For anyone into privacy conspiracies - then this is for you, whether true or real it makes for some interesting information Does what happens in Facebook, stay in Facebook? as they say, where there is smoke there is… mirrors!
Thanks to Sonet Journal.
Background information on Facebook.
Have you been wondering
why our government want to gather all our data together?, the NHS spine, the ID
cards, the National Identity Register, Biometric Passports, the
Then read this.
And because like most people in most countries, we tend not to look beyond our own
borders, don't be surprised when we do, that we see that the same laws, the same information
gathering, the same ID cards etc are being enacted right across
Even before 9/11, A
new agency was set up for George W. Bush called the Information Awareness
Office, newly created by the Pentagon agency DARPA to gather
intelligence through electronic sources like the internet, phone, and fax lines.
Its Director was
John Poindexter, and in his opening speech he stated that the
“The overarching
program that binds IAO's efforts together is Total Information Awareness or TIA
System. The primary goal of TIA is the integration and assured transition of
components developed in the programs
Global
security and the "war on terror" now dominate the global political
agenda. Driven largely by the
Within this context, governments have begun to construct, through numerous
initiatives, what amounts to a global registration and surveillance
infrastructure. This infrastructure would ensure that populations around the
world are registered, that travel is tracked globally, that electronic
communications and transactions can be easily monitored, and that all the
information that is collected in public and private databases about individuals
is stored, linked, data-mined, and made available to state security agents.
The object of the infrastructure is not ordinary police work, but mass
surveillance of entire populations. In its technological capacity and global
reach, it is an unprecedented project of social control. Already, the
And, all of this is taking place at a time when the
It is time for the public to take stock of the road that governments are
leading us down with these new registration and surveillance initiatives. The
ten "signposts" described below show just how far down the road we
have already traveled, and the dangers that lie ahead for all of us if we fail
to make governments turn back.
1st Signpost: The Registration of Populations
The first signpost on the road governments are leading us down was the effort
by the United States after September 2001 to register male non-citizens from
designated countries, and then all foreigners traveling to the U.S., and
similar efforts by the European Union to register immigrants and travelers.
In the
NSEERS. Under NSEERS (National
Security Entry-Exit Registration System), male non-citizens over the age of 16
from designated (mostly Muslim) countries were required to register with the
federal government. The more than 80,000 individuals who registered reported
many stories of harassment, insult, and rough treatment. NSEERS resulted in
more than 13,000 people being put into deportation hearings and thousands more
fleeing the country in fear.
US-VISIT. NSEERS was eventually phased
out, but that has hardly resulted in an end to the registration of foreigners;
it was replaced by another program called US-VISIT, under which all visitors
(except some Mexicans and most Canadians) are to be digitally photographed and
fingerprinted upon or prior to their entry into the
In
EU-
EU-wide
foreigners register. Additionally, registers of all legally resident third-country nationals
are being created through the "harmonization" of residence permits in
the EU member states. This data will be stored in a central EU database. An
automated procedure will link this database and the new EU
2nd Signpost: The Creation of a Global Identification System
The second signpost is what amounts to the domestic counterpart of the
registration of foreigners: the creation by governments of an international
identity card system for citizens.
National ID cards - and more significantly, the databases that lie behind them
- not only provide a means of registering domestic populations, but they also
provide a centralized, standardized means for tracking people as they go about
routine life activities. In many democracies, the idea of a national identity
card has been anathema due to its strong association with police states. Although
some democracies have national identification cards, in most of these systems,
the kind of information linked to the card is limited, and access is restricted
to domestic officials for specific purposes.
Since September 2001, many countries around the globe have started or
intensified efforts to institute national ID databases; countries that already
have national IDs are in many cases exploring ways of extending their
capabilities and their use.
But overtaking this trend is the emergence of a new identity tool that is being
implemented in all countries: the "globally interoperable biometric
passport." Based on an international standard created at the urging of the
The upshot is that individuals around the world are being issued computerized
identity documents, and entered into identity databases in their own and other
countries, setting the stage for the mass, routinized surveillance of
individuals' movements.
3rd Signpost: The Creation of an Infrastructure for the Global Surveillance
of Movement
The third signpost is the creation of a global infrastructure for the
surveillance of movement. Not only are the authorities of many nations well on
the way toward constructing checkpoints and databases to track individuals'
movements using their national identity documents and/or biometric passports,
they are also seeking direct access to airlines' passenger name records (
The
The International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO), a UN body, is currently
considering a harmonized data format for
4th Signpost: The Creation of an Infrastructure for the Global Surveillance
of Electronic Communications and Financial Transactions
The fourth signpost is the creation of an infrastructure for the global
surveillance of electronic communications and financial transactions. That
includes a number of developments, including:
Expanded
legal authorities for eavesdropping. Through measures such as the American "Patriot
Act," the
Expanded
private-sector requirements. Governments are also imposing more requirements on
companies and other private-sector entities to ensure that surveillance is
technically possible and easy to do. Some governments are claiming they must
introduce these requirements to comply with the Convention on Cybercrime - a
treaty that has been pushed by the
Mandatory
"data retention" Governments, particularly those in Europe, are also pushing for
"mandatory data retention," under which all communications service
providers will be required to save and store data on their consumers that they
would otherwise erase in accordance with privacy laws. The EU is currently discussing
binding legislation that will require the mandatory retention of all telephone,
e-mail, fax and internet traffic data for up to three years.
The
expansion of ECHELON. A shadowy and little-understood international surveillance program
codenamed Echelon soaks up much of the world's electronic communications. A
partnership between the
Tracking
and reporting of financial transactions. New laws around the world enlist financial
institutions and ordinary businesses into a financial-surveillance
infrastructure under the justification of stopping money-laundering and the
financing of terrorism. For example:
- A post-9/11 U.N. Security Council resolution requires all states to prohibit
their citizens from making funds or services available to terrorists - a
mandate that all but requires mass surveillance of economic activity.
- In the
- The FATF (Financial Action Task Force), a multilateral policy-making body
with 31 member countries, has extended its mandate from money-laundering to
terrorist financing, and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and
Development (OECD) has followed suit.
- in Europe, the disclosure to the US authorities of all SWIFT transactions.
Through these initiatives, state agents from around the world are rapidly gaining direct, cost-free access to every e-mail and phone call made, every website visited, and every financial transaction conducted. Charities and NGOs working in conflict zones, or with links to Arab and Muslim communities, are already experiencing the chill of this new infrastructure.
5th Signpost: The Convergence of National and International Databases
The fifth signpost is a development that feeds into all of the others: the
convergence of diverse databases -government and private-sector, nationally and
internationally. This trend is happening on many different levels. Examples
include:
The U.S. effort to tie over 20 different
government databases into the US-VISIT system
The collection and conglomeration of personal
information about
The tying together of numerous government and
private-sector data sources into a single comprehensive view by programs like
the one called "the MATRIX" in the U.S., which is then made available
to police across the country
The convergence of data from different sources into single centralized (or
distributed but centrally accessible) databases turns data collection into
full-fledged surveillance by providing ever-more-comprehensive records of
individuals' activities across time. The result is a global web of databases
that will be used by the
6th Signpost: The Spread of the "Risk Assessment" Model
The sixth signpost is the spread of a "risk assessment" paradigm that
is driving the collection, storage and linkage of so much information. Under
this approach to security, personal information is collected en masse about
individuals so that a judgment can be made about their
"trustworthiness" or risk to security. Instead of focusing on
time-honored techniques of working outward from known facts and suspected
wrongdoers, the risk assessment approach seeks to subject everyone to scrutiny,
in the hopes of combing wrongdoers out of the crowd.
The high tech approach to sorting for "risk" through the ocean of
information that is being collected by mass surveillance, is to use computer
"data mining" programs that search for suspicious patterns of
activity. This is like looking for a needle in an ocean of needle haystacks.
Not surprisingly, these programs yield alarmingly high error rates - not only
in the innocent people they flag as "dangerous", but in the dangerous
people they fail to flag. The low tech approach to risk assessment is to have
human beings making on the spot judgments about who they think presents a
"risk" to society. But since human beings are encouraged to err on
the side of caution and disregard the welfare of the individuals involved, the
stories of innocent people being wrongly assessed in this way are mounting.
Risk assessment has truly Kalfkaesque implications because the criteria used
for making judgments are vague or undisclosed and the information used is often
inaccurate or incomplete. Innocent individuals who are labeled security risks
under the risk assessment model are usually given no indication of why that
label was applied and how they can remove it.
7th Signpost: Security-Force Integration and the Loss of Sovereign Checks
and Balances
The seventh signpost is the deep integration of countries' police, security,
intelligence, and military establishments, and the concomitant abandonment of
national sovereignty and control. Examples of this trend include:
The
growing number of "mutual assistance agreements" pledging cooperation
between law enforcement and security agencies from different countries.
Recently such an agreement was cited by
The
joint investigation teams being set up between the
The
agreement between Europol and the
Mounting
stories showing the inability of governments to protect their own citizens when
they are wrongly caught up in the global security net, as in the case where the
Canadian government tried to obtain the release of a Canadian citizen whom the
U.S. had rendered to Syria, or the case where the Swedes tried to have some of
their citizens' names removed from U.N. terrorist list and had to negotiate
with the U.S.
8th Signpost: The Corporate Security Complex
The eighth signpost is the creation of a new "corporate security
complex." In the computer age, an ever-larger proportion of our activities
are being tracked and recorded by private companies, and that information is
increasingly available to governments. Government powers to demand access to
such data are being expanded, but many businesses are also voluntarily selling
databases and other services to government agencies.
For technology and data companies, the "war on terror" has opened up
a new government customer base. For government security and intelligence
agencies, left searching for a raison d'etre after the end of the Cold War, the
"war on terror" has offered an unprecedented opportunity to increase
its investigative and surveillance powers. This new corporate security complex
has become an aggressive driver of the global surveillance project.
Multinational corporations based in the U.S, Western Europe and Asia are poised
to make huge profits from the global market for databases, biometric readers,
data mining programs and other new technologies of control.
The EU has established a new "security research agenda", intended to
make the EU the rival of the
9th Signpost: The Erosion of Democratic Values
The ninth signpost is the dismaying betrayal of democratic values by the
government of the United States and other democracies as they move to implement
the global surveillance project. In order to achieve their ends, governments
have:
suspended
judicial oversight over law enforcement agents and public officials
concentrated
unprecedented power in the hands of the executive arm of government
circumvented
the democratic oversight and debate normally provided by the legislative arm of
government by imposing policy through unelected, unaccountable transnational
bodies
steamrolled
over well-established privacy protections for citizens
ignored
constitutional guarantees and rolled back criminal law and due process
protections that balance the rights of individuals against the power of the
state (such as the presumption of innocence, habeas corpus, attorney-client
privilege, public trials, the right to know the evidence against one and to
respond, reasonable grounds for search and seizure, and the right to remain
silent)
undermined
freedom of expression and association
Where mass registration and surveillance measures have been adopted by
repressive regimes, they have bolstered or worsened the status quo. The example
set by Western nations allows governments in less democratic countries to
consolidate their grip on power and gives them a green light to commit human
rights and other abuses.
10th Signpost: Rendition, Torture, Death
The tenth signpost is the loss of moral compass on the part of the
The
The Bush Administration has asserted that neither American criminal law, nor
the Geneva Conventions, nor other international laws apply to the people swept
up into this system of camps. In other words, according to the United States,
these detainees exist in a legal "black hole": a "no man's
land" where the United States, and by implication its allies, are free to
act outside the law, or to pick and choose what parts of the law they will
apply. While international law and the laws of most nations (including the
Conclusion
When one examines all of the developments described above, it becomes apparent
that the road toward a global infrastructure for mass registration and
surveillance is a dangerous one, both for our personal and our collective
security.
The initiatives described in this report are not effective in flagging
terrorists or stopping their determined plans. They divert crucial resources
away from the kind of investments in human intelligence we need to give us good
intelligence about specific threats, rather than useless information on the
nearly 100 percent of the population that poses no threat whatsoever. They
alienate the very communities from whom intelligence agencies need assistance
in order to obtain good intelligence. They do nothing to address the root
causes of terrorism. Far from making us personally safer, they weaken the
democratic institutions and individual protections upon which citizens'
security depend. Far from making the world a safer place to live in, they
exacerbate global insecurity. Their unjust targeting of Muslims and the brutal,
lawless treatment meted out in the global network of detention camps described
above engender hatred against Western countries and their partners, fomenting
only more fanatical oppositions and terrorism.
We are less safe with mass registration and surveillance, not more.
Notes
for Editors: The Idea of
being able to use technology in this manner was the brainchild of John
Poindexter. A retired Navy Admiral, John Poindexter lost his job as National
Security Adviser under Ronald Reagan, and was convicted of conspiracy, lying to
Congress, defrauding the government, and destroying evidence in the Iran Contra
scandal.
Before 9/11, The
agency which Poindexter set up initially for George W. Bush was called the Information Awareness
Office, a new office created by the Pentagon agency DARPA after 9/11 to gather
intelligence through electronic sources like the internet, phone, and fax lines.
Very few
newspapers and virtually no TV stations announced Poindexter's
appointment. Apparently they didn't consider it "newsworthy".
The same was true for the creation of the IAO.
Every Government
in
The seal of the Information Awareness Office Programme.
The Seal for the Total Information Awareness programme.
Why did John
Poindexter get the job?
He was the Vice President of Syntek Technologies, a government contractor. Syntek
and Poindexter worked for years with DARPA to develop
Where is
Poindexter now.?
With the Total Information Awareness programme, and all references to the
original IAO project website have been removed.
To
learn more about this subject, follow the link here to The International Campaign Against Mass Surveillance (ICAMS) who have launched a petition to
demand that international organizations and national governments stop
participating in the construction of this system.
This story can
also be viewed on New
Citizenship Net to whom I extend my thanks.
Reference
material
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2002/11/14/us_govs_ultimate_database_run/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Information_Awareness_Office
http://www.fas.org/irp/agency/dod/poindexter.html
http://www.epic.org/privacy/profiling/tia/
