IN THE NEWS
You don't have to make a heroic leap of logic to conclude that the Justice Department's request for the history of all Google searches ever performed is about more than child pornography. Google represents the ultimate fishing expedition--but again, if the Bush Administration is trying to net terrorists, it's fishing the wrong way.
Google's records represent another gigantic pile of information that is inherently useless, and may be more trouble than it's worth to sift for something worthwhile. Search and data mining technology can narrow down the results, but even the most skillful application of these tools won't necessarily prevent information overload. There's also the same risk of false positives. If you find this blog by Googling for Al Qaeda, terrorism, Ayman al-Zawahri, or nuclear weapons, are you a terrorist, or someone interested in how to defeat terrorists?
The problem doesn't stop there. Google uses a cookie, a hidden file on whatever laptop or desktop machine where you do your searching, that it uses to record your identity. If you've noticed a lot of small advertisements on web pages that appear to be targeted to your interests, you've seen one use of the cookie, Google ads. Google tracks your searches, notes the topics that interest you enough to search for them, and then generates a custom set of Google ads based on your personal search history and the web site you are currently visiting. Already, Google has perfected a way to characterize you as an Internet user, but it can be prone to failure. For example, I was reading this article in Slate about Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia's views on abortion and assisted suicide when I scrolled down to find Google ads for "Chrisitan [sic] adoptions" and European adoption consultants. Needless to say, these ads were relevant to neither the article nor the reader. (I'm not planning on adopting.)
In other words, if the US government tried to use the same or similar techniques to identify terrorists, they're likely to have a high rate of failure. Justice Department computer nerds are just as likely to miss real terrorists as they are to mistakenly identify a random, innocent person as a potential suicide bomber.
Unfortunately, Google has made it possible to monitor more than just your Internet searches. If you have an account on Google's widely-popular e-mail service, Gmail, Google uses the same cookie for tracking you as a Gmail user as it does to track your searches. That gives Google a complete pictures of both the searches you've performed and the e-mail you send and receive. Of course, anyone with access to Google's records shares that window into your private life. (Certainly, people have an expectation of privacy when using their own computer to perform their own searches or handle their own e-mail. Otherwise, Google would not have taken the pains to reassure users in their terms of service that private information will remain private.)
The opportunity for abuse is staggering, as are the possible Constitutional violations for the Justice Department to have this information in the first place. People concerned about electronic privacy issues have been warning what might happen if this information fell into the hands of government snoops, identity thieves, or aggressive marketers. Apparently, that day has come. Putting Google's archives in the hands of Justice Department attorneys amounts to a search, with neither probable cause nor a warrant, of private information concerning every American citizen who uses the Internet. No, I am not exaggerating.
In the beginning, I decided to join the campaign to impeach your "smirking chimp", my "dum'ass botch". As evidence for that, you'll soon be invited to click on a hyperlink.
Before doing so, however, I would like you to read through the rest of this text. In case, you'd like to know, the U.R.L for your blog, specifically, "Arms and influence", is found at the third hyperlink on the list below ... ah, please remember, no clicking until AFTER reading the entire text.
Perusing your blog, I believe I arrived at what is a reasonable inference. That is, both you and your readers would welcome news that indicates the campaign to impeach the president is increasing in both vigor and breadth. Ah, you'll find that evidence by clicking on the second enclosed hyperlink.
As for my plan for capturing Osama, you'll find it by clicking on the first listed hyperlink, which immediately follows this colon:
http://hewhoisknownassefton.blogspot.com/2006/01/osama-and-our-president-dumass-botch_20.html
http://hewhoisknownassefton.blogspot.com/2006/01/danger-senator-specter-danger.html
http://www.reachm.com/amstreet/states-writes.htm#CA
toodles
......\
.he who is known as sefton
oh, yes, surely, you've heard about the government "requesting" certain records about internet activity. oh, br'dah! Cynical and skeptical me, I'm smelling a rat in all that.
Posted by: he who is known as sefton | 01/21/2006 at 15:24
The 16 pages of bibliography cites numerous scientific journal articles and gives credence to Shealy's work as notbeing.
Posted by: home security systems | 07/28/2011 at 08:03