Illinois Governor Signs Law Banning Cops From Performing Background Searches On Public Speakers

from the hey,-this-is-the-1st-Amendment.-have-you-met? dept

The Chicago PD has a host of problems. Ones that have gone unaddressed for years and appear to remain unaddressed even after the federal government has been forced to step in. Misconduct goes unpunished, investigations into officers are left uncompleted, the PD buys surveillance tech with forfeiture funds to dodge its oversight, and it operated a CIA-style black site in the city where arrestees and their rights vanished with alarming regularity.

For years, the Chicago PD has also apparently investigated citizens who speak at public meetings. A 2019 investigation by the Chicago Tribune, aided by public records requests, uncovered this secret attack on the First Amendment.

Documents obtained by the Tribune under a public records request show the Police Department gathered the details on nearly 60 people in advance of their speaking at monthly meetings of the Chicago Police Board since at least January 2018. A police spokesman said the background checks go back further, to at least 2013.

The checks appear to be extensive, with police searching at least one internal department database to determine if speakers have arrest or prison records, warrants outstanding for their arrest, investigative alerts issued for them by the department and even if they’re registered sex offenders or missing persons. Police also searched comments that speakers had previously made on YouTube or on their Facebook and Twitter accounts, among other internet sites, the documents show.

Among those subjected to background checks were a woman who alleged she was sexually assaulted decades ago by a Chicago police officer, a community activist who gained prominence after the fatal shooting of Laquan McDonald by a police officer and a 77-year-old man known for his frequent, flamboyant rants on a variety of topics at public meetings across the city.

It actually goes back further than 2013. Other public records indicate the Chicago PD has been doing this for more than 15 years, beginning in 2006.

The background searches only targeted certain speakers at certain public meetings: those wishing to express their opinion during comment sessions hosted by the PD's oversight. Upon revelation of this practice, Police Superintendent Eddie Johnson offered up two useless comments. First, he claimed the PD had never acted on this information. Then he promised to end it, but seemingly because it was a pointless exercise in police overreach.

“I don’t think we have a reason at this point to continue it," said Johnson, who often attends Police Board meetings with members of his command staff. "It’s done.”

It's really done now -- at least as far as one background search database goes. The involuntary decision to end the practice of running searches on public speakers has been codified.

Gov. J.B. Pritzker on Friday signed into law a measure that makes it illegal for police to use at least one commonly searched law enforcement database to conduct criminal background checks on citizens who sign up to speak at public meetings statewide.

[...]

The new law, which goes into effect immediately, bars police agencies throughout Illinois from conducting background checks on citizens “for the sole reason” of that person speaking “at an open meeting of a public body, including police disciplinary boards.”

But the bill only forbids use of the LEADS (Law Enforcement Agencies Database System) database for these searches. It doesn't prevent the Chicago PD (and other agencies) from using other criminal record/background check databases they have access to. There's also a public safety exception that allows cops to run searches if they "reasonably" believe a speaker is a security threat or may engage in criminal conduct. That's a pretty massive exemption and one that can be abused without officers fearing they may be punished by employers that have shown little interest in punishing them for their misconduct.

However, if LEADS is used and an officer can't find a way to justify the search, there are actual consequences. A violation of the law can lead to 30 days in jail and a fine of up to $1,500. Considering how hesitant governments are about punishing their own, it seems unlikely we'll see many officers punished for violating this new ban. If the cops want to dig up dirt on public speakers, they'll find a way to do it. The better deterrent is something law enforcement agencies can't control: speakers are allowed to sign up to speak at meetings 15 minutes ahead of its start, rather than 24 hours prior. That gives some power back to the people, making it far more difficult for dossiers to be compiled by police officers more interested in abusing their powers than respecting people's rights.

Filed Under: background checks, chicago, chicago pd, free speech, illinois, intimidation, police, public meetings

University Hires Sports Info Director, Fires Him Two Hours Later After Local Paper Googles His Name

from the google-is-your-friend dept

It's sometimes amazing to me how many organizations have so much trouble with background checks. Granted, there's a lot to look through, and you don't want to inadvertently overstep the bounds of reasonableness. That said, it seems to me it's common practice these days to at least run a name through a Google search and make sure nothing horribly damning comes up as a result. I plan on doing this with my future children, in fact, shortly after I name them, just to make sure they weren't up to any gangster crap while in the womb.

Actually, given this recent story about the University of Great Falls in Montana involving their hiring of a Sports Information Director and then firing him after a local paper Googled his name, perhaps there's a business opportunity in all this.

UGF, whose athletic programs compete in the NAIA, introduced [Todd] Brittingham as the school's new SID and marketing director in a news release. The Great Falls Tribune set out to learn more about him. Presumably they first searched his name. Presumably they found what anyone can find, on the first page of the search results—stories from 2012 about Brittingham pleading guilty to charges stemming from a relationship with a 16-year-old student at the Kansas high school where he was teaching and coaching.

In the end, Brittingham copped a plea to endangering a child and giving alcohol to a minor in exchange for the drop of felony diddling a child charges. Justice! In any case, as you can imagine, the university wasn't terribly pleased at learning about this and fired Brittingham post-haste.

Gary Ehnes, athletic director at UGF, said he was stunned by the news. He said he was the one responsible for the hire.

"I'm devastated. You do a background check on a guy and figure that's going to do it. But I guess we have to go further than that," Ehnes said.

Go further? No, a Google search isn't going further than a background check, a background check is going further than a Google search. You probably shouldn't move to step two until you complete step one, especially when step one is the first thing we all do before going on a first date. That's why I'm thinking of opening Timothy Geigner's Step One Background Checks. Think of the money! I can contract with unwitting public institutions to perform simple Google searches for prospective employees. Sounds ridiculous, but there's obviously a need for this service, and for once it's a business need I can actually fulfill. Capitalism, people!

Filed Under: background checks, search, todd brittingham
Companies: google, university of great falls

St. Louis Police Officers Caught Running Possibly Politically-Motivated Background Checks On Police Board Members

from the access-denied dept

The problem with access to other people's personal data is that the potential for misuse is ever present. This is inherent in any system, whether it's the NSA's or a local politician's -- simply because humans are humans. The solution is accountability, not layers of bureaucratic control. That's what appears to be the focus in this story of alleged background check abuse by St. Louis County police officers, which is a good start.

Two St. Louis county police officers who were assigned to the detail of County Executive Charles Dooley have had their access to a criminal database suspended while an investigation over whether they were running unauthorized background checks, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The officers are specifically accused of running such a check on a former candidate for the police board, a body that’s theoretically supposed to supervise officers.

Internal affairs is now investigating the two officers in order to determine why it was accessed and if there was any additional abuse. County police chief Tom Fitch found himself questioning the motivations and actions of these two officers after they were inadvertently "outed" by a member of Dooley's office.

Questions first arose in October when Dooley’s chief of staff, Garry Earls, announced to the county council that a criminal background check into former police board candidate David Spence had come back clean, County Chief Tim Fitch said.

Fitch said he had questioned how the county administration would know that information because he didn’t believe it was his officers’ place to run the checks.

Officers running background checks on their own supervisors isn't a good idea, especially when it gives the unauthorized access the appearance of being politically motivated -- and possibly ordered by a county official. (This has been denied, of course.) Simply running a check for any other reason than "criminal justice" is itself illegal. And now Fitch is trying to figure out who else these officers have "checked out" in violation of policy.

At this point, the two officers must ask a supervisor to run names for them and have no access to the REGIS database. Until further details emerge, this at least prevents misuse by the two accused of unauthorized access. Whether there's evidence of more abuse remains to be seen. On the downside, Chief Fitch is being rather cagey with details on how much abuse has been uncovered.

Fitch would not say how many names the officers ran during their time assigned to Dooley’s detail, citing the ongoing internal investigation.

“The number (of names) isn’t important,” he said. “What’s important is why it was done and who asked them to do it.”

Understandably, some details need to be withheld during an ongoing investigation, but Fitch is a bit off when he says the total number isn't important. Checks that complied with department policy obviously don't matter, so it's only the total number that fall outside compliance that anyone's worried about. That number matters just as much as the "why." The "who" behind it matters as well, although the accused officers still had the option to say "no" if they were indeed asked to break the rules.

While it's refreshing to see a police chief unwilling to downplay his officers' misconduct, the intensity must be maintained not only through this investigation, but going forward to ensure incidents like these become rarer and rarer. And if it turns out that the database was frequently misused, the consequences need to be as severe as the abuse.

Filed Under: abuse, background checks, police, politics, st. louis

DOJ Says Company That Vetted Snowden Faked 665,000 Background Checks

from the well-of-course dept

When we last checked in on USIS, the contracting firm which large parts of the federal government and the intelligence community used to conduct background checks on employees (including Ed Snowden), we noted that it had been caught falsifying reports and claiming to have interviewed dead people. At the time, we noted at least one USIS employee had been accused of submitting 1,600 falsified credit reports. But, apparently, the story goes much, much deeper. The DOJ is now accusing USIS of faking background checks on 665,000 federal employees.

Not only that, but the practice of scamming the government seems to have been the official policy of the organization, clearly described in various emails. Basically, USIS was paid based on each completed background check, and realized it was a lot more profitable to "complete" them by not doing most of the actual work (pricey!) and just take the money (profits!).

Beginning in at least March 2008 and continuing through at least September 2012, USIS management devised and executed a scheme to deliberately circumvent contractually required quality reviews of completed background investigations in order to increase the company’s revenues and profits. Specifically, USIS devised a practice referred to internally as “dumping” or “flushing,” which involved releasing cases to OPM and representing them as complete when, in fact, not all ROIs comprising those cases had received a quality review as required by the Fieldwork Contracts.

USIS engaged in the practice of dumping in order to meet budgeted goals and, therefore, increase its revenues and profits. Given that USIS was paid by OPM for each completed case, the more cases USIS completed each month the more money it received from OPM. USIS’s dumping practices also enabled the company to receive annual performance incentive payments that it would not otherwise have been entitled to receive absent the dumping

Oh, and it became so profitable, they set up a computer program to help them defraud the government and not complete background checks. No joke.

Initially, USIS would dump cases manually. Soon after the dumping started, however, USIS began using a software program called Blue Zone to assist in the dumping practices. Through Blue Zone, USIS was able to identify a large number of background investigations, quickly make an electronic “Review Complete” notation indicating that the ROIs at issue had gone through the review process even if they had not, and then automatically release all of those ROIs to OPM with the “Review Complete” notation attached. By using Blue Zone, USIS was able to substantially increase the number of background investigations that could be dumped in a short time period.

You have to hand it to them. Not only did they figure out how to scam the government, they sure as hell did it efficiently. That's the American spirit at work!

In fact, it appears this became a key part of how USIS worked. Originally, it would only "dump" unfinished cases at the end of each day if it was behind schedule. But, later it realized it could get paid more by dumping these cases repeatedly during the day. No need to build up a queue, just dump... and get paid.

The DOJ also has emails showing that senior management was well aware this was going on and even participated or encouraged the activity.

Internal USIS documents confirm that USIS Senior Management was aware of and directed the dumping practices. For example, in one undated internal document, a USIS employee discussing the dumping practices stated: “They will dump cases when word comes from above, such as from [the President of Investigative Service Division] and [the President/CEO]. In the past, [the President of Investigative Service Division] and [the President/CEO] have told us to clear out our shelves in order to hit revenue. When this is done they will dump all [priority code] 6. If [the President of Investigative Service Division] and [the President/CEO] tell them they need to clear out more then they will dump [priority code] 5’s.... Last July through September we were dumping all [priority code] 4, 5, and 6’s per [the President of Investigative Service Division] and [the President/CEO].”

Another email chain dated September 16 and 17, 2010 involving USIS’s Vice President of Field Operations and its President of Investigative Service Division, among others, discussed the need to dump cases to meet revenue goals. The Vice President of Field Operations referenced USIS’s revenue situation as “[w]e all own this baby, and right now we are holding one ugly baby.” The USIS Workload Leader in Western Pennsylvania forwarded that email to the Director of National Quality Assurance and the Quality Control Manager in Western Pennsylvania and responded: “The only two things we can do in review to get them out faster is to (a) hire or (b) dump.... I don’t know if there’s any other levers left to flip other than dumping everything we know is bad. Just a side note, the more MSPC [Master Scheduling Production Control] rams through, the more the field will transmit sub-standards, and the more [the number of cases needing secondary review] will go up. Come EOM [End of Month], if they’re going to tell us to just dump all those cases anyways without a proper review, which [sic] will only make that ugly baby even uglier...”

There's also an email in which a "Workload Leader" tells the top "quality" assurance execs:

"Shelves are as clean as they could get. Flushed everything like a dead goldfish."

Oh, and another:

"t'is Flushy McFlushershon at his merry hijinks again!! **leprechaun dance**...I'm not tired..."

So, remember, folks, when Senator Dianne Feinstein insists the NSA would never abuse your privacy because they're professional, just realize that many of those "professionals" might not have actually gone through a background check, because it was taking away profits from a private contractor to actually do its job.

Filed Under: background checks, doj
Companies: usis

TSA Security Checks Begin Long Before Travelers Arrive At The Airport

from the more-data-stockpiling-and-careless-dissemination dept

The TSA may not be privately concerned about the average flier's desire to hijack the flight he or she is boarding, but that hasn't dissuaded it from continually ratcheting up the invasiveness of its pre-boarding procedures. Between the spilling of breast milk/baby formula and the casual groping of toddlers, attractive women and anyone with a visible medical condition, the TSA has "brusquely and barely competently invasive" nailed down.

But that's just what's going on between the airport exit and your departing flight. The New York Times reports that there's an entire level of pre-boarding screening going on well before you hit the airport.

The Transportation Security Administration is expanding its screening of passengers before they arrive at the airport by searching a wide array of government and private databases that can include records like car registrations and employment information.

While the agency says that the goal is to streamline the security procedures for millions of passengers who pose no risk, the new measures give the government greater authority to use travelers' data for domestic airport screenings. Previously that level of scrutiny applied only to individuals entering the United States…

It is unclear precisely what information the agency is relying upon to make these risk assessments, given the extensive range of records it can access, including tax identification number, past travel itineraries, property records, physical characteristics, and law enforcement or intelligence information.

At what point does someone "who poses no risk" start feeling offended the TSA is doing deep read on his or her financial and employment background? The TSA already has the PreCheck program, which allows fliers to pay money to reclaim civil liberties removed by the agency's security theater.

Those who haven't joined this select group are still receiving very thorough vetting (even when flying domestically) but without gaining any of the benefits the one benefit of extensive pre-screening: speedier passage through security. The TSA says these background checks "streamline" the process, but if so, the results are nearly imperceptible to travelers. Of course, this lack of noticeable change may be due to the TSA's bold plan to speed up things slightly sometime before 2015.

The T.S.A. has emphasized its goal of giving 25 percent of all passengers lighter screening by the end of next year, meaning they can keep their shoes and jackets on, wait in separate lines and leave laptop computers in their bags.

While we're all waiting for a one-quarter of travelers to start breezing through security, the extensive background checks will continue on all fliers, with the collected data being shared indiscriminately with other government agencies and private businesses.

Much of this personal data is widely shared within the Department of Homeland Security and with other government agencies. Privacy notices for these databases note that the information may be shared with federal, state and local authorities; foreign governments; law enforcement and intelligence agencies — and in some cases, private companies for purposes unrelated to security or travel.

For instance, an update about the T.S.A.'s Transportation Security Enforcement Record System, which contains information about travelers accused of "violations or potential violations" of security regulations, warns that the records may be shared with "a debt collection agency for the purpose of debt collection."

If you're one of those unlucky travelers who receive the algorithmically-generated "please extensively search this flier" designation (or return home from a trip to find your voicemail full of calls from collections agencies), there's not much you can do about it. There's an official "Traveler Redress Inquiry Program," but as we've noted before, it's low on functionality and long on officious uselessness.The TRIP provides minimal details in response to inquiries, if it can be bothered to respond at all. Those on no-fly lists (or those that suspect they might be) receive letters that refuse to "confirm nor deny" the inquirer's inclusion on this super-secret list.

Add the TSA to the long list of agencies gathering tons of data on Americans simply because they have the technology and the opportunity. Supposedly this invasion of privacy will pay off in an incremental speed improvement at airport security checkpoints sometime in the next year or two. The resulting payoff in increased security will continue to hover right around nil for the foreseeable future.

Filed Under: background checks, civil liberties, privacy, tsa

CIA Warned About Snowden Trying To Get Into Computers He Wasn't Authorized On Back In 2009 [Update: Or Not]

from the checks-and-balances dept

Update: And, of course, now the NY Times is walking back this story as the CIA has directly denied it:

Asked repeatedly for comment over the past several weeks, most recently on Thursday, the C.I.A. declined. But on Friday, the C.I.A. responded with a statement, the first public acknowledgment that Mr. Snowden had worked for the agency.

“The C.I.A did not file any report on Snowden indicating that it suspected he was trying to break into classified computer files to which he did not have authorized access while he was employed at the C.I.A., nor was he returned home from an overseas assignment because of such concerns,” Todd Ebitz, an agency spokesman, said in the statement.

This contradicts what the NY Times had reported on Friday -- and while it appears someone is not being particularly honest, we'll take back the story as well. Original below -- but crossed out.

The NY Times has an interesting report, claiming that investigators looking back through Ed Snowden's history, discovered that he was written up back in 2009, while working for the CIA, in Geneva, for "trying to break into classified computer files to which he was not authorized to have access." It was for this reason that he was sent home, and moved on to a new job, as a contractor for the NSA. The report notes that the writeup -- known as a "derogatory report" -- was considered somewhat minor, and wasn't shared with folks at the NSA.

What's interesting about this is that it at least suggests that Snowden has been considering all of this for quite a long time. Back in June, he had told Glenn Greenwald and Laura Poitras that his time in the CIA "disillusioned" him, and a colleague of his in Geneva apparently said recently that Snowden "was already experiencing a crisis of conscience of sorts" when she knew him back then. This seems interesting on a variety of levels, as it further highlights that Snowden didn't take the decision he made to be a whistleblower lightly. Plus, he had a long time to think things through, which supports the claims that Barton Gellman recently made, concerning Snowden's larger view of what he was doing.

Filed Under: background checks, cia, ed snowden, nsa, security

Contractors Providing Background Checks For NSA Caught Falsifying Reports, Interviewing The Dead

from the the-talking-dead dept

The fallout from Ed Snowden's leaks has taken many forms, one of which is the NSA taking a long look at its contractors' hiring processes. Snowden claims to have taken the job solely to gathering damning info. This revelation, combined with some inconsistencies in his educational history, have placed the companies who perform background and credit checks under the microscope.

What these agencies are now discovering can't be making them happy, including the news that one contractor's investigative work apparently involved a seance.

Anthony J. Domico, a former contractor hired to check the backgrounds of U.S. government workers, filed a 2006 report with the results of an investigation.

There was just one snag: A person he claimed to have interviewed had been dead for more than a decade. Domico, who had worked for contractors CACI International Inc. (CACI) and Systems Application & Technologies Inc., found himself the subject of a federal probe.

It's not as if Domico's case is an anomaly.

Domico is among 20 investigators who have pleaded guilty or have been convicted of falsifying such reports since 2006. Half of them worked for companies such as Altegrity Inc., which performed a background check on national-security contractor Edward Snowden. The cases may represent a fraction of the fabrications in a government vetting process with little oversight, according to lawmakers and U.S. watchdog officials.

Who watches the watchers' watchers? It appears as if that crucial link in the chain has been ignored. Give any number of people a job to do and, no matter how important that position is, a certain percentage will cut so many corners their cubicles will start resembling spheres.

These are the people entrusted to help ensure our nation's harvested data remains in safe hands, or at least, less abusive ones. Those defending the NSA claim this data is well-protected and surrounded by safeguards against abuse. Those claims were always a tad hollow, but this information shows them to be complete artifice. The NSA, along with several other government agencies, cannot positively say that they have taken the proper steps vetting their personnel.

USIS, the contractor who vetted Ed Snowden, openly admits there were "shortcomings" in its investigation of the whistleblower. Perhaps Snowden's background check was a little off, but overall, calling the USIS' problems "shortcomings" is an understatement.

Among the 10 background-check workers employed by contractors who have been convicted or pleaded guilty to falsifying records since 2006, eight of them had worked for USIS, according to the inspector general for the U.S. Office of Personnel Management. The personnel agency is responsible for about 90 percent of the government’s background checks.

In one case, Kayla M. Smith, a former investigative specialist for USIS, submitted some 1,600 falsified credit reports, according to the inspector general’s office.

Smith spent 18 months turning in these falsified reports, which accounted for a third of her total output. One might wonder how someone like Smith ends up working for a background check contractor. The answer? This problem isn't confined to one level.

[T]he investigator who had vetted Smith was convicted in a separate falsification case, Patrick McFarland, inspector general for the personnel office, said at a June 20 hearing held by two Senate panel.

Will it get better? USIS is already ceding market share to other contractors but it's impossible to say whether its competitors will be more trustworthy. McFarland says his office doesn't have enough funding to perform thorough probes, which indicates what's been caught so far is just skimming the surface. These agencies harvesting our data (and their defenders) all expect Americans (and others around the world) to simply trust them. Meanwhile, the reasons why we shouldn't continue to mount unabated.

A couple of senators are hoping their new piece of oversight legislation will fix the problem. It would provide McFarland's office with more investigation funding, but simply adding more "oversight" isn't going to make the problem go away. The NSA's mouthpieces continue to insist that everything it does is subject to tons and tons of "oversight," but that has done very little to improve its standing in the "trustworthy" department. There are systemic issues that need to be addressed, both in these agencies and the contractors they hire and expecting to paper over the cracks with a little legislation will only result in more revelations of wrongdoing, rather than fewer occurrences.

Filed Under: background checks, clearance, contractors, nsa, nsa surveillance, top secret
Companies: altegrity, caci, usis

Background Check Company Sued For Calling Samuel Jackson A Sex Offender

from the no,-not-that-one dept

Consumerist points us to the news that a guy named Samuel D. Jackson (not L.) has initiated a class action lawsuit against Infotrack, a background check company, because it claimed that he was a sex offender. The only problem? Infotrack got confused over its Samuel Jacksons, and didn't bother to do much to disambiguate them. That the guy they called a "sex offender" was only four years old at the time of the supposed "crime" apparently didn't set off any alarm bells at Infotrack. In fact, Jackson claims that the company told him this kind of thing happens often enough in cases where people have "common names." In this case, Infotrack didn't even check middle names, as the actual offender is named Samuel L. Jackson... though is not the famous Samuel L. Jackson. Thankfully, however, it appears that movie studios didn't rely on the same background checks in determining whether or not to employ the actor, or the class action lawsuit might have become even more entertaining.

Filed Under: background checks, class action, samuel jackson