A cast of literally thousands, well, three, tell the story of how collecting data about data in no way compromises privacy
Barack Obama: "Nobody is listening to your telephone calls"
Theresa May: "It is not snooping. It is absolutely not government wanting to read everybody's emails – we will not be looking at every webpage everybody has looked at."
Theresa May: "This is purely about the who, when and where made these communications."
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Cast of Characters
Winston Churchill: The prime minister of the United Kingdom
Alan Turing: A cryptographer
Theresa May: Alan Turing's line manager
Cryptographers: Various
Military Policemen (MPs): Various
Scene
Hut 6, Bletchley Park
Time
1944
Setting
A long, prefab "hut" in which various men and women labour over noisy machines. Churchill, May and Turing are stood in a corner, stage right, conversing. Cryptographers sit at their desks, pretending not to listen in.
Churchill: What news then? How goes the effort to break the Nazi ciphers?
(May and Turing exchange a complicated look. May's hands flutter at her sides.)
May: I'm sorry, prime minister, the news isn't good.
(May swallows audibly. Churchill glares at her)
May: Mr Turing and his colleagues have laboured hard with every hour that God has sent, but try as they might, they can extract nothing of use from the Enigma cipher.
Churchill: (roaring) Nothing? All these years, all this work, and you have nothing?
May: Well, not precisely nothing, prime minister. The lads have got far enough that they are able to extract "meta-data," but I stress again that this is of no strategic import and would in no way help us to compromise the foe.
Churchill: Meta-data? Tell me more of this meta-data? Is it a Greek word?
(May turns to Turing, who wipes his palms on his trousers)
Turing: Technically Greek, prime minister. It is our own coinage, a neologism. You know boffins and their neologisms.
Churchill: Indeed.
Turing: It's quite simple, really. We call the contents of scrambled radio intercepts – that is, the words of the messages themselves – "data."
Churchill: Go on.
Turing: Meta-data, then, is the data about the data.
May: But nothing that could be used to compromise Jerry, I'm sorry to report.
(Turing tries to hide a scowl. He is unsuccessful)
Turing: Quite. All we can tell with this analysis is who is speaking, what equipment they use to speak, whom else they speak to, who the messages are addressed to, the subject of discussion, the places where all parties are when conducting discussion, which equipment they use to communicate …
Churchill: Is that all?
Turing: Eh? Oh, erm, also we know how often they communicate, at what length they communicate, and where they go and what they do next.
Cryptographer: (calling out from his desk) Also who all their friends are, and how they know them.
May: But nothing compromising.
Turing: (through gritted teeth) Quite.
Churchill: Mrs May, would you mind stepping outside for a moment?
(As May is escorted out by a pair of burly MPs, Churchill, Turing and the Cryptographers huddle together excitedly)
Churchill: (muffled, from within the scrum) Nothing compromising!