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Across US, Police Officers Abuse Confidential Databases (ap.org)

Posted by msmash on from the policing-police dept.

Sadie Gurman and Eric Tucker, reporting for Associated Press:Police officers across the country misuse confidential law enforcement databases to get information on romantic partners, business associates, neighbors, journalists and others for reasons that have nothing to do with daily police work, an Associated Press investigation has found. Criminal-history and driver databases give officers critical information about people they encounter on the job. But the AP's review shows how those systems also can be exploited by officers who, motivated by romantic quarrels, personal conflicts or voyeuristic curiosity, sidestep policies and sometimes the law by snooping. In the most egregious cases, officers have used information to stalk or harass, or have tampered with or sold records they obtained. No single agency tracks how often the abuse happens nationwide, and record-keeping inconsistencies make it impossible to know how many violations occur. But the AP, through records requests to state agencies and big-city police departments, found law enforcement officers and employees who misused databases were fired, suspended or resigned more than 325 times between 2013 and 2015. They received reprimands, counseling or lesser discipline in more than 250 instances, the review found.

9 of 185 comments (clear)

  1. Wherever data is collected, it is abused by sl3xd · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Am I just paranoid, or does it seem that everywhere personal data is collected, it is abused?

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    -- Sometimes you have to turn the lights off in order to see.
    1. Re:Wherever data is collected, it is abused by HBI · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Of course it is.

      My grandmother was arrested several times during the Second World War on morals charges. Prostitution. Her mother (a very hard nosed woman indeed, battleaxe) ran a bar in Hoboken, NJ. She had three daughters who worked in the bar. During the war, they apparently supplemented their income working in the bar by providing services for custom for all the sailors passing in and out (ha) of the port doing convoys and such. There were fines and they were paid. When the war was over, she stopped making money that way, and got married shortly afterward*.

      Now, you may wonder how I know about this, since my grandmother was definitely not forthcoming about this. My mom doesn't know either. But I do. I know because an uncle (by marriage), a real busybody cop on the Hoboken force, went searching through old arrest records and found this. Then, he started talking about it to people. It takes a special kind of douche to tell someone's grandson that their beloved grandmother was a hooker, but there you have it. I literally pissed on the guy's grave when he died (he had other sins unrelated to this).

      So, while not all cops are all about this, a lot of them are. My grandfather was on the force and he never had anything to say about anyone. So there is a counter-example. But if the information is juicy, and it often is, people will make efforts to find it and use it in negative ways.

      * I think my grandfather knew because of the cryptic comment he made to me, "I married your grandmother to give her some class!"

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      HBI's Law: Frequency of calling others Nazis is directly correlated with the likelihood of the accuser being Communist.
    2. Re:Wherever data is collected, it is abused by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

      What's wrong is the social stigma that makes you feel bad that your dear nana did a bit of hoing around when she was younger - total cultural double standard where if your grandpa got money for hooking up he'd be awesome. There's nothing wrong with being a ho, in fact your grandma sounds cool.

    3. Re:Wherever data is collected, it is abused by JustAnotherOldGuy · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Your grandmother and her daughters didn't do anything wrong; we all do what we have to do to survive.

      As a friend once said to me, "We all have the ethics we can afford." In other words, would I steal food if my family was starving? Damn right I would. I'd lie, cheat, and steal to feed my family.

      As for prostitution, personally I don't think it's wrong in any way (unless it's forced). It should be completely legal, and not viewed as immoral or "sinful" or whatever label the authoritarians and bluenoses want to put on it.

      Again, your grandmother and her daughters didn't do anything wrong. Your uncle is the shitbag in this scenario, and feel free to piss on his grave for me if you happen to have the chance.

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      Just cruising through this digital world at 33 1/3 rpm...
    4. Re:Wherever data is collected, it is abused by ShaunC · · Score: 3, Interesting

      There are a few graves I would like to piss on but I cannot find out where these people are buried.

      While doing some genealogy research, I discovered the Billion Graves Project where I found a crystal clear 1600x1200 JPG of my grandparents' headstone. They have volunteers who go around taking pictures of all the headstones in a cemetery, then they're indexed online. In many cases, the exact location of the gravesite within the cemetery will be displayed on a map. Worth a look.

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      Thanks to the War on Drugs, it's easier to buy meth than it is to buy cold medicine!
  2. Re:so 50/50 by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Interesting

    That's *if you get caught*. More likely, if you get caught more than once or twice, or get caught in some really egregious violation (like bulk selling the data).

    Perhaps "a significant number" do get caught, but is that 90% or only 1% of the total occurances? I'd lean more towards the latter. What are the odds of getting caught the first time you do it?

  3. Simple fix, just requires money by Tablizer · · Score: 5, Interesting

    The solution is pretty simple, but often skipped:

    1) The reason for every search should be required and logged by the searcher. Example: "Related to case 12345, this person was a close match to the suspect description given by clerk at robbed market, who was interviewed by officer 84923 on Aug 7th." (In practice short-cut lingo can be used to reduce typing.)

    2) The logs be randomly spot-checked by an auditor(s) who verifies the reasons given by interviewing the person(s) who searched.

    3) The depth of the investigation will vary such that some will be pretty thorough. (Not every spot-check can be deep, but make enough deep to keep users on their toes.)

    4) Those who've failed past audits or enter poor records are audited more often.

    This won't catch every violation, but greatly reduces it because the search-user doesn't know which search will be audited and how deep the audit will be.

    The reason this is not implemented is that governments and/or tax-payers don't want to pay for logging features and auditors.

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    Table-ized A.I.
  4. Re:Would you rather they SHOOT YOU DEAD? by blackomegax · · Score: 4, Interesting

    World hunger is over because you ate today, too. Just because you don't see police brutality doesn't mean it's not infesting every police force in the country like a disease. Follow copblock or similar, watch all the videos. It's non-stop.

  5. Call centers have stricter rules by camg188 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Back when I was working at a call center (processing credit applications for several different companies) we had access to credit reports. If we looked up someone's credit report that was not applying for credit, it was immediate termination. I couldn't even look up credit reports for people that had the same last name as myself. If that situation came up, we had to transfer the application to a different service rep.

    Years later, I worked at a hospital. They had similar restrictions and consequences regarding patient records due to HIPPA regulations.