Police mugshot files 'alarm' MPs

7 March 2015 Last updated at 01:51 By Kevin Rawlinson BBC News

MPs want stricter regulation of how police use biometric technologies.

The Commons Science and Technology Committee said it was "alarmed" that police in England and Wales had collected the mugshots of innocent and guilty people alike.

Last month, BBC Newsnight revealed police were holding 18 million images to use with facial recognition tech.

The government said the technology had an "important role" but images had to be used "in accordance with the law".

Committee chairman Andrew Miller said the MPs were not opposed to the use of biometric technologies to combat crime.

"But we were alarmed to discover that the police have begun uploading custody photographs of people to the Police National Database and using facial recognition software without any regulatory oversight - some of the people had not even been charged."

The MPs said there had been a "worrying" lack of government oversight and regulation of the use of biometrics by public bodies.

They highlighted a 2012 High Court ruling that the police's policy on retention of mugshots at that time was "unlawful" - but that nothing had changed as a result.

The MPs recommended that the police's maintenance of its database and associated use of facial recognition technology should be brought into the jurisdiction of the Biometrics Commissioner, Alastair MacGregor QC.

The commissioner has previously expressed concern about the implications of the police's system for privacy and civil liberties.

The committee also called on the government to open a public debate about how public bodies used biometric data.

It said it was "inexcusable" that a government report into the risks and benefits of using the data had not yet been published, despite being due in 2013.

According to campaign group Big Brother Watch, the committee's report highlights how the current use of biometrics could erode the public's "already fragile opinion of the technology".

A spokesman said: "It is unacceptable for innocent people to be treated in the same way as those who have been found to be guilty of a crime. [The police] database, as it stands, does just that.

"The fact that two years have passed since the retention of these photographs was ruled illegal and nothing has yet been done to rectify it, is totally unacceptable."

A BBC Newsnight report on 3 February revealed that the database maintained by forces in England and Wales included photos of people who had never been charged with a crime, as well as those of people acquitted.

The images were uploaded without Home Office approval, the programme reported.

'Intrusive technologies'

But privacy groups say the Home Office itself needs to do more to control surveillance.

Jim Killock, the executive director of the Open Rights Group, said: "It's incredibly easy for surveillance powers to grow just because technology gets easier.

"That's what the Home Office doesn't like to tell you when they demand new surveillance laws - intrusive technologies deliver more police powers all on their own. Surveillance needs regulating and oversight rather than extra help to grow."

His comments were echoed by Privacy International executive director Dr Gus Hosein.

Dr Hosein said people should assume the Home Office was "hoping that secret deployment of surveillance techniques will go unnoticed. Fortunately, on this occasion, Parliament is demanding more of them".

Mr Miller acknowledged that biometrics involved "risks and raise important ethical and legal questions relating to privacy and autonomy".

However, he insisted that they could play a key role in people's lives.

"As we struggle to remember ever more passwords and pin numbers in everyday life, the potential benefits of using biometric technologies to verify identity are obvious."

Lord Bates, the minister for criminal information, defended the use of mugshots and facial recognition technology, saying it played an "important role".

But, he said, the images should be used in accordance with the law.

He said the government needed to find a balance between public protection and civil liberties and said it was reviewing how police use custody images.

Ch Con Mike Barton, of the Association of Chief Police Officers, said that, while DNA and fingerprints were covered by existing legislation, the management of custody images was not.

"Police have used existing guidance on the 'Management of Police Information (MoPI)' to agree principles upon which we review, retain and delete these images. This varies dependent on factors such as age and the type of crime," he said.

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Dozens arrested in cybercrime raids

6 March 2015 Last updated at 12:23

The UK's National Crime Agency has arrested 56 suspected hackers as part of a "strike week" against cybercrime.

In total, 25 separate operations were carried out across England, Scotland and Wales.

Those arrested are suspected of being involved in a wide variety of cybercrimes including data theft, fraud and virus writing.

One raid the BBC witnessed targeted a man suspected of involvement in a 2012 hack attack on web giant Yahoo.

Stolen data

The week-long series of operations was co-ordinated by the NCA's National Cyber Crime Unit (NCCU) as well as specialist officers from regional organised crime squads and the Metropolitan Police.

West Midlands police arrested a 23-year-old man in Sutton Coldfield who is believed to have been involved in breaking into the network of the US defence department in June 2014.

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Rory Cellan-Jones joined police on one of the cybercrime raids

The biggest operation saw the arrest of 25 people in London and Essex suspected of using the net to steal money, launder cash and carry out other frauds.

The hackers behind that attack stole contact information for about 800 people and data on the network's internal architecture was also pilfered.

Eyewitness: Rory Cellan-Jones, Technology correspondent

I was with one of the teams from the National Crime Agency as they carried out an arrest this week at a flat in north London. One group had tracked the suspect, a 21-year-old student, all the way back from university 40 minutes away.

The arrest had some of the drama of a classic police operation - "Go! Go! Go!" came the command over the walkie-talkie as we approached the suspect's flat. But no doors were kicked in, and there were no shouts of "You're nicked!" The priority was to make sure any computers were seized before they could be shut down or their data encrypted.

Teams arrived with equipment to gather data, and found a laptop and a desktop computer, both of them online. One officer was employed simply keeping her finger on the laptop's trackpad to make sure it didn't go to sleep. Later, police cyber-specialists would spend many hours examining exactly what was on the two computers.

The action also resulted in the arrest of people thought to be part of some well-known hacking groups.

In Leeds, a suspected member of the Lizard Squad group was arrested, and in London a 21-year-old man was taken into custody on suspicion of being part of the D33Ds Company hacking collective.

The D33Ds group is believed to have been behind a 2012 attack on Yahoo that stole more than 400,000 email addresses and passwords subsequently published online.

Phishing gangs

Investigations about suspects in Sutton Coldfield, Leeds and Willesden were aided by forensic information provided by the FBI.

The other actions targeted alleged phishing gangs, intellectual property thieves, users of financial malware, companies that offer hosting services to crime groups, and many people who took part in so-called DDoS [distributed denial of service] attacks in an attempt to knock websites offline.

One 21-year-old man from County Durham allegedly knocked out the Police Scotland website mounting such a DDoS attack.

"Criminals need to realise that committing crime online will not render them anonymous to law enforcement," said Andy Archibald, deputy director of the NCCU.

"It's imperative that we continue to work with partners to pursue and disrupt the major crime groups targeting the UK."

In addition, this week the NCA coordinated visits to 70 firms to inform them about how vulnerable their servers were to attack and how they could be used by cyberthieves to send out spam or act as proxies for other attacks.

The strike week also involved four forces setting up pop-up shops to give advice to the public about staying safe online and to get their devices checked to make sure they are free of malware and other digital threats.

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Solar plane completes first leg

9 March 2015 Last updated at 16:15 By Jonathan Amos BBC Science Correspondent

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Solar plane lands in Oman: ''An extraordinary sight, almost like a glider''

A record-breaking attempt to fly around the world in a solar-powered plane has completed its first leg.

The aircraft - called Solar Impulse-2 - took off from Abu Dhabi, heading east to Muscat in Oman.

With businessman and pilot Andre Borschbeg at the controls, the aircraft touched down in Oman at 16:14 GMT after a 12-hour flight.

Over the next five months, it will skip from continent to continent, crossing both the Pacific and Atlantic oceans.

"And there we are... confirmation we're down. Solar Impulse has touched the ground," a flight controller said as the plane's wheels touched the tarmac.

The single-seater vehicle took off at 07:12 local time (03:12 GMT).

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Five-day solo flight over the Pacific - Solar Impulse's biggest challenge?

Mr Borschberg will share the pilot duties in due course with fellow Swiss, Bertrand Piccard.

The plan is to stop off at various locations around the globe, to rest and to carry out maintenance, and also to spread a campaigning message about clean technologies.

Before taking off, Borschberg told BBC News: "I am confident we have a very special aeroplane, and it will have to be to get us across the big oceans.

"We may have to fly for five days and five nights to do that, and it will be a challenge.

"But we have the next two months, as we fly the legs to China, to train and prepare ourselves."

Monday's leg to Oman covered about 400km. Details of the journey are being relayed on the internet.

A solar revolution - by Roger Harrabin, BBC environment analyst

It's a deep-breath moment in the history of technology as Solar Impulse soars to the skies.

Because, pinch yourself, solar power is predicted to become the dominant source of electricity globally by 2050.

The price of solar electric panels fell 70% in recent years and costs are expected to halve again this decade.

And Deutsche Bank forecasts that, based on current fossil fuel prices, solar will produce power as cheaply as gas in two thirds of the world before 2020.

In the UK the solar industry thinks it can compete with wind within 18 months and with gas in the near future. In the USA, solar jobs already outnumber coal jobs.

The solar revolution was sparked by government subsidies, which attracted venture capitalists to fund innovation and created a huge market that Chinese manufacturers are battling to exploit.

The solar boom is a huge help in the battle against climate change, but scientists warn it's not nearly enough. And we must find ways of storing that mighty but capricious power, and making it work with the grid.

BBC iWonder: Is jet travel becoming the dirtiest way to cross the planet?

Lightweight plane

The Solar Impulse project has already set a number of world records for solar-powered flight, including making a high-profile transit of the US in 2013.

But the round-the-world venture is altogether more dramatic and daunting, and has required the construction of an even bigger plane than the prototype, Solar Impulse-1.

This new model has a wingspan of 72m, which is wider than a 747 jumbo jet. And yet, it weighs only 2.3 tonnes.

Its light weight will be critical to its success.

So, too, will the performance of the 17,000 solar cells that line the top of the wings, and the energy-dense lithium-ion batteries it will use to sustain night-time flying.

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Andre Borschberg was at the controls of the single-seater vehicle as it took off

Operating through darkness will be particularly important when the men have to cross the Pacific and the Atlantic.

The slow speed of their prop-driven plane means these legs will take several days and nights of non-stop flying to complete.

Piccard and Borschberg - whoever is at the controls - will have to stay alert for nearly all of the time they are airborne.

They will be permitted only catnaps of up to 20 mins - in the same way a single-handed, round-the-world yachtsman would catch small periods of sleep.

They will also have to endure the physical discomfort of being confined in a cockpit that measures just 3.8 cubic metres in volume - not a lot bigger than a public telephone box.

Flight simulators have helped the pilots to prepare, and each man has developed his own regimen to cope.

Borschberg will use yoga to try to stay fresh. Piccard is using self-hypnosis techniques.

"But my passion also will keep me going," said Piccard.

"I had this dream 16 years ago of flying around the world without fuel, just on solar power. Now, we're about to do it. The passion is there and I look forward so much to being in the cockpit."

The support team is well drilled. While the mission will be run out of a control room in Monaco, a group of engineers will follow the plane around the globe. They have a mobile hangar to house the plane when it is not in the air.

It is not at all certain Solar Impulse will succeed. Computer modelling suggests the ocean crossings are feasible, given the right weather conditions.

But that same modelling has shown also that there may be occasions when the team simply has to sit tight on the ground for weeks before a fair window opens.

"Last year, we had a very good exercise. We went around the world virtually, but with actual conditions," explained Raymond Clerc, mission director.

"For the Pacific crossing, it was an easy decision. We had a very good window on 2 May. But when we were on the East Coast of the USA, we had to look to cross the Atlantic and we had to wait 30 days to find a good window. And then it was easy - 3.5 days and we were in Seville, [Spain]," he told BBC News.

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Pilot Andre Borschberg gives a guided tour of the solar plane

If the pilots should come unstuck over the Pacific or the Atlantic, they will bail out and use ocean survival gear until they can be picked up by a ship.

Of the two protagonists, Andre Borschberg perhaps needs a little more introduction.

A trained engineer and former air-force pilot, he has built a career as an entrepreneur in internet technologies.

Bertrand Piccard, on the other hand, is well known for his ballooning exploits.

Along with Brian Jones, he completed the first non-stop, circumnavigation of the world in 1999, using the Breitling Orbiter 3 balloon. The Piccard name is synonymous with pushing boundaries.

Bertrand's father, Jacques Piccard, was the first to reach the deepest place in the ocean (a feat achieved with Don Walsh in the Trieste bathyscaphe in 1960). And his grandfather, Auguste Piccard, was the first person to take a balloon into the stratosphere, in 1931.

Jonathan.Amos-INTERNET@bbc.co.uk and follow me on Twitter: @BBCAmos

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Charges over 'largest' email breach

10 March 2015 Last updated at 13:20

Three men have been charged by US authorities for their alleged involvement with a huge email breach.

Two Vietnamese men are alleged to have hacked into email providers in the US and stolen one billion addresses.

It is believed the two then profited by sending junk mail or spam to tens of millions of the stolen addresses.

A third man also charged is alleged to have helped the hackers launder the money made from the large-scale spamming scheme.

According to allegations in a US Department of Justice statement, Viet Quoc Nguyen and Giang Hoang Vu hacked into eight separate email providers in the US between 2009 and 2012. The DoJ said they used this access to steal more than one billion email addresses in what it said was the "largest" data breach in US history.

The DoJ also alleges that the pair used their access to the internal systems of the email providers to help them despatch junk messages to tens of millions of people. The trade earned them millions of dollars from spam and from websites that paid to have traffic directed to them via junk mail, said the DoJ.

Some of the spam sent sought to make people pay for software they could get free elsewhere.

Vu was extradited to the US from Holland in 2014 and has pleaded guilty to committing computer fraud. He is due to be sentenced next month. Nguyen remains a fugitive, said the DoJ.

Also charged is Canadian David-Manuel Santos Da Silva who, the US alleges, helped Vu and Nguyen generate cash from their stolen email addresses and by laundering the money they made. Da Silva was arrested in Florida last month and is due to be arraigned before a judge this week.

"Large scale and sophisticated international cyber hacking rings are becoming more problematic for the law enforcement community that is faced with the challenges of identifying them and laying hands on them," said FBI agent J Britt Johnson who led the agency's investigation into the breach.

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Smart meters energy scheme 'at risk'

7 March 2015 Last updated at 07:23

Plans to install energy saving smart meters in every UK home and business by 2020 are at risk of veering off track, an influential group of MPs has warned.

Smart meters could save about £17bn and put an end to estimated bills.

But the Energy and Climate Change Committee said a key piece of the £11bn programme's infrastructure was behind schedule.

The Department of Energy and Climate Change (DECC) said it had designed the scheme to maximise value for money.

The committee said the project was in danger of becoming a costly mistake, with a series of "technical, logistical and public communication issues" resulting in delays.

'Time running out'

The MPs said the government needed to get a firm grip on smart metering to avoid future embarrassment.

Committee chairman Tim Yeo said: "Time is running out on the government's plan to install smart meters in each of the UK's 30 million homes and businesses by 2020.

"Smart meters could generate more than £17bn in energy savings for the country yet a series of technical and other issues have resulted in delays to the planned roll-out."

He added: "This committee first looked at this programme in 2013, highlighting issues which we urged the government to address.

"While some progress has been made since then, it's not enough.

"The energy industry told us that it needs the government to enable industry wide solutions, rather than the less efficient alternative of letting each energy supplier develop its own solution."

'Steer industry'

Mr Yeo said the government was at a crossroads with its smart-metering policy.

"It can continue with its current approach and risk embarrassment through public disengagement on a flagship energy policy, or it can grip the reins, and steer the energy industry along a more successful path which brings huge benefits for the country," he said

Smart meters will eventually allow consumers to know exactly how much electricity each appliance uses, in order to encourage more efficiency.

Installing a smart meter will not cost consumers anything upfront and there will be no additional charges - although the costs of infrastructure like electricity meters are already incorporated into power bills, according to Smart Energy GB.

The DECC said one million consumers had already benefited from having a smart meter.

Claire Maugham, director of communications at smart meter advocacy group Smart Energy GB, told BBC Radio 5 live that the rollout of smart meters was "well underway" in the UK and the people who have them are "more confident in looking around for the right tariff and the right supplier... and they're much more happy with the whole experience of buying gas and electricity".

However, she said that the rollout of smart meters needed more independent oversight, and that people may need more support getting to grips with the technology once it is installed in their homes.

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'Jealous hackers deleted all my Vines'

Viner Ben Phillips says his account has been hacked and all his videos deleted after he revealed he can earn up to £12,000 a clip.

He blames "jealous hackers".

"I'm thinking it's because of all the recent press I've been doing about my success with Vine," he tells Newsbeat.

"It's definitely a hack. My passwords change every week and my email address is completely generic. You wouldn't be able to guess."

The 22-year-old from Bridgend has more than 285 million loops on Vine and an international following.

This is what appears on Ben's Vine account

"Everything's gone from my first ever Vine right up to now. It's like memories, a photo book that has been deleted," he says.

He's contacted Vine asking if it can restore his clips but because its office is based in New York he's waiting for a reply.

Ben is hopeful Vine will be able to help him because clips he's posted on his Twitter feed are still playing loops.

He says he doesn't know what he'll do if Vine can't help.

"That's the question I really don't want to answer.

"I'll have no choice but to start again. For me, that's something I really don't want to be thinking about right now because it's more of the memories of those Vines.

"I feel bad for everyone. Those Vines are to make people smile and now they're gone."

Firms and marketing companies now pay Ben to feature their products in his six second clips, but he denies they're adverts.

Ben says: "I never get asked to put the price in of the product. I just get asked if I can have a bit of fun with their product.

"I don't contact them, they contact me."

Ford was the first company to pay Ben to feature a product. He got paid £12,000 for that Vine, the equivalent of £2,000 a second.

He says he doesn't like talking too much about money, but admits he has since been paid more than that for one of his clips.

"I didn't make a penny out of anything until I hit one million followers.

"Petrol, food and life isn't free so we have to incorporate some adverts but we make [those Vines] as much fun as possible. The last thing I want to be doing is pumping sales down everyone's throats."

With the money he's made from Vines, Ben has been able to travel around Europe, staying in hotels - a luxury, he says.

"The bigger you get and the more followers you have, the bigger the payments."

Follow @BBCNewsbeat on Twitter, BBCNewsbeat on Instagram and Radio1Newsbeat on YouTube

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Wikimedia sues NSA over surveillance

10 March 2015 Last updated at 11:53

The NSA's mass surveillance programme violates US laws on freedom of speech, alleges a lawsuit begun by the Wikimedia Foundation.

The legal action has been filed against the spy agency and the US Department of Justice.

The legal action, co-signed by eight other organisations, seeks to end the NSA's large-scale surveillance efforts.

The Foundation is the non-profit group that oversees the running of the Wikipedia online encyclopedia.

The Wikmedia Foundation said it was taking action against the NSA's so-called "upstream" surveillance work which targets communication with people not in the US.

Such spying violates US laws on free speech and those that govern against unreasonable search and seizure, it said.

The scale of the monitoring carried out by the NSA has been revealed in documents made public by whistleblower Edward Snowden over the last two years. Some of those papers show the NSA tapped the net's backbone network to siphon off data. The backbone is made up of high-speed cables that link big ISPs and key transit points on the net.

"By tapping the backbone of the internet, the NSA is straining the backbone of democracy," said Lila Tretikov, executive director of the Wikimedia Foundation, in a blogpost announcing the legal action.

Targeting the backbone means the NSA casts a "vast net" and inevitably scoops up data unrelated to any target and will also include domestic communications, violating the rules governing what the NSA can spy on, said Ms Tretikov.

Information in the Snowden papers revealed that Wikipedia has been explicitly targeted, said the blogpost.

"By violating our users' privacy, the NSA is threatening the intellectual freedom that is central to people's ability to create and understand knowledge," said Ms Tretikov.

In an accompanying editorial published in the New York Times, Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales said he hoped the lawsuit would bring an "end to the NSA's dragnet surveillance of Internet traffic".

Other organisations joining the lawsuit include Human Rights Watch, Amnesty International USA, the National Association of Criminal Defence Lawyers and the Global Fund for Women.

The NSA and DoJ have yet to comment on the legal action.

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Feminist site knocked offline

9 March 2015 Last updated at 12:46

A community-style blog encouraging female contributors to write about their experiences was knocked offline during a day for the global celebration of women.

Femsplain was unavailable for several hours during International Women's Day on Sunday, 8 March, after a Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attack.

It is unclear who was behind the attack.

The site was launched in October 2014 and has been crowdfunding on the net.

It reached its $25,000 fundraising target last week.

"We're more than a website or events - we're a movement. We are providing a safe space to connect, learn and grow with other female-identified people," reads the introduction to the site.

"Our goal is to highlight all the amazing diversity of women on the internet who might not have another outlet to share their experiences."

Women have increasingly reported being threatened and harassed online, especially on social media platforms, in recent times.

In 2013, Caroline Criado-Perez received death threats after successfully campaigning for writer Jane Austen to appear on £20 notes.

Under attack

DDoS is a technique in which many computers are used to flood an online service with requests in an attempt to overload its systems.

When the site went down, founder Amber Gordon tweeted that Femsplain frequently experienced attempted attacks.

"We constantly have people attacking us and attempting to bring our website down. It's unfortunate but the reality of our mission," she wrote.

"Ultimately, whoever is behind the attack hasn't achieved anything or even articulated a criticism of feminism or Femsplain specifically," said Jess McCabe, former editor of feminist website the F Word.

"Far from silencing anyone, it will only help amplify Femsplain's voices."

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Apple Watch prices and apps revealed

9 March 2015 Last updated at 22:18 By Leo Kelion Technology desk editor

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WATCH: The BBC's technology correspondent Rory Cellan-Jones investigates whether smartwatches are really the next big thing

Apple's smartwatch collection will range in price from $349 to $17,000 (£299 to £13,500 in the UK) depending on the metals they are made from and the straps they are bought with.

The larger 42mm (1.7in) models of the Watch will cost about $50 more than than the 38mm (1.5in) versions in the lower-priced ranges.

Apple also revealed that the devices are due to go on sale on 24 April.

Rivals' smartwatches have only seen limited sales to date.

A press event held in San Francisco held few surprises about the wearable tech beyond the fact that the mid-range stainless steel edition would start at $549 and go up to $1,099 in the US, and from £479 to £949 in the UK including VAT.

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WATCH: The BBC's North America technology correspondent Richard Taylor reports on a crucial moment for Apple boss Tim Cook

There had been speculation that Apple would seek a bigger price gap between the model and the basic aluminium-based Sport-branded version - something that would have restricted its appeal.

"Apple's pricing demonstrates the confidence it has in the new Apple Watch's functionality, design and consumer appeal," commented Ian Fogg from the consultants IHS.

Apple's website lists a total of 38 models, which might pose a challenge to how it markets them.

Same specs

The US firm did not announce any difference in specifications between the aluminium, steel and gold-cased versions - there had been speculation that the higher-end editions might have more storage or allow some of their parts to be upgraded at a later point.

"When there were estimates of $700 or $800 for the basic stainless steel versions, I would have expected more than just a difference in materials," said James Moar from Juniper Research.

"The fact Apple hasn't done that is why there is no justification for a higher price."

Apple's chief executive Tim Cook said the Watch would typically last owners 18 hours between charges, providing a day's worth of use.

Its website adds that the models take 2.5 hours to charge from 0% to 100%, and that the larger model has longer battery life.

It also reveals that a Power Reserve facility means that the Watch should continue to show the time for "up to 72 hours" after other functions are turned off.

The firm said on stage that thousands of new apps had already been developed for the Watch ahead of it going on sale.

The social networks Facebook and Instagram, the car pick-up service Uber and the Chinese messaging app WeChat are among those confirmed to have developed software for the device.

Apple also highlighted that its wrist-worn device could be used to make touchless payments and receive phone calls.

Other functions demonstrated by Apple included:

• using the Watch as a means to open a compatible hotel room lock as an alternative to a key card
• checking the name of a song via the app Shazam
• opening an internet-connected garage door remotely

"What was very clear is that disruption will not come from specific features that Apple will bring to the watch, but by enabling developers to add value through their apps," commented Franciso Jeronimo, an analyst at IDC.

"In the end, similar to a smartphone or a tablet, what will make smartwatches relevant are the apps available. And what will make them appealing is the design and the quality of the hardware that runs those apps."

Loyal super-fans

To provide many of its functions - including GPS tracking, receiving phone calls and transmitting messages - the Watch requires its owner to have an iPhone 5 or more recent Apple handset, limiting its potential audience.

Even so, one expert believes sales will be strong - at least initially.

"Apple will unquestionably sell millions of these watches because there's pent-up demand from the loyal super-fans who will buy almost any Apple product," said Ben Wood from the tech advisory firm CCS Insight.

"Even if this merely told the time they would deliver that first chunk of sales. But the challenge is how you get ordinary iPhone owners to buy the smartwatch, because to date consumers have been left wondering why they need them in their lives."

CCS Insight forecasts 20 million units will be sold by the end of this year - representing about 7% of the compatible iPhones currently in use.

However, other analysts range widely in their predictions, forecasting sales as low as eight million units to as high as 60 million in 2015.

For comparison's sake, the iPad sold 14.8 million units in the first nine months after its launch, more than double Wall Street's most optimistic estimate.

The UK, US, France, Germany, Japan, Australia and Canada are among the first wave of countries where the smartwatches will be sold.

WEARABLE TECH GLOBAL SHIPMENTS

	2013	2014	2015 (estimate)
(Source: CCS Insight)
Smartwatches	1.8 million	3.3 million	27 million
Wristbands	2.9 million	18 million	36 million

Analysis: Richard Taylor, North America technology correspondent

The big question: will Apple be able to reinvent the wristwatch industry in the way it has redefined others like computing and music?

So far consumer curiosity over smartwatches has not translated into sales: Apple's rivals running Android Wear have struggled to gain traction, collectively selling less than 800,000 watches last year, according to research firm Canalys.

Before today's event analyst estimates of Apple Watch varied wildly - partly because pricing is always going to prove a crucial part of purchasing decisions.

Although Apple has always vaunted margin over volume, it needs to sell a critical mass not merely to establish market dominance, but also to validate Tim Cook's foray into an entirely new product category in the post-Steve Jobs era.

Until today reaction has been mixed - with fashionistas divided over its styling, and techies not wholly convinced that it is a "must-have" product.

It certainly boasts unique features, like the ability to use it to buy products with Apple Pay and even open hotel doors - but other innovations - like sharing doodles with friends with "digital touch" - feel a bit gimmicky.

Will the entire package be enough to jump-start an entire product category? After years of speculation, we will finally know the answer in the coming months.

One-port laptop

Apple also announced a new 12in (30.5cm)-screened "retina" class laptop - meaning it has a higher resolution screen than its MacBook Air range, which remains on sale.

Apple said the new model was the "world's most energy efficient notebook".

The company added that it was its thinnest laptop to date, measuring 13.1mm (0.52in) at its thickest point, thanks in part to it no longer needing an internal fan.

It is also Apple's first laptop to provide vibration feedback via its trackpad, and be sold in a gold-coloured option.

However, it only features a single port - called USB-C - which it uses to provide the machine with power, data and output to an exterior monitor or TV.

The firm suggested that users could also use Bluetooth and wi-fi to link the machine to other kit, but some users are likely to miss the ability to easily connect older peripherals such as an external hard disk or mouse.

The basic version will cost $1,299 (£1,049 in the UK), making it a mid-range model for the company.

The US firm also unveiled a new software product - called ResearchKit - for its iPhones that can be used by medical researchers to gather data from volunteers without the information ever being shared with Apple itself.

Apple revealed that the University of Oxford had already developed an app using the facility to help it investigate the causes of heart disease and New York's Mount Sinai hospital is using it to study irritants that might cause asthma.

The move could potentially pave the way for Apple to seek regulators' approval for its products to be used as diagnostic tools in the future.

ResearchKit will be open source - meaning any company or developer should be able to work with the platform.

Apple has previously waited for others to pioneer new tech before leapfrogging the competition as the graphic below illustrates:

INTERACTIVE

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  The Alto was one of the first computers to use a mouse, and an early pioneer of the "desktop" concept.

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  Apple's first almost-affordable, mass-market computer was launched with a futuristic ad by Ridley Scott.

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  The Rio had just 32MB of memory – enough to store roughly an hour of music.

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  Apple launched the original iPod with the slogan '1,000 songs in your pocket'.

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  Weighing half a kilogram and featuring a rather crude touchscreen, the Simon was able to send and receive emails, as well as take notes.

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  At the iPhone's launch, Steve Jobs told the audience the device was 'five years ahead of any other mobile phone'.

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  Based upon what used to be known as the 'slate form factor', Fujitsu's tablet PC could be operated with a pen or connected to a keyboard for use at a desk.

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  One million iPads were sold in 28 days after its launch in the US.

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  Developed in partnership with Microsoft and Palm, the Fossil could deliver traffic and weather reports, among other things.

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  The Apple Watch comes in three ranges, each built out of different materials. All provide access to apps, notifications and activity-tracking data.

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'Banning Tor unwise', MPs told

10 March 2015 Last updated at 14:04 By Kevin Rawlinson BBC News

A ban on online anonymity networks would be "technologically infeasible" and unwise, MPs have been told.

Parliamentary advisers said networks such as Tor could be used for criminal ends but also in the public interest.

The advice for MPs contradicted the Prime Minister David Cameron, who has said law enforcement should be handed the keys to encrypted communications.

One expert said the document showed Mr Cameron's plans to be "noble", but ultimately unworkable.

The Parliamentary Office of Science and Technology (Post), which issues advice to MPs, said that there was "widespread agreement that banning online anonymity systems altogether is not seen as an acceptable policy option in the UK".

'Technical challenges'

In a briefing document on the dark net, of which Tor forms a prominent part, it added that, "even if it were, there would be technical challenges".

The report, published on Monday 9 March, cited the example of the Chinese government, which attempted to block access to Tor in order to enforce bans on unauthorised websites.

In reaction, it said, the body that maintains the network, simply added "bridges" that were "very difficult to block", allowing people to continue accessing Tor.

Speaking in January, following attacks by gunmen in Paris and its surrounding areas, David Cameron said there should be no "means of communication" the security services could not read.

He said: "In extremis, it has been possible to read someone's letter, to listen to someone's call to mobile communications.

"The question remains, 'Are we going to allow a means of communications where it simply is not possible to do that?' My answer to that question is, 'No, we must not.'"

He has also enlisted companies that operate internet search engines, such as Google, Microsoft and Yahoo, to help track down and block images of child abuse.

Whistle-blowing

However, the Post report clarified that the dark web was not indexed by such search engines, limiting the extent to which they would be able to help.

Jamie Bartlett, of the think tank Demos, whose book The Dark Net was cited in the report, said that - in theory - he agreed with Mr Cameron that there should not be a place in the dark web for criminals to hide.

However, he said that - in practice - the prime minister's plans were shown by the parliamentary document to be "more or less impossible to actually do".

He said: "It is about police being able to force people to give up their anonymity when necessary, without taking away the ability to be anonymous online."

Hidden services

The Post provides reports for MPs to offer them independent, non-political advice on highly specialised and complicated issues in science and technology.

It does not bind them to any position, but helps inform parliamentary debates and votes on subjects of which many MPs would otherwise have little understanding.

In its report, it differentiated between use of the dark web for criminal purposes and for acts in the public interest - such as whistle-blowing.

It noted that some people have argued for a network that allowed users to be anonymous, but without Tor hidden services (THS), such as the Silk Road marketplace, which have been used for criminal purposes.

"However, THS also benefit non-criminal Tor users because they may add a further layer of user security," the report said.

"Sites requiring strong security, like whistle-blowing platforms are offered as THS.

"Also, computer experts argue that any legislative attempt to preclude THS from being available in the UK over Tor would be technologically infeasible."

A spokesman for the prime minister did not respond to a request for comment.

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