Free linux spy software

Byline: Cynthia L. Webb

Not So Stellar E-Gov Funding

The House on Tuesday passed an appropriations bill that includes $1 million in funds tagged to e-government projects, Government Executive Magazine reported. "The Senate Appropriations Committee last week approved $5 million for the interagency fund, the same amount the fund received for fiscal 2003. Both sums fall at least $40 million short of President Bush 's $45 million request for the fund, and the amount authorized in an e-government bill signed by President Bush on Dec. 17, 2002. That bill grants $345 million to fund interagency technology initiatives over four years, allowing $45 million for fiscal 2003, $50 million for fiscal 2004, $100 million for fiscal 2005 and $150 million for fiscal 2006."

High-Tech Air Security

Are you a high-risk airline passenger? Soon a computer program will answer that question for security officials, assigning passengers a color-coded threat rating -- green, yellow or red. The goal, of course, is to identify potential terrorists before airplanes leave the ground. According to a front-page Washington Post article on Tuesday, "the federal government and the airlines will phase in a computer system next year to measure the risk posed by every passenger on every flight in the United States. The new Transportation Security Administration system seeks to probe deeper into each passenger's identity than is currently possible, comparing personal information against criminal records and intelligence information. Passengers will be assigned a color code ... based in part on their city of departure, destination, traveling companions and date of ticket purchase."

The color-coding system could mean some people won't get to board their flights at all. "Most people will be coded green and sail through. But up to 8 percent of passengers who board the nation's 26,000 daily flights will be coded 'yellow' and will undergo additional screening at the checkpoint, according to people familiar with the program. An estimated 1 to 2 percent will be labeled 'red' and will be prohibited from boarding. These passengers also will face police questioning and may be arrested," the article said.

Critics are already blasting the so-called Computer Assisted Passenger Pre-screening System II (CAPPS II) program. "This system is going to be replete with errors," Barry Steinhardt , director of the American Civil Liberties Union' s technology and liberty program, told Gannett's Journal News of Westchester, New York. "You could be falsely arrested. You could be delayed. You could lose your ability to travel." (Steinhardt was on washingtonpost.com to take reader questions on Wednesday.)

A Rocky Mountain News editorial yesterday raised similar worries: "[Y]ou don't have to be paranoid to see that it has enormous potential for abuse and invasion of privacy. In essence, a government bureaucracy will decide who gets to fly and who doesn't. And it's only a step from using this system to deter hijackers to using the airlines as a tool of law enforcement. Inevitably, some zealous type will propose the system be broadened to include, say, back taxes or child-support arrears."

Making A Case for TIA

John Poindexter , the infamous admiral recently driven out of his post as head of the Information Awareness Office at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency , wrote an opinion piece in The New York Times yesterday, defending the virtues of the ill-fated Terrorism Information Awareness program. TIA, which was once called Total Information Awareness program, is a sophisticated effort to scan databases worldwide for the purpose of fighting terrorism.

"The amount of data available to the federal government far exceeds the human capacity to analyze it. This has long been the case, but since 9/11 the need for better tools to help America fight the war against terror has become more urgent. Unfortunately, the Senate appears set to cancel financing for a promising and innovative set of technology programs that would help make America safe," Poindexter wrote.

"In the last few months, however, several myths have arisen in the public debate surrounding not just the Information Awareness Office but DARPA itself. ... The most damaging myth concerns the role of DARPA, which has conducted high-risk, high-payoff research and development since its founding in 1958. DARPA builds tools; it does not use them. It develops technology and tests it; the technology either works or it doesn't." More from his piece: "But it is a myth that the Information Awareness Office intends to develop some kind of system to spy on Americans. The terrorism information program is not and never has been intended for use in surveillance against Americans. The program's research is aimed at detecting foreign terrorist planning. The experiments have used only data from foreign sources, data that is legally available to all agencies that participated. ... I cannot elaborate on the specifics of recent experiments because they are classified. But I can say that our tools have been able to gather and sort data, and produce foreign intelligence analysis, in about one-tenth the time of current technology."

High-Tech Passports Delayed

A rule under the USA Patriot Act that would require people from 27 European and Asian countries to use computer-scannable passports has been delayed for a year. It was supposed to go into effect on Oct. 1. "Representatives from a number of foreign governments that are close U.S. allies and trading partners had told the State Department that they could not meet the October deadline for providing citizens with the scannable passports," The Washington Post reported. "Among the nations that were not prepared to meet the deadline are France, Italy, Spain and Switzerland, officials said. The United States and Britain have had machine-readable passports for more than a decade."

The Wall Street Journal said "tourism groups both here and abroad praised the move. They had been warning for weeks that the rule, part of several new national-security measures established by the State Department in response to the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks, would wreak havoc for those travelers planning to visit the U.S."

Hot Water For Former Northrop Worker

A former executive of Northrop Grumman Corp. 's information technology division (previously called Logicon ) was charged by the Securities and Exchange Commission on Monday "with aiding and abetting securities fraud at supplier Legato Systems Inc. Vincent Steckler , a 43-year-old resident of Great Falls [Va.] and Singapore, allegedly helped two salesmen at Legato boost the company's net income by $2 million -- or 146 percent -- in the third quarter of 1999 by entering into a secret agreement that improperly allowed Steckler to back out of a software-purchasing deal. Accounting rules bar companies from recognizing revenue from deals that may later be canceled. Legato, of Mountain View, Calif., later restated its financial results for that period and settled its own civil charges with the SEC last year," The Washington Post reported.

The Associated Press said Steckler "helped Legato sales executives draft a side agreement to a sale that Logicon wasn't obligated to pay for, according to a civil lawsuit filed by the SEC in federal court in San Francisco. The deal, involving software that Logicon intended to resell to the U.S. Air Force, was later canceled, the SEC said.

Steckler's lawyer had this to say to the Post: "Legato apparently had a practice of entering into side agreements with its customers. Vincent Steckler did not knowingly assist in any fraud."

Microsoft's Linux Headache Continues

Add Brazil to the list of countries worldwide that are looking to adopt open-source software systems in favor of proprietary products from Microsoft . President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva "is finalizing a policy recommending that federal ministries, agencies and state enterprises install open-source software, such as Linux , instead of proprietary software, such as Microsoft's Windows, in new computer equipment. Sergio Amadeu , Mr. da Silva's information-technology adviser, says the goal is for at least 80% of government computers bought next year to feature open-source software, though the guidelines aren't binding," The Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

"The free-software movement in Brazil has gained momentum since the leftist Workers Party took office in January. Four states have now passed laws encouraging the use of open-source software, and a Workers Party-sponsored federal bill urging the same is gaining traction in Congress after languishing for years," the article said. Of note, Amadeu told the newspaper: "At no point will we require the use of free software. The market will have to choose." But it is still noteworthy (and likely being watched by Microsoft) that a recommendation is being made that favors open source.