Thread: The government’s spying agency tries to woo social media, then falls flat on its face

The government’s spying agency tries to woo social media, then falls flat on its face (TWEETS)






The government’s mass spying organisation – the Government Communication Headquarters (GCHQ) – has joined Twitter, in an attempt to woo the public:
After Edward Snowden exposed GCHQ’s mass, indiscriminate surveillance programme the organisation wants to clean up its public image.
Andrew Pike, Director of Communications at GCHQ, said:

In joining social media GCHQ can use its own voice to talk directly about the important work we do in keeping Britain safe.

GCHQ’s social media presence will be used to further the government’s narrative. The government uses the threat of terrorism to erode the rights of its citizens. Apparently it needs to hoard all of our personal information to ‘keep Britain safe’.
However, moments after the agency joined, it became apparent Twitter wasn’t buying it:
The documents leaked by Snowden show that GCHQ has the ability to turn on our microphones and cameras on our computers, listen to our phone calls and track our locations, while collecting all sorts of data about what we do online.


GCHQ indiscriminately collects data from every visible user on the internet.
Aside from GCHQ, the government is currently using its ‘domestic extremism’ police unit to spy on the Green Party, environmental activists and children. So it would be naive to think that the government does not have its own motives for collecting our data.
Twitter users continued to make light of the situation:


GCHQ ✔ ‎@GCHQ
Hello, world. http://bit.ly/GCHQhello
11:02 AM - 16 May 2016



Hello, world - GCHQ has officially joined Twitter

@GCHQ is our new official Twitter handle. Our first tweet Hello, world will be familiar to many in the technical world as it is often the first program you learn to write when starting to code.
gchq.gov.uk

• 1,367 1,367 Retweets
• 1,096

While this Twitter used the occasion to spread valuable life lessons:
GCHQ ✔ ‎@GCHQ
Hello, world. http://bit.ly/GCHQhello

Follow
Chris T-T ✔ ‎@christt

@GCHQ hi! Presumably to DM you we just need to say it out loud in our kitchen while our phone's nearby, right?
11:14 AM - 16 May 2016

• 29 29 Retweets
• 71

Others took a more serious route:
GCHQ ✔ ‎@GCHQ
Hello, world. http://bit.ly/GCHQhello

Follow
Mhairi Hunter ‎@MhairiHunter

Hi @GCHQ you don't know where I left my keys do you?
12:59 PM - 16 May 2016

• 17 17 Retweets
• 50

Apparently the following revelation isn’t satire:


GCHQ ✔ ‎@GCHQ
Hello, world. http://bit.ly/GCHQhello

Follow
Benjamin Gray ‎@benbobgray

@GCHQ @DrLucyRogers surely following count should be "everybody"
11:14 AM - 16 May 2016

• 10 10 Retweets
• 42

Many Twitter users picked up on a certain handle GCHQ followed:
Does the threat of terrorism justify mass surveillance?
GCHQ’s new Twitter bio reads:

Where our brightest people bring together intelligence and technology to keep Britain safe.

Theresa May’s Investigatory Powers Bill or ‘snoopers charter’ seeks to make mass surveillance official government policy. Ostensibly, this is to prevent terrorism, but there is no evidence it works. In fact, treating the entire country as suspects is likely to be detrimental for terrorism prevention. It’s the equivalent of building a breathtakingly unnecessary and humongous haystack to find a handful of needles in.
The following is a chart produced by The Canary, showing the real risk of dying from a terrorist attack in the UK. It was inspired by this chart The Intercept produced for the US.

The death caused by Muslim extremism within the chart was the murder of Lee Rigby in May 2013. However, Seumas Milne – now Jeremy Corbyn’s strategist – said that this “was not terrorism in the normal sense”, because the killers specifically targeted a soldier who served in Afghanistan. It is important to realise the link; this was not an indiscriminate attack.
As we can see from the chart, one is way more likely to meet their end being struck by lightning than in a terrorist attack here in Britain. There are 2 deaths from lightning every year, 5 deaths from car accidents every day, and 110 deaths from air pollution every day. This is compared to 1 death from Muslim extremism since 2010, which is mirrored by 1 Muslim death at the hands of white supremacists since 2010.
As Glenn Greenwald notes:

The greatest obstacle to anti-Muslim fear mongering and bigotry: reality.

Islamist boogeymen are useful because they allow the government to scare people into handing over their rights. The risk of British people being attacked by terrorists is blown out of proportion to expand state power.
Hats off to Twitter for employing an important defence against such authoritarian policy – ridicule.


The government?s spying agency tries to woo social media, then falls flat on its face (TWEETS) | The Canary

A chart that lets you prove whatever you like.

Deaths in car accidents and from lightning strikes are sudden and somewhat unpredictable events, but people do not walk out of their house and get struck down by air pollution. While air pollution undoubtedly exists as a problem in many areas, in the majority of cases it can only be considered to be a contributory factor. Sooner or later people die; eliminating air pollution will not stop that.

While only one person may have been killed in the UK by a Muslim extremist, it is very likely that many others have traveled to areas of the world where they can kill without the threat of being arrested by the UK police.

Since 2010, (in the last 15 years), according to the OP;

I British soldier killed by two black Muslim jihadist thugs in London.
I Muslim killed by white supremacist thugs.


Compare that misleading figure to that of hundreds arrested, tried, prosecuted and prevented from acts of mass murder of British people UK in the same time frame.

And some of you blowhards think that public surveillance resulting in the arrest of these psychotic and merciless thugs is not warranted?

You must be completely naive, a PC lefty, a wannabee jihadist, or criminally insane to turn a blind eye to the risk of terrorism.


Terror arrests reach 'record high', Home Office figures show
10 September 2015


In the year to March (ref. 2015), 299 terror suspects were detained - an increase of 31% on the previous year - of which 100 were charged with a terror-related offence.

The previous peak of 284 occurred in 2005, the year of the 7 July attacks.

Among those arrested, there was a "marked increase" in the number who considered themselves to be of British or British dual nationality, officials said.
In 2014/15, they accounted for more than three-quarters of those detained for terrorism-related offences, compared with 52% in the year to March 2011.

The rate fell from January to March this year, with 67 terror-related arrests - but this was still higher than the same period in the previous two years.


In 2014/15, there were 35 women arrested on terror-related offences; also a record figure and more than treble the number five years ago. Eight of those arrested were under 18.

There has also been a significant increase in the number of suspects arrested who were aged 30 and over, with a rise of more than a third compared to the previous year.

Of the 299 people arrested in 2014/15, fewer than half - or 100 - were ultimately charged with terror-related offences.

The Home Office said this was the highest proportion since records started, "suggesting that police were more frequently able to find evidence to support the link to terrorism following a terrorism-related arrest".

The total number of terror arrests in the UK since recording began 14 years ago is just under 3,000.

Last month Mark Rowley, the country's leading counter-terrorism officer, disclosed that suspects are now being held at a rate of more than one per day.

Originally Posted by ENT

prosecuted

Can we see this list of "hundreds" please

This appears to be some more made up rubbish from you

Originally Posted by ENT

being held

Held. Not prosecuted. Did you know that anti fracking protesters are being "held" under the 2006 anti terrorism act?

Originally Posted by pseudolus

Can we see this list of "hundreds" please

The numbers quoted are available here;

https://www.gov.uk/government/upload...orism-1415.pdf

Originally Posted by ENT

Terror arrests reach 'record high', Home Office figures show
10 September 2015

In the year to March (ref. 2015), 299 terror suspects were detained - an increase of 31% on the previous year - of which 100 were charged with a terror-related offence..........Last month Mark Rowley, the country's leading counter-terrorism officer, disclosed that suspects are now being held at a rate of more than one per day.

Above posted article from;

Terror arrests reach 'record high', Home Office figures show - BBC News

Originally Posted by ENT

Originally Posted by pseudolus

Can we see this list of "hundreds" please

The numbers quoted are available here;

https://www.gov.uk/government/upload...orism-1415.pdf

43 convicted, but does not say what for. That could be 43 convicted for viewing suspect websites.52 prosecuted.

So can we see this list of hundreds please.

Originally Posted by pseudolus

Originally Posted by ENT

Originally Posted by pseudolus

Can we see this list of "hundreds" please

The numbers quoted are available here;

https://www.gov.uk/government/upload...orism-1415.pdf

43 convicted, but does not say what for. That could be 43 convicted for viewing suspect websites.52 prosecuted.

So can we see this list of hundreds please.

You're flogging a dead horse, no 'list' was mentioned.