E-mail plan calls for more Orwellian clichés...

Ah, another day, another Orwellian analogy to be made. This time it comes after the BBC reveals that the government is considering plans to maintain a national database of every phone call and e-mail sent in the UK. Big Brother is watching you? See you in room 101? How'd you say that in double-speak? Yeah, yeah, yeah, we know. We read that book too...

The Home Office has confirmed that the plans are in a nascent stage of development, though no ministers have yet had the opportunity to go over them. A spokesperson for the Home Office described the initiative as being a 'crucial tool' in protecting national security and fighting crime. Naturally, the word 'terrorism' has also managed to rear its ugly head, with one official trying to justify the idea with:

"The Communications Data Bill will help ensure that crucial capabilities in the use of communications data for counter-terrorism and investigation of crime continue to be available."

Well then, we'd best go for it then...

Luckily, there are a few sane minds that feel the move is not such a good idea. Lib Dem MP Chris Huhne has labelled the move as "an Orwellian step too far" and has gone on the record as saying that the state is not to be trusted with such information, especially considering its track record of losing important data every so often. Privacy groups have gone a long similar lines, expressing concern at the level of social intrusion and also implying that the government may sell the information.

Westmonster certainly doesn't see too much point in the plan. It seems that these days we seem to use technology because we can and not because we have to. Sure, you can throw out those arguments about 'if there's nothing to hide, there's nothing to worry about', but if we let the government take these kind of steps then it just allows them to go even further next time.

On the other hand though, it's well-known that Internet search engines such as Google already keep records of just about anything that they can. If companies get away with it then why not governments? Perhaps the future is destined to be an age of controlled information and that George Orwell was right about everything...

But when are we going to start doing something about it besides spewing out the same old Orwellian clichés??

Photo: Flickr

Written by Oli Anderson on 20 May 2008 10:11 AM. Permalink