Important: MUST SEE!!!!

[lala_rawraw]

I just got a call from some folks and was told that 10 PM EST, CNBC was something I needed to tune into and take notes. So I found a listing for the hour and program, it is a Russert show with James Risen and another intel writer (http://moneycentral.msn.com/content/CNBCTV/TV_Info/P2100.asp).

I then made some calls and was told certain things that will be presented on this show, which came completely under radar. If what I have heard is correct, we have entered 1984 completely.

I was told to take notes on the following:
Company Names/Locations/Field of Expertise
Technology overlaps
What you infer from what you are being told

I don't know what this means as I have not seen this show, but given what I was told (not sure of how much of what I was told is actually in the show, supposedly quite a bit) it is imperative that we pay close attention.

Can you live blog to help me out, so that we can have a running discussion thread on this? Can you please make sure to track the things I was told to take notes on? I want to make sure I don't miss anything, especially to focus on point number 1 (as it will include 3 really important names). Apparently one company named is involved in another business all together and will give us, pause in terms of why it is involved in this stuff.

Let's prep by researching the other guest on the show, his area of focus, and publications. Also, spread the word for people to watch it as well.


UPDATE: ONE COMPANY NAME IS CHOICEPOINT, ABSORBED INTO NSA PROGRAM (not sure if the person was trying to imply hired on contract or really "absorbed") Where do I know choice point from?

[NMDemDist2]

1. i'll TIVO it for you if that will help? n/t

[kentuck]

2. RFID

Something the author talked about...very minute chips that can be implanted in your hand that can follow you anywhere...It was scary stuff.

[wildbilln864]

8. I heard of this a couple years ago...

It was called "digital angel" from verichip. look up Applied Digital Solutions.

[wildbilln864]

17. here's a link to a...

an older article about it if this is what we're talking about.

http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=17705

[Ellipsis]

27. Tommy Thompson is on Verichip's board

Here's another link

http://news.zdnet.com/2100-1009_22-5793685.html

[bahrbearian]

28. Is "Digital Angel" some kind of "Double Speak" ?

[FreedomAngel82]

102. Speaking of which

earlier this week Alex Jones on his show had a guy who had one of these chips implanted in him. He volunteered for it with his work and so did his girlfriend. According to this guy some chips can be removed while others will never be removed. This was on Monday since Malloy was out.

[FARAFIELD]

3. well i dont know much

But if its russert, he and the other writer will call Risen a traitor for outing the program and talk about how the repukes will pass a secrets of governmnent law ALA great britain

[napi21]

4. Thanks. I'll watch. Nothing else on anyway! n/t

[ewagner]

5. Couldn't find the name of the other guest

on the CNBC site.....

do you know the name?

I'll help if I can.

e

[lala_rawraw]

7. Yeah, not listed (odd)

O'Hara was what I was told, WaPo writer? Looking for it now.

[Cleita]

12. My satellite program lists Robert O'Harrow. Misspelling by them?

eom

[babylonsister]

24. That's the man, and he's a critic of ChoicePoint. nt

[lala_rawraw]

33. Or me as I was writing quickly from my cell

in the car... going to look for book now... was told another company from Florida, not choicepoint, but another one and a third one was told nothing about.

[lala_rawraw]

6. I updated... help me look into Choicepoint

[WarNoMore]

9. Wasn't it Choicepoint

that was responsible for the Florida felon purge in 2000?

[MelissaB]

10. Must be...first hit for "choicepoint florida"

http://www.choicepoint.com/news/2000election.html

[MelissaB]

14. From Palast:

http://www.gregpalast.com/detail.cfm?artid=55&row=1

...

Early in the year, the company, ChoicePoint, gave Florida officials a list with the names of 8,000 ex-felons to "scrub" from their list of voters.

But it turns out none on the list were guilty of felonies, only misdemeanors. The company acknowledged the error, and blamed it on the original source of the list -- the state of Tex



I think I'm going to be sick now.

[lala_rawraw]

35. Wait, I don't follow... how is this tied to NSA?

And "absorbed by" comment? It must do data mining work in general and was hired for Florida, is that about right? So then NSA absorbed their data mining tech?

[roseBudd]

93. Choicepoint has been doing data mining in latin america also

http://www.voiceoffreedom.com/archives/Ofcourse/dataupdate.html

http://www.usatoday.com/tech/news/techpolicy/2003-09-01-choicepoint_x.htm

Vendor sells Latin American citizen data to U.S.
When Border Patrol agents came across the corpses of 14 Mexican immigrants who died trying to cross the searing Arizona desert in 2001, a brand new tool helped U.S. authorities identify the bodies and, eventually, the smugglers who abandoned them.
The tool was a database containing the personal information of 65 million voting-age Mexican citizens. The U.S. government bought access to it for $1 million a year from a giant data vendor called ChoicePoint.

U.S. drug and immigration investigators prized the data, accorting to the Department of Homeland Security and other law enforcement sources, because it gave them latitude to track suspects inside Mexico without alerting local authorities.

Now ChoicePoint's database is no longer available to help U.S. authorities. An Associated Press report detailing the U.S. government's access to the data triggered a public outcry in Mexico and other Latin American countries from which ChoicuPoint had obtained citizens' private records.

[Marie26]

86. Other interesting points:

- "In January, the state of Pennsylvania terminated a contract with ChoicePoint after discovering the firm had sold citizens' personal profiles to unauthorized individuals." This is a 2000 article. Seems like ChoicePoint has a long history of "losing" their files to people who shouldn't have them.

- "Florida is the only state in the nation to contract the first stage of removal of voting rights to a private company. And ChoicePoint has big plans. "Given the outcome of our work in Florida," says Fagan, "and with a new president in place, we think our services will expand across the country." I'll bet - and they did. Reward for a job well done?

- "Especially if that president is named "Bush." ChoicePoint's board and executive roster are packed with Republican stars, including billionaire Ken Langone, a company director who was chairman of the fund-raising committee for New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani's aborted run against Hillary Rodham Clinton. Langone is joined at ChoicePoint by another Giuliani associate, former New York Police Commissioner Howard Safir." Republican cronyfest.

[Delphinus]

92. Good grief!

This is sickening!! :puke:

[Marie26]

95. Isn't it?

I literally got chills as I read this thread. Fla., under Jeb Bush, was the first state to contract out voter roll purges, & just happened to award the contract to ChoicePoint. It looks like CP was a vital partner in "electing" George Bush in 2000 & was rewarded accordingly. So, CP was used to establish power & now it's being used to consolidate power. Look at what CP's contracts are - data collection, identification, biometrics, mining technologies. Check out their website - they've got a whole division, "ChoicePoint Gov" that deals with nothing but DHS contracts. Look at who they're partnered with - SAIC, who was the contractor for the TIA Pentagon program to gather information on Americans. CP rises from almost nothing to become a huge "security" firm that has information on every one of us. Think about it - then run for Canada. That's sure what I feel like doing right now.

[im10ashus]

16. From Wikipedia:

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

ChoicePoint has been criticized, by many critics of the 2000 election, for having a bias in favor of the Republican Party, for knowingly using inaccurate data, and for racial discrimination. Allegations include listing voters as felons for alleged crimes said to have been committed several years in the future. In addition, people who had been convicted of a felony in a different state and had their rights restored by said state, were not allowed to vote despite the restoration of their rights. (One should note Schlenther v. Florida Department of State (June 1998) which ruled that Florida could not prevent a man convicted of a felony in Connecticut, where his civil rights had not been lost, from exercising his civil rights.) Furthermore, it is argued that people were listed as felons based on a coincidence of names, despite other data (such as date of birth) which showed that the criminal record did not apply to the voter in question.

[lala_rawraw]

37. Wait a moment...

Racial profiling for voting... I did an article on this that I cannot find in Google cache... anyone happen to have the Florida 2004 Apartheid piece I did?

I have it stored on file, and not at that machine right now... the name in the article is Sir Moody Stuart

[im10ashus]

48. I can find this page:

http://www.afrocubaweb.com/news/worldnews166.htm

But the link for that article is not working. I will dig some more.

[im10ashus]

53. Got it!

Director of Florida voting contractor chaired companies linked to apartheid
By Larisa Alexandrovna and John Byrne | RAW STORY Staff

A lead director of the company hired by Florida to fix the state’s controversial felon voting rolls is also chairman of a company many regard as a former pillar of South African apartheid, RAW STORY has discovered.

cont'd...

http://www.kucinich.us/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=396

[sofa king]

100. Interesting. Abramoff was an Apartheid lobbyist, too, as per Raw Story

http://rawstory.com/news/2005/Before_he_became_lobbyist_Abramoff_abetted_0215.html

[AntiFascist]

109. Sir Mark Moody Stuart's name rings a "Bell"....

See XicanoPwr's comment to this post, which gives extensive background:

http://rigged-aggregators.blogspot.com/2005/03/exit-polls-collateral-what-you-must.html

Accenture's former CEO but now lead director of the Accenture board, Sir Mark Moody-Mark. He has a very interesting background.

He is chairman of Anglo American plc, a global mining and natural resources company. His bio from Accenture's web site.

http://tinyurl.com/5a8w4

[flyarm]

83. YES AND JEFF FISHER MADE THE CONNECTION WITH SEMLER

AND A KIDS detention connected with Mel and Betty Semler..STEALING ELECTIONS ..choicepoint=jeb

http://www.guardian.co.uk/usa/story/0,12271,949709,00.html

Firm in Florida election fiasco earns millions from files on foreigners

Oliver Burkeman in Washington and Jo Tuckman in Mexico City
Monday May 5, 2003
The Guardian

A data-gathering company that was embroiled in the Florida 2000 election fiasco is being paid millions of dollars by the Bush administration to collect detailed personal information on the populations of foreign countries, enraging several governments who say the records may have been illegally obtained.

US government purchasing documents show that the company, ChoicePoint, received at least $11m (£6.86m) from the department of justice last year to supply data - mainly on Latin Americans - that included names and addresses, occupations, dates of birth, passport numbers and "physical description". Even tax records and blood groups are reportedly included.

Nicaraguan police have raided two offices suspected of providing the information. The revelations threaten to shatter public trust in electoral institutions, especially in Mexico, where the government has begun an investigation.

The controversy is not the first to engulf ChoicePoint. The company's subsidiary, Database Technologies, was responsible for bungling an overhaul of Florida's voter registration records, with the result that thousands of people, disproportionately black, were disenfranchised in the 2000 election. Had they been able to vote, they might have swung the state, and thus the presidency, for Al Gore, who lost in Florida by a few hundred votes.

[Marie26]

87. CP also denied purchasing "election registry information" from Mexico. nt

[FreedomAngel82]

104. This is what popped out at me

The revelations threaten to shatter public trust in electoral institutions, especially in Mexico, where the government has begun an investigation.

Were they involved in 2004?

[proud patriot]

94. that's where my memory leads me

:think:

[kalibex]

11. http://www.choicepoint.com/

'ChoicePoint is the nation's leading provider of identification and credential verfication service'

-B

[Junkdrawer]

15. Wikipedia

ChoicePoint NYSE: CPS is a corporation based in Alpharetta, near Atlanta, Georgia, USA, which claims to be the "nation's leading supplier of identification and credential verification services". According to the TSA, the firm keeps more than 17 billion records of individuals and businesses, which it sells to more than half of America's top 1,000 companies. It also contracts with over 7,500 state and local government agencies, including law enforcement.

ChoicePoint maintains a database of names, addresses, Social Security numbers, credit reports, and other sensitive information. Its DNA laboratory aided in the identification of victims of the WTC attacks, and data supplied by ChoicePoint was used in the Beltway Snipers investigation. Choicepoint also assisted the Transportation Security Administration in investigating 112,278 applicants. The US Department of Justice and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children credit the corporation with assisting in the return of ~800 missing children.

Contents
1 Controversies
1.1 Major Security Breach in 2004
1.2 Florida Voter File Contract
1.3 DBT contract with the FBI
2 Corporate governance
3 Media Links
4 External links



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

[MelissaB]

19. From dkosopedia

Overview
ChoicePoint has a DNA laboratory which was used to identify victims of the WTC attacks. Data supplied by ChoicePoint was used in the Beltway Snipers investigation. Choicepoint also assisted the Transportation Security Administration in conduction ~100,000 applicants. The US Department of Justice and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children credit the corporation with assisting in the return of ~800 missing children. As of 2003, ChoicePoint's CEO is Derek V. Smith, who has held that position since 1997. In 2002, ChoicePoint generated earnings of ~$200 million on revenue of ~$791 million. The company employs ~3,500 people at 52 locations within 26 states.

More: http://www.dkosopedia.com/index.php/ChoicePoint

[SpiralHawk]

75. That stinks

Choicepoint identified the victims of 9/11?

Did they also identify the perpetrators?

MIHOP

[leftchick]

22. from a year ago ....

02/19/2005 Archived Entry: "The ChoicePoint data fiasco"

GARY NORTH HAS AN EXCELLENT TAKE on the ChoicePoint data disaster. Scathingly apt article -- though obviously written before ChoicePoint admitted that the real scope of their sloppy info gap went far, far beyond the "35,000 Californians" North mentions.

The two most shocking things, though, are that so many aware, intelligent people like North have never heard of ChoicePoint until now, and that Americans blandly accept that firms buy and sell masses of their personal information, including SSNs.

ChoicePoint, BTW, not only sells info to law enforcement, as many news stories have noted. It has such cozy-cozy connections with the feds that several federal agencies, including the FBI, have their own ChoicePoint web sites. To make this relationship even cozier, the firm has in the last several years expanded from merely gathering consumer data into explicitly seeking "security" and "intelligence" data. Yes, "intelligence" data on you and me.

Yes, the law says the feds can't maintain dossiers on innocent Americans. So -- wink, wink, nod, nod -- ChoicePoint does that odious job for them.

I absolutely don't advocate violence, but if I were writing a novel of the resistance, some fictional hero of mine would surely blow ChoicePoint (or at least its tools of its trade) straight off the planet. Even the dreadful Big Brother chipmaker, Applied Digital Solutions, is less of an enemy to privacy, individual sovereignty, and freedom. (Of course, chips and data will ultimately work together to enslave us. Hand-in-hand down the path they'll take us.)

http://www.clairewolfe.com/wolfesblog/00001224.html

[bobbieinok]

80. is this the dominionist Gary North, the son-in-law of Rushdonny???

[Emit]

88. Yes, I think it is! That's odd - more pieces written their by him. n/t

[MelissaB]

26. rose from nothing to multibillion-dollar status in a very short time

...snip


ChoicePoint made the news again recently when it was belatedly revealed that it had provided confidential personal information on 145,000 U.S. residents to identity thieves posing as legitimate business people. So far, according to an NPR report last week, 750 of those people have been victimized by the thieves.

How did ChoicePoint react to their damaging mistake? Well, at first it did nothing, claiming later that it did not want to interfere with a criminal investigation. The, when pushed, it sent out letters to the 145,000 victims, telling them they were at risk.

That's it. Letters. Just letters telling the victims that they'd been had and they'd better do something to protect themselves.

Here's the part that gets me. ChoicePoint is supposed to be the nation's top expert on personal information, so how is it that it cheerfully provides such information to a bogus company? Isn't the whole point of a company like ChoicePoint to protect others from being cheated by cheats? If it can't protect itself, why should others expect it to protect them?

The latest ChoicePoint fiasco cries out for investigation. Are there only 145,000 victims, or are there many more? Do all the victims belong to the same political party by any chance? What price will ChoicePoint be asked to pay for the massive damage its apparent negligence has caused?

A cynic would say there's more to ChoicePoint than meets the eye. It's a company that rose from nothing to multibillion-dollar status in a very short time. Its known mistakes are horrendous.

Is ChoicePoint tied in with the Bush administration in some way? Not that I know of. But I'm betting the Bushies have warm, fuzzy feelings about ChoicePoint, and it's not going to be held accountable.


http://www.sfgate.com/columnists/sorensen/


Things that make you go hummm....

[MelissaB]

34. benefits from Patriot Act

Since the election, ChoicePoint has been the beneficiary of a huge increase in the freedom of government agencies to gain access to personal data. The USA patriot act, passed after September 11, allows government investigators to gain access to more information on US citizens without a search warrant, and to see data on private emails with such a warrant but without a wiretap order. The act also means banks must make their databases accessible to firms such as ChoicePoint.

(next paragraph is interesting, too)

In Mexico, the president of the federal electoral institute, Jose Woldenberg, revealed that his investigators had talked to the Mexican company that said it paid a "third person" 400,000 pesos (£24,500) for a hard disk full of personal data drawn largely from the electoral roll. It sold this to ChoicePoint for just $250,000, indicating the huge profitability of ChoicePoint's contracts - last year's $11m payment was part of a five-year contract worth $67m.


Link: http://www.topdog04.com/000145.html

[im10ashus]

36. I swear this to be true.

When I need me some research, I am so coming to you.

:yourock:

[MelissaB]

41. I love digging.

:)

[Emit]

43. Seems this guy's done some research into choicepoint

They were also involved in a huge identity theft case that blossomed in CA last year. This guy includes some of that info in his rant about choicepoint:

March 02, 2005
Chew on This, ChoicePoint
THERE'S A SOLUTION to the dire threat posed to every American by ChoicePoint, the Atlanta-based "data miner" that has been cheerfully selling your most sensitive personal information to any Tom, Dick and Scumbag who ponies up a little cash. As Creative Loafing's Mara Shalhoup reported in 2003 in "Big Brother's Little Helper", plenty of smoke has been wafting from ChoicePoint’s robo-snoops for years, but that has elicited little mainstream press or regulatory interest.

ChoicePoint sells info-tidbits such as your Social Security number, what’s in your wallet and just about anything else about you that can be gleaned and stuffed into a computer. As disclosed in recent days, this corporate Orwellian nightmare didn’t much care to whom it auctioned your data. Those “customers” included swarms of “identity thieves,” who stole the digital life histories of 145,000 Americans, or maybe it’s 4 million. The large spread in numbers depends on whose account you choose to believe, and as we’ll see, you can file anything ChoicePoint avers under “unadulterated hokum.”

~snip~

ChoicePoint bosses likely agree that my solution, or something equally draconian, is in the offing. When identity scammers first surfaced in a California investigation in October (four months before the company bothered to clue in victims), ChoicePoint’s two top boys began dumping almost $21 million in stock. Other investors are now stuck with stock in free fall. Tough luck for them. If shareholders end up on the rocks because their identities have been purloined, ChoicePoint and its parent, credit reporting giant Equifax, will be sure to note financial problems on credit reports. Hey, it's just business.

~snip~

IN ADDITION TO SELLING YOUR information to insurance companies, prospective employers and, uh, identity thieves, the true business of ChoicePoint is circumventing the Federal Privacy Act of 1974. That law banned the government from becoming Big Brother and compiling digital dossiers on citizens. But when the law was written, people assumed only the government would have the computer wherewithal to amass databases. The law didn't ban -- the authors couldn't envision -- private companies from collecting data on virtually each and every American citizen, and then selling it to the government. ChoicePoint does business with at least 30 federal agencies.

Worried? You should be.

http://72.14.207.104/search?q=cache:CYvUNIpb2UEJ:www.johnsugg.com/2005/03/chew_on_this_ch.html+Derek+V.+Smith+Jeb+Bush&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=3

[OmmmSweetOmmm]

46. During the Katrina hearings, testimony was given that Choicepoint

had a data base with all social security numbers.

[Sydnie]

52. It appears they keep a screening program for entitlement programs

http://www.choicepointgov.com/fraud.htm

[babylonsister]

13. ChoicePoint, from wikipedia:

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

ChoicePoint
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
ChoicePoint Corporation
ChoicePoint company logo
Type Public (NYSE: CPS)
Slogan {{{company_slogan}}}
Founded {{{foundation}}}
Location Alpharetta, GA

United States
Key people Derek V. Smith, CEO
Douglas C. Curling, President/COO
Steven W. Surbaugh, CFO
J. Michael de Janes, Gen. Counsel
David T. Lee, Exec. VP
Industry Business Services
Products "Identification and credential verification services"
Revenue {{{revenue}}}
Operating Income {{{operating_income}}}
Net Income {{{net_income}}}
Employees 4,600
Parent {{{parent}}}
Subsidiaries {{{subsid}}}
Website www.choicepoint.com
{{{footnotes}}}

ChoicePoint NYSE: CPS is a corporation based in Alpharetta, near Atlanta, Georgia, USA, which claims to be the "nation's leading supplier of identification and credential verification services". According to the TSA, the firm keeps more than 17 billion records of individuals and businesses, which it sells to more than half of America's top 1,000 companies. It also contracts with over 7,500 state and local government agencies, including law enforcement.

ChoicePoint maintains a database of names, addresses, Social Security numbers, credit reports, and other sensitive information. Its DNA laboratory aided in the identification of victims of the WTC attacks, and data supplied by ChoicePoint was used in the Beltway Snipers investigation. Choicepoint also assisted the Transportation Security Administration in investigating 112,278 applicants. The US Department of Justice and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children credit the corporation with assisting in the return of ~800 missing children.

more...

[babylonsister]

18. ChoicePoint criticized for 2000 election repug bias!

Florida Voter File Contract

In 1998, the state of Florida signed a 4 million USD contract with Database Technologies (DBT Online), which later merged into ChoicePoint, for the purposes of providing a central voter file listing those barred from voting. As of 2002, Florida is the only state which hires a private firm for these purposes. Prior to contracting with Database Technologies, Florida contracted with a smaller operator for 5,700 USD per year. The state of Florida contracted with DBT in November 1998, following the controversial Miami mayoral race of 1997. The 1998 contracting process involved no bidding and was worth 2,317,800 USD.

ChoicePoint has been criticized, by many critics of the 2000 election, for having a bias in favor of the Republican Party, for knowingly using inaccurate data, and for racial discrimination. Allegations include listing voters as felons for alleged crimes said to have been committed several years in the future. In addition, people who had been convicted of a felony in a different state and had their rights restored by said state, were not allowed to vote despite the restoration of their rights. (One should note Schlenther v. Florida Department of State (June 1998) which ruled that Florida could not prevent a man convicted of a felony in Connecticut, where his civil rights had not been lost, from exercising his civil rights.) Furthermore, it is argued that people were listed as felons based on a coincidence of names, despite other data (such as date of birth) which showed that the criminal record did not apply to the voter in question.

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

[Digit]

20. I had to use ChoicePoint when I worked in an insurance office

ChoicePoint, with the help of a Fair, Isaac and Co. scoring formula, and the Insurance Services Office (ISO) offer insurers extensive nationwide resources that contain your name, address, phone number, credit report, claims history, and motor vehicle report - and that just scratches the surface. ChoicePoint also compiles aliases, criminal records, and histories of vehicles. "If you've got a car that's been in 35 accidents, that's something the insurance company is going to want to know," says Mark Wheeler, spokesperson for ChoicePoint.

ChoicePoint, which is an offshoot of the Equifax credit-reporting company, maintains a database called CLUE (Comprehensive Loss Underwriting Exchange). The company uses the information it gathers and maintains for "casualty loss" scoring, claims history reporting, and driving-record reporting. When a consumer fills out a new auto insurance application, the potential insurer queries ChoicePoint for an insurance score. ChoicePoint caters to nearly all property and casualty insurers.

The ISO says the databases it maintains, called the All Claims databases, are strictly for detecting fraud and expediting the claims process. If the ISO sees a series of claims that looks suspicious - for example, the same name appears on all the claims with a different social security number - the company will notify the insurance company and the insurer will investigate. The ISO also has information about any of your claims that might have ended up in court.

<snip>

You can get a copy of the ChoicePoint CLUE report by calling ChoicePoint's Consumer Disclosure Center at 770 752-6000. The report will cost between $8 and $10, depending on how the consumer wants the information, says Wheeler of ChoicePoint.

http://www.1800duilaws.com/article/auto_insurer.asp

[im10ashus]

21. K&R!

Here's what the Vice-President of Choicepoint had to say about the Flordia election:

Given the outcome of our work in Florida and with a new president in place, we think our services will expand across the country."

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_L._Fagan

[NYC]

25. Very interesting quote.

Thanks.

[babylonsister]

23. Tidbit on Robert O'Harrow Jr:

http://www.macon.com/mld/macon/news/opinion/13731122.htm

snip//

ChoicePoint describes itself on its Web site as, "A trusted source and leading provider of decision-making information that helps reduce fraud and mitigate risk. . . Through the identification, retrieval, storage, analysis and delivery of data, ChoicePoint serves the informational needs of businesses of all sizes, as well as federal, state and local government agencies."

Basically, the company collects data on millions of Americans and sells it. We all know that our electronic files are probably stored in a couple of thousand places. We do have a reasonable expectation that our information is secure. That's not always the case. Thursday, the Federal Trade Commission levied a record $10 million fine against ChoicePoint, with an additional $5 million to be used to pay back those who may have lost money due to ChoicePoint's lack of security.

In an alarmingly easy scam, scofflaws stole information stored by ChoicePoint on at least 163,000 people, 2,805 of them in Georgia. And if you're thinking this was simply name, address and phone number stuff, think again. Robert O' Harrow Jr., wrote a book on data piracy, "No Place to Hide." O'Harrow explains in great depth the type of information ChoicePoint and similar companies keep on individuals. Do you have bouts of depression? These data companies know about it. They know whether your tastes lean to whole or 2 percent milk, not to mention your credit score, bankruptcies and bank balances. It's estimated that ChoicePoint has the data of 220 million people. If you're an adult in America, ChoicePoint probably has your data.

snip//

[im10ashus]

30. That's some scary stuff.

"Do you have bouts of depression? These data companies know about it. They know whether your tastes lean to whole or 2 percent milk, not to mention your credit score, bankruptcies and bank balances. It's estimated that ChoicePoint has the data of 220 million people. If you're an adult in America, ChoicePoint probably has your data."

[RazzleDazzle]

49. 2% milk

And NOW we know what happens when you sign up for those grocery store or office supply or pharmacy store benefit cards. It's worse than I thought. I imagined that only the grocery store would be paying attention.

[slaveplanet]

89. However bad you think it is,

Multiply that x10 then double it.

They are using it as a caste system...you have no way of knowing what the person in front of you or behind you in line is paying , built in discounts could be automatically deducted depending on your class ranking.

[Marie26]

90. Unless they can sell that info to someone else

Kind of makes up for the 10% discounts, doesn't it?

[Sydnie]

31. I was thinking they had been "cracked and hacked" but couldn't

find the article. Wonder if that has anything to do with the NSA? Just claim you were hacked and you are off the hook?

[kentuck]

42. USAA insurance uses Choicepoint in some of their investigations..

At least they did a couple of years ago...

For example, when they were requested to insure a new driver or a new member, they would get information from the states who would get the information from the investigations and database of Choicepoint. For example, if you got a ticket for speeding 5 years ago. Or if you had filed bankruptcy. Or if you were very deep in debt and were more likely to commit suicide....those types of things....One of my short-term jobs in the new Bush economy....

[FreedomAngel82]

105. Why would they need to know though if

you were going to committ suicide and how would they know?

[emulatorloo]

29. Kick n/t

[livvy]

32. From Miller's "Fooled Again"....

As someone already mentioned they were involved in the purging of ex-felons in FL.
There is also this mention in Miller's book....
"While the purges did incalculable damage to the civic sphere in Florida, they were very good for the Republicans---and for Choicepoint, which, not long after the campaign, the regime handsomely rewarded with a range of contracts relating to the "war on terror". Among the many goodies handed Choicepoint, the Department of Homeland Security signed a $1 million contract giving it full access to the corporation's database on foreign nationals. (according to AP, the information may have been illegally acquired from "subcontractors"- that is, government employees- in Mexico, Columbia, Venezuela, Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Honduras, El Salvador and Guatemala).

pgs. 214-215

[lala_rawraw]

38. Wait, domestic people as well?

Maybe that is how the NSA is involved?

[livvy]

79. He gives this reference to the statement...

Jim Krane, "US drug and immigration probes suffer after vendor stops selling Latin American citizen data" AP, 8/31/03


Choicepoint bought up Database Technologies (DBT)in May 2000. DBT had been paid $3 million to purge the voter rolls.
Florida's legislature approved in May 2001 a $32 million electoral reform package. Part of the deal voided Florida's contracts with Choicepoint and forbid Harris to hire any outside companies to deal with the voter rolls.
"There were also calls for an investigation of the state's contract with DBT. 'By most accounts, this contract was an unmitigated disaster, which led to Floridians being denied the right to vote, and millions of taxpayer dollars wasted or misspent,' charged Democratic Leader Tom Rossin of West Palm Beach". (Florida Democrats Put Heat on Katherine Harris, Orlando Sentinel, 2/21/01) From "Fooled Again pg. 215

In 2001, the state signed a $1.6 million contract with Accenture, which was for all intents and purposes and outside company, to design a system which was to identify all would-be voters with criminal histories in the state. Accenture was formerly known as Andersen Consulting, spun off from Arthur Andersen after the Enron scandal. Apparently they got the contract because they were allied with Election.com, a New York firm that devised the voter registration database in Arkansas.
Accenture had many ties to Bush, Cheney et al. It was represented by Poole, McKinley and Blosser, a lobbying firm connected to Jeb. This same firm did business with Cheney during and since his CEO status at Halliburton. As if 2001, Accenture was the preferred provider across every division of Halliburton.
"Election.com had several jobs pertaining to the presidential contest in 2004. Aside from safeguarding the integrity of the voters rolls in Florida, the company was competing for the contract to provide 100,000 US military personnel, living overseas, with online absentee ballots." pg 217
This deal fell through because they felt the internet was not secure enough.

[MelissaB]

39. Somebody read this...DIEBOLD, ChoicePoint and Sproul

Have I had too much to drink?

BSNewswire: Diebold To Patent "+1" Operation

Thursday, 4 November 2004, 11:48 am
Press Release: BSNewswire
BSNewswire: Diebold To Patent "+1" Operation

NEW YORK, Nov. 3 /BSNewswire/ -- Diebold, ChoicePoint and Sproul - in a new partnership between government and business involving unprecedented interagency cooperation between the RNC/PNAC, the Patent Office, the Justice Department and the Department of Homeland Security - and funded in part by venture capital from Microsoft's capital-markets division - have announced plans to form a joint venture to leverage core software patents and other intellectual property for the purpose of maintaining America's strategic edge at providing "the best democracy money can buy."


http://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/WO0411/S00055.htm

[Emit]

44. Diebold/ChoicePoint/ Sproul/ RNC/PNAC /USGOV/MICROSOFT?!?!

Did I miss anyone?

"the best democracy money can buy." ??? How Orwellian is that?!

[Pachamama]

84. OMFG!

:wow:

The MSFT part just made me lose it....that's it folks....there all in it together...and then you have news lately about how companies like Yahoo etc were turning over info to the Chinese gov't....

And what makes one think they wouldn't do it to an US Citizen?

[babylonsister]

45. Diebold involved? And "The best democracy money can buy"?

Geesh, that's fairly blatant, isn't it?

This is dynamite, MelissaB!

[Emit]

47. That could relate to "Technology overlaps" from the lala's OP n/t

[Clara T]

56. C'mon what's a little surveillance nation to do?

[RazzleDazzle]

57. It's satire. BSNews ought to have been your first clue

It's cleverly written and God knows I put NOTHING past these fascist criminals, but this is not for real. I'm 99.999% sure.

[MelissaB]

61. It's got to be.

[drm604]

97. It has to be satire.

Diebold's flagship product - their distributed "black box" implementation of what assembly-language programmers used to refer to as the "INCR" operator, better known to the rest of us as "plus one" or "addition" - will to be the first of several strategic arithmetic operators to be included in the joint venture's portfolio of vital information-technology (IT) trade secrets, which will soon include implementions of other core mathematical functions, such as subtotal, percent, and greater-than-or-equal-to.

While it may not be obvious to most people, this is obvious nonsense to programmers, especially to assembly-language programmers. No way are they selling a black box implementation for INCR. There's no way any company would pay for an implementation of such a basic operation. This is just silly.

[maddezmom]

111. agree, here is a link

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x16718#16815

[MelissaB]

60. In relation: Diebold has ties to ChoicePoint and SAIC

ChoicePoint has ties to electronic voting vendors, e.g. CP has a data mining alliance with SAIC, and SAIC wrote wrote voting system security software for Diebold. It is untenable that a truly free country would permit the obvious conflicts-of interest inherit in the nexus between these entities...

Lots more, but it's a freaking PDF that I don't know how to copy and paste. :(

http://www.wheresthepaper.org/CEPN_Centralized_Voter_Reg_1.pdf

[Catrina]

96. SAIC came up in another thread about technology that could easily

check the containers coming into the ports.

DU poster Tomintib, related a story regarding a talk he had with rep for a company that made the technology and how he had tried to sell it to Homeland Security but was turned down. DUers researched companies that had this technology and in their research, came across SAIC.

Here's the thread ~

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x513982

Here's the first post about SAIC:


Steve_DeShazer (1000+ posts) Sat Feb-25-06 03:34 PM
Response to Reply #35
51. WHOA!!! CHECK THIS OUT....
From the SAIC website:

SAIC'S VACIS® Cargo, Vehicle and Contraband Inspection Systems to Be Installed in the Sultanate of Oman

(SAN DIEGO and MCLEAN, VA) - Science Applications International Corporation’s (SAIC) Security and Transportation Technology Business Unit today announced that its VACIS® cargo, vehicle and contraband inspection systems have been selected by Royal Oman Police Customs for operation at border crossings and Port Sultan Qaboos. Royal Oman Police Customs is acquiring Mobile VACIS and Portal VACIS systems, and the order includes installation, on-site operator training and maintenance.

SAIC’s VACIS inspection systems are gamma ray-based systems designed for the non-intrusive inspection of the contents of trucks, containers and cargo. The Mobile VACIS system is truck-mounted for rapid deployment and can inspect both stationary and moving vehicles and containers. Scanning can be performed in forward or reverse and an entire series of containers can be scanned in a single pass.

"We are pleased to be selected by Oman Customs to facilitate their efforts to improve security and productivity at high-throughput checkpoints," said Alex Preston, SAIC general manager of the Security and Transportation Technology Business Unit. "We have more than 280 VACIS inspection systems, designed to assist customs, port, terminal and checkpoint authorities with manifest verification, tariff collection and the identification of contraband and other suspicious items, deployed and operational globally."



......


From the OP in that thread:

Turns out he was with a SF/Reno based firm that makes the most kick-butt CT Scanner on the market for cargo containers. These things are so powerful they require their own power grid and can produce a crystal-clear 3-D image of the entire contents of the container. And quick, too.

So I ask him if they can keep up with the demand because of all the attention on Port Security.

He tells me that all of their business is overseas, primarily Middle East and Asia.

Says they cannot give them away in the US.

..........

He goes on to say that the rep told him if he went public with the information that the DHS won't buy this technology while selling it all over the world, he was told that he 'would be arrested'.

Don't know if this is significant, or even if the guy was from SAIC ~ but thought it was interesting.

....

Also, in view of all this information, remember the news that cellphone records were being sold online a few weeks ago? No one seemed to know where these companies were getting the info. John Aravosis bought the cell records of Gen. Clark during the election, AIRC. Could this company be selling the information they have collected for such purposes? Just a thought since they are implicated in the ID theft travesty ~

[stillcool]

106. I'm sure there are other ways...

as I'm no geek...but I use the export document to text....first you save a copy of the pdf...then after you open the pdf you click on the file button and click on export document to text... :hi:

[lala_rawraw]

62. I do not know how credible scoop is in all honesty, but

This seems a bit over the top to me. In any case, the show starts in 3 min, so get your fingers ready to blog it;)

[Mnemosyne]

81. self delete

[jillan]

85. If they are able to design chips that are so small that you barely

even see; they can keep track of where you are at any moment....

I'm not tech savvy, but I would imagine hacking into computer systems
would be small potatoes to them.

OMFG - It all makes sense now. What happened in the wee hours of November 3rd.
They thought no one would notice, everyone would be sleeping. Yeah, everyone
but the ones that voted for Kerry.

It really got to me when the author of NO PLACE TO HIDE said that
people in the microchip business were asking for regulations. I thought about the elections immediately.

This is huge.

[Marie26]

91. Scoop is a big election fraud site

Is there a link to an actual newswire? I couldn't find one - the article just links to Diebold's front page.

[maddezmom]

110. this was satire

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=203x16718#16815

[RazzleDazzle]

40. Three more things about Choicepiont

and someone should probably verify --

1. Founded by fundamentalists, big time

2. Something about voter registration rolls IN ADDITION to the felon purge in FL. Trying to remember...seems to me there's been some legislative push (passed? not passed?) to coordinate and clean up voter registration rolls elsewhere than FL (was this part of HAVA, part of proposed "fixes" to HAVA??) and ChoicePoint is already involved in building the databases that incorporate voter registration data with other records. They would be ideally suited for any of this "work" for states, and then they'd own that data too just like they own FL's data.

3. Weren't they involved with that little mini-scandal about the U.S. or a U.S. company buying voter registration rolls from Mexico? And maybe Nicaragua??


This is a very, very bad company. However good or nice or positive it started out, there's really a limit to what info should be collected on individuals, I think.

And along those lines, I rather doubt that the company comes under ANY laws that protect individuals at all. They probably don't themselves collect and report credit data and that's the only data I can think of for which consumers are somewhat protected.

--

Yeah, MelissaB's got some of this in post 34.

[TayTay]

54. ChoicePoint testified before Congress last year

on Identity Theft after they lost a rather large collection of data, incluidng the banking information of several Members of Congress. I have this transcript and you can watch this hearing at: http://commerce.senate.gov/hearings/witnesslist.cfm?id=1491

Why should you watch this? Because the Lexis/Nexis and ChoicePoint clearly spell out what their businesses do and how they are employed by various govenment agencies to track biomentric information. They can cross-reference this with their knowledge of American's financial records and purchasing information, as they manage incredibly large stores of information on that as well.

Imagine, for a second, that we have an Admin that doesn't believe in following the privacy laws. Imagine companies without consciences that have been known to follow the Republican line in the past and to have done shady business for certain polls. Now, imagine those companies and their incredible wealth of identifying information on ordinary Americans in cahoots with the NSA and their desire to do 'domestic spying.'

Then be afraid. Very afraid indeed.

[TayTay]

58. LaLa, this is how they identified themselves

They were trying to defend themselves in the Identify Theft case:

CURLING: Once again, we extend our apology on behalf of our company to those who have been potentially affected. We learned that there are few places for consumers to turn to if their identity is stolen. This alone increases the fear and anxiety associated with identity theft.
For this reason, we have recently formed a partnership with the Identity Theft Resource Center, a leading and well-respected nonprofit organization dedicated exclusively to assisting identity theft victims.

Most importantly, we have shifted our focus to ensuring our products and services provide a direct benefit to consumers or to society as a whole.

While this has meant exiting an entire market, we decided that consumer interest must come first. We have already made broad changes to our products, limiting access to sensitive personally identifiable information, and more changes are under development. Last year, we helped more than 100 million people obtain fairly priced home and auto insurance. More than 7 million Americans get job through our pre-employment screening services. And we help more than 1 million consumers obtain expedited copies of their own vital record—birth, death and marriage certificates. These transactions were started by consumers with their permission, and they provide a clear direct benefit to them. Not all of our work is as obvious, but the value is. At a time when the news is filled with crimes committed against children, we’re helping our nation’s religious institutions and youth-serving organization protect those in our society who are least able to protect themselves.
Our products and services have identified 11,000 undisclosed felons among those seeking to volunteer with children, 1,055 with convictions for crimes against children, 42 of which who were registered sex offenders.

Consumers, businesses and nonprofits are not the only ones that rely on ChoicePoint. In fact, government officials have recently testified to Congress that they could not fulfill their missions of protecting our country and its citizens without the help of ChoicePoint and others in our industry. Last month, ChoicePoint supported the U.S. Marshals Service in Operation Falcon, which served approximately 10,000 warrants in a single day. Mr. Chairman, apart from what we do, I also understand that the committee is interested in how our business is regulated by federal legislation, as well as various state regulations. Approximately 60 percent of ChoicePoint’s business is driven by consumer-initiated transactions, most of which are regulated by the FCRA.

CURLING: These include pre-employment screening, auto and home insurance underwriting services, tenant screening services, and facilitating the delivery of vital records directly to consumers. Nine percent of ChoicePoint’s business is related to marketing services, none of which include the distribution of personally identifiable information. Even so, we are regulated by state and federal “do not mail” and “do not call” legislation, and for some services, the FRCA.
Five percent of ChoicePoint’s business is related to supporting law enforcement agencies in pursuit of their investigative missions through information and data services. Six percent of our business supports law firms, financial institutions and general business to help mitigate fraud through data and authentication services.

The final 20 percent of our business consists of software and technology services that do not include the distribution of personally identifiable information.

Read between the lines. This is the kind of access to personal info that these folks have. Again, they are a GOP friendly and very Bush friendly company. Now, why would the NSA, which is going heavily into Data Mining want to partner with this company? Why indeed?

[TayTay]

63. Last one LaLa: again look at the type of info they access

and store:

BILL NELSON: You said last October that you bought a Florida company—Boca Raton—named Seisint. Seisint has a program called Matrix—it’s one of the most extensive tools that is used by law enforcement.

As a matter of fact, the officials of that company told me that within a few days after September 11th they could determine who were the hijackers, who were the perpetrators of September the 11th. How do you protect that information?

SANFORD: The Matrix program was a federally-funded pilot which has ceased. I believe it stopped last month, actually. Matrix was a search engine that allowed law enforcement to search our services for our public record information, and they could also at the same time search their own databases.
We did not maintain or manage that. That was managed, I believe, by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement on behalf of the other states that participated in that.

BILL NELSON: And so that system wouldn’t have any biometric information, no DNA information, no medical information? SANFORD: Again, the Matrix program—our participation in it—is to share our technology and access to our data. What the state law enforcement organizations are searching, I believe, are things like sexual offender databases, correction records, arrest records, when they’re trying to locate a suspect. I’m not aware—I’ll be glad to check with my staff and get back to you—if there was any medical information accessed in that. I don’t believe there was.

BILL NELSON: Blood types, diseases, scars, identification marks, et cetera, et cetera.
SANFORD: I’ll have to get back to you, Senator.

BILL NELSON: I would appreciate it very much. Mr. Chairman, I think you see the concern welling up here of the extent to which, if these folks—which, thankfully, you all are very accommodating here to want to help us develop this legislation. But if we are not successful, you can see that no one in America is going to have any privacy left, if people can invade your databases. You say you want to prevent that. That’s what we’re trying to do.

Thank you very much.

KERRY: Could I just have one quick follow-up?

SMITH: Absolutely.

KERRY: Would either of you sell to a political committee? SANFORD: Senator, we have legal research business, news and business information services. There’s nothing that would stop them from having access. I don’t think they would qualify for permissive use under TLBA (ph) or the BPTA (ph), though. I mean, those are around fraud detection and prevention and law enforcement type of permissible use.

KERRY: But is there anything to stop a committee from—have you sold anything to a political committee?

SANFORD: Not that I’m aware of, no, Senator.

KERRY: But could they buy?

SANFORD: I don’t believe that’s a customer segment we serve.

KERRY: But could they?

SANFORD: I don’t believe they would get credentialed, but I can find out. It’s not a question I’ve heard before. But I don’t believe—
I’ve never heard—I’ve been around with the company since its inception, and...

KERRY: Well, do you have a means of checking, so that...

SANFORD: We have a business purpose criteria upon which we’ll enroll people as customers. I don’t believe political committees meet the business purpose; therefore, I don’t believe we would set up a customer account with them.

KERRY: What about a political consultant, who is doing sophisticated political analysis, polling analysis?

SANFORD: I don’t believe they’re customers of ours, nor do I believe we’d serve them.

KERRY: You “don’t believe,” but there’s no set of guidelines with respect to...

SANFORD: I’m trying to be very specific. There are very specific guidelines about who we serve as customers. I’ve never heard of this customer segment being anybody we serve. The preponderance of our customers are large insurance companies, large financial institutions, trying to process transactions so a consumer can get some kind of benefit—an insurance policy, a job—large retailers or large customers of ours. We don’t have very many customers that aren’t in the large commercial—space (ph) or government enterprises.

Sorry for the unfiltered info here, but you said you were in a hurry and that means I don't have time to do heavy edits.

Good luck!

[SpiralHawk]

74. Founded by fundies?

the info wars

Christofacists Vs Islamofascists Vs Authentic Spritual Inspiration

[Clara T]

50. CDB Infotek- Subsidiary of Choicepoint

Early in the year, the company, ChoicePoint, gave Florida officials a list with the names of 8,000 ex-felons to "scrub" from their list of voters. But it turns out none on the list were guilty of felonies, only misdemeanors. The company acknowledged the error, and blamed it on the original source of the list -- the state of Texas.

Florida officials moved to put those falsely accused by Texas back on voter rolls before the election. Nevertheless, the large number of errors uncovered in individual counties suggests that thousands of eligible voters may have been turned away at the polls.

Florida is the only state that pays a private company that promises to "cleanse" voter rolls.The state signed in 1998 a $4 million contract with DBT Online, since merged into ChoicePoint, of Atlanta. The creation of the scrub list, called the central voter file, was mandated by a 1998 state voter fraud law, which followed a tumultuous year that saw Miami's mayor removed after voter fraud in the election, with dead people discovered to have cast ballots. The voter fraud law required all 67 counties to purge voter registries of duplicate registrations, deceased voters and felons, many of whom, but not all, are barred from voting in Florida.

<snip>

Especially if that president is named "Bush." ChoicePoint's board and executive roster are packed with Republican stars, including billionaire Ken Langone, a company director who was chairman of the fund-raising committee for New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani's aborted run against Hillary Rodham Clinton. Langone is joined at ChoicePoint by another Giuliani associate, former New York Police Commissioner Howard Safir. And Republican power lobbyist and former congressman Vin Weber lobbies for ChoicePoint in Washington. Just before his death in 1998, Rick Rozar, president of a Choicepoint company, CDB Infotek, donated $100,000 to the Republican Party.

http://archive.salon.com/politics/feature/2000/12/04/voter_file/print.html


CDB Infotek, based in Santa Ana, California, is the nation's leading provider of public record information. As a member of the information industry, CDB Infotek is a business-to-business provider of public record information products. The company was founded in 1979 as a licensed private investigative firm but discontinued offering these services in 1991 to focus on providing on-line public record information to the business community. In 1996, a majority interest in CDB Infotek was obtained by ChoicePoint, formerly the Insurance Services Group within Equifax, and today the nation's leading provider of personal information for insurance and risk management decisions. CDB Infotek provides access to its public record information products to selected organizations with legitimate business purposes in the following sectors.
Federal government. Federal agencies that subscribe to CDB Infotek include the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the Internal Revenue Service, the Health Care Financing Administration, the Department of Justice and many others.
 
State governments. CDB Infotek provides products and services to law enforcement, taxation and a wide variety of other agencies in many states.
 
http://www.ftc.gov/bcp/privacy/wkshp97/comments1/cdbinfot.htm

Formal Complaint


Subject: Unethical Use of Consumer Data for Reference Services/Look-ups

Companies: CDB Infotek ; Unidentified Publishers and List Compilers

Dear Ethics Committee Member:

It is a fundamental principle of the DMA that consumer data should only be used for marketing purposes.
I am hereby filing a formal complaint against CDB Infotek for using consumer data to provide reference services (e.g., skip tracing, bill collection, look-ups, people-locating). This complaint also is filed against all magazines, publishers, consumer mailing list compilers, and other compilers of consumer data who have provided CDB with consumer data for such purposes.

A summary of the applicable DMA standards is appended as Exhibit 1 for the benefit and convenience of all interested parties.

Facts

CDB/Equifax

CDB Infotek of Santa Ana, California, is a subsidiary of Equifax, Inc. According to its promotional materials, CDB offers consumer data on-line for reference purposes.

A sampling of CDB's materials and web site pages from 1993-present shows CDB offering data from "publishers' lists", "mailing lists", and "consumer files ".

As of last month, CDB was offering a "Skip Tracing Tool" called "National Publisher's Change of Address." This is currently described on CDB's web site as containing "new address information on individuals based on changes of address filed with various magazine and publishing companies".

According to a 1996 marketing pamphlet, CDB's "Missing Links" look-up service has utilized publishers' mailing records to obtain unlisted phone numbers, as well as age, address updates, wealth ratings, median income, and information on up to thirty neighbors.

http://www.epic.org/privacy/junk_mail/richardson.html

[lala_rawraw]

51. Aha, found it...

The article I was speaking of up thread:
http://64.233.179.104/search?q=cache:i-UIB1_hWx4J:kucinich.us/phpBB2/viewtopic.php%3Ft%3D398%26view%3Dprevious%26sid%3D155340c6f51922fb11888b3bd6c7cf06+alexandrovna+moody+stuart&hl=en&gl=us&ct=clnk&cd=1

Mods - I wrote the actual piece, please don't delete:


akota

PostPosted: +0000, Mon Dec 13, 2004 11:11 PM Post subject: FL voting list contractor tied to South African Apartheid Reply with quote
Director of firm that was paid to repair Florida’s voting list which disenfranchised African Americans has apartheid ties

Director of Florida voting contractor chaired companies linked to apartheid
By Larisa Alexandrovna and John Byrne | RAW STORY Staff

A lead director of the company hired by Florida to fix the state’s controversial felon voting rolls is also chairman of a company many regard as a former pillar of South African apartheid, RAW STORY has discovered.

Since joining the board of African mining conglomerate Anglo American plc a year ago, Sir Mark Moody-Stuart has sought to fend off class-action lawsuits from laborers and Africans who allege the company played a major role in propping up South Africa’s former apartheid government.

Moody-Stuart is lead external director of Accenture, the Arthur Anderson spinoff, which Florida hired to repair issues of eligibility the state’s central voting list. The list disenfranchised thousands of voters—many of them African American—in the 2000 presidential election cycle.

Contracted in 2001 for roughly $2.2 million, Accenture was hired to address voting eligibility issues which wrongly listed African-Americans as felons and thereby rendered them ineligible to vote under Florida law.

After three years on the project, the new list was scrapped July 10 of this year when the media and other watch groups discovered the list enfranchised Hispanic felons, without fully resolving eligibility issues of African Americans.

Miami-Dade, for example, received a filtered list from the state of more than 17,000 names, with only 14 of those wrongly identified as felons restored to the voting rolls. Some noted that Florida’s African Americans tend to vote Democratic, while Hispanics—in part due to the state’s Cuban-American population—tend to vote Republican.

Accenture also failed to comply with a 2000 NAACP settlement which required the firm to notify them and the U.S. Justice Department of project changes.

The Florida Inspector General’s Office issued a scathing 50-page audit on Nov. 22 addressing Accenture’s and the Division of Elections’ mismanagement of the project. The audit said inadequate project management within the state elections division created most of the problems.

Asked who was responsible for the failures, Florida Secretary of State Glenda Hood blamed “elections staffers who were handling the 2004 list had other duties and little time to supervise preparation.” Hood did not elaborate as to what the other duties were.

Moody-Stuart joined the board of Accenture in October 2001. His long career spans decades at Royal Dutch Shell, which he chaired from 1998-2001, and Anglo American, which he joined in 2003. Both companies are the target of ongoing class-action apartheid suits.

In 2003, the South African Truth and Reconciliation Commission recommended that the country’s businesses be made to pay reparations to victims of apartheid unless they offer to play a more substantial role in reconstructing the country. The commission singled out three business sectors that benefited particularly from apartheid policies—singling out jointly-owned government companies, Swiss banks and particular mining companies such as Anglo American.

Anglo American rebuffed the idea, saying that past was behind them. Anglo director of corporate affairs Michael Spicer told South Africa’s Business Day in March 2003 that the firm did not consider reparations appropriate when “both the business and political environments had changed significantly.”

During the 1980s, Shell, among other traders, supplied the apartheid regime with oil even after repeated votes in the United Nations General Assembly for an embargo.

Roughly 15 million tons of crude oil reached apartheid South Africa every year, the Guardian’s David Pallister reported in May, 2001. While the oil had a value of $3 billion, South Africa paid an extra premium—as much as 80 percent above market price—as a bonus to companies willing to carry on the clandestine trade, the Guardian noted.

During his tenure at Shell, Moody-Stuart’s firm continued to take heat for allowing higher levels of pollutants at their South African facilities. A 2001 Inter-Press article, “Lingering Toxins a legacy of apartheid,” gave voice to complaints of South African locals, which the jointly-owned Shell and BP refinery Sapref strenuously denied.

“While it is impossible to process 180,000 barrels of crude oil a day without having an impact, we want to reduce that impact, control it and remove it where possible to the point where the good we do exceeds the disadvantages,” Sapref’s managing director said. He admitted, however, that they had discovered higher levels of sulfur dioxide than previously reported.

As recently as April 2003, an IOL article detailed a class action law suit filed by a U.S. attorney against Anglo American for damages of to $6.1 billion. The suit alleged that thousands of South African blacks were wrongfully terminated for lawful labor strikes because of “forced labor under inhumane conditions.”

Accenture contributed thousands of dollars to Republicans in Florida in the last election cycle, slightly more to Republicans than Democrats. The company is currently under

investigation for possible violation of the Foreign Corruption Practices Act which bans bribing public officials, Vanity Fair reported in October (PDF part one, part two). Its address in Bermuda has prompted some members of Congress to question whether the company is dodging taxes.

Anglo American also faces a 2004 suit from former South African gold mines who say that poor safety standards led to their developing the incurable disease silicosis, which can lead to tuberculosis. Gold mining has been linked to tuberculosis since 1913.

The company dismisses the allegations.


Look for links to Accenture and Choicepoint, if possible. Their biggest client is Halliburton

[Emit]

71. lala, there were a lot of threads that dealt with Accenture

Following the 2004 (s)election. Here's an example:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=203&topic_id=232179#232781

Al-CIAda (1000+ posts) Tue Jan-04-05 08:06 PM
Response to Reply #13
14. Accenture/Author Anderson-
"seeker1" fr. RRMB-


Hmmm. A few tidbits from the article.

>>News reports stated Election.com was owned by an offshore Saudi front company in Bermuda consisting of five unnamed Saudi billionaires, until scrutiny forced a sale to Accenture, the remnants of the disgraced and disbanded Arthur Anderson, the accounting firm which made Enron possible.

Accenture was responsible for the 2004 "felon voter" purge here in Florida; Carl Hiaasen wrote a column about it many months ago and raised a stink. Of course, they went ahead and did it anyway. Soon there will be YANO accounting of how many people lost their right to vote because they were born on the same birthday as an ex-felon whose name looks "kinda similar" from Kentucky.

>>From a recent Federal lawsuit involving Khashoggi: “Ultimate Holdings Ltd., a Bermuda investment company owned by Adnan Khashoggi, the company's largest shareholder.

OK, google shows their fingers in a stock fraud scheme
http://www.bermanesq.com/Securities/CasePage.asp?caseid...

Their main line of business (Genesis Intermedia)... making Internet mall kiosks... and crappy nfomercials
http://www.observer.com/pages/story.asp?ID=4640

I don't normally turn to NewsMax, but here's info on Elections.Com, supposedly linked to Adnan & some other Saudis... and accused of mischief:
http://www.newsmax.com/archives/articles/2...29/174216....
(this claims the Saudis "dumped" it but it looks like it was dumped to ... Accenture...)

Didn't Madsen say way back when to look at the Saudis & Enron? Accenture = Arthur Andersen.

If I recall correctly, there were some threads that had less than credible sources, and I think some of the threads involved some weird poster who was leading some people on a wild goose chase, or so it seemed, that maybe involved hte black box voting site. At least I think that issue involved Accenture. I'll check it out.

Anyway, I'll look into more info from old DU threads if it will help you.

[sheelz]

55. According to TV Guide

Tim Russert: James Risen and Robert O'Harrow

[babylonsister]

59. If Choice Point or subsidiaries work for Echelon, there's your

connection to NSA.

http://www.wired.com/wired/archive/6.06/netizen_pr.html

NSA Reads Europe's Email

By Simon Davies

The European Parliament is shining an unflattering light on the activities of the US National Security Agency. The parliament's Civil Liberties Committee has been in an uproar ever since the release of a report - "An Appraisal of Technologies of Political Control" - that includes a detailed discussion of the NSA's global surveillance network, codenamed Echelon. Europe now intends to embark on a very public investigation that could redden faces throughout the American intelligence community.

Equipped with powerful artificial intelligence capabilities, Echelon intercepts electronic messages and extracts information using selective keyword searches. "Within Europe, all email, telephone, and fax communications are routinely intercepted by the NSA," the report observes, adding that the surveillance system is primarily designed for nonmilitary targets - "governments, organizations, and businesses in virtually every country."

Such official revelations about economic espionage and large-scale privacy violations have been widely noticed. The Norwegians have called for an inquiry, and the issue is now on the agenda of the British, Dutch, and Italian legislatures. The European Parliament plans to explore the constitutional implications of the Echelon system, while one of its subgroups will commission a follow-up report.

[lala_rawraw]

64. It's on...

Big brother? Nice Tim, would be even nicer if he did this show on Sunday, no?

[Sydnie]

65. You might want to start a second thread now

for the dialups helping out here ...

[Viva_La_Revolution]

72. TomInTib has one up...

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x521010

[lala_rawraw]

78. I did

[bleever]

67. We gonna use this for a live thread?

Nice black background.

:hi:

[Viva_La_Revolution]

68. did you start a discussion thread?

don't see one :shrug:

[lala_rawraw]

76. Yes, look below

[lala_rawraw]

66. Axiom company name, Litte Rock AK

We got second name.

[Sydnie]

69. Axium in Little Rock

Not sure I spelled the company name correctly

[FarLeftRage]

77. Acxiom of Conway, Arkansas

They provide a lot of credit information to various vendors for marketing purposes.

[starroute]

70. Found in my files -- Armitage/SAIC connection

http://www.questionsquestions.net/docs04/khashoggi-911_2.html

Prior to his appointment to the State Department, Armitage was a board member of Database Technologies (DBT)/ChoicePoint Inc. ChoicePoint is a partner of the vast 'data mining' company Science Applications International Corp. The SAIC web site proclaims it has 'developed a strategic alliance with ChoicePoint Incorporated to provide our clients with quick and effortless information retrieval from public records data. ChoicePoint Incorporated maintains thousands of gigabytes of public records data.' "

[lala_rawraw]

73. Thread #2 here

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=364x521016


Can someone put a summary in there of what we have learned thus far?

[jillan]

82. Thanks for the post - in AZ it's on at 11 pm - not on yet .

Got the TIVO all set.

[BooScout]

98. Choicepoint was oriiginally Equifax.....

Think Florida Elections...think Data Mining.........Massive Private Investigative Firm, etc...

[flyarm]

103. and choicepoint bought DBTOnline before the 2000 election

for scrubbing electorial voting rolls in fla...

[American liberal]

107. ChoicePoint was also an identity theft victim--wasn't there a news

story last year about how more than 250,000 names may have been jeopardized by some kind of electronic security breach?

on edit: Here's a link
http://www.privacyrights.org/ar/CPResponse.htm

[stickdog]

99. Kick (nt)

[GliderGuider]

101. The End of Privacy

Go to:
http://www.cbc.ca/thesundayedition/features.html
Click on: Forum: Just Watch Us - The End of Privacy
This was a public forum held in Ottawa and broadcast on CBC Radio 1, Feb 19/06, and available in RealAudio.

Good information. Pointed questions. Altogether, well done.

[EC]

108. Choicepoint is the company used to purge the rolls in Florida

We use it at the insurance company I work for to to check credit and records...it makes mistakes more than not, and if you live in an apartment building, your record will be combined with anyone else in the same building...we had one customer that had over 20 offenses show up, and he had a clear record...