What spies need: more computers, nominee says

[alp227]

Source: CNN

Washington (CNN) -- Improved technology would go a long way in helping intelligence analysts connect the dots and prevent terrorist attacks, according to the man who is nominated to become the nation's chief intelligence officer.

But James Clapper acknowledges that there are also serious cultural roadblocks as well as legal issues that stymie efforts to share pertinent information across the intelligence community.

Clapper, a retired Air Force lieutenant general who is the Defense Department's chief intelligence officer, has been chosen by President Obama to be the nation's fourth director of national intelligence.

The intelligence community was faulted last year for failing to connect bits of information within various agencies that might have prevented the deadly attack at Fort Hood, Texas, and the attempt to blow up a Northwest Airlines flight headed for Detroit, Michigan, on December 25.

Read more: http://www.cnn.com/2010/US/07/23/spies.computers/index.html

[Toucano]

1. There's already too much spyware!

LOL. Couldn't resist.

[Fearless]

2. More defense spending!!!!

:banghead:

[Downwinder]

3. They can't keep track of the computers they have. Computers cannot

replace intelligence.

[shraby]

4. The reason they need more is because someone keeps

stealing the ones they have..not to mention the ones they just simply lose.

[mike r]

5. Yes. We need 133,435 additional supercomputers and 1,895,760 additional Top Secret Americans

to operate them.

[Crowman1979]

6. How about less constitutionally intrusive spying and mass profiling.

So you can pay more attention to ACTUAL THREATS! Not ignoring a father's message that his son is going to blow up a plane would be a start.

[Crowman1979]

7. I sense a multi-billion dollar government contract.

[Proletariatprincess]

8. Typical.

Whether its business or government, there is always a huge effort to replace personel with technology. I can't help believe that this is due to the cozy relationships between the producers of the gadgets and bells and whistles, and the employer.(ie: the boss's brother in law is a major producer of the bell or whistle...even at the government level) What happens then is that there aren't enough people on the payroll to operate the technology or, in this case, analyize the results.
Having said all that, we don't need anymore spys and we shouldn't be spending a penny on spy toys. I would like to see the CIA and DOHLS completely eliminated....
Well...I can dream.....
:hide:

[boppers]

9. We have enough computers, we don't have smart enough programmers.

This isn't a hardware problem, it's a wetware problem, where most of the analysts involved can't program their way out of a wet paper bag.... so we have tons of data, but not enough people who know how to automate processing of that data.

[jmowreader]

10. They need BETTER technology, not more of it

Not only will the computers at the White Spy agency not talk to the ones at the Black Spy agency, the computers on the first floor of the White Spy Agency won't talk to the ones on the second floor. Every group has different software. (In Berlin, I worked in an office with nine PCs in it--this was back when we were running DOS--and every one of those computers had a different, and incompatible, word processor. Imagine having nine word processors loaded to be able to get your job done. Worse, the people on the first floor had a different five word processors, the third floor had three, in the command building there were four, comm center had six...and OMG we haven't even started on the poor bastards who had Wangs sitting on their desks. Those had some weird Wangwriter that was compatible with absolutely nothing, including itself.)

How do we fix it? Dunno. Maybe put the Mod 40 teletypes back in.

[Anakin Skywalker]

11. Really? Won't They Just Use It.....

to surf for porn instead? :) Just sayin'.

[scentopine]

12. The more they spy on us - the more they maintain their power, the more we become like slaves -nt