Tech giants raise concerns over UK draft surveillance bill

Facebook, Google, Microsoft, Twitter and Yahoo have expressed concerns to the UK Parliament over the draft Investigatory Powers Bill (IP Bill).

The firms are worried about the phrasing of proposals on encryption, bulk collection of data and openness.
The submission joins another, from Apple, which challenges the reach of the draft legislation.
If passed, the IP Bill would overhaul rules on how authorities access people's communications.
The five firms form part of a coalition called Reform Government Surveillance (RGS) which aims to promote a series of principles on how governments should collect communications data on their citizens.

"There are many aspects of the Bill which we believe remain opaque," the RGS companies state in their written evidence, citing the wording on judicial authorisation, encryption and technical requirements on tech firms among other things.
Their comments come in the form of written evidence submitted to a parliamentary committee considering the scope of the bill.

Secret communications

Currently, several of the corporations involved are standing by the provision of end-to-end encryption in some of their products - such as Apple's iPhones.

This allows people to communicate privately in a form that cannot be decoded, even by the company which makes the device.
The IP Bill would not outlaw encryption, but it would strengthen the power to force firms to give up decryption keys so that coded messages might be read.

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