In a major climbdown the UK government has dumped plans for a massive communications database. To quote Jacqui Smith, Home Secretary, in the foreword to a government consultation on the subject, “the balance between privacy and security is a delicate one, which is why this consultation explicitly rules out the option of setting up a single store of information for use in relation to communications data.” Which is another way of saying the government has accepted that, after leaving everything but the PM’s washing list on a train somewhere, the safest government database is one that doesn’t exist.
All we need now is for them to accept that a biometric ID card/passport database, holding details on the entire population, can’t be protected either.