PARANOIA

Loyal citizen Zild points us to the United Kingdom government's latest ingenious cost-cutting/fundraising move, described in this September 28, 2009 Telegraph (UK) story by Transport Editor David Millward, "Innocent motorists to be asked to pay court costs":

Drivers will fall victim to reforms which will see people who are acquitted by the courts expected to foot the majority of their own defence costs. It is thought some innocent motorists will plead guilty to reduce their costs.

Currently, somebody who is cleared of a motoring offence can expect to be reimbursed most, if not all, of the money they spend clearing their name. [...]

According to the Ministry of Justice's own statistics, 24 per cent of 1.4 million motorists prosecuted in the courts in 2007 were cleared. It meant that nearly 380,000 motorists recouped about 80 per cent of their costs.

Under the new arrangements, which come into force next month, acquitted defendants will only get a fraction of their money back. The reimbursement of lawyers' fees is being limited to the legal aid rate of £60 an hour – around a quarter of the what is normally charged.

Zild comments that this is an obvious idea for PARANOIA. "IntSec could falsely accuse a citizen of a crime simply to charge them for the cost of the resulting investigation -- presumably a tactic reserved for days when they are too busy to plant sufficient evidence for a conviction."

Zild also highlights another aspect of the ever-evolving UK strategic interception landscape, "Public to monitor CCTV from home" (BBC October 6): "Members of the public could earn cash by monitoring commercial CCTV cameras in their own home, in a scheme planned to begin next month. The Internet Eyes website will offer up to £1,000 if viewers spot shoplifting or other crimes in progress."

Charles Farrier from No CCTV said: "It is a distasteful and a worrying development. This is a private company using private cameras and asking private citizens to spy on each other. It represents a privatisation of the surveillance state."

Internet Eyes has defended its plans, saying viewers will not know exactly which camera they're watching or where it is located.

Although the UK is the "world capital of CCTV" - with an estimated one camera per 14 people - viewing hours of mostly tedious and often poor quality images is a lengthy and unpopular job, said the BBC's home affairs correspondent Andy Tighe.

In August, an internal report commissioned by London's Metropolitan Police estimated that in 2008 just one crime was solved per thousand CCTV cameras in the capital. The deficit was partly blamed on officers not being able to make the best use of the many thousands of hours of video generated by CCTV.

How will they fund these rewards for civilian snoopery? Hmm -- how about from court costs paid by accused innocents?