Mulling over George Pope to STEVE ASHER 14 Jul 2004

Hi George...

SA> SA> A Florida-based company, Seisint, Inc., created the database shortly
SA> SA> after the terror attacks of September 11, 2001 by combining the
SA> SA> companyAEs own commercial databases with law enforcement records.

SA>  GP> Shortly after, would be a fair amount of time before such was 
SA>  GP> even
SA>  GP> legal, eh?

SA> Apparently it was quite legal at the time, and naturally Seisint
SA> claims to respect privacy & confidentiality of the data they recognise
SA> their responsibility for. (As if they would say otherwise)

 GP> The Patriot Act, I surmise, has created some new laxity with
 GP> infringing on Americans' rights to privacy, but that wasn't in
 GP> until some time after the 9/11 attack!

That nearly 3 years since "9/11" went very quickly! The Patriot Act
passed the US House of Representatives in October 2001, so they lost
no time in drafting it & passing it. I'm not sure exactly how it
came to be law - I assume the US Senate also considered it & passed
it, & the President signed it into law.

 GP> And, Seisint, Inc., being a private business, wouldn't have the
 GP> allowances granted by the Patriot Act, so their accessing law
 GP> enforcement records was certainly not legal!

The Patriot Act is very broad, & affects or amends a whole heap of other
Acts - eg licenses (sic) :) to transport hazardous materials may not be
issued or renewed without doing a background records check of the person
or company - criminal history data bases, other relevanr data bases etc.
This is the sort of stuff that Seisint & other private companies in
partnership with law enforcement excel at - mounds of relevant data
to trawl through, & probably the applicant for the license would sign
a waiver consenting to the background check - etc etc.

 GP> I wonder if their clients, whose info was in Seisint databases,
 GP> knew that Seisint feels they(Seisint! have unlimited rights to
 GP> use/share their personal info!

If it is a state law enforcement authority, it may have set limits on
the uses that Seisint could make of the data, but the subjects of the
data probably get no say in the matter. The best approach to protecting
privacy is to not let them have it in the first place, to the extent
possible (or to bend, fold, spindle or mutilate the info to reduce
its reliability).

Cheers, Steve..

---