[Sheflug] RIP Bill

[Richard <nospam [at] sheflug.co.uk>]

Dear All

Computing just dropped in through the door.  For more info see.......

http://www.vnunet.com

On the front page it says......

[turn on ranting_mode --v]

"RIP BILL will 'cost UK economy £46 billion'

and the body of the message goes on to say.......

"The Government has been warned that it risks costing the UK economy
£46 billion over the next five years unless it makes substantial
changes to its Regulation of Investigatory Powers (RIP) Bill.

The legislation at the committee stage stage in the House of Lords,
will cost internet service providers £640M over the next five years,
much more than the government's estimate of £20M a year, according to
research carried out by the London School of Economics [looks like
they can't use a calculator ?] and commissioned by the British Chamber
of Commerce (BCC) [often refereed to as the chamber of horrors].  The
repost says ministers seriously underestimate the impact the Bill will
have on ISPs.

Mark Sharman, head of policy at the BBC, said that bill will result in
'the erosion of UK share of e-commerce revenues over the next five
years'. He added: 'The figures are very concerning.  The costs will
come through businesses moving overseas, new business ventures
starting abroad, instead of in the UK, and through businesses
investing overseas because it gives them the best opportunity to
maximise returns'.

If the bill becomes law, it would force ISPs to install equipment that
allows law enforcement agencies to intercept suspicious [religious ?]
e-mail, resulting in a string of indirect costs the government didn't
anticipate [they never do ?].  Sharman predicts a 5% to 10% increase
in software licence costs for ISPs, because products would have to be
able to function alongside monitoring equipment.  Managing encryption
keys would also cost more.

The editor of the research, Simon Davies, visiting fellow at the LSE
[lunatic silly excuses ?], accused the government of arrogance. 'We
have an absence of guarantees relating to the security and storage of
keys obtained by the authorities.  Something like 20% of investment in
e-commerce will simply go off shore, with countries such as Ireland
and Germany [SuSE ?] reaping the rewards, he said.  'The bill is
untenable and has to be withdrawn because there are too many baseline
problems that can't be resolved'.

The government has no intention of withdrawing the legislation, Labour
peer Lord Bassam, speaking in the House of Lords RIP bill debate this
week, said ministers will 'not be deflected from our course', Tory
peer Lord Cope of Berkeley said that when the bill went through the
Commons it was seen as of serious concern only to the e-community, but
that now 'opposition had become much wider'.

for more info see....  www.britishchambers.org.uk

Other headlines are "Online traffic stifled by Whitehall". Nothing new
here ??  Also "Microsoft spilt to hit users in the pocket" -
restructuring and rebranding will push up prices.

All sounds like the real thing eh ??

[ranting mode --kill -1 ]

Thanks

-- 
Richard
Sheffield UK

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