How would you feel if you knew your every move was being tracked?

Privacy, we all want it and on occasions we'll even get mad because we haven't had it. It's something that everybody holds dear, without it we'd feel trapped and a lot of that is down to natural instinct. After all, on a relative scale the human race is still in its infancy and as such many of our natural instincts remain from more primeval periods.

We fought to exist and to have our own property and land, an evolution that still exists today, albeit in a somewhat tamer form. So it's only natural that any threat to our privacy is treated with some disrespect, that's one reason many despise the Police so much, because they have the right to invade our lives if needed.

It's bad enough we're attacked in the real world like this, but now that's starting to spread onto the net thanks to the recent RIP Bill (Regulation of Investigatory Powers).

The New Law & Systems

The Internet is regarded by many as a universe free from regulation and the general social burdens of life. It allows people to be who they want to be and say what they want to say, but because of this it's also become a haven for cyber crime. Everybody from paedophiles to drug traffickers and even those involved with industrial espionage are now taking to the net in their droves.

Crime is starting to see just how useful a place the net can be, even going so far as to use the service of hackers to cover their tracks. This is starting to have a dramatic effect and if you were to factor online crime into statistics then the figures would be very much higher than the usual reports could predict.

As such the UK has, following the USA, become one of a select group of country's around the world to integrate a new type of security measure. While systems and details differ from place to place the fundamentals of the services remain the same, to catch cyber criminals. It may sound good on paper but there's a good reason many of us should be cautious about it.

First E-Mail, Then..

The system itself is being touted for the specific task of intercepting private E-Mails and investigating their content. This means that the hardware is required to be installed at every ISP in the UK so that their E-Mail servers can be monitored and accessed by the police if need be. It may all sound fair and good, but this isn't an ideal world and people are worried for many reasons.

The BILL required to make this practice law, which it has now become, is know as the RIP Bill or Regulation of Investigatory Powers. While everything seems fine on the surface, people are naturally worried and in this case they have every right to be. One of the primary reasons for a general dislike to the bill among people is the fact that it could represent the start of total control over the net.

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