ACLU Sues Over PATRIOT Act

WASHINGTON — The government agreed to tell the American Civil Liberties Union by Jan. 15 which documents it would release about increased surveillance in the United States under a law passed in response to the terrorist attacks.

In response to a suit brought by the ACLU and other groups, the Justice Department also said it would supply a list of documents that it would keep confidential, citing national security concerns. The ACLU could challenge the decision to withhold any documents.

The agreement was reached Tuesday before U.S. District Judge Ellen Segal Huvelle, who is hearing the case growing out of an Aug. 21 request filed under the Freedom of Information Act.

The civil liberties group wants to know how the government is carrying out the USA PATRIOT Act, passed in response to Sept. 11. The new law gives the government new powers to obtain personal information about U.S. citizens in an attempt to stop future terrorist attacks.

ACLU lawyer Jameel Jaffer asked for a specific date for the Justice Department to provide the information, saying that another federal judge set a deadline for the Energy Department to release documents and e-mails concerning Vice President Dick Cheney's energy task force. "It's reasonable to ask for a fixed date," he said.

Justice Department lawyer Anthony J. Coppolino said the government needed until mid-January because the ACLU request was being reviewed by several agencies. He said the government had produced 163 pages of information, but needed to check with the various agencies, including the Immigration and Naturalization Service, intelligence and the criminal division to see if the information could be released.

"This is a matter of great public interest," Huvelle said. "I am not unimpressed by the efforts of the government to comply. The government is moving heaven and earth to get what you want."

The ACLU asked the Justice Department for the number of times it has asked libraries or bookstores for lists of purchases or for the identities of those who have bought certain books; how many times law enforcement officials have entered people's homes without letting them know until later; how many times they have approved phone traces of people not accused of any crimes; and how many times they have investigated Americans for writing letters to newspapers, attending rallies or other First Amendment-protected activities.

That information is ALREADY is existing databases and available for sale.

WRONG!

You have obviously never dealt in the real world of marketing and lawyers. Only a small portion of what companies collect is available for sale. Today, if they sell or give away certain "private" data or any data that the release of which causes you harm, they can be held legally liable, sometimes to the tune of millions of dollars. They have an incentive to severely limit what they give out, to very general things like, everyone in this group bought major appliances within the last 6 months, from a WalMart in North Dallas. Since the data provider wants to limit his liability, he makes certain that the data does not contain specifics, like the exact date or price of the purchase, the exact address where it was delivered or what form of payment was used and especially deleting information like credit card or checking account numbers.

HSA, on the other hand, is written in such a way as to encourage companies to give the government every piece of information that they have about you. You see, once John Poindexter and his Nazis have your data in their hot little hands, the data provider is held harmless against any litigation that might arise out of the release of any of that data. Furthermore, if the government wants to use or release that data, they have only to ask the provider - NOT you - for a written release, with the data provider still being held harmless. To make matters worse, the plan is to ask the data provider to "voluntarily" sign a blanket release, when they provide your data. What company is not going to "voluntarily" sign that blanket release, when the option is to likely face a stringent IRS audit? In effect, there is NO protection against the accidental or intentional release of any of your private data.

But it gets worse. For liability reasons, corporations that have lot's of private customer data on their systems, have very elaborate firewalls that are constantly updated. On the other hand the US government, with all their technology has had many of their servers and web sites breached and most often because of failure to adhere to basic security principles. Even the CIA, DOJ, USAF and Whitehouse web sites have been defaced and that doesn't even begin to touch on the many servers that have been breached.

Now imagine what will happen when this database goes online. Today, the holy grail of hackerdom are the big three credit card companies, American Express, MasterCard and Visa. With all that personal data in one place, that Information Awareness Office (IAO) database will become the new holy grail of hackerdom. But, history shows us that the government, lacking the incentive of liability, often lets their security lapse. So what they will have done is to create by far, the most attractive hacker target ever, with far less security than that same data had when it was spread around thousands of separate commercial databases.

Can you say IDENTITY THEFT?

Unlike the hacker who penetrates the amazon.com system and steals only names and credit card numbers, the hacker who penetrates this abominable database, will be able to get not only your credit card info, but more than enough personal info to completely steal your identity. They will know your spending patterns, so as not to raise suspicion by over-using any one of the new credit cards that they get in your name and they will know where you normally shop, so as to avoid someone who might recognize them as impostors.

But, it gets even worse. The hacker who penetrates one commercial system, usually only gets one of your credit card numbers and uses that number for a few purchases and then discards it. How would you like to go to the mailbox and find that you were being held responsible for bills on 10 or more different credit cards that you had never applied for, to the tune of tens of thousands of dollars? Today, such identity thefts, though anything but rare, are far from common. But, with all of that information in one place, it's only going to be a matter of time, before that database is penetrated and identity theft becomes wide-spread.

This is not just some uninformed hypothesis either. I am a computer security consultant. Before that, I was responsible all US UNIX security for one of the major oil companies. I have been a featured speaker on security issues at computer conferences, both in the us and abroad and have even attended several hacker conventions (know the enemy). The point being that not only do I have experience defending against hackers, but I have probably talked with many of the same people who will be launching those attacks. Not only will they see penetrating the IAO database as a badge of honor among hackers, but depending on their bent for larceny, it could be very lucrative. Some of them hack simply for kicks. But, there are many who would not hesitate to use or sell any info that they download.

The idea of such a database would not be so bad, in a perfect world, where everyone in government could be trusted - yeah, right!. But, the only people who trust everyone in government either live at the funny farm or the have names like Guido and have all the dirt on those in positions of power.

How much do you you trust Hillary or Tom Daschle?

Even if you trust Dubya with that much power (which I certainly don't) can you say as much for the next President or the one after that? How about President Hillary? Remember that any time you allow the government to trample the Constitution and Bill of Rights, even for the most noble of reasons and with the most honest people in power, you must consider the fact that such legislation is never reversed and that sooner or later, an unscrupulous administration will misuse that power. It could be the next administration or the next or even the one after that. But, judging by the fact that the man that Dubya has as the head of the IAO, is convicted Iran/Contra mastermind, John Poindexter, we may not have to wait for the next President.

You make the same mistake that many idealists make. When you read a piece of legislation, you naturally want to think that it will be implemented and always overseen by good, honest conservatives, who will never abuse the power that the legislation gives them. But, the older you become and the more experience you have, the more you realize that when you read a piece of legislation, you must read it with a jaundiced eye. I just keep asking myself, "How would Hillary be able to abuse this legislation?" No matter how noble the cause or what benefits a piece of legislation may offer, it is all for naught if it doesn't pass the Hillary test.

Not only does the HSA fail the Hillary test, but one would think that Title II of the HSA was actually drafted by Hillary, using Nicolai Ceausescu's Romania as a model.

As for fighting terrorism, an integrated database will permit the flagging of people who purchase dual-use items (e.g. diesel and fertilizer, incubators and certain bacteria, etc.).

Using your definition, every farmer in the US would be flagged as a potential terrorist. So would anyone who owns a big diesel pickup and has a large suburban estate. Then, what about people who purchase gunpowder for doing their own loading. The list goes on, but interestingly, it does not contain any potential islamic terrorists. Our own government made the mistake of letting us know, just a few months after the WTC and Pentagon attacks, that the terrorists did not use our banks to launder money, use credit cards for anything more suspicious than lunch, nor participate in any suspicious activity, other than taking flight lessons. In fact, none of Title II would have had any effect on stopping or predicting the 9/11 attacks, had they been in place at the time.

Title II is aimed not at terrorists, but at honest US citizens. I like the idea of allowing pilots to be armed. There are several other good parts to the HSA. All in all, there is actually about 60 pages of positive legislation in the HSA. Unfortunately, there are 475 pages that make up the total package. If the Republicans had really been concerned about the Constitution, they could have easily waited until the beginning of the next session to enact the good parts and leave out the bad. But, by passing this version, both the Democrats and the Republicans showed their true colors...

It's time to start looking for real conservatives to run against most of the incumbents in the next primary.

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