Another privacy-infringing database is on the way
A couple years back, Admiral John Poindexter, former National Security Adviser to President Ronald Reagan, came up with the “brilliant” idea of an Information Awareness Office. It was dreamed up in the wake of September 11, 2001, but before the invasion of Iraq, and it was a spook’s wet dream. Its polite detractors publicly called it a massive Orwellian domestic unwarranted surveillance program. As for the not-so-polite detractors … well, I won’t repeat what they said here. Imagine several sigmas beyond infuriated and you get the general idea.
Naturally, a huge backlash formed against Poindexter’s idea, and as a particularly effective form of protest, opponents released all of the information they could find on John Poindexter that would be stored by the IAO’s Total Information Awareness Program, including his address, life history, social security number, satellite photographs of his house, etc. The satellite photographs were okay, but they didn’t contain any ground level detail of his house. Then I looked at his address — it was only a twenty minute drive from where I lived! Would I? Could I? Dare I?
I was just a teenager at the time, and I was too frightened to risk trespassing and take photos through the house’s windows to more accurately simulate a TIA-level invasion of privacy, so I remained on the public sidewalk. But they were effective nevertheless. The photos made their way into some of the public discourse on the subject, and eventually, the IAO was shelved. I like to think that, in some small part, I had something to do with its demise.
But it looks like the government is at it again, as they always are. The FBI is looking to expand its fingerprint database to include all sorts of other biometrics, and oh, if it’s alright with you, and if those stupid states would just repeal their privacy laws, they’d like to permanently store every set of biometrics checked against the database as well. That last part is what really gets me. I’m only 22 and I’ve never been arrested or charged with a crime, but I’ve already had my fingerprints checked against the FBI’s database several times as a requirement of some of my jobs. The thought of my fingerprints ending up in the FBI database permanently for no other reason than that I was looking for work makes me sick.
The fingerprints aren’t even what really worries me. It’s the other biometric data that they plan on storing, especially the iris of the eye and pictures of the face. Remember the movie Minority Report, in which ubiquitous scanners routinely identify everyone passing through in public? The only way to get real privacy was to have your eyes replaced! Admittedly, that’s a little further into the future, but how about facial recognition? The Germans tested automated facial recognition in a train station in 2006 and they were able to identify over half of the passengers. If the thought of being tracked everywhere you go in public somehow doesn’t frighten you, consider this: should we really be implementing German-style fascism on American shores? Did we win in World War II, or did we agree to give up and join them decades later?
Like John Poindexter’s IAO, I would like to do something to help bring down the FBI’s new program. I don’t know what that is just yet, but I am perfectly placed to do something about it: I’m located just outside the Washington D.C. beltway, near Spook Central. Now if any FBI spooks are reading this, don’t worry, I’m not about to do anything illegal to try to trash your program. Don’t forget that it is the noblest obligation of patriotism to step in and object when your country commits ill deeds. My actions will be totally inside the bounds of the law. Unlike yours.
