British spying bill gives more access to citizens’ Web activity

LONDON — The British government plans to make telecommunications firms keep records of customers’ Web histories and help spies hack into computers and phones under a new cyber-snooping law unveiled Wednesday.

Home Secretary Theresa May said the new rules would give security services a “license to operate” in the Internet era — but privacy groups called them a license to snoop.

If approved by Parliament, the bill will let police and spies access Internet connection records — a list of websites and social media apps someone has visited, though not the individual pages they looked at or the messages they sent.

Jim Killock, executive director of the Open Rights Group, said the bill was “an attempt to grab even more intrusive surveillance powers and does not do enough to restrain the bulk collection of our personal data by the secret services.”