Comments on: English cops arrest man for planning water-fight via Blackberry Messenger

By: stephenl123

stephenl123 — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 03:52:00 +0000

Here we have Nick Clegg saying the riots mean we should cut social welfare, stigmatize the poor and advance irrational zero tolerance policies across the board:
http://www.libdems.org.uk/latest_news_detail.aspx?title=Nick_Clegg%3a_Speech_to_party_members_on_the_riots&pPK=c69dd25e-6ade-4e74-b011-248db8f37401

By: stephenl123

stephenl123 — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 03:42:00 +0000

Keep in mind that Nick Clegg and the Liberal Democrats are every bit as responsible for this as the Tories. They joined a coalition to put the hard right in power in exchange for something they never got. And yet they stay in the coalition. So what do they want? What do they expect? Have the Lib Dems basically purged enough progressives that members who remain now put up with this nonsense?

By: travtastic

travtastic — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 03:24:00 +0000

Aside from the terrorists winning?

By: travtastic

travtastic — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 03:02:00 +0000

I’m planning a silly pillow fight tomorrow, if anyone’s interested.

BYOP, and dress for fun!

P.S. no cops allowed!

By: laurencerowe

laurencerowe — Wed, 17 Aug 2011 01:00:00 +0000

Are they a growing menace? We must be told! http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/request/statistics_on_serious_crimes_inv

By: That_Anonymous_Coward

That_Anonymous_Coward — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 20:53:00 +0000

And so it begins to get worse…

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/first-riot-related-eviction-notice-served.html

Lets evict the entire family of someone who was charged with rioting.

Someone mentioned this elsewhere….
You know, V for Vendetta… it was a documentary.

By: andygates

andygates — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 19:15:00 +0000

I’m sorry, I can’t post coherently for the spluttering rage I seem to have discovered. A WATER FIGHT? really? I really pay my taxes to snoop on legal things? Oh and RIM, you great big subbie sluts, you. I am disappoint.

By: Little Mouse

Little Mouse — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 18:09:00 +0000

The problem is that both Labour and the Tories are as bad as each other and they build on each others previous bad decisions. Labour apparently can’t budget their way out of a wet paper bag, bloat up with unnecessary departments and get busy with stupid extremes of legislation that cost excessive amounts of money. When everyone is sick of that the Tories come in, bitch about everything Labour has done “just because” (whether some of it was good or not), then get to work trying to balance the books with heavy-handed cuts, no empathy to the poorer members of society that hits the most, and set up their own raft of crappy legislation. After that we go back to Labour because the general public remembers things being easier under them and the cycle continues.

In the case of the latest riots and this stupid arrest for arranging a water fight, I suspect Labour would be doing exactly the same as the Tories right now – Making an overblown declaration of intent they have no hope of fully upholding that just ends up pissing off a lot of people. I don’t think the government is seriously considering censorship, I think they’re just trying to appear to be doing something until a few weeks pass and the media attention gets focused elsewhere.

By: Mark Cresswell

Mark Cresswell — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 17:27:00 +0000

It makes you wonder what on earth the previous Labour Government did between 1997 and 2010 when they were in a position to deal with the underlying cause of the recent riots? Or are you suggesting that two generations of people in our society can be so damaged in just 12 months? Do you honestly think the current government are so efficient and powerful that they can dismantle over a decade of Labour’s ‘legacy’ in a year??

By: dragonfrog

dragonfrog — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 17:21:00 +0000

Nope – BBM goes from the sender’s blackberry, to RIM’s infrastructure, where the PIN is mapped to a cellular connection, and then to the recipient’s blackberry. It doesn’t matter if it’s a corporate blackberry or not. In addition, the BBM messages are all “encrypted” with the same key, which RIM knows (they install it on every blackberry). So in principle, they could intercept and decrypt ever BBM message, which is something the corporations deploying the blackberries can’t.

I just learned this today… http://www.cse-cst.gc.ca/its-sti/publications/itsb-bsti/itsb57b-eng.html

email is encrypted between BES and the blackberry, such that RIM can’t get at emails to or from corporate blackberries it crosses their infrastructure, which is probably what you’re thinking about. BIS I don’t know about.

By: jenjen

jenjen — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 17:16:00 +0000

I wonder what would happen if people used their Blackberrys to organize a mass photo shoot on public property.

By: Maurice Reeves

Maurice Reeves — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 16:53:00 +0000

Time to reread “It Can’t Happen Here” by Sinclair Lewis, especially in light of Dick Perry stepping up to run for President.

By: Maurice Reeves

Maurice Reeves — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 16:48:00 +0000

This is why, next week, Cameron is going to announce the creation of a Morality Squad which will travel around the UK making sure people aren’t running afoul of proper local customs and the general established morality. That way we can ensure no one sees or hears something they’re not supposed to. Also, burqas for women and children.

By: jphilby

jphilby — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 16:18:00 +0000

So much about the UK to admire, too bad it’s been saddled with a shitty government for about the same length of time as the US. I like to find time to enjoy their increasing panic about the outcomes of their incompetence. Somehow they came to believe that the public exists to support them. As that support fades, their view of reality is filling with yellow spots.

By: bardfinn

bardfinn — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 15:38:00 +0000

That is because the majority of BBM / BBE servers are run by the companies using them, and implemented as an extension to MSExchange. RIM can’t get to that content. The holder of the _NSAKEY for Windows can access that content.

By: putty

putty — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 15:34:00 +0000

Cory, has it not occurred to you that the law-abiding public might be sick and tired of public unrest on the streets right now?

I dunno Mark. Do you think the law-abiding public might be sick and tired of Police spying on their private communications and bullying citizens with trumped up charges and zero evidence of any actual crime?

By: bardfinn

bardfinn — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 15:30:00 +0000

RIM’s messaging is encrypted from client to server and from server to client. The administration of the servers has always had access to the contents of messages – this fact is central to why Karl Rove / Cheney et al. have been sued for using GOP-owned blackberrys and blackberry servers to run executive branch communications — in that the comms were not secured to DOD standards and surprise surprise surprise (Gomer Pyle voice) all the hard drives were “mistakenly” wiped / lost / destroyed once an investigation began.

By: Kimmo

Kimmo — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 15:14:00 +0000

I can’t help feeling like England is living some sort of grim alternate history straight out of cautionary fiction.

By: Paool

Paool — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 15:06:00 +0000

Lets see…where’s my copy of ‘Common Sense’…..

By: Otto Lipschitz

Otto Lipschitz — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 15:05:00 +0000

I feel like I’m missing something here. Are water fights illegal in England?

By: Franklin

Franklin — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 14:52:00 +0000

How Orwellian.

By: That_Anonymous_Coward

That_Anonymous_Coward — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 14:48:00 +0000

“You admit that *most* water fights have remained peaceful – is it really
worth the risk in the current climate to allow people to behave like
immature dicks when the bodies of victims killed in the recent unrest
have only just been buried?”

And the possibility that a water fight arranged as a simple fun action is not a covert action planning to restart the riots?
That maybe some young people wanted to show that not every young person is an evil dick looter?

“If the Police have information suggesting any form of unrest (even an innocent sounding water fight) might escalate”

People shopping in the same market can lead to violence, is your answer to only allow people in 1 at a time? But then you have multiple people in the queue, and violence can break out there.
Shall we just confine everyone to a single room where they never interact with anyone again ever?

If you escalate the responses to everything for “the sake of the peace”, you end up having less peace.

Knowing the time and place of the water fight, they could have made their presence known and that should have kept any hooligans inline. To burst into his home and arrest him for the simple act of arranging a fun event… they do that in China and other dictatorships… is that the kind of country you want to live in?

By: HubrisSonic

HubrisSonic — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 14:07:00 +0000

I hear its a new life in the off world colonies!

By: Brent Kirkham

Brent Kirkham — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 14:06:00 +0000

Snow!!!!???? Are you insane!!??? It contains a frozen version of dihydrogen monoxide!!!11

Do you have any idea how dangerous that stuff is? No, didn’t think so.

By: Brent Kirkham

Brent Kirkham — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 14:03:00 +0000

I can’t even bear to think about it, in case it lets the ‘evils’ in….. must go for a lie down in a dark room…

By: Church

Church — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 13:44:00 +0000

We just got four inches of water in the past 24 hours. When will the government do something about this threat from the sky?!

By: Ken Law

Ken Law — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 13:41:00 +0000

You know, I sometimes use a water gun in my classrooms to inspire my students to higher levels of thought. Boy, I hope I’m not going to get arrested too.

By: Mark Cresswell

Mark Cresswell — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 13:37:00 +0000

Cory, has it not ocurred to you that the law-abiding public might be sick and tired of public unrest on the streets right now? If the Police have information suggesting any form of unrest (even an innocent sounding water fight) might escalate – given the current tinder-box of community relations, then it is their duty to intervene for the sake of public order and safety. You admit that *most* water fights have remained peaceful – is it really worth the risk in the current climate to allow people to behave like immature dicks when the bodies of victims killed in the recent unrest have only just been buried? Your article is just another tiresome, thinly veiled and cynical attempt to have a dig at the Government.

By: Blaze Curry

Blaze Curry — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 13:35:00 +0000

What’s next? arresting people for protesting by going to public places and doing ordinary things?

By: rwmj

rwmj — Tue, 16 Aug 2011 13:19:00 +0000

This entire story (35 articles currently on Google News) derives from this odd press release by Essex Police. You can read the original here:

http://www.essex.police.uk/news_features/latest_news_updates/police_reassure_residents_they.aspx

I’m interested to know (a) WTF Essex police and the CPS were thinking and (b) what is the actual story here.