[url=http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-33017310Millions of US government workers hit by data breach[/url

This follow on from from an attack on the IRS that compromised the details of 100,000 US taxpayers.

Is there anyone on here still daft enough to be in favour of the Tories snoopers charter hoovering up data on every aspect of their lives?

I think people must realise this has been going on for a lot longer than a few years. Take the "Data Protection Act" for instance. Ostensibly it sounds like a good idea. Preventing unauthorised disclosure of personal data to individuals or groups who might not be acting in your best interests is a no brainer.

But when you look at the policies and structures underpinning DP at a macro level you quickly realise that it is very much a dual-purpose piece of legislation which conveniently categorises, sub-divides and indexes the entirety of the nation's "protected" data and places it within the easy grasp of government and/or intelligence mandarins who are completely above any and all forms of oversight.

Prior to the creation of DP data was very often invisible to government. It existed in company filing cabinets, card indexes, rudimentary databases etc. If, say, a policeman wanted to conduct an investigation into an individual he'd really struggle. First he'd face the inordinately time-consuming step of establishing whether or not data exists. Largely he'd be dependent on his own imagination and sheer bloody guesswork. Then he'd face the equally difficult task of LOCATING that information. One employee folder in a badly-indexed and maintained archive of thousands might take days or weeks to find. Now repeat these steps for the five or six other jobs the man might have had.

Sure, these paper archives still exist today. But it's far easier for governments to locate and disseminate such data if the record-keepers are forced to register and classify all their information within an over-arching "Data Protection" index.

I mean, there is a good deal of sense in it, too. In times of catastrophe it's important government can gain quick access to information and use such in all our interests. So, let's say there was some kind of nuclear accident and we really needed to mobilise people who have skills and experience in nuclear physics, engineering etc. Prior to DP government would really be guessing on the numbers of skilled personnel living in Britain who could be useful. Today all they need do is cross-reference whatever records match specific search criteria, locate the data and then find their men.

But what happens when the enemy is your own government? Consider what took place in Holland during WWII when the Nazis took over census data which had been collected in good faith and with the best of intentions leading up to the war. Suddenly the Gestapo no longer needed to conduct time-consuming investigations into the ethnicities of Dutch people - they had the information right at their fingertips on punched and tabulated IBM cards! The only issue from therein was requisitioning the trucks and trains to march these poor folk off to Auschwitz or Dachau.

Looking at DP at the micro level it is easy to become frustrated and disillusioned with the sheer bloody inconvenience it causes regular folk. I've lost count of the number of times when what should have been a relatively simple administrative task was turned into spirit-crushing ordeal.

I mean, sure - I GET that just because I'm married to the bill-payer and we share a joint bank account it doesn't automatically follow that she must agree with my decision to alter our Virgin subscription package. But this doesn't stop me from filling the air with expletives every time such a simple request takes on the difficulties of a solo attempt at Everest's north face without oxygen.

George Orwell is masturbating in his grave right now.

Mass spying, intrusion from government and global corporations, and the never ending erosion of personal freedoms..
The continuation Keynesian economic policy, and a criminal, morally bankrupt, 'too big to fail' banking system with the ability to create money out of thin air.

Worst of all we have an apathetic, complacent population oblivious to the walls of totalitarianism closing around them.

We're currently in the final stage of Western dominance, and we're moving towards some form of military conflict with China, and the balance of power is moving East IMO.

None of the above is anything new. I'm a keen student of ancient Roman and Greek history and the issues we face today are not much different to those of antiquity.

However, I really do think we are now entering a truly unprecedented period where we will collide with fundamentally intractable and existential problems.

As stated, increasing government authoritarianism has always been with us. But previously such was successfully counterbalanced by the expansion of unhappy and disillusioned peoples into new territories where they created laws respecting the freedoms and independence they weren't being granted back home.

Unfortunately there's nowhere left to run to these days. Practically every last inch of the planet was measured, mapped and settled over a century ago.

Another novelty is the end of war. Or at least - war as traditionally defined as an armed conflict between states. Today the major powers all know that conflict is unthinkable since such must ultimately escalate to a nuclear confrontation. At which point the entire species exits stage right.

War - as we once knew it - ended with the atomic detonation over Hiroshima. Since then warfare has largely been fought not with guns and bombs but "Credit Default Swaps", "Derivatives" and such.

With rising population, dwindling fossil fuel, food and water reserves and an existential threat to the planet we really are sitting in a pressure cooker with the heat rising steadily.

We are continually being told that there is a high chance that terrorists want to kill us and we are always at risk. Personally I don't feel threatened at all. Whenever our puppet government want to introduce new laws to limit our personal freedoms they disguise it as a way to prevent terrorism or child abuse. The general public lap it up.

They say 'If you've got nothing to fear you've got nothing to hide' but if the government can build up a cache of information on you which may not necessarily be illegal but things you'd rather keep private then they have ammunition to use against you.

The next "major conflict" will be over fresh water!

If you look around the world, it's not as crazy as you might think.

There are large populations living in areas of the Middle East which only one generation ago were considered uninhabitable due to a complete lack of fresh water - they seem to be managing quite well now to the extent where they produce enough water to spray it on golf courses rather than drink the stuff.

Its never a problem when a population is inventive enough to want to exist where water naturally doesn't.

But to answer the topic question my concern over Government and private data banks is not so much what they know about me, but what they think they know about me and just how out of date and downright inaccurate that can be.

For instance two weeks ago I finally got my new tax code for the company car I was given last December, out of the four pieces of information the Inland Revenue were given to calculate my benefit in kind they entered every one incorrectly despite filling in the forms online they still then manually type the details and they got it so wrong that I was rated at £16,100 benefit in kind instead of £3300, in other words without earning a penny this year I would have still owed them the tax on £5500 of benefit.

To correct this appalling assessment you have to register with their web site and in this new age of privatisation of services they have seconded the security checks to Equifax, went through their procedures which were extensive and involved passport and driving licence details until I got to a security question that involved entering the full bank account number from the current one they held on record for me, they gave me the last three digits as a hint. I don't own a bank account with that number.

After two days of searching I finally found an old bank account number that was closed in 2007 and which actually was in a Ltd Company name with me as a signatory (ie it wasn't my personal account and it certainly wasn't current) - this however, according to the UKs leading credit reference agency and HM Governments preferred citizen security checker is my main bank account, presumably they have no details at all of the actual accounts that I use daily.

Talking of daft security checks - I've banked with NatWest since 1976. About 2 years or less ago I failed a security check to execute a transaction because "I" got my date of birth wrong. The idiot I was speaking to could not conceive that I might know my dob and another idiot at NatWest might have input it wrong when entering it onto a computer system some years back! It's not hard to see why they almost (and arguably have) bankrupt the UK!

I was surprised to discover that within 24 hours of leaving my last company Facebook had changed my employment status.

It makes me wonder what other personal details are changed by outside forces completely beyond one's control.