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."

Comments

Well...

[jd]

In a twist, it turns out at least one search was performed by a contractor paid by an Obama advisor. It also appears that the records were accessed multiple times, not just the once (with quick reaction) initially stated. Now, I personally think that passport information is personal information and that personal information deserves a very high level of protection. I totally agree with the EU and the UK on that, although I think both have been too willing to compromise on principles in order to get anywhere with the US where there is no meaningful privacy at all.

(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.)

Re:What's private about passport records?

[TubeSteak]

Don't ask why or apply logic, just accept the fact that we got a blow in for whatever we are supposed to support this week. What are we supporting this week?
Stronger privacy protections? Less intrusive government?
My, what an awful political tool /. has become.

Anyways, the connection is merely someone's loose opinion. Step 1. Government creates database
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.

You're short some information.

[raehl]

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.

Re:What's private about passport records?

[GodfatherofSoul]

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.

Re:I guess you could spin this into anything

[mikael]

Here is a real world example which had tragic consequences:

Unmasked, policeman who gave two killers their victim's address after road rage row