British police are storing the details of political campaigners in a database known as ‘Crimint’ used to catalogue criminal intelligence, the Guardian had revealed.  Photographs, names and video footage is kept for seven years. 

Every day, more is revealed about the surveillance society of SECURITY BREACH

A British company, accused of selling workers’ confidential data, including union activities, to building firms, has been raided and shut down.  The raid on The Consulting Association in Droitwich, Worcs, revealed a serious breach of the Data Protection Act, the Information Commissioner’s Office said. Action is being considered against more than 40 firms who used the service. The Consulting Association’s owner would also be prosecuted, it added. According to the ICO, the company ran a secret system for over 15 years which enabled employers to unlawfully vet building workers applying for jobs. Not only was the database held without the workers’ consent, but the very existence of it was repeatedly denied.

Every day, more is revealed about the surveillance society of SECURITY BREACH 

The children’s best selling author, Philip Pullman, has spoken out against Britains’ surveillance society, by attacking the government for eroding civil liberties under the pretext of national security. He spoke of the government creating a surveilliance society based on “institutional paranoia and furtive hatred”. A nation whose laws engender fear and suspicion cannot sustain delight,” he said.

Genetic information taken from nearly 1.1 million children is now stored on the national DNA database in Britain, according to the Guardian. The figure fuels the row about retention of personal information on the DNA register and on the police national computer for years after it ceases to be relevant.

Meet Kat Polinski in the most heavily surveilled democratic society in the world.

SECURITY BREACH  

Pakistan chose to free A. Q Khan, its most prolific nuclear proliferator, just as Richard Holbrooke, the new US envoy to the region is due to visit.  Khan, now 73, has publicly confessed to selling nuclear technology to North Korea Iran and Libya.  Yet, in Pakistan itself, he is revered as a national hero  for giving his country the nuclear bomb.

The decision to free him appears to be political. Pakistan continues to deny US investigators access to Khan, and according proliferation expert, Matthew Bunn, at the Harvard Kennedy School, — whom I’ve recently interviewed it also refuses to cooperate on the security of its nuclear sites — all this in a country that is now the headquarters of Al Qaeda.

As the global economic crisis gathers pace, many eyes are on China and Russia to see if they can help provide answers. But what is their view of how the world will be run and what rules will they play by.

SECURITY BREACH       

Communist North Korea has said it is scrapping all military and political agreements signed with the South, accusing Seoul of hostile intent.  The North said South Korea had pushed relations “to the brink of a war”.

When does posturing become reality, and how can you judge? 

To find out read The Third World War.   

North Korea says it has ‘weaponised’ enough plutonium stocks tp prodice four or five nuclear weapons, according to US expert, Selig Harrison. With the leadership  of Kim Jong-Il in doubt, North Korea has also threatened to ‘retaliate’ against South Korea while South Korea has put its military on a high alert.

That’s all fact. For what happens next see The Third World War which we hope remains fiction.

The British government is thinking of keeping track of everyone’s phone calls, e-mails texts and internet use and using a private company to do it.  Critics say it is paranoid  attempt to create a world of total security.

Security Breach –  KAT POLINSKI & Murder in a World of Total Surveillance 

The US Congress has warned that China  is aggressively developing its power to wage cyber warfare and is now in a position to delay or disrupt the deployment of America’s military forces around the world, potentially giving it the upper hand in any conflict. China now has both the intent and capability to launch cyber attacks “anywhere in the world at any time”. In 2007, it says, about 5m computers in the US were the targets of 43,880 incidents of malicious activity — a rise of almost a third on the previous year.

Kat Polinksi is about the best cyber agent the US has — but even she finds it tough when she comes against China. 

Security Breach —