UK Government Spying On Innocents' Bank Accounts | Cash Is King

Bill Already in House of Lords

Dec 05, 2023

Disclaimer: This isn’t legal advice, speak with a legal professional.

Coming out of almost nowhere is this rushed bill called the “Data Protection and Digital Information Bill” is a provision where the tyrannical UK government has granted itself the power to snoop on anyone in receipt of any sort of money from the UK government, including those receiving State Pension, Childcare Credits and Benefits.

It would allow them to access information from third parties, regularly, on a monthly basis. No crime need be committed and the UK government will have dragnet style mass surveillance, automatically, all the time.

The alarm of the abusive scope was raised by MP Stephen Timms in the House of Commons:

Fraudulent Claims About Fraud

The UK government have falsely claimed it is to ‘combat fraud’ within benefits, misleading the public into believing it is only against welfare recipients (we remind the public the UK government allows shoplifters to walk scot-free)…

…however as the video from MP Stephen Timms notes, MP Karl Turner pointed out mechanisms for the production of bank records in cases of suspected fraud already exist, so they don’t need these powers:

Therefore it cannot be due to fraud, but some sinister scheme the UK government has cooked up for the future which involves tracking and controlling people’s purchasing habits (no doubt rescinding the benefits if they do not comply with the government’s diktats). One possibility is carbon tyranny.

Or something akin to carbon tyranny fines:

Hint it might be carbon related (bearing in mind it includes State Pensions) are expenditures aboard are prohibited beyond a certain time limit:

Mass Surveillance Has Already Started

Banks are threatened with fines if they do not comply with the dragnet mass surveillance, and the datamining of innocent people’s information is automatic, using the digitally generated payment ID associated with their account.

Already members of the public have reported being snooped upon — before the bill has even become law! John writes how the council already knew about his account balances:

Another, with disabilities, ‘The Dog Mother’, expressed despair:

Who can forget when the government cried ‘terrorist’ with the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 that they intentionally used it against dog walkers and pigeon feeders, parents in school catchment areas and journalists trying to expose government corruption in order to sink their investigation.

How Can We Resist?

Contact Banks And Get Them To Oppose

One way would be to contact your banks to get them to proactively oppose such legislation. They have the money, the lawyers and the power to do so, and it is within their own best interests to do so, as it will cost them money if they don’t comply, and opens them up to GDPR violation risks and thus lawsuits if they overshare customer data.

Contact House Of Lords And Get Them To Stall

Another way would be to contact the House of Lords (list of email addresses at link) and get them to sit on the “Data Protection and Digital Information Bill”.

House of Lords have the power to stall a bill for 2 years (used most famously to stop Thesera May’s disasterous Withdrawal Act and Labour’s National ID); to the casual onlooker this might seem meaningless, but in 2 years a lot of resistance and hostility can grow to the point of overturning laws still in the works.

It’s strongly recommended to contact House of Lord peers who have either associations with banks or investment banking and appeal to their sense of finances and/or money; some may have ties to charity and can be swayed to be generous to the poor. Either way, choose who you appeal to carefully.

Set Up A GDPR Lawsuit

GDPR (General Data Protection Regulation) states data must be the absolute minimal for the purposes specified; so a dragnet style mass surveillance of innocents is not minimal because no grounds of suspicion of guilt have been established.

GDPR also requires a mechanism to withdraw consent, that is ‘as easy to withdraw as to give’. The withholding of State benefits does not make withdrawing ‘as easy’ and such dark patterns of financial reprisals contradicts GDPR.

Set Up A Secondary Bank Account For Expenditures

One thing that isn’t clear in the provision is if it applies to proxy or secondary bank accounts.

Hypothetically, if Santander process payments from the UK government for your account, Santander are the only ones seemingly covered.

If you then transfer money from Santander, to say, Barclays, via E.G. automatic direct debit, it isn’t clear if Barclays have the legal right to snoop on your bank accounts by proxy, given it wasn’t received via Giro reference.

This seems especially true given the system seems automated and thus looks for the Giro payment ID; if it isn’t present on an account, then hypothetically it might not be subject to surveillance.

Additionally, overseas bank accounts may be immune; given they’re not beholden to UK laws (on account of being overseas). They may enforce ‘overseas’ usage fees, so choose your bank carefully.

Have Someone Make Payments On Your Behalf

Another possible bypass is if you’re married, for example, and only one of you are in receipt of ‘benefits’ from the government.

The one who isn’t conducts the expenditures on behalf of the one who is (so you withdraw and give them cash or send it via direct debit). It’s a variation on the ‘secondary bank account’, except it has the benefit of being owned by someone else.

Pay In Cash: Cash Is King

Most obvious way to resist is to simply withdraw the cash the moment you get it. Given cash does not leave a banking account papertrail, there is nothing for the government to snoop on other than the cash withdrawal.

Resist In Other Ways?

Would we say ‘overthrow the government?’ that has clearly overstepped their bounds into outright tyranny as a solution? That would be beyond the scope of this article.

The Daily Beagle

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