Britain to track every website users visit

The British government has revealed plans to introduce a range of new online surveillance powers, including the storing of every website an individual user visits.

Home Secretary Theresa May has introduced plans to mandate the storage of an Internet Connection Record that would track every site a visitor accesses.

ISPs would need to retain this data for a year and provide access to investigators on request.

Announcing the proposed Bill to British Parliament, May said the records will not store a user's activity on a website, only that the user has visited.

Law enforcement agencies will also only be able to request the data under limited circumstances, such as to determine whether someone has visited an illegal site. They will not be able to determine whether an individual has visited a mental health or medical site.

The proposed rules have nevertheless provoked a strong response from privacy and consumer advocacy groups, who fear that the law has a significant potential for abuse.

A spokesperson for Attorney-General George Brandis told Fairfax Media that the government does not plan to amend the Data Retention Act with similar legislation.

The Act currently does require ISPs to retain records of IP addresses allocated to customers, but no requirement to retain destination IP or URL addresses.

Image courtesy of Mike Licht under CC