Thread by @owenblacker

Next at #ORGcon17: @mikebutcher and @PaulbernalUK: What does #Brexit mean for digital rights?

Paul: most important thing to understand is that we don't understand what will happen with Brexit—pticly with tech matters. Most of our >

< UK digital rights law originates from Europe. And the great timing of GDPR, which we will be required to do … for a few months > #ORGcon17

I pffft'd at the idea that the EU might improve our digital rights further and Paul agreed—Brexit will make our meagre protections worse

Even with Data Protection Bill in Parliament rn, we've taken EU rqmts and removed our protection from immigration agencies #ORGcon17

And our govt is worse at that shit—our intelligence agencies are "rather more enthusiastic about surveillance than most". And we pretend >

< our spies are all James Bond and everyone else's are the Stasi.

(Background to Safe Harbor and Privacy Shield agreements and @maxschrems)

The problems we will face after Brexit is that our surveillance state is just as bad as the US's, so data transfer from the EU will >

< become just as much of a problem. Our govt has merrily been pretending this won't be a problem, just as they pretend the Investigatory >

< Powers Act is not privacy invasive. What will likely happen is the CJEU will say our safeguards are insufficient & screw our data economy

The problem is the govt pretends this won't be a problem. Possibly because they're relying on the rest of Europe becoming as enthusiastic >

< with surveillance as we are, which would mean that there no Data Protection problem at all. Or maybe "we'll just muddle through", much >

< as the sky hadn't fallen in with Safe Harbor being stuck down. And Ireland is likely to be shafted even more than we, as their data >

< comes through the UK—Apple is considering moving it's European data HQ from Ireland. And, of course, a large terrorist attack *could* >

< cause a change of mood in Europe—it certainly has done in France. The historical position of the UK govt has generally been very poor. >

< Membership of the EU has added grit to the cogs of our govt doing Bad Things™, which has definitely been to our benefit

Theresa May historically wanted to stay in EU but leave jurisdiction of CJEU, cos it frustrated Bad Things™ the govt wanted to do #ORGcon17

After all, Tories have talked about a British Bill of Rights instead of ECHR for over a decade; they still can't choose rights to lose…

Privacy is a fundamental right allowing the exercise of most of the others. And our govt has always wanted to frustrate our privacy.

The age verification rubbish in the Digital Economy Act we were discussing earlier is an example of that—and will have chilling effects.

Historically, we've tended to get more protection in British law for the likes of Google than Europe has—on the "Right to be Forgotten", >

< after a private evidence session from Google (everyone else's was public) the UK report could have been a Google press release. >

Interestingly, Theresa May is being much less friendly towards Internet intermediaries regarding takedown of extremism… #ORGcon17

Clearly though, we will have less leverage in conversations with big companies as a small nation-state than within the EU #Brexit #ORGcon17

Q: What can concerned citizens do?
A: Very little, tbh. We need to work on our MPs & parties, though they've mostly been very poor on Brexit

It's worth noting also that what Amber Rudd says in public matters: "real people don't need encryption", for example #ORGcon17

MPs use WhatsApp—not because it has crypto, just because that's what everyone uses rn. That does mean it matters abt what companies offer

We have to stop with "the terrorist used WhatsApp". Yes, everyone does, NBD. That path leads towards total surveillance. #ORGcon17

And GCHQ acknowledge that metadata is far more useful in any case.
Audience mentions being e-resident of Estonia. Paul: that's the kinda>

< thing this immigration exception is for, to allow the govt to abuse a power to try to work out of you are immigrant or not.

Mike: Partly this is also a way of helping Estonia counter risk of invasion from Russia—they were the target of 1st cyber war, after all

Privacy for the rich: yes people can afford VPNs, but default protections matter because that's what people generally have. #ORGcon17

Audience: At Cambridge, ethics lecturers now available for maths & compsci students to discourage then from joining surveillance agencies

Paul: also be wary, though: some people learn ethics just so they know the language to use to make Bad Things™ sound acceptable #ORGcon17

Q about parliamentary sovereignty and of a written constitution would better protect our fundamental rights.
A: we shouldn't think about >

< fundamental rights on that sense in the UK. Not least because we're not gonna change and codify our Constitution even in medium term. >

< Also, the situation is always changing rapidly, so fundamental digital rights would be hard to codify futureproof at the best of times.

It's also pticly challenging cos we've handed control over privacy to social networks. And we wouldn't want to hand that control to govts!

Q: How will different tax regimes across EU affect our relationship with big digital companies?
A: We'll probably reduce our taxes.

< though the UK is somewhere rich executives consider a nice place to live, which will continue to benefit is, at least. #ORGcon17

Q about upload filtering in Digital Single Market Directive and surveillance in guise of "copyright protection". #ORGcon17

A: Our creative industries lobby is pretty powerful, so we're likely to move more in the direction of surveillance-for-copyright and away >

< from the interest of small producers and startups in the creative sector. #ORGcon17

In response to Q, it's anyone's guess what Brexit deal we'll get. EU is likely to look for data protection adequacies regardless of any deal

unroll