Briefs

New York Times (03/25/03) P. C6; Lohr, Steve

In-Q-Tel CEO Gilman Louie told PC Forum attendees on Monday that a proposal favored by some technology executives--one calling for a large database on citizens' activities that government officials would have unrestricted access to--is "very dangerous." Such an approach, known as data mining, would collate data on Americans and sort it by name, purchasing history, or travel itinerary in order to find suspicious patterns; anyone who is profiled as a suspect would be placed on a watch list.

Although Louie acknowledged that data mining can be useful under certain circumstances, he believes that making it the chief information-based weapon in the war against terrorism is a mistake, one that would destabilize civil liberties. A much more acceptable strategy, in his opinion, is data analysis, in which software tools are employed to search for connections between investigative leads and known terrorists by studying places of residence, recent travel, and other behavior.

One form of data analysis software is Non-Obvious Relationship Awareness (NORA), which Las Vegas casinos use to trace links between customers or even employees with known criminals. Louie said the failure to prevent the Sept. 11 attacks was not a lack of information, but the inability of various government agencies to pool their information resources. In-Q-Tel is a venture fund founded by the CIA as a springboard for new concepts, but Louie believes its importance has grown in the aftermath of Sept. 11. "Now, this isn't an experiment," he stated. "This is a necessity."

See http://www.nytimes.com/2003/03/25/technology/25DATA.html