The UK is setting a bad example to the rest of the world with proposed changes to the law on surveillance, the United Nations special rapporteur on privacy has said.

The criticism by rapporteur Joseph Cannataci is made in a report presented to the UN Human Rights Council. The report deals with privacy concerns worldwide but Cannataci, concerned about developments in the UK, has devoted a section to the British bill.

He says the British government has failed to recognise the consequences of legitimising bulk data collection or mass surveillance. Instead of legitimising it, the government should be outlawing it, he says.

MPs are scheduled to vote on the second reading of the investigatory powers bill next week. The bill is in part a response to the revelations of whistleblower Edward Snowden in 2013 about the scale of bulk data collection by intelligence agencies in the UK and US.

The bill enshrines in law a host of surveillance powers the intelligence services had kept largely hidden from the public for the last two decades, including computer hacking. In contrast with the US, which last year banned bulk data phone collection, the UK is keeping all its surveillance powers.



Cannataci, in the report, expresses serious concern and calls on MPs to use their influence to ensure “that disproportionate, privacy-intrusive measures such as bulk surveillance and bulk hacking as contemplated in the investigatory powers bill be outlawed rather an legitimised.”

He notes the influence the UK has over the commonwealth and calls on it to step back from taking disproportionate measures which could have “negative ramifications beyond the shores of the United Kingdom”.

He also urges the UK to show greater commitment to privacy and “to desist from setting a bad example to other states by continuing to propose measures, especially bulk interception and bulk hacking” which run counter to recent European court judgments and “undermine the spirit of the very right to privacy”.

Jim Killock, executive director of the Open Rights Group, welcomed the report and described the bill as deeply flawed.

“The special rapporteur’s report is yet another damning criticism of the investigatory powers bill. Not only does it call for the disproportionate powers in the bill to be outlawed rather than legitimised, it points out that the bill does not comply with recent human rights rulings, which means it could be open to legal challenges.

“The report voices another serious concern – that the impact of this extreme legislation will be felt around the world, and copied by other countries.”