Judith Vidal-Hall: Taking on the giant

When a group of claimants in the UK took on Google for invasion of privacy, they had little idea that the case would become a landmark in the fight to tame the internet giant's intrusion into our lives on the web.

On 27 March 2015, a group of claimants in the United Kingdom, including myself, won what is being called a “landmark victory” against Google Inc. It handles three billion searches a day globally, exercises a virtual monopoly and is valued at around £250 billion. It is also among the world’s biggest advertising agencies with revenue in 2013 of some £49 billion.

Snoopers' charter: report on "Scrambling for Safety", 19 April 2012

"What does the UK Home Office think they want to do, and why do they think they want to do it?"  The question was a recurring theme at Scrambling for Safety 2012, a conference to discuss the mooted new powers for the "Surveillance State", swiftly arranged in the wake of April's media furore.