Privacy International have launched a campaign to file a complaint against the British intelligence agency GCHQ for illegally spying, and are looking for people to sign up and find out if they were spied upon:
Chances are, at some point over the past decade, your communications were swept up by the U.S. National Security Agency's mass surveillance program and passed onto Britain's intelligence agency GCHQ. A recent court ruling found that this sharing was unlawful but no one could find out if their records were collected and then illegally shared between these two agencies… until now!
[...] Join our campaign by entering your details below to find out if GCHQ illegally spied on you, and confirm via the email we send you. We'll then go to court demanding that they finally come clean on unlawful surveillance.
A FAQ covers the motivations and details requested, and it's worth noting that this does not apply to the UK exclusively:
The implications of our recent legal victory against GCHQ in the Investigatory Powers Tribunal means that all intelligence sharing from the NSA to GCHQ prior to December 2014 was unlawful. Because people located all over the world are affected by illegal intelligence sharing, not only British citizens, but anyone in the world, can ask if their records collected by the NSA were unlawfully shared with GCHQ.
Originally spotted at Hackernews.
(Score: 5, Funny) by The Archon V2.0 on Monday March 02 2015, @10:52PM
> GCHQ are only allowed to keep your details for the purposes of establishing whether or not they spied on you illegally and for the duration of the investigation by the IPT.
And of course the GCHQ are an upstanding organization who would never do something they weren't allowed to in order to collect data on people.
(Score: 3, Informative) by mojo chan on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:30PM
According to a leak presented at the end of Citizenfour there were 1.2M people on various watch lists some time ago, and it will certainly be more now. It's not a very exclusive club.
const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
(Score: 1) by TLA on Monday March 02 2015, @11:03PM
Ask GCHQ if you're on a watchlist...
(I know I'm on at least one watchlist. I am that good at pissing judges off. Hell, if I wasn't on a watchlist then I've wasted the last seven years of my life).
Excuse me, I think I need to reboot my horse. - NCommander
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Monday March 02 2015, @11:28PM
I'm an american, with a pakistani friend from college who now lives in London.
I've emailed her many times over the last decade. So I'm pretty sure I'm on the list.
I'm not sure I want to confirm it though. I think I'd feel moral pressure to follow-up as much as possible and I'm not anywhere near as brave as someone like Snowden and the worst case possibilities of confronting this are pretty scary.
Plus, at best the results would be neutral for my friend. Her daughter has dual-citizenship, but she does not. So she's vulnerable.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by MrGuy on Monday March 02 2015, @11:47PM
what the UK equivalent of the US's "state secrets" exception is, but I expect this is one way to find out.
Regardless of whether the surveillance was lawful, they will argue, disclosing any records of what was and what was not collected about any individuals will expose methods and techniques that have a potentially lawful or necessary purpose to surveil other legitimate targets. Therefore, they cannot disclose any information.
Or, at least, that's how I'm sure the NSA's attorneys would argue (and, tragically, likely win) in court in the US.
(Score: 5, Informative) by TLA on Tuesday March 03 2015, @12:03AM
there is but a single piece of legislation they can use to completely shut down any lines of enquiry, and that is the Official Secrets Act 1911. No arguing with it, once the national security immunity card is played, game over.
Excuse me, I think I need to reboot my horse. - NCommander
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @06:11PM
The Official Secrets Act is insanely broad. You can be arrested for loitering within 800 (IIRC) metres of a government building - which probably covers most of the UK. Probably loads of other stuff, it's a while since I read it.
(Score: 2) by Dunbal on Tuesday March 03 2015, @01:18AM
Let me hurry up and give my personal details to some unknown internet site. I'm sure I can trust (strikeout)Privacy International(strikeout) to tell me I haven't been spied on and then immediately discard my personal info.
(Score: 1) by Pseudonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @05:21AM
Privacy International doesn't have access to backbone traffic. I don't think they're the ones you should fear, mate.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday March 03 2015, @09:31AM
Maybe the NSA/GCHQ has hacked them. So it might be convenient way to get more details or confirm some details.