US Plans Huge Computer System To Spy On The Public
from the uh... dept
Well, I'd say the only big surprise on this one is that it's being done so openly. It seems that the US Government has created the Orwellian-named Information Awareness Office to build a huge computer system that will sift through all your private data to determine whether or not you might be a terrorist. They say, of course, that they're concerned about protecting people's privacy, but you can say whatever you want when you've got $200 million a year to build technology to spy on anyone and everyone. If the description of what they're planning to do isn't scary enough, check out their logo. This seems so over the top, my first thought was to check to see if it's April Fool's day. Unfortunately, it seems pretty real. This seems like a huge boondoggle that will make a lot of money for the companies chosen to supply the technology, but which will do little in the way of useful work in protecting anyone (though, it'll turn up all sorts of false positives while destroying individual privacy rights).Thank you for reading this Techdirt post. With so many things competing for everyone’s attention these days, we really appreciate you giving us your time. We work hard every day to put quality content out there for our community.
Techdirt is one of the few remaining truly independent media outlets. We do not have a giant corporation behind us, and we rely heavily on our community to support us, in an age when advertisers are increasingly uninterested in sponsoring small, independent sites — especially a site like ours that is unwilling to pull punches in its reporting and analysis.
While other websites have resorted to paywalls, registration requirements, and increasingly annoying/intrusive advertising, we have always kept Techdirt open and available to anyone. But in order to continue doing so, we need your support. We offer a variety of ways for our readers to support us, from direct donations to special subscriptions and cool merchandise — and every little bit helps. Thank you.
–The Techdirt Team
Reader Comments
Subscribe: RSS
View by: Time | Thread
Committees formed already
Can't you just imagine the score of meetings it took just to get this put together?
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Poindexter
Ollie's other plans during Iran-Contra were to turn FEMA (who are supposed to help clean up after natural disasters) into an enforcement arm for Martial Law in case anti-Contra protestors got in the way.
[ link to this | view in thread ]
The New Total Information Awareness Resource Cente
http://geocities.com/totalinformationawareness
[ link to this | view in thread ]
Re: Poindexter
[ link to this | view in thread ]