Tag Archives: State surveillance

Britain, Government, Human Rights, Legal, National Security, Politics, Society

Secret courts: The need to balance security with individual freedom…

(From the archives) Originally posted on April 4, 2012 by markdowe

BALANCING SECURITY AND LIBERTY

Keeping citizens safe and free is the primary role of the state. In attempting to achieve this it must properly balance the requirements of national security with the principles of liberty. In Britain, this tension runs like a thread throughout its history. Over the centuries, the executive has sought to arrogate further powers to itself – usually in the name of protecting the people – while Parliament and the judiciary have acted as a check on its presumption. Invariably, parties in opposition believe the government of the day is acting in an illiberal fashion; yet when they take office, they discover that achieving the right balance is harder than they imagined.

When in opposition, the leaders of the two parties now making up the Coalition were vehemently critical of Labour’s plans for a substantial extension of the state’s surveillance powers. But having flip-flopped, the Conservative-LibDem coalition are now making precisely the same supportive arguments as their predecessors. The problem with this kind of volte-face is that it erodes public trust in government, and makes it harder for ministers to do anything in the name of security without being denounced for their illiberal instincts. This is one reason why the Government’s proposals for ‘secret courts’ have received such a sceptical, if not hostile, reception. In a report published today the joint parliamentary committee on human rights adds its criticism, saying that plans outlined in a Green Paper last year to hear some civil actions involving the security and intelligence services behind closed doors are based on ‘spurious assumptions’ and are ‘inherently unfair’.

The Government is seeking to extend the so-called evidence procedures following the claims for damages brought by Binyam Mohamed and others, who alleged that Britain had ben complicit in their mistreatment whilst in Guantanamo Bay. Rather than disclose information that might damage national security, the Government withdrew from the action and paid substantial compensation. Under plans put forward by the Coalition, a judge would see the evidence and hear arguments from special advocates with appropriate clearance. However, no one else – including the plaintiffs – would be entitled to know what was being discussed. This should go without saying that this is not open justice. The question, though, is whether it is justified.

On balance perhaps it is – so long as these procedures are used only in the most exceptional circumstances and not at all in inquests. There are times when the national interest requires secrecy; it would be naïve to pretend otherwise. But Parliament must ensure that the law is properly framed to balance the requirements of fairness and security.

Standard
Britain, Government, Intelligence, National Security, Society, Technology, United States

The appearance of the heads of Britain’s Secret Intelligence Services before Parliament…

A WELCOME STEP

Yesterday, the heads of the three intelligence services in Britain – MI5, MI6 and GCHQ – gave evidence in public for the first time before Parliament’s Intelligence and Security Committee (ISC).

Underlying the examination was one of the oldest questions about the nature of state-sponsored surveillance: who monitors and regulates the watchers? An analysis of what was said should glean that we did not learn a great deal that we did not already know. The transparency element, for example, went only so far. They appeared suitably nondescript, too, with faces you would quickly forget in a crowd, a prerequisite for any spymaster.

MI6 chief Sir John Sawers, GCHQ chief Sir Iain Lobban and Andrew Parker, who handles intelligence agents in the UK, deserve some credit for showing up, given their keen professional aversion to public exposure in a political theatre. This should be seen as a welcome step in the right direction if the work of the agencies is to be more open and less susceptible to caricature by conspiracy theorists.

Three developments compelled yesterday’s momentous public appearance. The first is the leaks by the former US national security contractor Edward Snowden which revealed extensive spying by GCHQ and the US National Security Agency. The scope and extent of this surveillance, its modus operandi and authorisation frameworks are matters of high public interest and concern given our historic traditions of personal privacy and public angst over the monitoring activities of government into citizens’ lives.

The second is the revolution wrought by communications technology with subsequent and resultant concerns over data protection. And the third is the sizeable increase to the budget of the security services to combat ‘terrorist’ threats. Balancing the duty to protect the public from dangerous and highly-organised would-be killers with how that objective is achieved by SIS (Security & Intelligence Services) is bound to create conflicts.

For spymasters, whose stock in trade is secrecy, it is perhaps too much for others to expect answers to be given in public about what they do. Such shortcomings soon became apparent during exchanges about the impact of the leaks perpetrated by Mr Snowden. Sir Iain Lobban denounced the way the disclosure of thousands of covert documents had hampered his agency’s efforts to thwart the nation’s enemies. Sir Iain claimed it had put the security effort back many years. In a similar vein, Sir John Sawers insisted our adversaries were ‘rubbing their hands with glee’ as a result. When asked, though, for specific details they retreated behind a cloak of secrecy, saying that to divulge such information would compound the damage.

Because of the synthetic nature of the exercise, the imperfections exposed matters that could not be revealed and which the public would not expect to be told. It is from this point, then, where we have to rely on systems of parliamentary oversight and surveillance protocols to work effectively.

It is indicative that the parliamentary committee for security and intelligence hold the chiefs accountable in private for the allegations they have made and to establish whether their concerns are substantively genuine. The ISC should then report its findings to the public.

The issue of mass surveillance was also raised at a time when it is becoming increasingly difficult to keep an appropriate balance between intrusion and security because communications technology is developing so rapidly. On being asked how legislation setting out their powers can possibly be relevant today when it was last updated 13 years ago, Mr Parker of MI5 said the law was a matter for parliament, not the intelligence chiefs. They also punctured the notion that simply because something is secret does not mean it is also sinister.

Standard