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Is Britain a mass surveillance state? (lemmy.world)

submitted 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) by CmdrGraves@lemmy.world to c/askuk@feddit.uk

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I hear that kind of sentiment due to the amount of CCTV they have in London specifically & enforcement of the online safety act using the excuse of "it's to protect the kids" with age verification becoming standard when all that's doing is making people bypass all that.

I wonder why most stores prefer "cashless only" under the guise of convenience (kind of makes sense when you understand the ulterior motives) coming at a cost of making cash extinct with the government wanting to conduct espionage on the average joe.

The thing is, with potential digital ID (which is BS by the way) since people can just use the Gattaca card by changing their entire life and identity living under an assumed name and genetic code or just play dead by declaring themselves as deceased (on record).

As in, the individual is "dead" (living as someone else) as cameras can only surveil the living. Even resort to having facial bone structures entirely altered like plastic surgery. Fake ID's are being used to take advantage of AI estimated age verification.

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[–] Drusas@fedia.io 5 points 3 days ago

It has been for ages.

[–] warm@kbin.earth 10 points 4 days ago

Part of five eyes, of course it is. Also:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tempora

Why do you think they want backdoors into encryption?

[–] twinnie@feddit.uk 10 points 4 days ago

Getting that way, I think it’s more of a culture than the state though. The main reason there’s so much CCTV is that nobody wants to be the one person or shop on the street that doesn’t have it, it makes them the soft target.

As for the online safety thing, most people seem to be in favour of it. Most parents say they’ll do anything for their kids and they think that giving up some privacy is a small price to pay when there are so many problems with kids and mental health these days. Personally I think the legal stuff is doing far more damage, things like influencers pressuring them to always look like models, adverts convincing them they need the latest iPhone, etc. How often do you hear about issues from watching porn? The long term solution is education

Also, age verification could be done in a more privacy respecting way than constantly requiring someone to scan their personal details; some kind of certificate and RSA type time based code. I picture it something like the government confirms your ID and gives you a certificate, you use that to authenticate to some kind of time based ticket service, which you then give to a company to prove you’re over 18. They know you’re old enough but have no link back to your ID.

[–] TotallyNotSpezUpload@startrek.website 7 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago) (1 children)

Short answer: Yes

Every time I'm in GB it freaks me out. I tend to wear hats and scarfs outdoors and I'm only using the Internet with a VPN connection.

I frequently travel to Ireland and since I don't fly, my usual route includes a ferry from France to England and there I'm taking a bus to Wales for the final ferry to Dublin. Last time I went, I first went to the French border checkpoint. The lad takes one quick look at my passport, said "Welcome to France!" and sent me on my merry way to the British border checkpoint. The people there checked my passport for 20 minutes (it was a brand new one with new security features) and after finally deciding it was probably a real passport asked me what my business in England was. I swiftly replied "Getting on the first bus out of England to Ireland".

[–] CmdrGraves@lemmy.world 2 points 4 days ago (1 children)

I mean, is it "China" level bad? I know that they have WeChat where all apps are consolidated. Will the same happen in the UK?

[–] TotallyNotSpezUpload@startrek.website 4 points 4 days ago (1 children)

It's not that bad yet, but clearly getting worse with each year passing since Brexit. Btw: I added some more information in my first reply. For context: I'm a European citisen.

[–] CmdrGraves@lemmy.world 3 points 4 days ago* (last edited 4 days ago)

It's not exclusive to Britain unfortunately, as I've heard Australia enforced their own version of the online safety act (known as the under 16 social media ban) over there since December 2025, and that didn't do anything according to the friends I know who reside there. Recently, they added Pornhub to their blacklist (weird, LOL) with age verification but VPN's circumvent the geoblock.

[–] floquant@lemmy.dbzer0.com 5 points 4 days ago

Every five eyes member is.

[–] lazynooblet@lazysoci.al 5 points 4 days ago

Yes.

[–] Cyber@feddit.uk 2 points 4 days ago

Just to counter balance the discussion, no.

Yep, lots of shops, cafes have a small camera in the corner, but most are.either broken or only live - ie no recording. And they accept cash... in fact lots of takeaways only take cash.

There's ANPR on major roads, but not on minor ones. (I recall there is / was? an app for tracking where ANPR cameras are located on OSM maps)

I can go about my life with very little surveilance, but I don't live in a major city.

I was also told recently thelat even the mobile speed detector vans publish - rougly - where they'll be on Facebook, so it's not all bad.

But, digital surveillance (think of the kids / terrorists) is definitely eroding privacy and affecting the general public to move in the wrong direction.