 14:46:10 +0100
From: e-mail at mcrilly.co.uk
To: chester at mailman.lug.org.uk
Subject: Re: [Chester LUG] Fwd: [lugmaster] [S0107981 at Cumbria.ac.uk: [admin]	[Feedback] Press Release - Prostesters to Picket Shareholders	at BT PLC AGM]

I have strange feelings towards this Phorm thing. I don't mind being "spied" on, if you can call it that, because I have nothing to hide; just as I don't mind CCTV, biometric ID cards, DNA tests and databases - I don't break the law and I don't have a criminal record it is therefore only in place to assist me, not hinder me.

However, the thing that does boil my blood about Phorm is purely the fact they're breaking the law. I hate, with a passion, big companies thinking they can just do as they please and are above the law - i.e. MS.

That's my two-cents on the matter :P

On 5/31/08, Les Pritchard <les.pritchard at gmail.com> wrote:
After our Phorm conversation in the LUG meet this week I thought this was interesting...

----- Forwarded message from S0107981 at Cumbria.ac.uk -----

To: admin at lug.org.uk

From: S0107981 at Cumbria.ac.uk
Date: Fri, 30 May 2008 23:23:56 +0100
Cc:
Subject: [admin] [Feedback] Press Release - Prostesters to Picket

       Shareholders at BT PLC AGM

Alexander Hanff sent a message using the contact form at
http://lug.org.uk/contact.

I know this is not Linux related, but I am a long term and well known Linux
user here in the UK so I thought maybe you guys could support me by posting
this out to your lists and newsletters:

Press Release - Immediate Release

Protesters to Picket shareholders at BT PLC Annual General Meeting - 16th
July 2008

On 16th July 2008 there will be a full day protest against the use of Deep
Packet Inspection for the purpose of behavioural profiling.  The event will

focus on the plans by BT PLC, Virgin Media and Car Phone Warehouse to
introduce deep packet inspection technologies through exclusive contracts
with Phorm Inc.

Since Phorm issued a press release on 14th February 2008 regarding these

exclusive contracts there has been a storm of outrage amongst the public,
leading academics, privacy advocates, Members of Parliament, Members of the
European Parliament, Peers in the House of Lords and the industry as whole.

The technology has been called illegal by Foundation for Information
Policy Research, which was recently supported by a statement from the
European Commission.

As a result of the negative publicity generated over the past 3 months

Phorm Inc.'s share price has plummeted by approx 70% and continues to
struggle to develop confidence from investors.

In 2006/2007 BT PLC have admitted to running covert trials of the
technology without first obtaining the consent from customers required by

EU and UK Data Protection and Communications regulations, directives and
legislation.  However, to date neither the Information Commissioner nor the
Secretary of State have held BT PLC to account for these allegedly illegal

actions.

Therefore, the growing public campaign to seek justice for the victims of
these covert trials and the wider mission of stopping the technology from
being deployed, has led to an organised one day protest in London, UK.

There is expected to be a significant press and media presence at the event
which will begin at the Barbican Centre, continue on to BT Centre (BT's
corporate HQ) and finally end with a march on to Charing Cross Metropolitan

Police Station in the early evening.  On arrival at the Metropolitan Police
station a full case file with witness testimonies and supporting evidence,
along with a petition demanding a criminal investigation will be handed to

the senior officer on duty.

For more details about the event, please visit the following two web
sites:

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/05/30/bt_agm_phorm_protest

http://www.nodpi.org

If you require further information please contact me by reply.

Sincerely,

Alexander Hanff
University of Cumbria

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