More NSA/Phone Database Controversy
Well, never underestimate the power of Congress to demagogue; here’s one of our leading lights on the new phone database revelations:
On Capitol Hill, Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy expressed outrage. “Are you telling me tens of millions of Americans are involved with al-Qaeda?” said Leahy, the ranking Democrat on the Judiciary Committee. “These are tens of millions of Americans who are not suspected of anything.”
Leahy should be ashamed – the whole point of data-mining is to find the people involved with al-Qaeda from amongst the innocent. If you knew who they were, you wouldn’t need to data-mine. Pure, unadulterated ignorance…
I’m still gathering my thoughts on what to make of this new revelation, but I want to correct something. In the post below, I said this new phone database aspect was a part of the program that was revealed by the NY Times late last year. That’s a little sloppy – the program revealed by the Times involved eavesdropping. There may be (probably is) some data-mining that goes on to tell the NSA what calls to eavesdrop on, and this database may be a source for that data-mining – but remember that, at least to the extent that we know of and that has been acknowledged, the calls that were eavesdropped on involved at least one suspected terrorist on foreign shores, though one end of the call could be domestic.
This database, however, is a collection of calling records – in and of itself there is no eavesdropping, just data related to numbers called from other numbers. I’m not saying that’s good or bad – I’m just trying to make sure we keep our definitions straight moving forward…and that’s why Leahy’s statement is so absurdly and obviously faux outrage…
Is there a chance your calling records are in this database? Oh, yes, a very good chance, particularly if you used a telecom company that cooperated, and that’s most of the big boys except Qwest. Is there a chance one of your calls was selected for eavesdropping? Almost assuredly not.
More later…
The ACLU has a database of its own
Jay at Stop The ACLU has done some digging and low and behold, the same institution who slammed the admin for the latest NSA ’scandal’ – regarding datamining of ‘millions of phone calls’ – has (or at one point had) a data collec…
Almost.
There’s also the wee chance that someone will want to access your convieniently indexed phone and e-mail records 5, 10, 15 years from now. Maybe when you apply for a govmint job, or a job with a company that does business with the guvmint. Maybe when you decide to run for city council. Maybe when the IRS notices something funny in your return. Maybe when your kid gets into radical politics at State U. Maybe when a friend of a friend of a friend gets caught up in some shady business…
Maybe you should be more careful who you associate with.
Re-Hash Of An Old Story
Well excuse me for not being over-excited about a re-hash of an old story, the timing of which stinks to high heaven. AhemNo sooner had the man who ran the National Security Agency for years been nominated to head the CIA than USA Today rushed out deta…
After 25 years in the database and customer service high tech business, and being involved with data bases for Fortune 500 companies, I can say that there is a pretty poor chance of obtaining any useful information unless some of the calls were “listened” to, contrary to what the goverment is trying to spin on this on.