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Trepiodos said: When the government taps into the communications of such large numbers of people, it is statistically a waste of resources in the detection of terrorists. The numbers of terrorists are so minuscule among the subjects of government spying, that (if in fact the purpose is to catch terrorists) so many false leads will be generated as to overwhelm investigators and send them on wild goose chases, reducing the chances to what is essentially equivalent to random picks from the population at large. Couple this with the fact that anyone of minimal intelligence engaged in a terrorist plot will in fact encrypt their communications, or resort to physical meeting or message drops out of the reach of the eavesdropping of electronic communications and the justification is patently ridiculous.
The only statistically logical reason for such wide nets as we see coming from the administration and their toadies is to detect who in fact are their political opponents and to intimidate them or target them, as political opponents are much more numerous and a greater threat to the powers that currently control our government. I seriously doubt that the sycophantic cheerleaders of the nascent Bush police state would have been happy if Bill and Hillary were engaged in such trolling. I know from past discussions and tuning in to right-wing talk radio, that the vast majority seemed quite displeased with Hillary's access to the paltry 900 plus FBI files and the Clinton administration's targeting of political opponents utilizing the IRS. That they should so blithely dismiss the growing threat of tyranny posed by the Bush administration reeks of self serving, blind allegiance, a total lack of principles, and extreme short-sightedness for the health and longevity of the republic.
Do you not understand how data-mining works, or are you just a conspiracy nut?
I do not agree with the government keeping tabs on anyone without at least having probably cause, but that said, the logical jump you made here is ridiculous.
The whole purpose of data mining is that you need A LOT of data. They're not just looking at everyone who visits a given website and then investigating them, that would be a waste of time.
Instead, you have to look at trends. A professor I had the opportunity to work with was actually approached by the government to help them identify such trends, and from what he told me the process goes something like this:
There are certain lifestyles that only terrorists will lead. If you look at the 9/11 terrorists you'll see the following patterns (again this is from the professor and he was generalizing to me without documents infront of him, so some of these might be off, and I know I'm missing a few):
They never paid mortgage, rent, or utility bills They never owned any form of insurance They frequently made cash withdrawls from ATMs in the largest amounts possible, and did so one after another (i.e. there would be 6 or 7 $500 cash withdrawls in a row) They routinely carried out the same internet operations (be they e-mailing the same people, visiting the same websites, etc.) They never opened non-checking accounts (i.e. savings, money markets, etc.) They paid several large bills every month (presumably flight school) despite not paying utilities, rent, etc. as mentioned above.
Now, if you're going to try and catch a terrorist, it's a waste of time to investigate everyone who e-mails a suspected terrorist, or makes a $500 cash withdrawl from an ATM.
So, what's the solution? You cast a very wide net and look for someone who shows all or most of the above listed behaviour. If you don't open an investigation unless someone always makes $500 withdrawls, does so in sequence with other people, does not appear to be paying any for of rent or utility, and owns no insurance, then you have a pretty good chance of finding a terrorist with very few investigations.
But, the only way to do this successfully is to cast a very wide net. You would have to know about banking transactions, insurance parments, atm activity, school enrollments, etc.
So, please stow your conspiracy crap and actually look into how data mining works before making similar ridiculous claims.
If we want to stop the Bush administration, the best way to do it is to make realistic arguments, and fight within the law. Make sure investigators have probable cause, make sure warrants require the involvement of courts and judges, etc. Making up conspiracies because you don't understand what's going on won't help anyone, and oftentimes it can serve to make the entire opposition look silly.
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I know very well what data mining is and how it works, having worked in information systems for over a dozen years and on systems that perform it. The fact is that with your example criteria, you would turn up so many false positives as to make the amount of leads too great to be followed up, diverting resources to many false leads, overwhelming investigators. Terrorists will also not be repeating the same patterns as they did in the run-up to 9/11, as this attack was already tried, and government has put into place policies addressing the particular circumstances of that particular attack. The only thing that would make the mining REALISTICALLY useful is to have a significant percentage of the data you are looking at (comprising a significant percentage of the population) lead to actual targets of investigation. I explained this, how did you miss it? Also, you seem to have missed this very important part, Quote:
anyone of minimal intelligence engaged in a terrorist plot will in fact encrypt their communications, or resort to physical meeting or message drops out of the reach of the eavesdropping of electronic communications
Intelligence professionals know this, the terrorists know this.
I am making no ridiculous claims. What is ridiculous is assuming that the government will not use data to target political opposition. There is historical precedents for this all over the world, even in the U.S. To deny the possibility is to deny reality. Have you heard of CONTELPRO? Have you heard about the Clinton administration's use of FBI files and tax information to target political opposition? Have you heard how our current administration treats political opponents? Do you think that the outing of Valerie Plame was an accident?
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And as things fell apart, Nobody paid much attention... - David Byrne, '(Nothing But) Flowers' from the Talking Heads' album, 'Naked'
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