The saga continues folks with UK Government documents showing Phorm did not disclose their illegal activities to the government at the time of an important meeting.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/06/18/home_office_phorm_meetings/The Home Office held a private meeting with Phorm in August last year, but BT's interception and profiling partner did not disclose that it had completed an allegedly illegal trial of its technology on tens of thousands of unwitting broadband subscribers just weeks earlier.
Senior civil servant Andrew Knight revealed the meeting had taken place in a response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOI) request from a member of the public, passed to The Register. Today, the Home Office said it had no knowledge of the secret interceptions until we revealed the 2007 trial on 27 February and the 2006 trial on 1 April this year. BT reps were not present, Knight's note implied.
The Home Office refused to disclose further details of who was present at the August 2007 meeting with Phorm, how it was arranged, or what was discussed, saying that the information remained the subject of an ongoing FOI inquiry.
The trials have been widely branded a criminal interception on a grand scale, under the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000 (RIPA). Phorm refers all questions on the legality of the action to BT, which in turn refuses to comment beyond stating that it took legal advice.
This story is starting to warm up quite nicely folks its been simmering a little bit on snips of information and guarded comments but it does seem clear now that he law was broken and the government is aware the law was broken, the next stage is what action is to be taken to ensure the law is enforced, and perhaps more speedily in the future.
