[e-privacy] Il RIPA in azione nel Regno Unito contro un'attivista animalista

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 Saturday, November 17 2007 @ 06:56 AM PST
UK: Animal rights activist hit with RIPA key decrypt demand
	
Thursday, November 15 2007 @ 09:30 AM PST
Contributed by: Anonymous
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Police State An animal rights activist has been ordered to hand over
her encryption keys to the authorities. Section Three of the
Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA) came into force at the
start in October 2007, seven years after the original legislation
passed through parliament. Intended primarily to deal with terror
suspects, it allows police to demand encryption keys or provide a
clear text transcript of encrypted text.

Animal rights activist hit with RIPA key decrypt demand

An animal rights activist has been ordered to hand over her encryption
keys to the authorities.

Section Three of the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (RIPA)
came into force at the start in October 2007, seven years after the
original legislation passed through parliament. Intended primarily to
deal with terror suspects, it allows police to demand encryption keys
or provide a clear text transcript of encrypted text.

Failure to comply can result in up to two years imprisonment for cases
not involving national security, or five years for terrorism offences
and the like. Orders can be made to turn over data months or even
years old.

The contentious measure, introduced after years of consultation, was
sold to Parliament as a necessary tool for law enforcement in the
fight against organised crime and terrorism.

But an animal rights activist is one of the first people at the
receiving end of a notice to give up encryption keys. Her computer was
seized by police in May, and she has been given 12 days to hand over a
pass-phrase to unlock encrypted data held on the drive - or face the
consequences.

The woman, who claims to have not used encryption, relates her
experiences in an anonymous posting on Indymedia.

"Now apparently they have found some encrypted files on my computer
(which was stolen by police thugs in May this year) which they think
they have 'reasonable suspicion' to pry into using the excuse of
preventing or detecting a crime'," she writes.

"Now I have been 'invited' (how nice, will there be tea and biccies?)
to reveal my keys to the police so they can look at these files. If I
do not comply and tell them to keep their great big hooters out of my
private affairs I could be charged under RIPA."

The woman says that any encrypted data put on the PC must have been
put there by somebody else.

"Funny thing is PGP and I never got on together I confess that I am
far too dense for such a complex (well to me anyway)
programme. Therefore in a so-called democracy I am being threatened
with prison simply because I cannot access encrypted files on my
computer."

She argues that even if she had used encryption she'd be disinclined
to hand over her pass phrase. "The police are my enemy, I know that
they have given information about me to Huntingdon Life Sciences (as
well as hospitalising me)," she writes. "Would I really want them to
see and then pass around private communications with my solicitors
which could be used against me at a later date in the civil courts,
medical records, embarrassing poetry which was never meant to be read
by anyone else, soppy love letters or indeed personal financial
transactions?"

Indymedia reports that similar demands have been served against other
animal rights activists, a point we have not been able to verify.

The woman was issued a notice by the Crown Prosecution Service, and
not (as might be expected) the police. According to the code of
conduct, the authorities would normally ask a suspect to put the files
into intelligible form, though how this would work when a PC is being
held by the police is far from clear.

It's unclear if the woman was given an official Section 49 notice or
simply "invited" to hand over the data voluntarily as part of a bluff
by the authorities.

Richard Clayton, a security researcher at Cambridge University and
long-time contributor to UK security policy working groups, said that
only the police are authorised to issue Section 49 notices. "What
seems to have happened is that the CPS (who couldn't issue a notice
anyway) have written asking the person to volunteer their key," he
adds.

"Should they refuse this polite request, they are being threatened
with the subsequent issuing of a notice, which might or might not
require the key to be produced (it might of course just require the
putting into an intelligible form of the data)."

Clayton expressed concern that the incident illustrates possible holes
in the long-delayed code of practice. "It would clearly be desirable
to seek NTAC's views before approaching suspects with requests for
keys (rather than requests to put into an intelligible form) - lest
the authorities give the impression that they know rather less about
the rules (and the operation of encryption systems) than everyone
else," he said.

Link:
http://www.infoshop.org/inews/article.php?story=20071115093010712

Full Account written by the activist:

http://www.indymedia.org.uk/en/2007/11/385589.html