New US Government Project To Monitor Electronic Communication

An anonymous reader writes "PRODIGAL (Proactive Discovery of Insider Threats Using Graph Analysis and Learning) is a recently uncovered U.S. government program created in partnership with the Georgia Tech School of Computational Science and Engineering, ostensibly to monitor IMs, texts, and emails on government networks, is feared to be turned on the U.S. population at large. From the article: 'Cherie Anderson runs a travel company in southern California, and she's convinced the federal government is reading her emails. But she's all right with that. "I assume it's part of the Patriot Act and I really don't mind," she says. "I figure I'm probably boring them to death."'"

Comments

First post!

[GameboyRMH]

First entry into PRODIGAL database!

Encrypt

[Neutral_Observer]

Encrypt anything that goes "On Grid".

Re:Encrypt

[Openstandards.net]

We've had the ability to encrypt email for years, and we battled for PGP, yet no one uses it. The question is how do you get people to encrypt email by default, particularly when it requires participation by both sides. Add this challenge to IM.

Re:Encrypt

[Neutral_Observer]

I have been working on an application that makes this easy for every... hold on, someone is at the door.... ****carrier lost****

Re:Encrypt

[DarkOx]

Encryption may not help you here. When we get to talking about graph analysis and learning, suddenly who you are talking to becomes as interesting as what you are talking about.

You might be identified as threat based sole on what would seem to be unusual information flows. For example, if someone in say HR is trading lots of mails with someone in accounting, an other person in inventory management, and finally a couple of warehouse shipping clerks, such a system might flag it as a possible theft conspiracy to steal inventory.

It would be unusual for such a ad-hoc group to be exchanging information at high frequency, and might warrant scrutiny. You can discover that and flag it independent of the the messages being encrypted or not. It could be completely innocent of course, they might just be on the company volleyball team together. Still its an interesting technology.

Re:Encrypt

[Sloppy]

When we get to talking about graph analysis and learning, suddenly who you are talking to becomes as interesting as what you are talking about.

No, it's interesting, but it's not as interesting. "Looks like he called his wife again," doesn't tell you a whole lot.

Imagine you're trying to decide which house to burgle. Some sends a message to someone else who is planning a party. You really want to know if they said, "I'll be there and am bringing a few growlers of homebrew quadbock. We are getting so 'faced! Can I crash at your place?" or "sorry, can't make it. I'm teaching the kids how to recycle ammo brass that night."

Technology Exists Already

[geoffrobinson]

I interviewed for a major life insurance company. They already have the ability to monitor all that stuff (except for texts, but that seems trivial if you have access). I know for a fact a previous employer of mine had that capability and used it as well.

The only interesting thing about this is they asked Georgia Tech to help instead of a more traditional defense-type contractor.

wrong images

[Tom]

"I figure I'm probably boring them to death."'

There's your problem.

People don't mind because they don't understand what is really going on. With this or any other privacy intrusion (ignoring if this particular one is real or not).

Cherie, no human being is reading your mails. Computers with natural language engines are, and they are searching for and generating patterns. Human beings come in long afterwards. They don't get to read your mails, what they get is a summary of your preferences, opinions, buying habits, and probably some kind of score indicating (depending on who is doing the spying) if you're a good customer, a potential terrorist, have the right political agenda, etc. etc.

The 1984 "Big Brother" concept is 1984 - in the 21st century, you will not be arrested because some office drone in the ministry of truth read through all your e-mails and decided you're a bad person. No, in the 21st century you get put on the No Fly List and nobody can friggin' explain to you why , because the reason, as far as the humans involved are concerned, is that some score in some automated system crossed a threshold value.

Re:wrong images

[tatman]

Scary isn't it. No one will care until it becomes a problem for themselves; then they wonder what happened....

Re:wrong images

[BMOC]

Future TSA worker:

"Ah, you can't fly, in fact, I'm supposed to arrest you. Come here please."

"Oh, you say this is a mistake?"

"Don't worry, this is just a result of a feature with a work-around. I'm sure they'll fix these bugs in CIA 2.0. In the meantime, enjoy your stay in Leavenworth."

Re:wrong images

[CarbonShell]

Uhm, wasn't Sen. Kennedy on the No-Fly list at one time? Not to mention people like Robert J. Johnson, John Lewis

or

Walter F. Murphy, McCormick Professor of Jurisprudence at Princeton, reported that the following exchange took place at Newark on 1 March 2007, where he was denied a boarding pass "because I [Professor Murphy] was on the Terrorist Watch list." The airline employee asked, "Have you been in any peace marches? We ban a lot of people from flying because of that." "I explained," said professor Murphy, "that I had not so marched but had, in September 2006, given a lecture at Princeton, televised and put on the web, highly critical of George Bush for his many violations of the constitution." To which the airline employee responded, "That'll do it."

source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No_Fly_List

Re:wrong images

[spidercoz]

I care. I try to educate people. They look at me like I'm off my nut.

Re:wrong images

[Anonymous Coward]

[Sarcasm] I'm absolutely sure that any misuse was just a complete misunderstanding. [More more likely never, ever happened.]

I mean really, counter-intelpro, Iran Contra, Watergate, due-process free assassination of US citizens [on exclusive executive branch say-so] are all just pure misunderstanding. We'd never really do something wrong. [I mean, if the president does it, it, *by definition,* it isn't illegal.]
[/Sarcasm]

The Prima facie case of misuse is that it's a "black" program.

1) The rules for getting on the list are secret.
2) How you get off is secret.
3) Who is on the list is secret.

Secret rules for secret laws for a secret government = abuse.

That is pretty much all that needs to be said. When people [pretty much any people] are allowed carte-blanche to do as they will, abuses will occur.

The only way that is [sometimes] prevented or rectified is accountability to the populace.

Once accountability is lost - and believe me, secret laws, and secret programs, by secret police because we must be *scared*, very *scared* causes a loss of accountability - once that accountability is lost, then abuses happen. It's just a forgone conclusion.

Examine the written history of man.

So, while you may want to demand evidence - I say there is no need.

Abuses happen when the laws, and their enforcement and prosecution are secret. Not might happen, just will and do happen.

Anyone who takes even the most cursory examination of history will very quickly come to that conclusion. Thus, your asking "show me the evidence" - I think it shows that either
1) You're woefully uninformed about the nature of people
or
2) You're just a shill for whatever abusive authoritarian structure is currently in place and feign ignorance of the results of such policies.

If it's option #1 - I pity you. You're a stupid git and simply can't grasp that fact.
If it's option #2 - they I pity me, since you're likely to place me on one of those secret list, based on secret laws written by our secret government. [Because, it's clear, I'm a subversive threat!]

Not News

[Prodigal86sc]

The NSA has been doing this since 2003, probably before. It's extra creepy that DARPA is now in on the act, but that's about it. http://www.wired.com/science/discoveries/news/2006/04/70619

What's the definition of "prodigal"?

[khasim]

People always get that bit confused. What it REALLY means is
"A person who spends money in a recklessly extravagant way."

Nice name for this program.

Re:What's the definition of "prodigal"?

[rwa2]

Well, this is the Twitter generation. The worst thing that can possibly happen to you nowadays is that no one cares to listen to anything you say...

It used to be that ${God} would listen to everything you thought and prayed for, and that used to be enough to let people think their problems and concerns were being addressed. I think it's healthy to have that feeling replaced by the warm, comforting feeling that the government is watching you and might choose to intervene.

Or at the very least, it would encourage people to actually start using encryption :-P

Re:What's the definition of "prodigal"?

[Qzukk]

It used to be that ${God} would listen to everything you thought and prayed for, and that used to be enough to let people think their problems and concerns were being addressed. I think it's healthy to have that feeling replaced by the warm, comforting feeling that the government is watching you and might choose to intervene.

I dunno, given the past few years, I'd say the government is about on par with God in terms of delivering on promises.

Re:Do you think they look up definitions?

[masternerdguy]

That's the two criteria for a government technology project. This one is pure gold as far as they're concerned.

Money better spent

[FellowConspirator]

The thing is, as crime goes, terrorism is rare and the threat hasn't change appreciably in 50 years ( no matter what the evening news says ). The type of criminal activity in the US and international finance industries, however, is unprecedented and capable of causing far more damage. Unfortunately, we don't bring as many resources to bear on the greater threat to the country.

On Reddit yesterday...

[AdmiralXyz]

I know we're supposed to look down on Reddit as Slashdot-lite, but someone posted an interesting question there yesterday:

The ghost of Plato offers you one of two pills. If you take the blue pill, from now on your government will precisely represent the will of its people. If you take the red pill, your country will be seized by an intelligent dictator whose political views are identical to yours. Which will it be?

It's almost a difficult choice until you read things like "I assume it's part of the Patriot Act and I really don't mind", and then you realize you'd grab the red pill so fast you'd yank Plato's arm off. Participatory government is dead.

Re:On Reddit yesterday...

[Kjella]

Everybody would like a dictator that rules "their way" because everyone else is stupid and wrong, in fact it's a thinly veiled way of asking if you'd like to become that dictator yourself. Except that's not how it works, because everyone can take the blue pill and have their fair share of democracy but only one person gets to pick the red pill. So the question is, would you really take a lottery where one person gets to appoint a dictator for life? I mean you could get lucky, but you might also want a one-way plane ticket out of there before your new randomly-chosen overlord closes the border. Weird as it sounds, the politicians you have are actually moderates compared to what you could get.

Besides, if you want that dictatorship to not get overthrown in the first five minutes, that dictator has to cease control and keep it - people don't obey by magic. You might find that even if you are doing the "right thing" and have the people's best interest at heart, what you have to do to force it upon them actually makes the cure worse than the problem. It won't be long before your dictator passes mass surveillance laws of his own - for the people's own good, of course. Nothing like a government that's decided they're right and the people wrong, surely some reeducation camps will make people understand. That's worked so well in the past.

it does matter

[Killer Instinct]

In the old days, the ATF would just make up some charges against you (meth, guns), keep the press/news 2 miles away from your compound (Waco) and charge in shooting and setting fires to a building with your family in it. Now they can say "we have a report from our security system" that you are a threat. They dont even need to make up anything as a cover story, you are on a list..'nuf said. Theres a saying ive seen on here, around the net goes like this "when they came for the Jews, I didnt say anything because i wasnt a jew. when they came for the gays, i didnt say anything because I wasnt gay. Now they are coming for me, and theres no one left to say anything". The point is, with a system in place like this it is too easy to abuse and we are one step closer the end. And we cant stop it now, without a lot of people getting really upset, the very thing this system will detect and prevent. We are at the point now where we decide the next step in our evolution. Up until now, evolution had a pretty decent set of "rules" where the species that evolved certain traits, stuck around longer. At this point a system like this will make sure someone's idea of the next generation, will be followed, circumventing natural selection, and probably guaranteeing the human race, as we know it, will cease to exist.

-KI

Re:it does matter

[Jah-Wren Ryel]

Theres a saying ive seen on here, around the net

        First they came for the Communists,
        but I was not a Communist so I did not speak out.

        Then they came for the Socialists and the Trade Unionists,
        but I was neither, so I did not speak out.

        Then they came for the Jews,
        but I was not a Jew so I did not speak out.

        And when they came for me,
        there was no one left to speak out for me.

Martin Niemoller

Retrospective Searches

[anorlunda]

I've assumed that the US government has been intercepting all our communications since they first had the technical ability. Why? Because of the 911 commission. Goverment really reacts and overreacts to that kind of stinging criticism that they didn't protect us.

What should we expect from them today? I expect that as soon as they find a terrorism suspect, that they are able to review his/her communications retrospectively; and also those whom he/she had contact with and so on 3 plys deep. To do that, they need an archive of everyone's messages 100% of the time, because they can't know in advance whose they want to review in the future.

I too hate big brother and I hate invasions of my privacy. However, it is unrealistic to expect the feds to not fully exploit 21st century technology. If we were smart, we would give up on trying to restrict what data they gather and focus on restricting what they can do with gathered information.

Re:Retrospective Searches

[surgen]

I've assumed that the US government has been intercepting all our communications since they first had the technical ability.

I look at this the same way I might view a person who said to me "I've always assumed that an invisible Bigfoot watches me whenever I masturbate".

Given the US government has given themselves the ability to perform wholesale monitoring of communications (Room 641A is the easiest proof to point to), we must also posit that there is an invisible Bigfoot, and that he frequently watches people masturbate.

Re:Private key

[Nerdfest]

There was an article here a couple of weeks ago about a browser plugin that managed your private keys and worked with webMail. I don't think many people are interested, which is unfortunate.

Re:Total Information Access (TIA)

[dkleinsc]

Actually, no, that's art imitating life.

In 2003, a program called "Total Information Awareness" was created to intercept all Internet traffic and try to process it looking for phrases the NSA and others in government might find interesting. In 2007, the newly elected Congress defunded it (mostly Democrats, with the support of a few libertarians like Ron Paul). The NSA responded by shifting the efforts into different programs that they didn't have to explain to Congress.

Idiot

[vlm]

From the article: 'Cherie Anderson runs a travel company in southern California, and she's convinced the federal government is reading her emails. But she's all right with that. "I assume it's part of the Patriot Act and I really don't mind," she says. "I figure I'm probably boring them to death."'"

What an idiot. The problem is not a boring civil servant reading her emails and at most noting "oh how interesting, someone ordered flowers for Charles Manson again". The problem is her competitor donating money to a politicians campaign and inadvertently getting a copy of her emailed sales plan. The problem is a subcontractor of a contractor getting a copy of all emailed credit card numbers, ID thefting them, and she must be to blame, after all, she is the "only" common link. The problem is the civil servant's drug addicted gang member brother getting a copy of her bank statements, and noticing she makes all her weekly cash deposits at 3 pm on wednesdays, and being california, he's heavily armed, and she is completely disarmed. The problem is she tries to negotiate a better contract with her flower supplier, but thru "national technical means" her flower supplier has a copy of all her emailed communication with her accountant, and knows exactly how much profit he can extract from her. The problem is her local political muscle noticing via emailed sales figures that she is not donating the "correct" percentage of gross revenue to the politicians re-election campaign. The problem is the police notice, and blame her, when recipients of her "welcome home" gift baskets have their houses broken into and ransacked after the basket is ordered and before the basket arrives. The problem is she dates a police officer, it doesn't work out, she gets stalked by a guy with total electronic access to her life. Or a disgruntled client happens to work at the station, and has access to all her future emailed delivery plans, and knows just the dark alley to drag her into, and via the emailed schedule, knows just the right time to grab her.

She's already done for Re:wrong images

[Anonymous Coward]

Cherie Anderson:
Anderson, nordic last name: aryan flag, militia flag, christian flag, racial solidarity flag

Person match:
Slashdot, an open techno-social resistance site: knowledge flag, ideals flag, subversion flag, networking flag, anonymous flag, hacking flag, criticism flag, hub flag, unusual interests flag
Discovery, an unredacted popular science site: knowledge flag, inspiration flag, networking flag, science flag, news flag, hub flag, unusual interests flag
Travel agency AB7311C2, a "prime interest" industry: owner flag, subversion flag, knowledge flag, hub flag, transportation flag, capabilities flag, insider flag, resources flag, moneylaundering flag, financial flag, offensive category 111F flag, defensive category 02B3 flag

Quotations:
Flagged words: Patriot Act, death
Pattern counts: 2 "I"'s per sentence, narcissist flag

Location:
California: troublemaker flag, insolvency flag, social unrest flag, extremism flag

I'm shocked!

[PPH]

My private communications should be kept between myself, my closest friends, and my sysadmin.

Re:gavel.avi

[qbast]

Sound of drone firing?