Technology Archives

Westwind by Ian Rankin

Amazon Link To Buy – Westwind by Ian Rankin

For me the concept that the military from the USA, UK and other countries, as described in Westwind by Ian Rankin, would conspire to bring down the elected governments of the day is an anathema, however, we only have to look into history and what happened in German pre WW2 and the African sub-continent and its various countries and we can see parallels.

As an ex-soldier who has served in the UK and Germany, Canada and South America I could never conceive of a time in which the British Armed Services would allow this to happen and where they would give up their allegiance to the Crown (not the government).

The characters are reasonably well-drawn, but the main character Martin Hepton has questions to be asked. How come a computer nerd, who does not seem to have any background in intelligence apart from watching a computer screen and interpreting pictures, suddenly develop a 6^th sense in being able to handle a prime assassin?

Various other characters are brought into the story to add pace and distance, but the ‘badies’ are somewhat predictable as are the various stage sets and locations.

It is also interesting to look at age-old secret service writer’s ploy – namely that of levels within levels of the British Secret Service all looking over their shoulders to check who is watching whom!

And not to be forgotten is the age-old commentary on a person’s position in society – what university did one go to, which service did you belong to etc.

However, even with all these thoughts and reservations, I would still recommend this book. It is a good thriller, well crafted and written, and it does pose questions – could it happen now?

To quote Wikipedia, Ian James Rankin OBE DL FRSE FRSL (born 28 April 1960) is a Scottish crime writer, best known for his Inspector Rebus novels… His range is prolific, from the series with Rebus, to stand-alone novels to collaboration on opera, to short stories.

Fun Extras and Links

I am a book blogger. I am not paid to do this. All opinions are my own.

Source: Surveillance Camera Statistics: Which City has the Most CCTV Cameras?

Surveillance cameras proliferance does not equate to less crime, so says this report.

Big Brother Surveillance

But what made me go looking at these statistics? The Sunday Mirror on the 2nd Aug 2020 has a smallish report by Matthew Davies stuck on the bottom of page 14 – ’19 billion cars a year caught on cops’TV’. This report stated that ‘cops’ are snapping motorists with road cameras at a record rate of 610 per second, that the number of cars pictured by a network of CCTV devices annually has doubled in five years, up to 19.2 billion in 2019-2020 from 11 billion in 2014-15.

But are all these drivers breaking the law? It would seem not, and privacy watchdogs have warned the technology could be used to film innocent people who are not breaking any laws.

This is nothing new or startling, but what is startling is the volume of pictures being taken, and that there is very little oversight into how long these pictures are kept, who is taking them, and if they even should be taken!

An interesting fact that came out during my research is that the vast majority of CCTV cameras are not operated by government bodies, but by private individuals or companies, especially to monitor the interiors of shops and businesses. According to the 2011 Freedom of Information Act request, the total number of local government operated CCTV cameras was around 52,000 over the entirety of the UK. (Wikipedia -Mass Surveillance In The UK).

Surveillance