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Passport Files of Presidential Hopefuls Snooped
CNN is reporting on the widening brouhaha that began when Barack Obama's passport file was accessed illegally on three occasions beginning in January. Now it seems that John McCain's file was also snooped; and that last year Hillary Clinton's file suffered the same fate. Ars Technica nails the real importance of these breaches, saying that the Presidential hopefuls are "...currently providing the country with a very public lesson in why the 'privacy advocates' who oppose initiatives like Real ID and the executive branch's domestic surveillance programs should really be called 'democracy advocates.' In short..., the entire incident shows exactly why citizens' privacy is critical in a country where citizens compete with one another for control of the government."
...that the actual culprits (of the most recent "oopses") were an employees of a contractor run by an Obama adviser, John O. Brennan. The previous one was a trainee who was instructed to test the access with a family member's name. I'm neither for nor against Obama, but he crowed the loudest and it was people answering to someone in his camp, not from "the administration". ...interesting...
(I find it sad that in America, private property is often guarded with deadly force, but private property is replaceable, whereas privacy has no protection at all and privacy can never be replaced. Once privacy is lost, it is lost forever.)
It's a small world and it smells funny; I'd buy another if it wasn't for the money; Take back what I paid (SoM)
High profile people are more likely to have their records accessed unnecessarily than any of us. The flags were put in place after Bill Clinton had his records searched by political enemies trying to prove he dodged the draft during his first run for president. Hopefully they have an access/audit trail for the records so that if something improper goes on it can be properly investigated but sending up an alert every time everyone's records are accessed would be a pretty stupid idea.
I never said I was smart, I just said I was smarter than you
"US passport files include data such as age and place of birth, foreign travel records, and a Social Security number."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/americas/7309165.stm
I'd be interested to know if UK passport files include foreign travel records (since I have one).
Stronger privacy protections? Less intrusive government?
My, what an awful political tool
Step 2. Databse gets abused
Step 3. Reforms are 'enacted'
Step 4. Go back to step 2
The only reason this case of abuse was noticed is because high profile people have a tripwire attached to their records to alert a supervisor whenever those records are accessed. The people who pass laws have built in special privacy protections for themselves and anyone with money, fame, or notability. You think it would be front page news if a contractor was probing through the passport records of sumdumass (711423)?
If you can't see the relationship between a contractors snooping through a Passport database and the potential for contractors snooping through a Real ID database... you must be willfully blind.
[Fuck Beta]
o0t!
So we're concerned about the relatively innocuous data that is found in passport files? Thank god they don't keep track of our health records! Oh wait... that may be coming next.
--------========+++Dont Feed The Lab Techs+++========--------
All three people who accessed the information were employees of contractors. Some were fired immediately by the contractor before the State Department learned about it. The others the State Department specifically asked that they NOT be fired so they had some leverage to get them to cooperate with the ensuing investigation. (If they were fired, they wouldn't have to do anything unless actually subpoenaed.) Apparently if the state department had not intervened, the contractor would have fired them already. (The exception being the trainee who looked up Hillary instead of a family member during the training exercise - that was (probably properly) viewed as a training error and that employee just had the error explained.)
Regardless, while this is private information, it's not exactly SENSITIVE private information. There's really nothing in these files that isn't a matter of public record (when you applied, where you lived when you applied, name, birthdate) or isn't going to be terribly interesting for any political reason (SS#).
It's pretty safe to assume these breaches were merely the result of idle curiosity, as there's really no other reason to even bother looking at these files with such uninteresting information. That would also explain the fairly wide access thousands of people have to these files.
And to the GP:
Yes, an Obama campaign supporter (donated $2,300) runs one of the contractors whose employees looked at the files. But a Clinton campaing supporter (donated $1,000) runs the other one. Pretty much a wash, unless you're McCain.
paintball
I was following news coverage of passport records on Friday, and apparently they contain WAY more data than your passport, ID, and travel records. Criminal records, details about your interactions with other countries, attempts to change citizenship, etc.
I swear to God...I swear to God! That is NOT how you treat your human!
Here is a real world example which had tragic consequences:
Unmasked, policeman who gave two killers their victim's address after road rage row
Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
>They have to present this passport to government officials upon arrival in every country they visit.
>Why should they expect privacy in this matter?
There is more information in the State Department's passport file than what is on the passport.
In particular, it lists the amount of money you have taken into and out of the country, and there
is information specific to people who travel with diplomatic credentials. The passport itself may
have visa stamps, but it does not contain transcripts of interviews with the agents at points of
entry, and so forth.
On a more mundane level, your passport also does not have your address (check it!), does not have your
last 3 addresses, your mother's maiden name, your social security number, both your parents addresses
and social security numbers, those of your spouse, or really very much of the information at all that
was provided for the application. Take this to the level of a person getting a passport that indicates
diplomatic credentials, and there is much, much more data.
It's a pretty serious incident being swept under the rug.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.
>OK. What's your name, address, social security number, and mother's maiden name?
There is far more than that in a passport record, and for a passport record with
diplomatic credentials, assuredly more than a regular citizen passport.
-fb Everything not expressly forbidden is now mandatory.