Sunday 29 June 2008

FBI's all-seeing database project

“By refusing to answer even the most basic questions about this program, the Department of Justice has given us little choice. In fact, we’re only doing what they told us to do,” said Congressman Brad Miller in a statement. “The Department of Justice... said that if Congress didn’t like what they were doing, we could pull their funding. Well, that’s what we’ve done... Until an agency can provide reasonable explanations, and assurances that our citizens’ privacy won’t be violated, it would be irresponsible to give the Department of Justice this large increase in funds. ”

An FBI project, known as the National Security Analysis Center (NSAC), is supposed to bring together "hundreds of millions of electronic records created or collected by the FBI and other government agencies," ABC News notes. The idea is to use that "vast ocean of data to 'predict' who might be a potential terrorist, in the absence of intelligence linking the man or woman to any radical or extremist group."

sources:
the inquirer
wired

No comments: