The UK’s health and social services have become tools of surveillance and control, with working class women the most vulnerable to state intervention. Madame Tlank reviews the State’s policies, targets and projects and uncovers the warped logic and fragmenting effects of marketised welfare

Having come full circle in half a century, today British citizens stand on the brink of having their 'fundamental rights and freedoms' enshrined in the plasticated chip of a compulsory ID card. But what, asks Martin Twomey of the Hackney NO2ID Group, is this card for exactly and whose interests does it serve?

The plight of Steve Kurtz of the Critical Art Ensemble arrested under‘war on terror’legislation has become a cause celebre on the new media art scene. But his case is not a unique masterpiece of injustice. As Alisa Solomon reports, the primary target of State repression has been not artists but immigrants

The era of quantum technology is dawning. With quantum computing set to smash our existing ciphers, quantum encryption is providing a new set of uncrackable codes. But are the new codes completely secure? asks Peter Carty

II The revolution shall not be criticised?
In response to ISEA98 Micz Flor, organiser of Revolting temporary media laboratory, asks "why now, why revolution?" Is the current popularity of the term and its associated icons anything more than Middle Youth talking to itself in the latest of a long line of fashionable lingos?

IV Net.Politics Q&A

Echelon is the worldwide signals intelligence network run by the US National Security Agency and the UK Government Communications Headquarters in collaboration with Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Reportedly the system is capable of intercepting large portions of the world's communications, including phone conversations, email and SMS.

Gregor Claude reports on the Don’t Blow IT conference, held at Bloomberg’s London HQ, where debate centred on the difference between autistic and autonomous models of privacy

This month’s Head to Head asks: Does the possible introduction of ID cards into the UK represent an attack on freedom? In a political climate in which the sacrifice of personal privacy is widely considered a fair price to pay for the protection of society from ‘terror’, the media debate often does not extend beyond the practicalities involved.

JJ King investigates a European treaty that signals the demise of national sovereignty and continues the gradual decay of the individual’s right to privacy

A hidden battle is raging between our fundamental right to privacy and the requirements of the state to maintain and advance its powers of surveillance. The battlefield is complex and confusing, the players numerous. Modern information technologies are key: they have created the many new media in which we communicate, and accordingly increased authorities’ requirements for extensive and invasive information-gathering capabilities.

Hari Kunzru reports on Freenet — a new development which could revive free speech on the Internet.