Category: National Security State

Spycops in Spain; EU asylum plans; AI Convention draft leak; UK govt attacks basic freedoms

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Friday, 3 February 2023 — Statewatch

Issue 02/23, 2 February

Also available as a PDF

statewatch.org / Twitter / Mastodon / LinkedIn / Facebook / RSS

Welcome to our latest bulletin, featuring:

  • Special report: Spycops in Spain
  • EU asylum plans: unaccountability and failure
  • First draft of artificial intelligence convention published
  • UK government assault on basic freedoms continues

And: Draft European Council conclusions, Dutch police surveillance case, travel surveillance, and more.
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Statewatch: Join us in Brussels on 25 January at Privacy Camp 2023

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Thursday, 12 January 2023 — Statewatch

Workshop: Policing the crisis, policing as crisis: the problem(s) with Europol

Register for Privacy Camp 2023 here (our workshop is in-person attendance only). For more information on Privacy Camp, see the website.

In June 2022 EU policing agency Europol received substantial new powers. Legal changes mean the agency can now process data on entirely innocent people, more easily receive and transmit personal data from non-EU states, and is responsible for developing algorithms and other new technologies for police forces across the EU.

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Review of 2022: the year it became okay to jail protesters in Britain

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14 December 2022 — Netpol

Calendar of Nerpol activities in 2022

It has not been a good year for our right to dissent. The vehemently resisted Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts (PCSC) Act came into force in the summer, while the government continues to push through its Public Order Bill, aimed at criminalising our right to protest even further. The National Security Bill also includes even more measures to restrict the right to demonstrate.

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Will Belated Open Letter by The New York Times and other Media Outlets Be Enough to Compel Julian Assange’s Release From Prison?

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Monday, 12 December 2022 — CovertAction Magazine

By Ellen Taylor

A person holding a sign</p> <p>Description automatically generated with medium confidence[Source: qa.ousdoc.com]

Or will vindictive elites exposed as war criminals in documents Assange released and who engaged in deep-reaching smear campaign directed against him try to lock up the heroic truth-teller forever?

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Stay Aggravated in the Permacrisis

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Wednesday, 2 November 2022 — NetPol

It will come as little of a surprise to most of us that ‘permacrisis’ – the feeling of living through “an extended period of instability and insecurity, especially one resulting from a series of catastrophic events” – has been chosen as Collins Dictionary’s word of 2022.

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Statewatch News Issue 18/22: Join our Board; Refugee relocation scheme founders; Who benefits from EU security funding?

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Friday, 28 October 2022 — statewatch.org

(Issue 18/22, also available as a PDF)

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Welcome to the latest edition of Statewatch News, featuring:

  • Join our Board of Trustees!
  • Refugee relocation scheme founders as states plan to “intensify police checks” across the EU
  • Who benefits from EU military and security funding?

As well as news on a fresh round of migration control funding from Spain for Morocco (to the tune of €30 million) and our usual roundup of news and reports from across Europe.

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Statewatch News Issue 17/22: Change needed at Frontex; EU seeks deportation increase; Activity report 2021

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Friday, 14 October 2022 — Statewatch News

14 October (Issue 17/22, also available as a PDF)

Welcome to the latest edition of Statewatch News, featuring:

  • Demands for change at Frontex
  • EU still adamant on increasing deportations
  • Our annual activity report for 2021

And reports on the externalisation of migration controls, police exploitation of software vulnerabilities, and a joint statement on the Egyptian government’s brutal treatment of Eritrean refugees.

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Tory Party conference confirms draconian Public Order Bill will go ahead

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Sunday, 9 October 2022 — NetPol

BravermanSuella Braverman continues Priti Patel’s war on protesters

Home Secretary Suella Braverman confirmed that she will be pursuing Priti Patel’s crackdown on dissent at the Conservative Party Conference. Braverman continued the recent rhetoric of calling protesters “a mob” and threatened campaigners that “you cross a line when you break the law. And that’s why we’ll keep putting you behind bars.”

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“We battled the algorithm and won”

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Wednesday, 28 September 2022 — The Electronic Intifada

Omar Zahzah

Meta and Twitter have been accused of censoring Palestinian voices. alexskopje/Newscom

Social media juggernaut Meta Platforms lists “Give People a Voice” as one of the principles on its website.

“People deserve to be heard and have a voice – even when that means defending the right of people we disagree with.”

It seems that Meta employees should have added “fiction writing” to their job description, however. A number of damning recent articles exposing patently unjust experiences of censorship have revealed the company to be more concerned with silencing voices – particularly Palestinian ones.

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Police response to anti-monarchy protests shows the need for Netpol’s Charter for Freedom of Assembly Rights

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Friday, 16 September 2022 — NetPol

There has been outrage at the arrests. But protest is not illegal!

#NotMyKing and police

There has been outrage this week at the arrests and threat of arrest of anti-monarchy protesters. However the arrests have also led to a lot of misinformation and alarmist statements about the law and our right to protest.

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Smart Meters — The Household Device That Spies on You 24/7

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Friday, 9 September 2022 — The Defender

The data from smart meters reveal far more than you might think — and could even be used against you to control your individual energy use or, one day, to help ensure “net zero” compliance.

By Dr. Joseph Mercola 

Story at a glance:

  • Smart meters measure and record electricity usage at least every hour, if not more, and provide the data to the utility company and consumer at least once a day.
  • The data from smart meters reveal far more than you might think — and could even be used against you to control your individual energy use or, one day, to help ensure “net zero” compliance.
  • Smart meters do more than measure your energy usage; they’re also capable of distinguishing what type of energy you’re using, such as doing laundry or watching TV.
  • It’s an intensely personal form of surveillance — one that could easily be used against you, including to scrutinize your energy usage and even ration your energy.
  • Smart meters should also be avoided because they’re yet another source of electromagnetic fields (EMFs), which include radio frequencies from smart meters, cellphones and Wi-Fi and dirty electricity.
  • If you can, opt out of receiving a smart meter; be aware that you will likely be charged an extortion fee, in the form of one-time and monthly charges, to do so.

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Open Letter to the Met

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Thursday, 8 September 2022 — NetPol

Extinction Rebellion protests: we need clarity about what to expect from the Metropolitan Police

Sign the Open Letter

Actions planned in London in the coming months on the unprecedented global climate emergency, by Extinction Rebellion and other environmental campaigners, will represent the first real test of new police powers to impose aggressive protest restrictions that came into effect in June.

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Lost in the Matrix – how police surveillance is mapping protest movements

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Friday, 2 September 2022 — NetPol

How can British police, who have struggled for so long to justify its surveillance on alleged “extremists”, ever hope to adequately categorise something as subjective as people’s political opinions? As Netpol asked in March 2021, how do campaigners become “aggravated activists” – the new label applied to those taking action that challenges state and corporate interests?

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Journalists who challenge NATO narratives are now ‘information terrorists’

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Tuesday, 23 August 2022 — Vanessa Beeley

Vanessa Beeley 

We will have to answer to the ‘law’ as ‘war criminals’

Nazis congregate on Google Plus 2019.

A US state department sponsored round table on ‘countering disinformation’ was recently held at the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine. 

“Information terrorists should know that they will have to answer to the law as war criminals” Andrii Shapovalov

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How One Spook-Run London College Department Is Training the World’s Social Media Managers

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Monday, 22 August 2022 — MintPress News

Staffed by NATO military officers and former government ministers and notorious for training the West’s top spies, the Department of War Studies at King’s College London is also providing the workforce for many of the largest social media companies. This includes Facebook, TikTok, Google, and Twitter.

A MintPress study of professional databases and employment websites reveals a wide network of War Studies alumni holding many of the most influential jobs in media, constituting a silent army of individuals who influence what the world sees (and does not see) in its social media feeds.
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