Is IT abuse a threat to democracy?

[Omaha Steve]

http://blogs.zdnet.com/Murphy/?p=1119

April 17th, 2008

Here’s a bit from a Washington Post report dated Dec 22/07 and headlined “FBI Prepares Vast Database Of Biometrics”:

CLARKSBURG, W. Va. — The FBI is embarking on a $1 billion effort to build the world’s largest computer database of peoples’ physical characteristics, a project that would give the government unprecedented abilities to identify individuals in the United States and abroad.

Digital images of faces, fingerprints and palm patterns are already flowing into FBI systems in a climate-controlled, secure basement here. Next month, the FBI intends to award a 10-year contract that would significantly expand the amount and kinds of biometric information it receives. And in the coming years, law enforcement authorities around the world will be able to rely on iris patterns, face-shape data, scars and perhaps even the unique ways people walk and talk, to solve crimes and identify criminals and terrorists. The FBI will also retain, upon request by employers, the fingerprints of employees who have undergone criminal background checks so the employers can be notified if employees have brushes with the law.

“Bigger. Faster. Better. That’s the bottom line,” said Thomas E. Bush III, assistant director of the FBI’s Criminal Justice Information Services Division, which operates the database from its headquarters in the Appalachian foothills.

I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand the FBI is on our side - one of the organizational good guys. On the other, this kind of thing is heir to the political version of Murphy’s law: “if it can be abused, it will be abused.”

As bureaucracy will have it, however, there’s very little reason for immediate concern because the bidding was limited to the usual suspects -companies with essentially 100% records of sub-par delivery - and finally went to the people running the current fingerprint system: Lockheed Martin’s Transportation and Security Solutions branch.

As I’ve argued before the underlying thinking here reflects a hundred years of police and national government procedure - all of which evolved before information technology came along and all of which is hopelessly inappropriate to our world today. Unfortunately that won’t stop anyone: instead this project will waste a billion or more taxpayer dollars gradually achieving mediocrity.

FULL story at link.

[Adsos Letter]

1. Interesting...

~snip~ "I have mixed feelings about this. On the one hand the FBI is on our side - one of the organizational good guys. On the other, this kind of thing is heir to the political version of Murphy’s law: “if it can be abused, it will be abused.” ~snip~

This is exactly what makes so much of the technological advances so maddening...they have great potential for good, if used appropriately. Who wouldn't like to see a more effective system for combating crime; and, concurrently, decreasing the incidence of wrongful incarceration?

It is in our inability to ensure that they WILL be used appropriately, and that crimes will not be equated with rights guaranteed under the Constitution...therein lies the rub.

The makeup of the SCOTUS is of crucial importance, if only more citizens would realize it.

[hyphenate]

2. I will read the story later

But my initial impression is skepticism. No matter how much we hope the technology can help us, there is always the chance that it will be abused at some point down the line. We have been lucky that some crime-fighting tools have been mostly transparent in that their use hasn't been able to use stereotypes as much--fingerprinting, for example, which, up to now hasn't been racially based (which might change--who knows?), and such things related wholly to a crime scene, such as fibers, shoe prints, and such. Since the technology that has grown has been beneficial in many ways, some of the older deductions have been overturned, and with DNA testing, we've been able to exonerate many people who were convicted on less scientific means, and in many cases, that means the racial profile of "young black man" has been resolved. Still racial prejudice exists.

But once we get further along in technology, we will find that we will need to readjust our thinking even more. DNA testing, on a case to case basis, has proven to be immensely successful, but the chance for abuse exists exponentially to the amount of data collected.

Racial profiling is already in use, and we are well aware that some segments of the population are being burdened with further suspicion, even though there is no evidence of complicity. What will happen we don't know, but if the trend continues down the line, we could see more racial prejudice, and perhaps questionable use of the data.

Our rights are being tread upon by this administration already, affecting both the unaware and the so-called "criminals." With the invasion of privacy we're experiencing now, the right to have any kind of personal life is diminished--how that's going to change, I don't know. But it's scary now without exercising the imagination any further.