Lockdown critics accuse Covid Inquiry of 'endorsing' state-sponsored surveillance during the pandemic
The unit was set up in 2019 to address domestic "threats" and during the pandemic it was used to log or remove items critical of lockdown policies
Lockdown critics have accused the Covid Inquiry of "endorsing" state-sponsored surveillance during the pandemic.
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The Covid Inquiry's latest report concluded that there was "nothing unlawful or inappropriate" in the activities of the Government’s counter-disinformation unit during the pandemic (CDU).
Lockdown-sceptic campaigners who had social media posts taken down during the pandemic said the finding was "chilling".
The unit, which was set up in 2019 to address domestic "threats", was used during the pandemic to log or remove items critical of lockdown policies.
Some of the concerns flagged by campaigners at the time - including the impact of restrictions on schoolchildren - have since been borne out by the Inquiry.
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The inquiry was previously told that during the pandemic many children did just one hour of schoolwork a day while at home and spent the rest of the time watching TV and scrolling on social media.
Molly Kingsley, co-founder of the campaign group UsForThem which advocated for schools to be kept open during the pandemic, said the CDU was “very much referenced in a way that endorses its activities”.
She told the Telegraph that the Inquiry's approach risked "sewing these lies into the history books we are risking our own Orwellian repeat of history. We are giving licence to the same thing happening again.”
Two of the items flagged to the CDU included a December 2020 tweet in which Ms Kingsley described school closures as "unforgivable", and a a February 2022 article arguing children's lives were still subject to overly strict curbs.
Professor Carl Heneghan, an Oxford epidemiologist who was also monitored by the government, criticised the “chilling” use of covert surveillance.
He told the Telegraph: “What is the legal basis for surveillance of individuals by a government? If it is legal, then the second question is, is it ethical and moral? How do we, as a society, benefit from that approach?”
Articles by Professor Heneghan published in the Telegraph and the Spectator were logged by Government units, including pieces questioning the scientific basis for the rule of six and the data used to justify the second lockdown.
Some of his social media posts challenging the accuracy of coronavirus death data and about face masks were also taken down by technology giants over concerns about Covid disinformation.
In it's report published last month, the Covid Inquiry noted that the CDU “had clear policies governing the scope of its functions" and that staff had to be satisfied that all monitoring and analysis was "lawful, necessary and proportionate".
It added: “Most importantly, it did not access private data and only flagged up information that had already been posted on public platforms."
The report conceded that "some of the vaccine injured and bereaved sharing their experiences online felt stigmatised and ignored when their content was labelled as misinformation."
It contrasts with the approach in the United States, where a 2024 report by the House of Representatives judiciary committee into the White House's approach to censorship during the pandemic found it had conducted a "pressure campaign" with "devastating" effects.
The report accused White House officials of coercing Big Tech to censor the American people during the pandemic.
The committee found that "by suppressing free speech and intentionally distorting public debate in the modern town square, ideas and policies were no longer fairly tested and debated on their merits."
A separate report by the select subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic published later that year found the Biden administration "employed undemocratic and likely unconstitutional methods to fight what it deemed to be misinformation". It was published in 2024 after Donald Trump's election as President but research began in 2023 while Mr Biden was still in office.
A UK Government spokesman said: “The counter-disinformation unit played an important role during the pandemic helping identify false information that could pose a dangerous risk to UK public health.
“As acknowledged by the inquiry, the decision to label or otherwise act on online content was only ever taken by the social media platforms, not the government.”
A UK Covid-19 Inquiry spokesperson said: “The Inquiry examined the CDU's role in tackling Covid-19 vaccine misinformation and disinformation.
"It concluded that government monitoring of public social media to identify disinformation trends and flagging potentially harmful content to social media companies, was neither unlawful nor inappropriate.”