CIA knowingly bought flawed software for drone attacks

[Jeffersons Ghost]

CIA allegedly bought flawed software for attacks

The CIA allegedly purchased flawed targeting software for drone missile attacks on suspected terrorists--software it knew was faulty, and that could misdirect attacks by as much as 39 feet--according to a report in The Register based on claims made in a lawsuit.

The suit, filed by a Massachusetts-based company called Intelligent Integration Systems (IISI), involves another Massachusetts company, Netezza, The Register said in its report today. Netezza, a data warehousing company IBM has made a bid to buy, allegedly got a $1.18 million purchase order from the CIA last year to provide data warehouse appliances for use in drones, according to The Register. When combined with IISI's "Geospatial" software, the devices can be used to track movement of cell phones and pinpoint peoples' exact locations in real time, The Register said.

However, the IISI software does not run on the latest version of the Netezza appliance, which the CIA was purchasing, and when IISI said it couldn't port its software to Netezza's next-generation device fast enough for the CIA, Netezza allegedly met the CIA's demands on its own, with an "illegally and hastily reverse-engineered" version of IISI's code, The Register said. Despite knowing of flaws in the hacked software, the CIA acquired it, the news site reported the lawsuit as saying.

"My reaction was one of stun, amazement that they want to kill people with my software that doesn't work," IISI Chief Technology Officer Richard Zimmerman is quoted as saying in a deposition. The Register said Zimmerman was responding to an alleged comment by the CIA that it would accept untested IISI code in chunks.


Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-27080_3-20017809-245.html#ixzz10pfxfsQ9

[indepat]

1. Imagine if some other nation purchased flawed software for their drones directed at terrorist

targets in America and those drones missed the target by 39 feet and killed innocent civilians instead, just imagine how Americans would probably get their hackles up and surreptitiously start calling such attacks terrorism. Ah, how sweet the duplicitous dichotomy of it all when we attempt to deceive but only delude ourselves. :banghead:

[Jeffersons Ghost]

2. and after calling it terrorism US citizens would take up arms to kill the oppressors

[dixiegrrrrl]

3. Does 39 feet really matter in a drone bombing?

Serious question.
I have no clue how big of a foot print a drone attack makes.

[Jeffersons Ghost]

4. it matters a great deal in a small village. the ordinances are designed to take out one hut...

39 feet means you hit the wrong hut

[DirkGently]

5. Richard Holbrooke was on Maddow last night,claiming we could hit the producers (standing in

the studio) and spare he and Rachel. Part of the supposed moral excuse for non-military CIA officers conducting targeted killings without a declared war or any civilian oversight is that we always get "the bad people," and only "the bad people." The fact is, we're blowing up Pakistani civilians (and according to one report, American citizens) left and right, and selling this to the public as some kind of sanitzied, ethical Robo-War in which no innocent blood is shed. Which is bullshit.

[unblock]

6. show me software that isn't flawed, and i'll show you software that doesn't do much of anything.

being unaware of any specific bugs doesn't mean they're not there.

still, this particular case is, um, egregious....

[Jeffersons Ghost]

7. the article isn't specific on the flaws...

But it did state that it had to do with targeting