Schneier’s critique of airport false alarms also explains why the Patriot 2 provisions — which let the government gather reams of financial data without probable cause — is likely to backfire.
Schneier writes in Salon Magazine
In the months and years after 9/11, the U.S. government has tried to address the problem by demanding (and largely receiving) more data. Over the New Year’s weekend, for example, federal agents collected the names of 260,000 people staying in Las Vegas hotels. This broad vacuuming of data is expensive, and completely misses the point. The problem isn’t obtaining data, it’s deciding which data is worth analyzing and then interpreting it. So much data is collected that intelligence organizations can’t possibly analyze it all. Deciding what to look at can be an impossible task, so substantial amounts of good intelligence go unread and unanalyzed. Data collection is easy; analysis is difficult.
The Patriot 2 provisions let the government trawl for data. If there’s no need to show probable cause, it’s easier to cast a wide net than to catch the tuna and leave the dolphins alone.
“If there’s no need to show probable cause, it’s easier to cast a wide net than to catch the tuna and leave the dolphins alone.”
I have no idea what this metaphor is supposed to mean.
Anyway they have all sorts of data analyzation stuff – how well any of it works is another question. They are certainly on a learning curve.
I had a great article linked on how we make sense of intelligence data and how the best of it is never better than an educated guess, but I can’t find it.
Getting bumped
KILKENNY — If you really don’t want to take a trans-continental flight to connect with Americans, there are some things you can do to set off flags in the system. Ross Mayfield, Bruce Schneier or Adina Levin might categorise these
There’s a more pointed example supporting the argument that decisionmakers need less raw data, not more: the recent revelations that higher-ups in the Bush administration bypassed professional analysis by the intelligence agencies and demanded raw reports from informants while deciding whether to invade Iraq.
Informants notoriously deliver lots of bogus information for various self-serving reasons and the pros at the intelligence agencies are said to have expertise at separating legitimate information from the noise — or at any rate be better at it than policymakers, who are inclined to accept at face value what they want to hear.
Thus the most charitable interpretation to date of Bush/Cheney/Rumsfeld et al’s decisions regarding Iraq: they gullibly fell for bad information about WMDs. (Less charitable interpretations have it that they knew the information was bogus but used it to sell a course of action they wanted to undertake for other reasons.)
Just like informants, masses of raw data can be naively used to justify almost anything. What’s needed is to focus on what’s relevant, not cast the widest possible net.