Posted on 12/08/2010 9:21:13 PM PST by stolinsky
Credit card companies have computer programs that reject charges which seem unusual because of amount, type of purchase, or location. The companies want to save themselves the trouble and expense of fraudulent charges, but in so doing they also save us, their customers, trouble and expense.
If private companies take the trouble to save themselves and us money, why can’t the U.S. government take the trouble to save our nation from embarrassment and damage to our foreign relations? Why can’t it take the trouble to save our friends overseas, who stuck their necks out to help us, from the very real risk of death? Why can’t it take the trouble to save foreign government officials who helped us from the risk of embarrassment and loss of power?
Why can’t the U.S. government have computer programs that reject the request − and ring alarm bells − when a 22-year-old private first class attempts to download at least 251,287 confidential or secret documents that contain sensitive details of State Department cables from across the globe? Why can’t our government have computer programs that reject requests for documents that seem irregular because of size, type of document, or location?
(Excerpt) Read more at stolinsky.com ...
Because government is inherently inefficient. If Blackwater were in charge of our national security docs, none of these leaks would have happened.
Having worked in the CC merchant services field,...
all I can say is...
this is one of the least smart ideas put forth so far.
Credit Card clearing houses have had billions more files stolen from their distributed databases than the US intelligence/military through the Wikileaks events.
I dunno, I’ve been in all kinds of classified military installations, from live nuclear missile firing facilities(within a couple of feet of “the button”), to the hangar where the first MX re-entry system was being integrated, to intelligence operating centers, to ballistic missile early warning and space track radar sites and nothing compared to security I encountered at a large New York check clearing center.
This whole affair reeks of uncontrolled access and failure of enforcing “need to know”.
When did the security clearance thing stop requiring the “NEED TO KNOW” part?
It seems that if you have been granted a clearance, then you get access to everything.
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