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The FBI's IT Expansion Plans
Lam1969 writes "The FBI is fast-tracking the hiring of IT professionals, reports Computerworld. Computer scientists, engineers, IT specialists and IT project managers are wanted to develop systems to support FBI analysts and agents working in the field. Large-scale database development projects are part of the FBI's IT expansion as well. From the article: "The FBI is also focusing on data warehousing as well as federated search technology, which allows a single search query to be deployed across a number of databases, regardless of whether those databases belong to the same protocol or platform.""
You mean google?
Oh, come on now. I'm sure the Bush administration would never, ever ask a Federal agency to do something explicitly forbidden by law. Nor would they ever use secrets for political gain. To suggest otherwise would be blatantly partisan!
Oh - and as far as the FBI fast-tracking new hires to deal with sensitive information? Two words: Robert Hanssen.
Sounds like a driver's license, minus the biometrics.
Hardly. This is so much more in that it will access a common database that is available everywhere in the nation to any law enforcement official that requests your information or ID and additionally makes that information available to private security companies and other companies that contract with the federal government. There are also a number of other problems associated with this legislation in that it was attached to an appropriations bill and has gone through very little oversight. Lots of folks actually have no idea of what is actually contained in this legislation or who was involved in its creation.
At the very minimum, there is now the possibility of the federal government tracking the movement and ID of any US citizen at any time and preempts judicial involvement in the process.
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Cleara
> They just let you in without any screening whatsoever?
There is a difference between
a) no screening whatsoever
b) The US government wants to make sure that, if you join their ranks, they know more about you than anybody else
You are going to work for the government, not rule it. Did senators have to pass drug-test or the polygraph?
"Between strong and weak, between rich and poor [...], it is freedom which oppresses and the law which sets free"
Come on, you don't think Bush really turned his back on the TIA project so easily, do you?
Knowing the FBI, I am putting my money on a "scalabale implementation of the lastest in RDBMS technology called....Microsoft Access"
So, in otherwords, the fbi is starting another big unsuccessful project to sink hundreds of millions of dollars into?
It's called a "Passport" and I use it in just about every circumstance that calls for more than one form of ID, since for ID purposes, it counts for three (Birth Cert+Social Security Card+Drivers License).
Well, it counts for birth cert, SS, and state ID, I wouldn't call it driver's license, since you aren't supposed to show it if you are actually pulled over while driving. But the issue here isn't that one ID already exists, but that it will be essentially required. It would be as if you were required to get a passport to get a DL or state ID, and the two are tied together so that any state's info is linked to the national database. Then it doesn't matter what you pull out and show them, they have access to information from the feds and all 50 states.
But yes, I too show my passport often when I need to prove ID as well as citizenship. It is much easier to have that than worry about carying around my birth certificate and a state ID or other combination to that effect.
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This is not news, especially with the current environment since 2001. Now the challenge has always been non-technical for the FBI:
hire really IT-savvy folks (i.e. with real experience, not DoD or college newbies) for gov't level salaries and ever-shrinking budgets--and considering the deployment environment is rather boring IMO. Of course, those engineers would be competing with [money hungry] companies like MicroStrategy that offer products they could buy vs. build.
And throw in the culture/environment, it's a tough pill to swallow for a tech-person to be serious and enjoy the job.
And really no one should be scared about these types of systems as long as their a policy/laws defined. I mean google already places a "surveillance" factor on the public domain and no one has a problem [yet].