Reference:
For all the ambitious technological proposals being debated in the wake of the 2001 terror attacks, the new unified system was cobbled from existing networks and has required little new spending. "These are the networks that people are already using," said Roseanne Hynes, a member of the Defense Department's domestic security task force. "It doesn't change jobs or add overhead."
....
So officials emphasize that the State Department database is not making any information newly available to law enforcement, simply making such information easier to acquire. But that increasing ease of accessibility raises some concern from civil liberties groups.
....
The changes come as the F.B.I. continues working to upgrade its entire computer system, which is so antiquated and compartmentalized that it cannot perform full searches of investigative files.
NYTimes

Notes:
A lot of it boils down to attitude. What used to be considered "not a good idea" is now considered "a very good idea". And as we push government to be more efficient, we've got to accept what that means as a practical thing.

The hope is that by having more data, police will proceed with greater intelligence.

Reference:
With RFID chips, it’s possible that most consumables and spare parts will eventually be chipped with encrypted RFIDs to completely freeze out aftermarket products. Manufacturers of all types ­ not just printer manufacturers, but auto makers, appliance manufacturers, stapler companies, everything ­ will chip all their items with encrypted code to prevent competition and enforce price fixing. Cars will “reject” windshields and tires that are not “genuine” or "approved" (on-board computers will prevent the car from running) and of course manufacturers will call it a safety, liability, and quality issue.
Politech

Notes:
Fascinating how the same technology controls many things. Privacy advocates are concerned about the geographic and identity tracking potential of RFIDs in clothing. Here's how the same technology freezes the "free market".

Put them together, and this human "component" is not allowed in this within this particular "product" -- the door won't open or the tv show won't play.

Reference:
Notably, under the Fourth Amendment, activities carried on in the home enjoy the strongest possible presumption that the persons have a reasonable expectation of privacy. As the U.S. Supreme Court made clear in Kyllo v. United States, 533 U.S. 27 (2001), the expectation of privacy in a person’s home is so strong that a search warrant is required even for non-intrusive technologies, such as thermal imaging devices, that can be placed on public property and aimed at outside areas of a house.
....
4. Similarly, the First Amendment imposes a heavy burden of justification on scrutiny of materials that are read or viewed in the home. Even the private viewing of obscene materials, which in themselves enjoy no First Amendment protection, may not be criminalized because “the justification for … statutes regulating obscenity … do not … reach into the privacy of one’s own home.” Stanley v. Georgia, 394 U.S. 557, 566 (1969).
Peter Swire

Notes:
From Mr. Swire's Declaration in the Verizon appeal of the ruling that they must turn over the identity of a P2P user to the RIAA based on the RIAA claim (ubsubstantiated per the DMCA) of copyright infringement.

Reference:
Many environmentalists, however, want to create hydrogen using wind, solar and other renewable energy sources, a utopian scenario in which both the fuel for cars and the process by which that fuel is produced are environmentally harmless.

"The big debate is, Do we piggyback on the existing petrochemical industry or do we invest in renewables?" Ms. Mazurek said.

For now, the Bush administration seems more intent on investing in the petrochemical industry. "Initially, we anticipate that the source of the hydrogen fuel in this country would be natural gas," a senior administration official said last week in a briefing to reporters.

The official noted that technology will eventually make it possible to move toward renewable fuel sources, like agricultural waste. But, he said, the president's plan will also expand research in hydrogen production to coal and nuclear power.

Exactly how much money will be spent on coal and nuclear power will be known on Monday, when the administration is to release its budget. Last year, Mr. Bush requested $97.5 million for hydrogen and fuel-cell programs. Of that, $12 million was for research into hydrogen production, and that was spent entirely on natural-gas, petroleum and renewable energy.
NY Times

Notes:

Reference:
[The content industry] has also managed to create the simplistic and basically fallacious notion that unless we strengthen dramatically the existing copyright [regime], that artists don't get paid anymore. First of all, artists aren't getting paid much now. Second, making the institutions that are robbing them blind even stronger is not going to assure [their] getting paid more.
....
We have the assumption that unless you're selling 200,000 units of work, you're not successful. Well that's true -- under the current conditions -- because it takes at least that much before [the artist] ever sees a dime. But if you're not dealing with this piratical intermediary, you can do just fine with an audience of 5,000 or 6,000.
....
We're creating the architecture, the foundation for the social space where everybody in humanity is going to gather. And if we jigger the foundation design to suit the purposes of organizations that will likely be dead in 15 years, how shortsighted is that?
Infoworld

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Reference:
HPR: In an interview with CNN.com, you discussed how costly the lack of censorship was to President Johnson during the Vietnam War. Having fought against the government's attempts to censor the movie industry, how do you think the government should approach censorship during wartime?

JV: At all costs, the government should stay out of censorship, except in war. When soldiers lives may be at stake, I think you can. Vietnam is the only war we've ever fought in the history of our country, without censorship. But in any other arena, I'm totally opposed to censorship in any form. I'm a great believer and defender of the First Amendment.
Harvard Political Review

Notes:
We were not officially at war in Vietnam. There was a resolution to use arms to help support the South Vietnamese government, but there was no declaration of war.

So far, the same holds true for the situation in Iraq. Congress has passed a resolution supporting the use of arms, but there has been no declaration of war.

If we use the "war on terrorism" as a pretext for censorship, then we are on the way down the slippery slope to general censorship. Only with a constitutionally authorized declaration of war do we have a chance of containing the reach of censorship while it is active and have a chance of ending it at the conclusion of a war situation.

Reference:
President Bush has signed a secret directive ordering the government to develop, for the first time, national-level guidance for determining when and how the United States would launch cyber-attacks against enemy computer networks, according to administration officials.
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"There's a lot of inhibition over doing it," said Harvey M. Sapolsky, an MIT professor who hosted the Jan. 22 session. "A lot of institutions and people are worried about becoming subject to the same kinds of attack in reverse."
....
"There are questions about collateral damage," Clarke said. As an example, he cited the possibility that a computer attack on an electric power grid, intended to pull the plug on military facilities, might end up turning off electricity to hospitals on the same network.

"There also is an issue, frankly, that's similar to the strategic nuclear issue which is: Do you ever want to do it? Do you want to legitimize that kind of weaponry?" Clarke added.
Washington Post

Notes:

Reference:
Although Mecca-Cola started its sales campaign in mom-and-pop stores in largely Muslim neighborhoods, it quickly drew the attention of big supermarket chains in France, like Auchan, which recently stocked two of its markets in northern Paris with Mecca-Cola.

Mathlouthi, who visits the United States regularly, says that he is a great admirer of the American way of doing business, and indeed that his company reflects the American spirit of competition.

"I am influenced by the United States and its dynamism," he said. "But I have the right to refuse the dictates of American policy, like any American who opposes the administration's policies."

Mathlouthi makes no bones of his distaste for Israel, which he simply calls "the Zionist entity."

"Some choose violence; I am against it," he said, adding that "the Arabs have behaved like imbeciles." "We have to bring the United States to be a partner, and not a guardian," he said. "America is the foster parent of the Arab world, and the Arab peoples are like minors under the guardianship of the United States."

"Even friends have their dignity, and we want to remain friends with America," he said. "But with America the open society, with civil culture, that gives a chance to everyone."
Islam Online

Notes:

Reference:
Measurable means that the characteristic or trait can be easily presented to a sensor, located by it, and converted into a quantifiable, digital format. This measurability allows for matching to occur in a matter of seconds and makes it an automated process.
....
Authentication may be defined as “providing the right person with the right privileges the right access at the right time.” In general, there are three approaches to authentication. In order of least secure and least convenient to most secure and most convenient, they are:
•Something you have - card, token, key.
•Something you know- PIN, password.
•Something you are - a biometric.
....
Although the words “right to privacy” do not appear in the U.S. Constitution, the concern with protecting citizens against government intrusions in their private sphere is reflected in many of the Constitution’s provisions. For example, the First Amendment protects freedom of expression and association as well as the free exercise of religion, the Third Amendment prohibits the quartering of soldiers in one’s home, the Fourth Amendment protects against unreasonable searches and seizures, the Fifth Amendment protects against self-incrimination, and the Due Process Clause of the 14th Amendment protects certain fundamental “personal decisions relating to marriage, procreation, contraception, family relationship, child rearing, and education.” (Planned Parenthood of Southeastern Pennsylvania v. Casey, 505 U.S. 833, 851 (1992).) The constitutional “right to privacy” therefore reflects concerns not only for one’s physical privacy – the idea that government agents cannot barge into one’s home – but also concerns less tangible interests – the idea that citizens should be able to control certain information about themselves and to make certain decisions free of government compulsion. Moreover, the Supreme Court has cautioned that it is “not unaware of the threat to privacy implicit in the accumulation of vast amounts of personal information in computerized data banks or other massive government files.” (Whalen v. Roe, 429 U.S. 589, 605 (1977).)
....
But the Court has found that a person does not have a reasonable expectation of privacy in those physical characteristics that are constantly exposed to the public, such as one’s facial characteristics, voice, and handwriting. (United States v. Dionisio, 410 U.S. 1, 14 (1973).)

So although the Fourth Amendment requires that a search conducted by government actors be “reasonable,” which generally means that individualized suspicion is required, a scan of people’s facial characteristics as they walk on public streets does not constitute a search. As for information privacy concerns, assuming that law enforcement officials limited their actions to simply comparing scanned images of people in a public area with the computerizeddatabase of suspected terrorists, known criminals, and other legitimate law enforcement targets, then information privacy concerns would likely not arise.
....
The concern with balancing the privacy of the citizen against the government interest occurs with almost all law enforcement techniques.
RAND

Notes:

Reference:
...the Austrian approach, most forcefully developed during the forties and later by Friedrich Hayek and his followers. They have not attempted to "defend" markets by the use of theorems. Instead, they see markets as institutions that have evolved to solve information problems. According to Hayek, neoclassical economics got itself into trouble by assuming perfect information to begin with. A much better approach, wrote Hayek, is to assume the world we have, one in which everyone has only a little information.
....
The modern study of political economy has uncovered many inefficiencies associated with government behavior, just as the modern study of firms has uncovered many inefficiencies associated with market behavior.
But information economics does not agree with Hayek's assertion that markets act efficiently.

The fact that markets with imperfect information do not work perfectly provides a rationale for potential government actions.
The Library of Economics

Notes: