I sure hope that the UK isn’t planning on developing any systems administration, software development, or security research talent; because apparently an interest in any of those things makes you a likely ‘cyber criminal’.
Good work, airstrip one!
Second time in two days I’ve used this gif:
Warning signs your government is becoming fascist and authoritarian:
- Are they obsessed with rooting out criminals by any means necessary?
- Do they tend to view everybody as a criminal?
- Do they dispense advice on topics they aren’t fully informed on?
- Do they randomly harasses their citizens?
- Are they resistant when asked to account for their actions?
Kind of horrifying how applicable it is on a daily basis, isn’t it?
I guess some people want England to be a quiet backwards little island where life moves a bit more slowly… like it did 100 years ago.
Wasn’t England pretty busy in 1915? Mostly coping with a brutal meatgrinder total war on a hitherto unprecedented scale and all; but still not exactly Ye Olde Pastoral Idyll.
Just like 1815!
Londinium and the islands havn’t been the same since Boudicca just had to upset the apple cart.
But seriously, what is the motivation for this? Busy work for bureaucrats so they can wait out their time till pension day?
Okay, there are two lines that kinda sorta aren’t complete and utter garbage, in the context of a parent being a good parent and not (vomits in mouth) cyber crime.
If a kid is making money, its a good idea to know how. If for no other reason than taxes.
Using up your data allowance is cause for a grounding. Go buy your own data plan with your own money! (Oh… Shit)
Well come on now, we all know most of those are just normal teen behaviors, but you must admit learning to code in the 21st Century is a huge red flag.
Well, shit. I’m all those things, except maybe this one:
I’m happy to talk about what I do online, specifically the parts that A. provide income and B. I spent a lot of time teaching myself how to do (with code). Particularly, I’m most happy to talk about it with folks who are near me and wish to pay me to make web thingies for them. It’s those jobs that allow me to C. spend all my time online, and D. remain socially isolated, with my E. irregular sleeping pattern.
If someone asks what I’m doing all day on boingboing, well, that person likely thinks I’m a subversive anyway.
As a kid in the UK I would be a terrorist AND criminal! Not bad for a little bit of common sense and a fable for computers.
Re: the video, anyone else bothered by how ignorant the UK gov apparently perceives parents to be? The kid wasn’t even reluctant to talk about what he was doing as suggested, either; the parents just apparently mistook bank robbing and DDoSing (the latter forgivable except that they explicitly mentioned that the knew what it was) to be totally legit.
Jesus wept.
So, basically, they’re asking if your child is living in the 21st century.
And i thought it couldn’t get lower than that extremism leaflet camden council recently sent to parents. More fool i.
f’n’a better keep an eye on myself, i think i might be a cyber criminal, or the next steve gates!
I also burn incense, so there might be drugs involved as well.
gotta keep an eye out for these early warning signs, because you never know what you might be up to when you aren’t looking!
there is a test for cyber-criminal isn’t there? Is it that they don’t burn or don’t sink? I can never keep it straight.
The UK has all of their criminals in one agency?
That’s brilliant!
They also forgot
* Do they spend a lot of time in the bathroom?
It would be nice if they would also stop using the prefix Cyber.
