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Outgoing Director of Public Prosecutions Sir Ken Macdonald warned that the expansion of technology by the state into everyday life could create a world future generations “can’t bear”.

In his wide-ranging speech, Sir Ken appeared to condemn a series of key Government policies, attacking terrorism proposals – including 42 day detention – identity card plans and the “paraphernalia of paranoia”.

Instead, he said, the Government should insist that “our rights are priceless” and that: “The best way to face down those threats is to strengthen our institutions rather than to degrade them.”

The intervention will be seen as a significant setback to Home Secretary Jacqui Smith who last week saw her plans to lock up terror suspects for 42 days before being charged thrown out by the House of Lords.

It is also a blow to Miss Smith’s plans for a super-database to record the details of millions of people’s online presence, including emails, SMS messages and Facebook profiles as well as the controversial identity card programme.

Sir Ken chose to issue his tough warning about the perils of the “Big Brother” state in his final speech as DPP, days before he leaves his post at the end of this month.

He warned that MPs should “take very great care to imagine the world we are creating before we build it. We might end up living with something we can’t bear”.

Sir Ken, who has held the post for the past five years, said: “We need to take very great care not to fall into a way of life in which freedom’s back is broken by the relentless pressure of a security State.

“Technology gives the State enormous powers of access to knowledge and information about each of us, and the ability to collect and store it at will.”

At the last estimate, there were 4,285,000 cctv cameras in Britain.

Last week Miss Smith said the Government was examining ways to “collect and store’’ records of phone calls, emails and internet traffic.

Plans for the new snooper databases, which will be held by the Government or by phone companies, will be included in a draft Communications Data Bill, which will go out for consultation in the new year.

The new law was necessary to allow officials to keep track of potential terrorists who use social networks, such as Facebook, to plot attacks free from detection, she said.

But Sir Ken warned that increasing the powers of the state in law meant that any new powers would be “with us forever”.

He said: “It is in the nature of State power that decisions taken in the next few months and years about how the State may use these powers, and to what extent, are likely to be irreversible.

“They will be with us forever. And they in turn will be built upon. So we should take very great care to imagine the world we are creating before we build it. We might end up living with something we can’t bear.”

Sir Ken warned Parliament to resist “special courts, vetted judges and all the other paraphernalia of paranoia” in the fight against terrorism.

That risked copying “the Guantanamo model…. which says that we cannot afford to give people their rights, that rights are too expensive because of the nature of the threats we are facing”.

He added: “It is difficult to see who will maintain a cool head if governments do not. Or who will protect our Constitution if governments unwittingly disarm it.”

Britain was right to tackle terrorism and other “medieval delusions” through the courts, he said. This was “in accordance with our constitution”.

Miss Smith is facing a major battle to force through plans for the legislation, which could also force people who use pay as you go mobile phones to register their identities with phone companies.

Last week, Lord Carlisle of Berriew, the Government’s independent review of anti-terrorism laws, said the “raw idea’’ of the database was “awful’’ and called for controls to stop government agencies from abusing it.

There has been criticism after councils have used powers which were designed to tackled terrorism to spy on local people.

It is thought that staunch opposition from within Whitehall to the plan forced Miss Smith to abandon hopes to unveil a bill in the Queen’s Speech next month.

The Tories’ shadow Home Secretary Dominic Grieve, said: “Sir Ken has been at the forefront of our counter-terrorism effort for several years, so he knows the security challenges we face.

“This Government’s approach has all too often proved cavalier – unjustified powers, sprawling databases and excessive use of surveillance powers risk undermining both our security and our way of life.”

Sir Ken’s replacement from the end of this month is Keir Starmer, QC, 45, who comes from the Doughty Street chambers, and who made his name for his ground-breaking human rights work.

Chris Huhne, the Liberal Democrats’ home affairs spokesman, said; “Sir Ken has sounded a clarion call for freedom. He is absolutely right to highlight the dangers of a Leviathan state that wants to know all and control all about the citizens it should serve and not master.”

A Home Office spokesperson said: “The Government agrees with the Director of Public Prosecution that technology and Communications Data is critically important in tackling all forms of serious crime as well as in the fight against terrorism.

“The Government also agrees that care is needed to agree what safeguards are needed, in addition to the many we have in place already, to provide a solid legal framework which protects civil liberties.

One pilot said he was seconds away from firing 24 rockets at the object, which moved erratically and gave a radar reading like “a flying aircraft carrier.”

The pilot, Milton Torres, now 77 and living in Miami, said it spent periods motionless in the sky before reaching estimated speeds of more than 7,600 mph (12,000 kph).

After the alert, a shadowy figure told Torres he must never talk about the incident and he duly kept silent for more than 30 years.

His story was among dozens of UFO sightings in defence ministry files released at the National Archives in London.

In a written account, Torres described how he scrambled his F-86 D Sabre jet in calm weather from the Royal Air Force base at Manston, Kent in May 1957.

“I was only a lieutenant and very much aware of the gravity of the situation. I felt very much like a one-legged man in an ass-kicking contest,” he said.

“The order came to fire a salvo of rockets at the UFO. The authentication was valid and I selected 24 rockets.

“I had a lock-on that had the proportions of a flying aircraft carrier,” he added. “The larger the airplane, the easier the lock-on. This blip almost locked itself.”

At the last moment, the object disappeared from the radar screen and the high-speed chase was called off.

He returned to base and was debriefed the next day by an unnamed man who “looked like a well-dressed IBM salesman.”

“He threatened me with a national security breach if I breathed a word about it to anyone,” he said.

The documents contain no official explanation for the incident, which came at a time of heightened tension between the West and the Soviet Union. Planes were on constant stand-by at British bases for a possible Soviet attack.

The files blame other UFO sightings on weather balloons, clouds or normal aircraft. Torres said he had been waiting 50 years for an explanation.

“I shall never forget it,” he told the Times. “On that night I was ordered to open fire even before I had taken off. That had never happened before.”

UFO expert David Clarke said the sighting may have been part of a secret U.S. project to create phantom aircraft on radar screens to test Soviet air defences.

“Perhaps what this pilot had seen was some kind of experiment in electronic warfare or maybe it was a UFO,” he said. “Something very unusual happened.”

Police said they believe the attack is meant as a threat intended to drive oil and gas companies out of the area.

The attack came after letters were sent to local media demanding that oil and gas companies leave the district.

The latest bombing, which was discovered by workers Thursday morning in a remote area outside Dawson Creek, B.C., occurred at a natural gas pipeline owned by EnCana. Police said it was not clear when the blast occurred.

The first blast – also on a sour gas pipeline owned by EnCana Corp. – was discovered on Oct. 12. Police said they believe the two attacks are linked. In both cases, the pipelines were damaged but did not rupture.

RCMP said the second explosion in a “remote and isolated area” caused a small leak in the pipeline, quickly contained by technicians.

“We don’t know if it was an individual or a group of people. We do know there appears to be a motive for it, which is to get oil and gas companies to cease operations and move out of the area,” said RCMP Sgt. Tim Shields.

The latest bombing took place off Highway 2, about 500 metres from the Alberta border. RCMP said the blast left a crater in the ground beneath the pipeline, which carries sour gas – natural gas tainted with toxic hydrogen sulphide.

Had the pipeline ruptured, RCMP said they would have been bracing for the worst.

“We’re certainly operating on the assumption that it would leak,” said Sgt. Tim Shields, RCMP spokesman.

The Dawson Creek Daily News reported that on Oct. 10, it received a letter in a small white envelope with no return address. The letter was handwritten in large print on a sheet of unlined paper.

“We will not negotiate with terrorists which you are as you keep on endangering our families with crazy expansion of deadly gas wells in our home lands,” read part of the letter.

It set a deadline of Oct. 11 for “EnCana and all other oil and gas interests” to close down operations near the community of Tomslake (referred to as “Tom’s Lake” in the letter), and made specific reference to the Steep Rock Plant, a $60-million natural gas project.

In a hastily arranged news conference Thursday, EnCana spokesman Alan Boras said everyone at the company is very concerned.

“These events are very rare. There’s been nothing like this in our company’s history,” he said.

Speaking in Calgary, Boras said the company never received any threatening letters directly.

Boras said damage from the blast was discovered by two electricians who heard a hissing noise coming from the pipeline while doing routine work.

Although almost 30 people living in the area were notified of the leak, Boras said it was an isolated spot and there was never any threat to human health before that section of the pipeline was shut down.

“There was no danger to the public,” he said. “This is rural bush country.”

He added that EnCana has increased security and surveillance in the area, but would not go into details.

Boras said the pipeline carries a relatively small amount of gas, 40 to 50 million cubic feet a day. Company officials occasionally have heard concerns from local residents about sour gas facilities, he said, adding “we work very hard to maintain favourable relations.”

The first explosive device was detonated on a pipeline 50 kilometres east of Dawson Creek. The blast crater was discovered by a hunter Sunday.

Dawson Creek Coun. Paul Gevatkoff, who is one of the city’s oil and gas industry liaisons, said the attacks are dangerous and frustrating for a region dependent on such development.

“This really is an act of terrorism. There’s no other description for it,” he said. “Whoever is behind it, they are trying to terrorize the industry.”

About a quarter of the residents in the area are employed either directly or indirectly by oil and gas companies, he said.

Gevatkoff said he’s not concerned that the attacks will cause oil and gas companies to flee the region.

“It’s more worrisome that it could cause injuries or fatalities,” he said. “If one of these things explodes, it could result in fires.

“That’s what’s more worrisome. I really hope that industry would deal with it . . . as opposed to running from it.”

“Of course we’re worried about it. You’d have to be stupid not to be worried about it,” said Barb, an employee at Dawson Creek’s Silvers Pub. She would not provide her last name.

“It’s scary that people are so accessible to explosives. It’s not a good thing.

“Especially right now with the mess the economy of the world is in, people are hungry and angry. I think the trouble has just begun and I think there’s going to be a whole lot of it.”

Shields said RCMP are looking into possible connections to a wave of “eco-terrorism” in the Peace Country from 1995 to 1998 that is often associated with farmer Wiebo Ludwig, a longtime activist who claimed sour-gas wells adversely affect human health.

Ludwig was released from prison in 2001 after serving two-thirds of a 28-month sentence for five charges related to oilpatch bombing and vandalism.

“It’s something that we will be examining,” Shields said.

The RCMP is asking oil and gas workers in the area to remain extra-vigilant and be on the lookout for any suspicious activity.

No information has been released on the type of explosive used.

Some recent incidents of plots against, and attacks on, industry infrastructure in Canada:

* Oct. 11, 2008

Bomb explosion at an EnCana sour gas pipeline near Dawson Creek, B.C. There was a crater underneath but the pipe was not damaged.

* December 2000

Alfred Heinz Reumayr of New Westminster, B.C., is arrested for plotting to plant 14 bombs along the Trans-Alaska pipeline on the eve of the millennium in 1999. He eventually pleaded guilty and was sentenced to 13 years in American prison in 2008.

* August 1998

Wiebo Ludwig is charged for an explosion at a Suncor oil well near Hinton, Alta., in August. In 2000 he was convicted and sentenced to 28 months in jail.

* 1997

A spokeswoman for Chase said the letters were delivered to three branches in the Denver area and locations in Oklahoma City and Norman, Oklahoma.

Some of the envelopes contained the white powder, Chase spokeswoman Mary Jane Rogers said, and one employee was treated for a rash as a precaution, but it was not clear if the skin irritation was caused by the powder or had already been there.

She identified the Colorado branches as being in Lakewood and Arvada.

Fire Marshal Kevin Ferry of the Cunningham Fire Protection District near Denver said the powder in one package was found to be harmless, though the substance had yet to be identified.

That branch was inside a supermarket in the Denver suburb of Centennial. The supermarket was evacuated as a precaution.

Several bank employees who had close contact with the package were sent to a local hospital for evaluation, he said.

A police department spokesman in nearby Lakewood, Steve Davis, said a white substance found on a parcel there appeared not to be dangerous and resembled talcum powder.

JPMorgan Chase & Co last week surpassed Citigroup Inc to became the largest U.S. bank, and has aggressively acquired other assets as the financial system has weakened, including the banking assets of Washington Mutual Inc.

Rogers said Chase would not release the total number of banks affected until they were sure all the letters had been found.

“We immediately called the FBI and Postal Inspection Service to handle the matter and ensure the safety of our customers and employees,” Rogers said.

“They’re just gentle, curious, fun-loving animals. (They’re) safe around children,” said Dave Swickard of Lonesome Dove Farm.

If you spend a little time around Swickard’s herd, you’ll understand why he’s sold on alpacas.

“You can see it’s compounding without any more initial investment,” Swickard said.

Swickard started three years ago with four breeding females. The Swickards now have 18 alpacas and two guard llamas.

“Breeding stock is where the profitability in the business is at,” Swickard told KMBC’s Bev Chapman.

Females sell for between $10,000 and $25,000. Stud-quality males have sold for six figures.

“You feel that density; you feel that fineness,” Swickard said, referring to the quality of the animals’ coats.

Swickard’s goal as a breeder is to produce the thickest, softest fiber possible for a yarn that is lightweight, warm as wool, and non-allergenic. He’d also like to invest his money in something relatively safe.

“Mortgages,” Swickard said.

Alpacas are one of the oldest domesticated animals on the planet. Their history dates back to the Incas of the South American Andes.

The video is sent from unmanned and manned aircraft to intelligence analysts at ground stations in the United States and abroad. They watch video in real time of people getting in and out of cars, loading trunks, dropping things or picking them up. They can even see vehicles accelerate, slow down, move together or make U-turns.

“The dynamics of an urban insurgency have resulted in a rapid increase in the number of activities visible in the video field of view,” according to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

Although the exploits of the Predator, the Global Hawk and other airborne collectors of information have been widely publicized, there are few authoritative descriptions of what they can see on the ground.

But some insights into the capabilities of the Predator and other aircraft can be drawn from a DARPA paper that describes the tasks of a contractor that will develop a method of indexing and rapidly finding video from archived aerial surveillance tapes collected over past years.

“The U.S. military and intelligence communities have an ever increasing need to monitor live video feeds and search large volumes of archived video data for activities of interest due to the rapid growth in development and fielding of motion video systems,” according to the DARPA paper, which was written in March but released last month.

Last month, Kitware, a small software company with offices in New York and North Carolina, teamed up with 19 other companies and universities and won the $6.7 million first phase of the DARPA contract, which is not expected to be completed before 2011.

During the Cold War, satellites and aircraft took still pictures that intelligence analysts reviewed one frame at a time to identify the locations of missile silos, airplane hangars, submarine pens and factories, said John Pike, director of GlobalSecurity.org, an expert in space and intelligence matters.

“Now with new full-motion video intelligence techniques, we are looking at people and their behavior in public,” he said.

The resolution capability of the video systems ranges from four inches to a foot, depending on the collector and environmental conditions at the time, according to the DARPA paper. The video itself is also shaped by the angle to the ground from which it is shot, although there are 3-D capabilities that allow viewers on the ground to manipulate videos of objects so they can see them from different vantage points.

Systems also exist that allow tracking, moving-target detection of objects under forest or other cover and determination of exact geographic location. Development is underway of systems that allow recognition of faces and gait — in other words, human identification.

Currently, because there are so many activities or objects to be watched for hints of suspicious behavior, “more analysts . . . watch the same, real-time video stream simultaneously,” according to DARPA. “If any of the given activities or objects are spotted, the analyst issues an alert to the proper authorities.”

Future collection systems are expected to provide even more imagery, cover areas greater than 16 square miles and make it more difficult “for a limited number of analysts to effectively monitor and scrutinize all potential activities within the streaming field of view,” DARPA wrote.

Today’s volume of intelligence data, beyond just streaming video, already “makes it very difficult to detect specific events in real time and too time intensive to search archived video,” the DARPA paper said. The effort underway is designed to find a way to index similar activity, then search and retrieve it from archives. The proposed new system should be able to analyze real-time streaming video as it is received in a ground station and match it on command to archived video from more than one video library.