Police in £9m scheme to log 'domestic extremists'
Thousands of activists monitored on network of overlapping databases
- guardian.co.uk, Sunday 25 October 2009 20.29 GMT
- Article history
Detailed information about the political activities of campaigners is being stored on IT systems. Photograph: Fiona Hanson/PA
Police are gathering the personal details of thousands of activists who attend political meetings and protests, and storing their data on a network of nationwide intelligence databases.
The hidden apparatus has been constructed to monitor "domestic extremists", the Guardian can reveal in the first of a three-day series into the policing of protests. Detailed information about the political activities of campaigners is being stored on a number of overlapping IT systems, even if they have not committed a crime.
Senior officers say domestic extremism, a term coined by police that has no legal basis, can include activists suspected of minor public order offences such as peaceful direct action and civil disobedience.
Three national police units responsible for combating domestic extremism are run by the "terrorism and allied matters" committee of the Association of Chief Police Officers (Acpo). In total, it receives £9m in public funding, from police forces and the Home Office, and employs a staff of 100.
An investigation by the Guardian can reveal:
• The main unit, the National Public Order Intelligence Unit (NPOIU), runs a central database which lists thousands of so-called domestic extremists. It filters intelligence supplied by police forces across England and Wales, which routinely deploy surveillance teams at protests, rallies and public meetings. The NPOIU contains detailed files on individual protesters who are searchable by name.
• Vehicles associated with protesters are being tracked via a nationwide system of automatic number plate recognition (ANPR) cameras. One man, who has no criminal record, was stopped more than 25 times in less than three years after a "protest" marker was placed against his car after he attended a small protest against duck and pheasant shooting. ANPR "interceptor teams" are being deployed on roads leading to protests to monitor attendance.
• Police surveillance units, known as Forward Intelligence Teams (FIT) and Evidence Gatherers, record footage and take photographs of campaigners as they enter and leave openly advertised public meetings. These images are entered on force-wide databases so that police can chronicle the campaigners' political activities. The information is added to the central NPOIU.
• Surveillance officers are provided with "spotter cards" used to identify the faces of target individuals who police believe are at risk of becoming involved in domestic extremism. Targets include high-profile activists regularly seen taking part in protests. One spotter card, produced by the Met to monitor campaigners against an arms fair, includes a mugshot of the comedian Mark Thomas.
• NPOIU works in tandem with two other little-known Acpo branches, the National Extremism Tactical Coordination Unit (Netcu), which advises thousands of companies on how to manage political campaigns, and the National Domestic Extremism Team, which pools intelligence gathered by investigations into protesters across the country.
Denis O'Connor, the chief inspector of constabulary, will next month release the findings of his national review of policing of protests. He has already signalled he anticipates wide scale change. His inspectors, who were asked to review tactics in the wake of the Metropolitan police's controversial handling of the G20 protests, are considering a complete overhaul of the three Acpo units, which they have been told lack statutory accountability.
Acpo's national infrastructure for dealing with domestic extremism was set up with the backing of the Home Office in an attempt to combat animal rights activists who were committing serious crimes. Senior officers concede the criminal activity associated with these groups has receded, but the units dealing with domestic extremism have expanded their remit to incorporate campaign groups across the political spectrum, including anti-war and environmental groups that have only ever engaged in peaceful direct action.
All three units divide their work into four categories of domestic extremism: animal rights campaigns; far-right groups such as the English Defence League; "extreme leftwing" protest groups, including anti-war campaigners; and "environmental extremism" such as Climate Camp and Plane Stupid campaigns.
Anton Setchell, who is in overall command of Acpo's domestic extremism remit, said people who find themselves on the databases "should not worry at all". But he refused to disclose how many names were on the NPOIU's national database, claiming it was "not easy" to count. He estimated they had files on thousands of people. As well as photographs, he said FIT surveillance officers noted down what he claimed was harmless information about people's attendance at demonstrations and this information was fed into the national database.
He said he could understand that peaceful activists objected to being monitored at open meetings when they had done nothing wrong. "What I would say where the police are doing that there would need to be the proper justifications," he said.¡Ahora sí que estamos todos fichados!
El pasado 25 de octubre, el diario inglés “The Guardian”, informaba de que la policía de ese país había creado una base de datos en la almacenaban los datos personales de miles de activistas que asisten a reuniones políticas y protestas. El aparato de inteligencia está guardando información detallada sobre actividades políticas de aquellos ciudadanos que son considerados “extremistas domésticos”, a pesar de que no han cometido ningún delito. El estado británico ha destinado a este aparato oculto nueve millones de libras y unas cien personas empleadas.
Las unidades de información también fotografían a los asistentes a actos, quedando su imagen personal registrada tanto en la base de datos como en las tarjetas de identificación que se facilitan a los observadores.
Toda esta infraestructura se creó para luchar contra los activistas pro derechos de los animales. Los responsables reconocen que es poca la actividad delictiva de estos grupos por lo que han ampliado sus investigaciones a aun amplio espectro político, incluyendo activistas anti-guerra y grupos ecologistas que sólo han realizado acciones pacíficas.
Anton Setchell, que es el principal responsable del “extremismo doméstico”, dijo que las personas que se encuentran en las bases de datos "no deben preocuparse en absoluto". Pero se negó a revelar cuántas personas se encontraban en la base de datos estatal, afirmando que "no es fácil" recontarlos. Sobre las fotografías, dijo que los oficiales de vigilancia habían anotado la información, según el inofensiva, sobre la asistencia de personas a las manifestaciones y que seguidamente esta información se introduce en la base de datos.
Esta actividad del Estado del Reino Unido es una violación flagrante de los derechos humanos a la intimidad, es cierto que en esa monarquía es más sencillo jurídicamente realizar este tipo de espionaje a sus propios ciudadanos por la ausencia de una constitución escrita, pero debe servir de llamada de atención al resto de los ciudadanos para estar vigilantes frente a los abusos de los aparatos policiales.
Curiosamente, el Reino Unido no dispone de documento de identidad similar al español o francés pues los activistas pro derechos humanos se han negado cuando se ha intentado implantar recordando los peligros de que todos los ciudadanos estén perfectamente fichados en el caso de que un Estado caiga en manos del fascismo. Por ello, Holanda, que sufrió de primera mano el nazismo, tiene reconocido como derecho fundamental de sus ciudadanos el negarse a identificarse, incluso frente a la policía, derechos que también tienen los ciudadanos de los Estados Unidos de América.
Un portavoz de la policía británica ha llegado a justificar esta base de datos con las siguientes palabras: “Es un listado de información y no de recogida de pruebas. Manifestarse no es un delito, pero en ocasiones hay una línea que se cruza cuando la gente comete delitos”.
Ya advertimos de las posibilidades que ofrecen las fotografías digitales de alta calidad y software de reconocimiento de rostros, en el caso inglés además, cruzado con reconocimiento de matrículas de vehículos. La variante más divertida de estas nuevas técnicas que ha sido noticia recientemente es es la utilización de un programa para contar cabezas desde una foto aérea para contar manifestantes. Software que ha dejado en evidencia a la ultraderecha española que afirmaba haber convocado a dos millones de personas a una manifestación anti abortista cuando en realidad no superaban los sesenta mil.
En este caso, y con toda seguridad, la policía española no habrá fichado “preventivamente” a los manifestantes ultra-católicos. Y deberían, según el criterio de la policía inglesa, puesto que se convertirán en delincuentes sí cruzan la línea que existe entre manifestarse y agredir a un médico que practica interrupciones de embarazo a petición de la mujer.
También, y con esta misma filosofía, debería ficharse a todos aquellos individuos que tengan un nivel de vida alto por que seguramente defraudarán a la Hacienda Pública, o a aquellos ciudadanos que se afilien al Partido Popular español, pues con mucha probabilidad cometerán un delito relacionado con la corrupción durante su carrera política.
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