This will be a brief diary, as I’m at work.
Just wanted to bring the article below to the attention of the Tribbers. The link is actually from 29 April, but I cannot recall any discussion and the “search” did not yield relevant results. (I found the link in a comment to a thread at Americablog from last night.)
How would you like to spy on your neighbors?
Check this story out:
Homeland Security Secretary Michael Chertoff this week floated an idea to start a nonprofit group that would collect information on private citizens, flag suspicious activity, and send names of suspicious people to his department.
(snip)
According to one techie who attended the April 27 meeting, Chertoff told the group, “Maybe we can create a nonprofit and track people’s activities, and an algorithm could red-flag individuals. Then, the nonprofit could give us the names.”
Let’s ask the population of previous East-Germany what they think of such a system.
And by a non-profit, hmm, who will govern this non-profit?
Harris Miller, president of the Information Technology Association of America, organized the gathering of about 50 security-industry executives from companies such as Microsoft, Oracle, and Verizon.
(snip)
One meeting participant said that Chertoff told the group that having a nonprofit collect names rather than the government “would alleviate some of the concerns people have.” Not so for this participant: “This is what made me sort of shift in my seat. It sounds like investigating every person for no reason.” He was particularly concerned that an unknown formula created by this new group would determine the red flags.
So, the head of DHS is open to such ideas and is discussing them with the big players in the ITC-business.
I find this extremely disturbing.