I want to write to Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: To ask Her Majesty's Government whether they monitor the internet regularly for evidence of a rise in criminal activity with regard to birds caught in the wild; and if so, what has been the result of such monitoring.
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...I know that older decision-makers find it hard to imagine the speed with which technological changes happen. Some 25 years ago we had no idea of what cyberwarfare meant or what it would mean to an internet-connected world. My worry is that Trident will be to the UK what Hannibal’s elephants were to him: seemingly fearsome, massive and invulnerable, but easily defeated as the Romans crept...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: My noble friend mentioned the very high volume of trade that takes place over the internet. Do I understand from the Minister that the Government intend to make sure that anyone advertising puppies for sale on the internet will have to have a licence number?
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: .... I welcome particularly my right honourable friend Nick Clegg’s announcement that the Royal United Services Institute—RUSI—has agreed to establish an expert panel to review the use of internet data for surveillance purposes. That panel will consist of a group of experts drawn from the worlds of intelligence, technology, civil liberties and the law, and it will be chaired by...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Bill was drafted. In common with all noble Lords, I can remember when opening someone's post without proper authorisation was a serious offence, yet in the internet age, popping in to their IP address and having a look at what they are up to is not taken as seriously as it should be. An example is that, legislatively, RIPA offered protection when, in...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...at best; at worst, we are losing the battle. This seems a good moment to try a different approach. Something in particular that has changed is that in the early 1970s, when we did not have the internet, people could not just order things online and get them by post. The public now are looking for consumer protection, whether for aspirins or legal highs. I understand that we all, whatever...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...agree that they do. However, I have felt all the way through the Bill that there are not sufficient checks and balances to protect the consumer. In particular, when a person, an institution, an internet café or a university is accused of transgressing these rules, it will hit the individual very hard. How will they disprove the accusations? They will have to employ a computer expert to...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: My Lords, I have added my name to the amendments. I feel particularly strongly about Amendment 83. Unfettered access to the internet is seen by many people as being on a par with access to other services such as electricity or water. We would not dream of technical measures being taken against those services without an order and an explanatory document being laid before Parliament. This...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...concern with this whole debate is that whatever we conclude here, the other place will not be able to spend any time scrutinising what is actually an incredibly important change in the way that the internet is dealt with. The Minister almost implied that the Government needed power in times of crisis. This is not a national crisis: this it still a matter of civil copyright infringement....
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ..., for example-that choose to offer wi-fi. I am sad that the Government have not chosen to introduce a clause stating what category educational establishments or commercial establishments such as internet cafés, or indeed municipal facilities and wi-fi towns such as Swindon, would fall into. The vision set out by the Government in Digital Britain was of a place where local government...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...say that I have never found it in the past to be an organisation that has been anything other than reasonable and logical. BT says that, "it is not clear which of the definitions of 'subscriber' or 'internet service provider' would apply to account holders such as businesses, organisations and householders whose internet connections are or can be used to provide internet access for many...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...said underlines the glaring omission from this Bill of any rights given to users of the digital economy-the citizens. The Government could have chosen to draft a clause setting out the rights of internet users, because the digital economy should bring lots of rights to those who use it. Among those would be the right to have all the ways that fraud can take place on the internet explained....
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: My Lords, the purpose of Amendment 43 is to explore with the Government what sort of defence there would be when a subscriber to an internet access service allows another person to use the service and that other person infringes a copyright. The Minister said helpfully in response to my Amendment 82 that he would write to Members of the Committee setting out a series of things that a communal...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...think the legislation here will have on corporate and communal facilities. As the Bill is drafted, I find it hard to understand what the effect will be, other than negative, on, for example, an internet café. Internet cafés and communal wi-fi, such as that being pioneered by Swindon, are aimed at exactly what I thought the Government were trying to include: digital inclusivity to enable...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: I shall use the gap in the Minister's reply to check something with him. He said that a university or internet café could take various steps, but is it the Government's intention that if it has not taken those steps, it will be just as open as an individual is to all the processes and sanctions in the Bill?
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...very helpful technical note, it would still be useful to have something on the record. This amendment speaks to the particularly important issue of the right to privacy. Checking on other people's internet traffic to see whether file-sharing is taking place is akin to opening somebody's post in envelopes to see whether they have illegally photocopied books, for example. It is very similar....
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...advice of Sir Tim Berners-Lee, the adviser to the Minister for the Cabinet Office on public information delivery, on clauses 4 to 20 of the Digital Economy Bill and on any impact on access to the internet; and, if so, what was his advice.
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: To ask Her Majesty's Government what is their timetable for taking forward the Interception Modernisation Programme and the Mastering the Internet programme.
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...to be answered as we move into Committee. The other thing I find difficult to understand is that this Bill seeks to make one industry that has seen phenomenal growth, investment and innovation-the internet service providers-pay for the protection of another sector. That does not seem a reasonable principle to pursue. The Minister will say that Clause 15 talks of sharing costs, but we do...
Baroness Miller of Chilthorne Domer: ...of labour. We should also bear that in mind in forthcoming trade talks. My last point relates to the Digital Economy Bill. It has been suggested that a more appropriate name for it should be the "Internet Policing Bill". It would place a duty on internet service providers to intercept the web traffic of users to see whether they were illegally downloading. Given that we are subject to...
