The tension between Privacy and Security — a necessity, to be sure — sometimes leads to some odd results. Take for example the recommendations of an blue ribbon advisory panel to the DoD which takes the idea of Data Mining is Evil to apparently new extremes.
The committee demands that counterterrorism analysts seek court approval to mine the Pentagon’s own lawfully acquired intelligence files, if there is a chance that they might contain information on U.S. citizens or resident aliens — basically all intelligence files. Eyeball scrutiny of those same files, however, requires no such judicial oversight. This rule suggests a bizarre conceit that the automation of human analysis, which is all data mining is, somehow violates privacy more than the observation of those same items by a person. In fact, the opposite is true. A computer has no idea what it is “reading,” but merely selects items by rule.
So it’s okay for humans to read the files, look for patterns, sift through data, etc. But it’s not okay for computers, programmed by humans to do so, presumably because they’re a heck of a lot more efficient about it.
There is, of course, a danger in treating data mining as Pronouncements of Absolute Truth. Correlation is not causality, as we all should know, and having a computer declare that X is a terrorist because he lives in the same ZIP Code as Y (especially if that rationale is not clear) is not a good thing..
On the other hand, knowing that Y and X do live in the same ZIP code might be a clue worth researching further. So declaring that the dangers of mistaking the correlation with causality are presumably so great that we cannot afford to be efficient about finding correlations seems kind of dippy to me.
And, to take things a step further:
The advisory committee’s technophobia does not end with intelligence analysis. It would also require the defense secretary to give approval for, and certify the absolute necessity of, Google searches by intelligence agents. Even though any 12-year-old with a computer can freely surf the Web looking for Islamist chat rooms, defense analysts may not do so, according to the panel, without strict oversight.
Next up: requiring defense intelligence personnel to have records read to them via telephone by people with heavy accents and bad eyesight.
(via Cronaca)