Briefs

By Ben Bain, July 24, 2008, FCW.com

Clarification is needed for the definition of data mining and the rules governing it, civil libertarians and academics said today.

Several experts at a Homeland Security Department conference on implementing privacy protections in government data mining expressed concerns that the meaning of data mining was misunderstood, or had not been fully explained, thus leading to confusion or potential violations of privacy rights.

In the legislation that established DHS, Congress required the department to "establish and utilize ... a secure communications and information technology infrastructure, including data mining and other advanced analytical tools, in order to access, receive and analyze data." However, according to some experts, there's confusion over what constitutes data mining, causing misperceptions.

...

"What’s important here is that we not reflexively say that data mining is bad ... but we need to have in place the rules of the road here ... about when data can be collected, how it can be used," said Barry Steinhardt, director of the Technology and Liberty Project at the American Civil Liberties Union.

In its 2007 annual report to Congress on the department’s data mining activities, DHS' privacy office said that "it is important to note that no consensus exists on what constitutes data mining."

Read more.