Posted on 11/24/2004 10:11:04 PM PST by 26lemoncharlie
As part of the effort to keep America secure from future acts of violence, the U.S. is looking at monitoring Internet chat rooms to identify potential terrorists.
According to CNET News.com, the CIA is quietly funding research into surveillance of online discussion halls.
In April 2003, the intelligence agency reportedly agreed to finance a series of research projects that newly disclosed government documents indicate were intended to create "new capabilities to combat terrorism through advanced technology."
One of the projects at the Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, N.Y., centers on profiling the behavior of those who talk in chat rooms.
The money is said to come from the National Science Foundation, but the CIA was part of the process for choosing which parties would receive the research grants.
It's unclear, though, how far into the future the CIA will continue its relationship, as an official said the two-year agreement was unlikely to be renewed for the 2005 fiscal year.
"Probably we won't be working with the CIA anymore at all," NSF program director Leland Jameson told CNET. "I think that people have moved on to other things."
The disclosure of the CIA's involvement is raising the eyebrows of some privacy advocates.
"The intelligence community is changing the priorities of scientific research in the U.S.," Marc Rotenberg, director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, or EPIC, told CNET. "You have to be careful that the National Science Foundation doesn't become the National Spy Foundation."
But Al Teich, director of science and policy programs at the American Association for the Advancement of Science, said he doesn't have a problem with the CIA's financing of research on terrorism in general.
"I don't know about chat-room surveillance, but doing research on issues related to terrorism is certainly legitimate," Teich said. "Whether the CIA ought to be funding research in universities in a clandestine manner is a different issue."
Very good advice I'll have to remember!! A fresh cup of coffee too!
Enough!!, I've gained 10lbs just reading your post !!
DU would be a good starting point.
Absolutely! DU is THE best funded terrorist breeding website in the United States.
The chat rooms there are a vast collection of virulent anti-American psychopaths.
The only time I went there was one time Conspiracy Guy asked me to sign up and trash his poetry(as a gag). Ten minutes was enough for me....truly sick, sick people.
That is more or less my time limit also for Democrat Underground sewer browsing. These people truly HATE the United States.
Chat rooms are ephemeral.....
We've been monitoring Free Republic for years.
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