Digital surveillance 'worse than Orwell', says new UN privacy chief

Joseph Cannataci describes British oversight as 'a joke' and says a Geneva convention for the internet is needed

The first UN privacy chief has said the world needs a Geneva convention style law for the internet to safeguard data and combat the threat of massive clandestine digital surveillance.

Speaking to the Guardian weeks after his appointment as the UN special rapporteur on privacy, Joseph Cannataci described British surveillance oversight as being "a joke", and said the situation is worse than anything George Orwell could have foreseen.