On Thu, 26 Nov 1998, Vladimir Z. Nuri wrote:
fun wired article on new movie "enemy of the state" with privacy /cpunk implications. bamford quoted, info on NSA, rotenberg, spy satellites, etc.
In this article Judy DeMocker writes.... The scenario of an innocent man being digitally hounded through tunnel and building, traced to pay phones and 7-Eleven surveillance systems, and exposed by a digital trail of personal information, is overblown. Most store cameras are not hooked up to outside systems, and databases are not so rapidly accessible that a government agent could pull up a suspect's past addresses, personal history, bank, and telephone records in the blink of an eye. I don't know about pay phone tracing, though I imagine voice print identification could be done. Don't know what 7-eleven does with their videocams other than record it onto video tape, but I can speak about the databases... Pulling up a suspects past addresses, personal history, bank and telephone records can be done very quickly. Past addresses and personal history could be pulled very rapidly through credit agencies. Mean income level, kids, their ages, past employment etc. I've seen this done in about 20 or 30 seconds. Bank records could probably be snatched from FINCEN. Telephone records might take a court order if done legally, but I wouldn't put it past FBI or CIA to infiltrate telephone companies. CIA was already found to be infiltrating the press when investigated by the Church commission. What have they done since? For those that have done background investigations on these agencies this is a little like expecting to be shocked when told "sister smokes!" For those that have been to busy to check or care it might come as a surprise. For Wired it's inexcusable. If they would be remove just 5% of the hype and replace it with a little reality it might be a lot for valuable. Wired's editors need to pay a little bit more attention to detail. That being said I haved enjoyed some of the articles, such as those by Declan and Charles Platt. A little less flourescent ink, a little more content. jim