Britain increases surveillance budget.

• Position: RECORDS - Brief article

Britain's plan to expand its surveillance program includes 200 million [pounds sterling] ($300 million U.S.) a year to access details of every citizen's online moves--that's 380 [pounds sterling] million ($569 million U.S.) a minute spent on Internet surveillance.

[ILLUSTRATION OMITTED]

According to The Daily Mail, state agencies and councils already make one request every minute to spy on the phone and e-mail records of British citizens. The number of spying efforts carried out by police, town halls, and other government departments has increased by 44% in the past two years to a rate of 1,381 new cases every day.

Ministers say the five-year cost of the existing surveillance program is 55.61 million [pounds sterling] ($83 million U.S.), an average of 11 million [pounds sterling] ($16 million U.S.) a year, which goes to phone companies and service providers to pay for keeping and providing private customer...