Govt Computer Surveillance Rings Alarm Bells

[Snazzy]

Govt Computer Surveillance Rings Alarm Bells
Thu May 27, 2004 12:09 AM ET

By Andy Sullivan
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Nine months after Congress shut down a controversial Pentagon computer-surveillance program, the U.S. government continues to comb private records to sniff out suspicious activity, according to a congressional report obtained by Reuters.

Privacy concerns prompted Congress to kill the Pentagon's $54 million Total Information Awareness program last September, but government computers are still scanning a vast array of databases for clues about criminal or terrorist activity, the General Accounting Office found.

Overall, 36 of the government's 199 "data mining" efforts collect personal information from the private sector, a move experts say could violate civil liberties if left unchecked.

Several appear to be patterned after Total Information Awareness, which critics said could have led to an Orwellian surveillance state in which citizens have little privacy.

....

http://tinyurl.com/2p76b

[ParanoidPat]

1. Did they really disband TIA?

Pay close attention to Rummy's quote! :evilgrin:


CONCEPT PAPER


Working Group on Preventive and Preemptive Military Intervention


William W. Keller and Gordon R. Mitchell1
Project Coordinators

<Snip>

U.S. Senator Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), the ranking Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, called for an FBI investigation into the forgery of documents cited by President Bush and Secretary Powell as proof of Iraq’s nuclear transactions with Niger. As Rockefeller explained in a letter to FBI Director Robert Mueller: “There is a possibility that the fabrication of these documents may be part of a larger deception campaign aimed at manipulating public opinion and foreign policy regarding Iraq.”26

The timeliness of Rockefeller’s proposed inquiry was underscored by the appearance of official documents that lay out official American deception plans: "In a document last autumn, the joint chiefs of staff stressed the need for strategic deception and influence operations as tools of war. The army, navy and air force have been directed to devise plans for information warfare."27

According to defense analyst William Arkin, the Bush strategy lays out goals for information warfare that pursue D5E: "destruction, degradation, denial, disruption, deceit, and exploitation." Arkin notes that the wide array of sites and ractices of information control brought into the range of this policy "blurs or even erases the boundaries between factual information and news, on the one hand, and public relations, propaganda and psychological warfare on the other."28

This fusion of military deception programs with media propaganda efforts enabled the Office of Strategic Influence to commission officers from the U.S. Army's Psychological Operations Command to work as interns in the news division of CNN.29

Eventually, the Bush Administration was burned by the political heat generated when the Office of Strategic Influence was leaked to the media. The ensuing firestorm of controversy prompted Secretary Rumsfeld to close the propaganda unit. Yet less than a year later, Rumsfeld stipulated that his action had only been symbolic, and that information warfare missions were still underway at other Pentagon offices: And then there was the Office of Strategic Influence. You may recall that.
And “oh my goodness gracious isn't that terrible, Henny Penny the sky is going to fall.” I went down that next day and said fine, if you want to savage this thing, fine, I'll give you the corpse. There's the name. You can have the name, but I'm gonna keep doing every single thing that needs to be done and I have.30

The political implications of blurring military strategic deception and public sphere propaganda are worth exploring, given Arkin's concerns about military deception that "while the policy ostensibly targets foreign enemies, its most likely victim will be the American electorate."31

<More>

[Just Me]

8. Good stuff!!! Thanks. I'm printing this doc for study. n/t

[struggle4progress]

10. Yeah, the Rummy quote gives some important info.

[w13rd0]

2. By Andy Sullivan?

This is a different Andy Sullivan than "bareback", right? Or has he really turned against the chimp now?

[countmyvote4real]

3. flip-flop FM FU

That's all I'm gonna say in this thread. (nod nod wink wink)

[SquireJons]

7. No

And I never thought they would.

The shrub mis-administration had one honest moment way back in it's infancy. Sometime around Feb. of 2001 they announced two offices of disinformation. ("We're Lying") This immediately caught flack and was officially disbanded. But of course they weren't disbanded, and every piece of information that comes from the mis-admin comes through that sewer.

So when they shut off funding for the program, it simply meant another 'black budget' item. The most dangerous aspect of TIA (other than it's daddy - Poindexter) is the naivety of it's handlers. Currently it's being used against our 'enemies': foreign, domestic and political. While still being bad, that's not evil - just stupid. But if this thing gets to a next generation, the implications are truly frightening. We may be creating our very own Frankenstein's Monster here.

[anarchy1999]

12. You think?

It's already a done deal. It already is at the next generation. Be an activist and see how easy it is to get on a plane. Do you feel safer now that you have had to take off your shoes and watch your kids be searched? Is this the America you grew up in or that you want, in the name of security?

I am the out of custody mom of a 16 year old daughter. Prior to the infamous 9/11 I flew her to see me once a month. After 9/11 the two commuter airlines flying out of the airport closest to her quit flying. No more trips to see Mom, for 2 years now. When she does get to fly to see me, she goes through the "big" search, her ticket is apparently marked. She now calls it routine. My heart breaks. She is just a kid, non=threatening in every way.

The worst part is watching what we go through to get through the gate and watching what her load on suitcases do not go through in the way of inspections. I want every suitcase and package going into the cargo hold examined! Do any of you know what percent is screened? 1% nationwide. I don't like to have my daughter get on a plane, no matter how many shoes they inspect!!!!!!!

Sherry

[SquireJons]

17. I mean MORE scary

What you have described is a loss of personal liberty. Such things have come and gone, even in this country. But what I'm talking about is much worse. Kind of like the science fiction movie where the computers handling our nukes teams up with the computer handling the soviet nukes and runs the world. I know it sounds nuts but remember, we are in it's infancy here.

I read that part of the TIA system was being researched at the University of South Carolina. They are installing cameras connected to powerful computers that can analyze a persons gait to identify them. They claim that it is already accurate 80% of the time. And this is just one of several programs underway. Give it 30 years and what will we be looking at? Is someone using 1984 as a blueprint?

[goforit]

4. No check and balances = no police .......(longing for 1776!!!!)

Oh well........

[SquireJons]

5. Hold Tight

The checks and balances are there. It's just that they are being ignored by government authorities right now. But be patient. There is a time between when the rat takes the cheese and when the metal hits the back of the neck. We are in that time period now.

Most often, scandals need time to take hold. It's sad that so many people die and suffer while the awareness of the problem grows, but such is human nature. I honestly believe that a major correction is coming next November. Then the apparatus will be properly used against those who hijacked America. I want to see Cheney and Rumsfeld in jail.

[salin]

6. What, the Pentagon (and Executive Branch)

overstepping their constitutional authority - stepping around Congress - what a shock?! Sorta like diverting allocated funds away from the operations in Afghanistan (and by extension - to disrupt alqeada and catch Osama) to start planning for Iraq and then lying to Congress about it?

[mulethree]

14. kinda like

disgracing a Reagan National Security Advisor, convicting him of conspiracy, lying to congress and other stuff. But then keeping him on the defense payroll through DARPA contracts while he explores ways to deceive and target american citizens en-mass.

Then - oops - someone left his crypt door ajar a few administrations later and he got out in the daylight again. Now they have re-buried him and have to try and sanitize and re-secret the programs of his. Problem is he made people look and now a dozen more programs start to look sleazy when people imagine what uses a really evil fiend might do with them.

Hopefully they will restrict what government can do with information and will turn the same eye to what companies like choicepoint, equifax and other do. I strongly object to some company selling my driving record, grocery preferences, vacation habits, EZ-PASS records or anything else of mine. It's bad enough getting junk mail from 6 car dealerships because they all somehow know I have a Ford whose warranty has just expired and all want to be the first to offer me a trade-in deal. Another dozen 'welcome to the neighborhood' type junk mails after I moved.

[monobrau]

9. I've got something you can sniff

Nothing to hide here, assholes. We will bring down your incompetent and corrupt administration.

[dArKeR]

11. U.S. government still data mining, GAO says - MSGOP

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/5077342/

[Pachamama]

13. I'm sure the mine the DU daily...and try to find out who we are....

...if they aren't now, they will soon...

[moondust]

15. Any bets they are using

IP address tables/searches with forced or voluntary cooperation of ISPs?

[dusty64]

16. Even the very few

times the rightwing Congress says no, they ignore it.