Now that we have a supposedly pro civil liberties inclined government in power it will be interesting to see whether they keep to all their promises regarding Gary McKinnon and his extradition to the USA on trumped up charges of hacking into US military computer systems.

The government recently announced a £500m funding boost for 'cyber defence'. My reaction was immediately cynical... the only significant 'cyberwar' threat we've seen to date was the recent Stuxnet virus (which was designed to attack industrial control software, and seemed to focus its efforts in Iran more than anywhere else, hence is suspected of being a deliberate attack of sorts). This one incident doesn't seem enough to justify a massive investment in boosting our defences against this mostly hypothetical attack vector, especially at a time when the country's finances are not in the best of shape.

Of course, if you are the cynical type, you can think of other motives for throwing funding into monitoring and control of the Internet... and lo and behold, in today's Comprehensive Spending Review (specifically, in the Strategic Defence and Security Review,) we find that the coalition has revived the all-but-shelved Intercept Modernisation Programme.

West Midlands Police already have a far better Twitter presence than any other force, but with their latest account - WMP CSI dog Smithy - they're tapping into the infamous British love of animals.

The Taxpayers' Alliance is unimpressed at this use of police time and money, but actually it's quite a neat way to get a lot of people following a police-controlled Twitter account - the dog is already up to nearly 800 followers, whereas many accounts belonging to real WMP police officers languish down in the low hundreds at best. The main WM Police account has a few thousand followers, but it wouldn't surprise me to see the dog overtaking that in the next few days or weeks. And now the dog can RT things from the more official accounts, thereby spreading them to hundreds of people who would never dream of following a police Twitter account normally. It's a smart move, even if that wasn't the original reason for it.

One of the odder accusations I hear as a Lib Dem activist is that we have a "civil liberties fetish". So far, I've always heard it from Labour-leaning people, though that may be a reflection of a currently slightly anomalous relative positioning of the Labour and Conservative parties rather than anything intrinsic to the species. It's supposed to make us sound irrational, I dare say, or naively idealistic. It's supposed to make us blush and admit that yes, perhaps we did get a bit carried away, and perhaps that nice Mr Blair was all right after all.

I'm sorry - or actually, I'm not sorry at all - but no. Shall we pick that phrase apart a bit?

These tips were submitted by a friend who works within the civil service, and has worked on analysing consultation responses before. If you are responding to a consultation and wish to make a positive impact on those reading your response, she recommends the following:

1. You don't have to respond to every question if you don't want to.
2. Succinct responses tend to have most impact...
3. ...but don't let that make you refrain from saying things you think are important.

The following article is reproduced from various locations on the web, where it carries a notice requesting that people republish it as widely as possible. It was originally published on www.wessexblog.com but has subsequently been removed. We are currently attempting to contact the author to confirm it is okay to reproduce the article here.

Update: We've now spoken to Peter via email and he's asked us to take the piece down, as he did himself, on the request of Ian Tomlinson's family's legal team. The article contained an eye-witness account of the events immediately prior to Ian's death and the subsequent IPCC investigation, and some of the information it contained may be relevant in future legal proceedings. We hope to republish the article, perhaps with further updates, at a future date.

Last Saturday I attended ORGCon, the Open Rights Group's first digital rights conference. The day was packed full with interesting discussions, and I'll aim to blog about a number of relevant issues here over the next couple of weeks. The most pressing topic concerns the campaign to amend the problematic sections of the Digital Economy Act, as Ofcom's current consultation period ends on Friday, and we need to send in as many responses from a digital rights perspective as possible this week.

The question of how digital rights activists should respond to the passing of the Digital Economy Act by the previous government was tackled in a panel discussion including Tom Watson MP, Julian Huppert MP, Eric Joyce MP, John Grogan and Anita Cole (Director of civil liberties foundation Liberty).

Photo from ZDNet UK

At the protest today outside New Scotland Yard, I noticed something interesting. One of the things City of London Police have done since the G20 debacle is attempt to make officers more approachable and identifiable by adding a name-badge to their uniform. As you can see in the following photos, it's worn on the chest, and if you're in a public order policing situation it can be handily covered with either your walkie-talkie or your fluoro jacket - even if you're the man in charge. So, much the same as shoulder numbers in the past, it doesn't look like these badges will be much use to anyone who's been slapped around the head with an armoured gauntlet or a baton lately.

(Top to bottom: Constable *mumble*ch, Constable Silb*mumble*, and Superintendent Morg*mumble*)

Breaking news has just come in concerning the police officer who assaulted Ian Tomlinson at the G20 protests last year. Tomlinson died shortly afterwards, but the incident in which he was struck by a police baton while walking home from work, and thereafter pushed to the ground by an officer, was captured on camera and released to the public.

The CPS ruled today that no charges would be brought against the officer in question.

This morning the new Liberal Democrat / Conservative coalition government of the UK, headed by David Cameron as Prime Minister, have announced a "major programme of civil liberties". Both parties share common policy ground on this issue, and have come together to produce the following commitment:

• A great repeal or freedom bill to scrap the ID card scheme and the national identity register and the next generation of biometric passports
• Extending the scope of the Freedom of Information bill to provide greater transparency
• Adopt protections of the Scottish model for the DNA database
• Protecting trial by jury
• Reviewing libel laws to protect freedom of speech
• Further regulation of CCTV and other items

(source)