UK Intelligence Boss: We Had All This Info And Totally Failed To Prevent Charlie Hebdo Attack... So Give Us More Info

from the um,-what? dept

We already wrote about surveillance state opportunists like Michael Hayden using the Charlie Hebdo attacks as evidence for why the surveillance state should be allowed to spy on everyone, and now the head of the UK's MI5 intelligence agency has similarly used the attack as an excuse to demand more surveillance powers:

The head of MI5, Andrew Parker, has called for new powers to help fight Islamist extremism, warning of a dangerous imbalance between increasing numbers of terrorist plots against the UK and a drop in the capabilities of intelligence services to snoop on communications....

[....]

“If we are to do our job, MI5 will continue to need to be able to penetrate their communications as we have always done. That means having the right tools, legal powers and the assistance of companies which hold relevant data. Currently, this picture is patchy.”

What's especially sickening about this is that this argument "works" for surveillance state opportunists whether they succeed or fail. If they actually do stop terrorist threats (and in the same speech Parker claims they have stopped a few planned attacks in "recent months" but fails to provide any details), they use that to claim that the surveillance works and they need to do more. Yet when they fail to stop an attack -- as in the Charlie Hebdo case -- they don't say it's because the surveillance failed, instead, it's because they didn't have enough data or enough powers to collect more data. In other words, succeed or fail, the argument is always the same: give us more access to more private data.

And they'll claim this again and again, even as it's been shown over and over again that grabbing more garbage data actually makes it that much more difficult to find relevant data. Piling more hay onto the haystack doesn't make the needles easier to find. It makes them much harder to find and often sends you digging through piles of hay for a needle you think you saw, but isn't really there. Yet that never seems to enter the equation. It's as if those in the surveillance business don't understand the idea of quantity over quality.

And this goes beyond just the general desire for "more" power, to a ridiculous belief among some in the power of algorithms to sort through this data. The power of "big data" can be useful in many ways, but people get so obsessed with the magic of algorithms and the power in "big data" that they forget that these things are imperfect, and the ability to sort through massive piles of data for relevant information and links is incredibly limited and faulty. Yet, because a computer does it, they get all excited and think it's all powerful. It's this mistaken belief in the power of the algorithms that leads them to always assume that "more data is better" and the end result, unfortunately, is continuously stripping away privacy, in search of some tiny marginal benefit that may not even exist.

Filed Under: andrew parker, charlie hebdo attack, intelligence community, mi5, surveillance

Committee That Grilled Guardian Editor Over Snowden Documents Won't Get To Question Intelligence Boss

from the of-course-not dept

We recently wrote about the ridiculous performance put on by the UK Parliament in quizzing the editor of the Guardian, Alan Rusbridger, concerning the legality of reporting on the Snowden leaks. Now, it appears that the same committee sought to hold a hearing with the head of the British MI5 intelligence agency, Andrew Parker, in order to see if he could back up the claims that the Guardian's reporting had put UK citizens in danger. However, that's not happening. UK officials won't let Parker testify in front of the same committee. Why? Because.

The home secretary, Theresa May, told the home affairs committee chairman, Keith Vaz, that she had rejected the request for the spy chief to give evidence because his appearance would "duplicate" the existing oversight provided by the prime ministerially appointed intelligence and security committee.

And, indeed, it is true that the intelligence and security committee held a hearing on the topic not so long ago -- but, like the Congressional counterparts, it was almost entirely softballs allowing them to spew rhetoric, rather than answer serious questions concerning the intelligence community.

Even worse, it appears that the UK leadership is working extra hard to keep trying to pass a hot potato to make sure no one has to testify on this particular issue:

A similar request for Kim Darroch, the national security adviser, to give evidence to the committee's inquiry into counter-terrorism was also rejected in a letter from David Cameron. He said "it was not a good idea" because Darroch's role focused on providing private advice to him and the national security council and his appearance would "set a difficult precedent".

The prime minister said it should be left to the home secretary to give evidence to the MPs on their concerns about counter-terrorism and the Guardian's disclosures of mass digital surveillance by GCHQ and the US national security agency.

The decision prompted a furious reaction from Vaz, who said: "The prime minister has suggested that the home secretary should come before us to answer our questions and Theresa May is suggesting that it is a matter for the intelligence and security committee. We cannot play pass the parcel on the issue of accountability on these important issues.

While the US process has been something of a joke, at least Congress has been able to get James Clapper, Keith Alexander and others out to testify a bunch of times on these issues. Some in the UK, however, would apparently like to sweep the whole issue under the rug.

Filed Under: andrew parker, edward snowden, mi5, oversight, theresa may, uk parliament

UK Intelligence Boss Blames Snowden And Reporters For Giving A 'Gift' To Terrorists

from the blame-game dept

Well, it appears that the head of the UK's MI5 is going on the offensive (and I mean that in multiple ways) concerning the Ed Snowden leaks, spreading a hilarious story claiming that it's Snowden (and to a lesser extent the Guardian) who have "helped the terrorists" with the leaks... and the UK press dutifully repeated the talking points as fact: And, indeed, the claims are making the rounds of the UK press with little analysis.

Revelations by Edward Snowden about British eavesdropping are a gift to terrorists because they weaken the ability of the security services to stop those plotting deadly attacks against the West, the head of the MI5 Security Service said on Tuesday....

[....] Though he did not mention Snowden by name, Parker warned about the danger of disclosures about the work of Britain's listening agency, known as GCHQ, whose capabilities were made public by media reports based on documents from Snowden stole.

"It causes enormous damage to make public the reach and limits of GCHQ techniques. Such information hands the advantage to the terrorists. It is the gift they need to evade us and strike at will," Parker said in his first public speech taking up his post as MI5 chief on April 22.

This is hogwash on multiple levels. First, it takes incredible self-obsession to claim that someone exposing your questionable activities should be blamed for the consequences of those questionable activities. That's what Andrew Parker doesn't seem to recognize: the problem isn't that Snowden revealed these things, it's that the intelligence community was doing it in the first place. Second, it's already been shown, repeatedly, that terrorists already assumed these kinds of surveillance efforts were ongoing, and were careful to avoid such easy routes of surveillance. Third, if the surveillance relies on keeping the entire concept secret, you're doing it wrong. For decades, criminals have known that the police have the ability to tap phones. There's a whole process involved with real oversight, and most people are now comfortable with the general idea of phone taps following a specific warrant and oversight. The point here is that you don't have to keep the fact that you tap these things a secret if you have sufficient oversight and controls to make sure they're not abused. But that's not what anyone did here.

But, really, these stories of doom and gloom are pretty laughable given that there's been almost no evidence that these surveillance techniques have ever actually stopped terrorist attacks in the first place.

Filed Under: andrew parker, blame, ed snowden, gchq, mi5, nsa, surveillance