Great Britain broadens online search abilities - and opens up the door to law enforcement agencies from other EU states

The Home Office in Great Britain adapted a plan which allows “police across Britain routinely to hack into people’s personal computers without a warrant” according to the Times Online. This kind of remote search allows both police and MI5 officers to examine suspects’ hard drives, to install keylogging software or infect the targeted computer with other kinds of malware (viruses, rootkits etc.). This can be done to a suspect’s computer at home, in the office or in a hotel room. The plan for remote search in GB is based on a decision of the Council of ministers of the European Union from late 2008 which suggests adapting “operational measures, such as cyber patrols, joint investigation teams and remote searches to become part of the fight against cybercrime in the next five years”. I already discussed this decision and its possible negative implementations for privacy and internet freedom in an earlier article.

As the plan in GB is an adaptation of the Council of ministers decision it can be seen as a blueprint for similar laws in other EU states. Therefore it makes sense to take a look at what it allows officers to do:

• First of all there is no need for a warrant to be granted before such a search can be performed. As a matter a fact a search can be done if a senior officer deems it necessary to prevent or detect serious crime, which is defined as calling for a jail sentence of more than three years. This seems to be a rather low barrier to such an intrusive tool and MPs in the UK as well as civil liberty groups have stated that this decision goes against “the legal safeguards for searching a suspect’s home”.
• Secondly by entering both the hard drives of suspects and using keylogging and other malware software this kind of intrusion would let law enforcement official not only view all files on the computer (including of course browsing history etc.) but also all inbound and outbound communication (e.g. Email, Instant Messenger). Consequently the warrantless intrusion into the suspects’ privacy would also violate the privacy of persons with whom he or she is communicating with.
• Thirdly the strategy also includes plans for cross border cooperation as it would allow police official from other EU member states to ask British officers to hack into UK citizens computers and hand over all the material found on them. This means that UK citizens could be suspect to foreign investigation without a warrant using the intrusive tools described above and also leads to the question whether implementations such a law in other EU states will also include this kind of cooperation. If so this would effectively lead to any EU police force being at least able to get access to any EU citizens computer if he or she is suspected to be involved in a crime.

It seems to be pretty clear that the Home Offices advance in the field of remote searching and online surveillance could lead to immense fallout for citizens’ privacy and could be a blueprint for other EU states to following when they are adapting the EU edict concerning remote search. Therefore it is important to keep an eye on this development and participate in the discussion if such tools are really necessary and if they are how they can be organised in a way which does not violate fundamental citizens’ rights.

Tags: hacking, privacy, remote search, surveillance, UK