The whole world is going on about this and the role Guido Fawkes played in it, but what gets me is the sheer basic and bloody incompetence of it all. First rule of anything that might bite you on the backside is that you don’t leave a trail that lets it come back to you. Have our politicians became so crap that they can’t even plan a decent black op anymore?
(and yes, while I do think it is a good day for bloggers, there’s at least half a dozen ways Labour could have controlled this online and minimised damage)
(and a very salient point from Dizzy Thinks with Derek Draper talking about the emails:
Imagine if all your emails suddenly became available to people wanting to damage you. That is, of course, the other question that needs to be asked: how were these emails obtained? Was criminal activity and hacking involved? Believe me, these are issues I will be looking at when I return from my holiday. “Blog wars” are one thing but hacking into people’s emails is surely a step too far?
As Dizzy puts it in response:
I wonder whether Derek is aware that the Government and party that he supports is actually has an official policy of reading our emails if it wants? Or taking contorl of our computers remotely if it suspects us of something?
3 responses to “Basic lesson from the Damian McBride affair…”
“Imagine if all your emails suddenly became available to people wanting to damage you.”
I think my reaction to this is that I might be embarrassed or inconvenienced by what I’ve written in emails becoming public. But I don’t think there’s anything I’d be ashamed of – and if Derek Draper is not ashamed of a blatant attempt to cause damage through rumour spreading (at best) and malicious fabrication of stories (at worst) then that would maybe tell us most of all. In fact he needs to be a little careful – I have a suspicion that some of this could get very close to conspiracy to commit a criminal libel. Now I’m no fan of UK libel laws, but even in the US deliberate fabrication is actionable (although I’m not sure if there is a criminal charge that can be raised there – such a thing is in UK common law, although very, very rarely exercised).
But the real scandal here is not the slurs as such, but the involvement of individuals in government in underhand manipulation of news. We know this happens all the time, but when it extends to deliberate invention of malicious stories, then one wonders where it ends.
Whatever the rights and wrongs of what was said in the email, it is a criminal offence to hack into or log into another person’s emails without their permission or knowledge. The offence is covered by The Computer Misuse Act – Part I . I have no doubt that Downing Street will have the police onto this as we speak.
Dizzy is referring to the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act. This act only allows the police or other legal body, e.g. MI5 to read a person’s emails if a) a serious crime is suspected and b) permission has been given by the DPP or a relevant Chief Constable – depending on the crime and who is seeking authorisation.
Jen Fearne: Good point, but I think those involved have been disingenious with this. After all, it’s one thing to hack an email account, it’s another to have them legitimately and just pass them on methinks. Also, is there a public interest defence on this one?