Big brother society 'putting lives at risk'

UK Daily Mail | March 26, 2007

By JAMES SLACK

A fifth of the world's CCTV cameras are trained on people living in Britain.

Experts have called for a curb in the spread of the cameras, which now total a staggering 4.2m - one for every 14 people living here.

The Royal Academy of Engineering also warned the lurch towards a 'big brother' society, in which the Government and even supermarkets hold huge amounts of our personal information, could put lives at risk.

In a deeply worrying report, the academy said our identities, eating habits, health and vulnerability could all be compromised and abused.

Scenarios include details of whether a woman has had an abortion or a person's HIV status being sold or leaked on to the internet.

Supermarkets, which keep records of a shopper's purchases each week using loyalty cards, could pass on information about unhealthy eaters to the NHS, or life insurance companies.

One of the report's authors, Professor Nigel Gilbert, said the number of CCTV cameras in Britain is so large that installing any more should be halted until their need is proven.

The average Londoner could be monitored by up to 300 cameras each day.

Britain relies on the cameras far more than other countries, accounting for 20 per cent of all technology used across the world, despite having just one per cent of the globe's population.

Prof Gilbert said that as digital technology improved there would be no barrier to storing images from cameras indefinitely.

In the future, matching CCTV cameras with face recognition technology will allow the authorities to pinpoint a person's exact location at any given time, he warned.

The report added that the Government's plans for storing huge amounts of data on computer databases and microchips posed a huge risk to the public, even to the extent that lives could be at risk.

Any system operated by an individual was vulnerable to abuse - with staff tempted to sell bundles of personal data. They are also at risk of being hacked, using the Internet.

The academy gave the example of the Government's planned Children's Database, which will contain the names and addresses of children considered vulnerable or 'at risk'.

This, the report says, would allow paedophiles to target the child.

The NHS computer to store patient records, which is currently costing billions of pounds to develop, could also jeopardise a person's lifestyle or employment prospects if information leaked out, it said.

The report says: "Examples might be HIV status or a record showing that a woman had had a pregnancy terminated, or data showing that the paternity of a child could not be the presumed father."

The document also said biometric data stored on radio frequency microchips on the Government's new passports - the same technology which will be used for ID cards - could be 'eavesdropped' by fraudsters.

The microchips, which the Daily Mail has revealed can be read from a distance of several feet, could even be hijacked by fraudsters - giving them access to names, addresses and other personal details - and even terrorists.

The report said that, in the future, extremists could construct a bomb which would only be detonated when a certain passport, or nationality, was nearby.

The bomb would sit and wait to be activated by information stored on the passport's electronic chip, which gives out a radio signal.

On supermarkets, the experts say there is no reason why firms such as Tesco or Sainsbury's need a person's name in order to issue them with a loyalty card.

The report says: "It is not entirely absurd to imagine that supermarkets' loyalty card data might one day be used by the Government to identify people who ignored advice to eat healthily, or who drank too much, so that they could be given a lower priority for treatment by the NHS.

Prof Gilbert added: "We have supermarkets collecting data on our shopping habits, and also offering life insurance services. What will they be able to do in 20 years' time, knowing how many doughnuts we have bought?"

The document follows a recent study from the Government's privacy watchdog, the Information Commissioner, which warned Britain was becoming a "surveillance society".

The commissioner Richard Thomas said excessive use of CCTV and other information-gathering was creating a climate of suspicion.

Director of human rights group Liberty, Shami Chakrabarti, said: "This report sends a clear warning to public and private sectors with their insatiable appetite for our personal information.

"The desire for a little bit of privacy is part of being human and the nation's dignity should not be for sale. Smart politicians and businessmen take note."