Topic: The 17th June Swedish goverment sees you

[Mia]

Or rather they will on the 17th of June. From that day all communication traffic that passes the Swedish border will be monitored and processed by a new created government called FRA. Keep this in mind if you call to Sweden from another country or if you are using a Swedish Internet service. Myself I will start using cryptography on Sunday on mail and internet service, my phone I can't do much about.

Those of you that live near Sweden (Europe) should keep in mind that Internet traffic finds its own path when you are out on the Internet so the risk of passing Swedish border is something that will be a constant risk.

Information about it all in English and Swedish.

[Celestial Goblin]

Kind of creepy in a Bush-esque way. I hope there will be lots opposition. It looks like another thing pressured by world-wide anti-piracy organizations. (though no doubt wrapped in promises of fighting terrorists/pedophiles/whatever)

[strangely made]

So what cryptography are you going to use Mia? is it something that anyone can use?

[Mia]

For mail GnuPGP and Enigmail. So change to Mozilla Thunderbird and you will be just fine. I got a description how it is used but it is in Swedish...

The even more strange is that there has been NO discussion at all. No newspaper has lifted this at all (except for one small article in one of the major papers the other day). The only place where people has protested is on the net but the majority of the Swedish population is totally unaware of what is going to happen.

[Captain Maltese]

*shakes head* Is the Echelon system familiar to you? If not, that's the US system for listening in on all telecommunication over the Atlantic.

[RubySlippers]

And people wonder why I hate the US Government at the Federal level and now the EU is pulling the same crap and what gets me you Europeans thought bigger government was better. Now you learn.

[Mia]

Yeah I know of Echelon system and the US government is one of those that are meant to be able to make requests to the FRA system. But know that this is only limited to Sweden so far but I would expect it to grow to EU level within a few years. Probably will also the UK law that states that you have to give the government your cryptography keys also spread outside the UK otherwise this system won't be very efficient. But I expect them to take one step at a time. Why hurry it isn't as the populations will stop this.

[Celestial Goblin]

And people wonder why I hate the US Government at the Federal level and now the EU is pulling the same crap and what gets me you Europeans thought bigger government was better. Now you learn.

It's possible to want a 'big' goverment and be against certain of it's decisions. European citizens have decent chances resisting this sort of things, actually. The EU courts are a battlefield for internet and privacy related rights, but we aren't always losing.

It's also worth noting that this system is likely a result of USA corporations pressuring Sweden(breaking Swedish law) into cracking down on software piracy. I doubt the 'moral panic' crowd could get this thing to pass if there wasn't any pressure from corporations.

[Celestial Goblin]

Oh yeah, here's what I've read in one place:

it hasn't been passed yet (if by passed you mean followed through and already become a law or watever). they're voting on the 17th, I think. thats wat the fuss is all about on TPB. they only need 4 more politicians to vote nay on the bill and sweden is home free.

other then that, it's also a bill intended to fight terrorism. not copyright infringement, but the fear of it creeping into fighting copyright infringement is obviously there.

and yes, it would be somewhat of a breach on the swedish democratic constitution. but it hasn't been instituted yet. so stop writing in bold lettering. it hurts my eyes.

[Captain Maltese]

You know, they have become good at taping but there's an obvious flaw. How are they possibly going to actually listen and read to all this junk? By the time they have processed a day's worth, three weeks have gone by. So what they do is sample. But it's like fishing at a bloody huge lake in hope of catching a few boots that are spread randomly...

[Celestial Goblin]

Heh, it's a reason why getting as much people as possible to use internet is so beneficient to our security and privacy. Anonymity in the crowd.

[Mia]

By letting it all run through one of the worlds most powerful super computer, FRA ordered it last year I believe and was by that time number five on the world list.

[Captain Maltese]

By letting it all run through one of the worlds most powerful super computer, FRA ordered it last year I believe and was by that time number five on the world list.

Well, obviously they weren't going to read it by eye But the computer is still only as good as the programmers. Ever seen the number of glitches non-shelfware software has?

[Mia]

I have no doubt the FRA will pull it off. They have been doing this but only by air so far since the 1940s so they know how to filter mass information. Problem is what they are searching for is classified so we will never know. Most likely will I or anyone else know either but sometime strange things will happen;

Suddenly a person isn't allowed to enter USA.
Maybe another person is suddenly picked up during a hollyday abroad and just vanishes. Happened to a Germany citizen a few years back. The guy was kidnapped by CIA in Italy and then dumped in Afghanistan for questioning and later released a few months later.

[kongming]

It looks like, if this goes ahead, everyone will start needing to add certain words to any e-mail they send or message they post online - bomb, terrorist, jihad, free download, piracy and the like. Simply to render the system completely useless so they say "Know what? Forget it. It was a dumb idea anyway."

Although, that being said, if a computer does simply filter for keywords, another option is "don't talk about illegal activity". But seeing as this has little chance of actually preventing crime, I am opposed to this breach of human rights, so fully endorse non-criminal tactics used to screw the system up.

[Celestial Goblin]

You just say 'soccer' instead of 'Jihad' and 'carbonated bewerages' instead of 'pirated software'.
Or masquerade as spam. Textual communication is un-f...n-touchable.

[strangely made]

My whole problem with this is not if they will do it, or how they will do it but simply the fact that they want to do it.

[Nephili]

Ugh... no offense to the Europeans here... but your governments are really starting to scare me... between this and all the cameras in Britain (as well as the fact that they're advertising them in a rather Orwellian fashion)... Can someone tell the leaders over there that 1984 was supposed to be a WARNING, not a how-to guide?

[Mia]

The system goes online the 1st of January 2009...