Man Who Wants Database Has His Personal Info Splashed On Web!

Wired.COM ^ | December 15 2002 | By Paul Boutin

[ConservativeMan55]

The head of the government's Total Information Awareness project, which aims to root out potential terrorists by aggregating credit-card, travel, medical, school and other records of everyone in the United States, has himself become a target of personal data profiling.

[TomServo]

Already posted here.

[reagandemocrat]

Not only is the logo troubling, but why the name "Babylon" for a government project? Or it's mission statement re: "Story telling, change detection, truth maintenance" and "Biologically inspired algorithms for agent control"?

RD

[summer]

Speaking now as the independent voter I am, who is a former Dem, and posts on FR, here is the most interesting part of the article to me:

The dispute over TIA seems to fall not along straight political party lines, but between advocates and opponents of the government's right to monitor its own citizens. Former President Clinton expressed support for the project in a recent public appearance, while conservative New York Times columnist William Safire recently wrote a pointed editorial criticizing the idea.

One Bush voter, speaking on condition of anonymity, said of the pranks on Poindexter: "If they're making him as uncomfortable as we are, good."

[summer]

Tom, Not many people saw that other thread. I know I missed it! :)

[poindexter]

Payback's a b$$ch!

[Reaganwuzthebest]

Jack Anderson did something similar to J. Edgar Hoover many years ago, going through his garbage the way it was done to Americans by the FBI.

Needless to say the boss didn't like it very much. Goes to show how many in government consider themselves above everyone else.

[summer]

LOL...your name is quite a coincidence here. Perhaps you REALLY know of what you speak! :)

[independentmind]

How many posters here would feel differently about this program if it were instituted under Clinton's administration? We all know that once a program is in place it's very hard to shut down. What do you suppose someone like Hillary would like to do with all of our information?

[summer]

Are any posters HERE actually FOR this program???

[TomServo]

Tom, Not many people saw that other thread.

That's why I redirect to a thread already in progress.

[summer]

And, really, here is where the debate should be moving: towards better border control and preventing illegal immigration. Whichever party runs on THAT platfoirm in 2004 wins.

[summer]

And, really, here is where the debate should be moving: towards better border control and preventing illegal immigration. Whichever party runs on THAT platform in 2004 wins.

[summer]

You lost me a little bit there, but not a problem as I'm running out the door!(There are already more posters on this thread.) :)

[independentmind]

I don't think too many here are overly exercised about it. They'd rather talk inside baseball about whether Trent should stay or go. :)

[summer]

Yeah, but people here get all hot and bothered about the lack of border control, and I agree with that. Why are we moving towards policing our own legal citizens so heavily while allowing anyone under the sun inside the borders???

[Nick Danger]

What do you suppose someone like Hillary would like to do with all of our information?

It is a mistake to think that this capability does not exist now. It does, it's just not concentrated in one knows-all-sees-all government agency.

A firm called HNC Software already sees every credit card transaction you make. They're the folks who run the machine that looks for "patterns" in the data that might indicate credit card fraud. Have you ever been called to the phone to speak to the bank when you try to charge something that's not something you usually do? That's them.

What was done to Poindexter here could be done by any bill collector in the U.S., in fact by anybody with a few bucks. It's all on line right now, from Lexis-Nexis, Seisint, People Search, and many others. You can get the satellite photo of the house from Microsoft's Terraserver.

People act like this "Information Awareness Agency" is going to be some new and frightening thing. Sorry, the new and frightening thing already exists. All these on-line data outfits have XML gateways; if you have enough money, and a business reason for doing so, you could put together the same capability right in your house... today.

[dalereed]

"Don't they keep all your Temporary Internet Files and Cookies, and then sell them to marketers, who in turn create custom pop up ads of things they think you would be interested in?"

They must be selling bad information!

I get dozens of them a day wanting to give me a CC with bad credit, to repair my credit, refinance my home, etc. and i've never in my life bought anything on time, never paid interest on anything except a mortgage and haven't had one of them in 12 years and own 2 homes, and hae a CC with a $25k limit that is paid every month.

[pabianice]

Isn't that the Seal the Gao'uld use?

[ItisaReligionofPeace]

I hate to bust your bubble, but a 25k credit limit isn't a big deal. I know a college student who has never had a real job...and he has around 20k in credit available through his credit cards.

[dalereed]

"and he has around 20k in credit available through his credit cards"

You answered your own response with "cards", there are lots of people that carry multable cards that could add up to $25k and are in hawk up to their eyeballs but those same people couldn't get a single card with a $25k limit if their life depended on it.