Pentagon database leaves no child alone

[Clara T]

Pentagon database leaves no child alone
By Mike Ferner
Online Journal Contributing Writer

Feb 3, 2006, 16:11

Since 2002, the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD) has spent a half-million dollars a year creating a database it claims is “arguably the largest repository of 16-25 year-old youth data in the country, containing roughly 30 million records.” In Pentagonese the database is part of the Joint Advertising, Marketing Research and Studies (JAMRS) project. Its purpose, along with additional millions spent on polling and marketing research, is to give the Pentagon’s $4 billion annual recruiting budget maximum impact. And it has lit a fire under civil libertarians, privacy advocates and counter-recruiting activists across the nation.

Over 100 organizations recently sent a letter to Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and to the DoD oversight committees of Congress, demanding the Pentagon dump the JAMRS database. Gary Daniels, litigation coordinator for the Ohio ACLU, declared, “The ACLU’s work revolves around personal privacy, but in 2005, it’s almost like the ship has sailed. It’s clear the Pentagon’s database does not bode well for privacy rights.”

“JAMRS is a much larger issue than recruiters’ presence in the schools,” Daniels added. “Students who ‘opt out’ of having their information turned over to recruiters by their school are just shifted into another column in the JAMRS database, called the ‘suppression list.’” With students’ personal information now in the hands of the Pentagon, Daniels estimated that keeping recruiters from contacting youths directly is just about impossible.

<snip>

She characterized the 14 “Blanket Routine Uses” the Pentagon claims as exemptions to the Privacy Act as “a catch-all loophole that allows an agency to disclose personal information to others without the individual's consent,” and objects that, to date, the Pentagon refuses to put in writing why they are not requesting information directly from the data subjects, how to correct false information in a record, or how the military intends to notify someone that local, state, or federal agencies have requested their information.

http://onlinejournal.com/artman/publish/article_477.shtml

Department of Defense
Blanket Routine Uses

Department of Defense
Blanket Routine Uses

1) Law Enforcement Routine Use:
If a system of records maintained by a DoD Component to carry out its functions indicates a violation or potential violation of law, whether civil, criminal, or regulatory in nature, and whether arising by general statute or by regulation, rule, or order issued pursuant thereto, the relevant records in the system of records may be referred, as a routine use, to the agency concerned, whether federal, state, local, or foreign, charged with the responsibility of investigating or prosecuting such violation or charged with enforcing or implementing the statute, rule, regulation, or order issued pursuant thereto.

2) Disclosure When Requesting Information Routine Use:
A record from a system of records maintained by a DoD Component may be disclosed as a routine use to a federal, state, or local agency maintaining civil, criminal, or other relevant enforcement information or other pertinent information, such as current licenses, if necessary to obtain information relevant to a DoD Component decision concerning the hiring or retention of an employee, the issuance of a security clearance, the letting of a contract, or the issuance of a license, grant, or other benefit.

3) Disclosure of Requested Information Routine Use:
A record from a system of records maintained by a DoD Component may be disclosed to a federal agency, in response to its request, in connection with the hiring or retention of an employee, the issuance of a security clearance, the reporting of an investigation of an employee, the letting of a contract, or the issuance of a license, grant, or other benefit by the requesting agency, to the extent that the information is relevant and necessary to the requesting agency's decision on the matter.

<snip>

14) Counterintelligence Purpose Routine Use:
A record from a system of records maintained by a DoD Component may be disclosed as a routine use outside the DoD or the U.S. Government for the purpose of counterintelligence activities authorized by U.S. Law or Executive Order or for the purpose of enforcing laws which protect the national security of the United States.

http://www.defenselink.mil/privacy/notices/blanket-uses.html

[liveoaktx]

1. I called JAMSR last year and was told the only way they would

stop collecting that information is if Congress prevents it... So hammer Congress, too.

[mangobunny]

4. NSA, SAIC ... spying on peace

I saw a very informative thread on DU about KBR/Halliburton getting contracts to make detention facilties ... and, of course, we've all heard about the "domestic spying" issue that is being half-heartedly kicked around. So, I wanted to chime in with two observations:

1.) We (progressives and our reps) should not let the Bushes (you know Rove, Dan Bartlett, William McGurn and other PR spinmeisters for Bush) ... we should not allow them to keep framing the whole debate about the NSA spying on U.S. citizens as simply a matter of listening in on calls with "Al Queda" on one end. The real issue with this domestic spy program is that it is also being used against all kinds of dedicated peace activists - activists and other citizens who have nothing at all to do with any militant group. This is the real point of contention and it has always largely been danced all around in the media and in any public discussion of this matter. All the Republican spokespersons always make a referrence to "Al Queda on the other end" ... whenever they are questioned about the domestic spying issue and this is a sidestep, an escapist farce ... a red herring and all of that ... The issue is that we Americans, and our democratically elected representatives, have no idea who they are really listening too and their is ample evidence that they listen in on groups like Greenpeace and Quakers. This is an outrage and we should not let this sidestepping and hyperbolic rhetoric about "Al Queda on the other end" to continue. Osama is indeed becoming 1984's Immanuel Goldstein.

and

2. SAIC - Strategic Applications International Corporation ... This company is the number one private contractor for the NSA. It is in the top five for the CIA and among the top ten for the Pentagon. It was hired (with our tax dollars in Feb. 2003) to set up the original Iraqi Reconstruction and Development Council (IRDC) in Iraq. One of their primary businesses is surveillance. They also bought Network Solutions during the dot.com boom and then sold it for a huge profit, just before the bust. They parnered with Bechtel in the Yucca Mountain ... the make Vigilante Helicopters ... they run the Tera Text and the Latent Semantic Indexing for the NSA ... so, they are huge, they are doing all kinds of shady stuff and not many of us "progressives" ever seem to mention them. So, my sisters and brothers, I encourage you to look into them and to make them part of you lexicon ... We need to shine the light on these guys as well as on Halliburton(KBR) and Becthtel. And, with Enron back in the news, we should also be looking into Bearing Point ... but, hey, if some among us start talking about SAIC - I'll be happy enough.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Science_Applications_International_Corporation

http://www.publicintegrity.org/wow/bio.aspx?act=pro&ddlC=51

http://www.corpwatch.org/article.php?list=type&type=17

http://www.sevenstories.com/Book/index.cfm?GCOI=58322100484530

OK, thank you for your interest and your time ... peace out,
Zee Bunny

[Clara T]

5. Thanks for those links

welcome to DU.

:toast:

[Benhurst]

2. Relax. This is no big deal.

Every police state worth its salt needs a good data base.

[pocket]

3. dragoon the american kids, bomb the foreign brown ones

fuckign scumbags