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The UK refuses to give up on a Mark Zuckerberg privacy hearing
UK MPs are doubling down on their campaign to get Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg to appear before them to answer questions on data privacy. Zuckerberg has previously refused MPs' requests, instead sending a representative to hearings. This time, though, the Commons Digital Culture is joining forces with its Canadian counterpart for a joint hearing in London on November 27, with chair Damian Collins saying Zuckerberg's "evidence is now overdue and urgent."
Body cameras will be given to 'over 22,000' London police
To help keep the peace, more than 22,000 London police officers will soon be given body cameras. The roll-out begins today -- six months later than former mayor Boris Johnson had anticipated. The new hardware, supplied by Taser, won't be recording around the clock; instead, officers will need to hit the shutter manually and notify the public "as soon as practical." A red light and beeping noise will indicate new recordings. The footage will then be uploaded to a secure server where it can be used as evidence in court. If it's not required, the data will be deleted automatically after 31 days.
Investigatory Powers Bill gets vote of approval from MPs
The Investigatory Powers Bill passed its latest milestone yesterday, as the proposed surveillance legislation passed through the House of Commons. MPs voted overwhelmingly in favour of the bill, with 444 ayes to only 69 noes. In the run-up to the vote, Shadow Home Secretary Andy Burnham voiced several concerns, saying the draft law needed "significant improvement" before his support was guaranteed. The Home Office did manage to secure the Labour Party vote, however, thanks to several concessions on its part, including submitting to an independent review of untargeted, bulk surveillance powers.
London police raise privacy hackles with gang violence software
London's Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) has completed a 20-week study in a bid to more accurately predict whether specific gang members are likely to commit violence. The software, developed by Accenture, pulls data together from systems already used by the MPS and runs it through an analytics engine. It's looking at geography, past offenses, associations with other criminal and even social media postings. An MPS spokesman told the BBC that the system would record and analyze threats or negative comments made by gang members on social media, for example.
