The specter of data warehouses

Wish I'd said that!

[Reprinted from Issues & Views July 15, 2002]

In the name of preventing foreign terrorism, the FBI has turned away from the likeliest targets of foreign terrorism investigations--foreigners--and instead diverted precious resources to surveilling law-abiding American citizens in the hopes that a "vacuum cleaner" approach to intelligence gathering will prevent future acts of terrorism on our soil. The logic goes something like this--if we suck up enough information, we can sort through it all and "connect the dots" later. If the irrelevant information were immediately destroyed after the FBI completes an investigation, this method would be less of an issue. Unfortunately, the domestic Guidelines contain no provisions for the management of data after it is no longer needed. If the Guidelines remain unchanged, the specter of vast FBI data warehouses containing information of the most sensitive and personal nature will be on the horizon very soon. . . .

The ramping up of indiscriminate data collection could make the job of terrorists, who often use insiders to gain access to sensitive information, far easier. Some of the information may not even be factually accurate, or when interpreted outside of its proper context, could lead to blackmailing or harassment of American citizens.

-- Christopher Kilmer, summer research associate at the Free Congress Foundation's Center for Technology Policy.

Copyright © 2008 Issues & Views