Some UK politicians are trying once again to pass mass surveillance laws after the Paris attacks. It's a misguided approach, says a computing researcher. […]

Mass data collectors can dig deeply into anyone's digital persona but don't have the resources to do so with everyone. Surveillance of the entire population, the vast majority of whom are innocent, leads to the diversion of limited intelligence resources in pursuit of huge numbers of false leads. Terrorists are comparatively rare, so finding one is a needle in a haystack problem. You don't make it easier by throwing more needleless hay on the stack. […]

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn26801-mass-surveillance-not-effect...