Data Mining Doesn't Catch Terrorists:New Cato Study Argues it Threatens Liberty

[cal04]

In the wake of 9/11, a jittery Washington embraced any measure intelligence and law- enforcement agencies said would help prevent further terrorist attacks. Data mining was dubbed an essential tool in the war on terror, with the agencies arguing that comprehensive monitoring of personal data would assist in catching terrorists. In "Effective Counter-Terrorism and the Limited Role of Predictive Data Mining," Jim Harper, director of information policy studies at the Cato Institute, and Jeff Jonas, a distinguished engineer and chief scientist with IBM's Entity Analytic Solutions Group, demonstrate that data mining is costly, ineffective, and a violation of fundamental liberty.

Data mining relies on "pattern-based analysis," where the government analyzes private data from large numbers of people. The data includes travel and transactional history. Predictive data mining not only invades citizens' privacy, but registers false positives over 90 percent of the time. The technology needed to obtain more precise results simply does not exist -- a fact that renders data mining useless and potentially harmful.

The "statistical likelihood of false positives is so high that predictive data mining will inevitably waste resources and threaten civil liberties," argue the study's authors.

"Data mining is not an effective way to discover incipient terrorism," Harper and Jonas write. "It is not well suited to the terrorist discovery problem." In fact, the authors conclude that the information about the key members of the 9/11 plot was available to the U.S. government prior to the attacks. It was "quite feasible" to find and connect the culprits "using the legal authority and investigative systems that existed before the attacks."



http://releases.usnewswire.com/GetRelease.asp?id=77376

[Viva_La_Revolution]

1. yep

but will this make the MSM? :(

[rodeodance]

2. whow. coming from CATO, this is grand

[Gelliebeans]

9. that was my thought too

Cato has been behind some of the right's biggest policies haven't they?

[ck4829]

3. I can hear the RW'ers now...

"The Cato Institute is obviously a Liberal Think Tank that hails from San Francisco!"

[peacetalksforall]

4. I am offended by the first sentence - I snear at the lie - anyone who

tells me that data mining was born to fight terrorism in the aftermath of 9-11 is misleading me. Someone needs to prove to me that data mining/spying/archiving wasn't conceived and started before 9-11 and that it wasn't one of the key pre-planned 'benefits' to the a certain group of people who were and are hell bent on controlling us. Who? The same people sponsoring the politicians who made it possible. (No matter which side of the Senate or House room they sit in.)

[KansDem]

8. I agree...

Data Mining Doesn't Catch Terrorists

I don't think it was ever intended for this purpose. I think it was implemented to "catch" anyone who didn't agree with the neo-con, fascist agenda...

[DerBeppo]

11. Can't Prove a Negative.

But I get your meaning. I think it was ramped up and used more widely and freely after 9-11, but data mining in some form or another has been around for a very long time.

[wakeme2008]

5. I think the author John Sandford is right on this

read my review of his "fiction" book The Hanged Man's Song

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=208x9904

[High Plains]

6. Why are we paying attention to this report?

After all, CATO is just a bunch of libertarians. You know, Republicans who smoke pot.

Okay, now where is that sarcasm smilie thingie?

[Karenina]

7. File under: Duh!

:eyes:

[zreosumgame]

10. I ran into a commercial data-mining morass this weekend

a company called Verid from someplace in Fla has persuaded the Miami BBB to REQUIRE it's use for those using on-line purchases from companies in the area (how that is enforced is a mystery to me). the issue to me is not how they came up with 2 pages of old addresses of mine from 30 years ago (3 of them i had lived at yet they said i didn't, yeah like they have a fucking clue), or how they asked me my brothers age and then told me I was wrong (LOL assholes) but how very inaccurate and stupid their 'information' is. thye do not seem to ever verify what they gather and then spew it all over the internet. No wonder 6 month old babies and ted kennady end up on 'no fly lists' if they are using the same level of stupidity when gathering 'info'.