EFF Sues for Information on Electronic Surveillance Systems

TEXT SOURCE: October 03, 2006, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) Press Release

FBI Withholds Records on Tools to Intercept Personal Communications Washington, D.C. - The FLAG Project at the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) filed its first lawsuit against the Department of Justice Tuesday after the FBI failed to respond to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for records concerning DCS-3000 and Red Hook -- tools the FBI has spent millions of dollars developing for electronic surveillance.

DCS-3000 is an interception system that apparently evolved out of "Carnivore," a controversial surveillance system the FBI used several years ago to monitor online traffic through Internet service providers. One Department of Justice report said DCS-3000 was developed to "intercept personal communication services delivered via emerging digital technologies" and that it was used "as carriers continue to introduce new features and services." According to the same report, Red Hook is a system to "collect voice and data calls and then process and display the intercepted information."

The FLAG Project first filed its FOIA request for information about the surveillance systems on August 11, 2006. The FBI acknowledged receipt of the request, but the agency has not responded within the time limit required by law.

"Recent allegations of domestic spying by the U.S. government already have both lawmakers and the general public up in arms. Americans have a right to know whether the FBI is using new technology to further violate their privacy," said EFF Staff Attorney Marcia Hofmann. "The Department of Justice needs to abide by the law and publicly release information about these surveillance tools."

EFF's FLAG Project, launched last month, uses FOIA requests and litigation to expose the government's expanding use of technologies that invade privacy.

"Transparency is critical to the functioning of our democracy, especially when the government seeks to hide activities that affect the rights of citizens," EFF Senior Counsel David Sobel, who directs the FLAG Project. "We have recently seen numerous instances where federal agencies have sought to conceal surveillance activities that raise serious legal issues."

For the full FOIA suit filed against the Department of Justice:
http://www.eff.org/flag/dcs/dcs_complaint.pdf

For more on the FLAG Project:
http://www.eff.org/flag/

Swift Case

Text source, CSOonline.com, Oct 04, 2006, by Paul Meller, IDG News Service (Brussels Bureau)

Swift CFO Questioned by Euro Parliament About Data Privacy

Executives from financial data transfer company Swift and the president of the European Central Bank (ECB) faced tough questions in a European Parliament committee meeting Wednesday, about the illegal sharing of private data with U.S. authorities.

ECB chief Jean-Claude Trichet denied that the bank should have stepped in to prevent the breach of European data-protection laws, saying that the bank could only advise the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication (Swift). "We have no judicial competence in the field of data protection," he said.

Full article at CSOonline.com


L I N K S

SWIFT supports calls for EU-US talks on security and data privacy Swift website

04/10/2006 - Speech: Jean-Claude Trichet: Statement by the President of the ECB at the public hearing at the European Parliament on the interception of bank transfer data from the SWIFT system by the US secret services. European Parliament website

04/10/2006 SWIFT: EDPS preliminary findings on the role of the ECB (press release). EDPS, European Data Protection Supervisor

RFID Guardian Project

The RFID Guardian Project is a collaborative project (Vrije Universiteit, Technical University of Delft) focused upon providing security and privacy in Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems. The goals of this project are to:

- Investigate the security and privacy threats faced by RFID systems
- Design and implement real solutions against these threats
- Investigate the associated technological and legal issues

The namesake of thjs project is the RFID Guardian: a mobile battery-powered device that offers personal RFID security and privacy management. One the focuses of this project is to build an RFID Guardian prototype.

Home Health Project

Photo by Xacobe de Toro



Home Health Horoscopes Project is a project by Cornell University (Phoebe Sengers) in collaboration with Royal College of Art and Intel, a privacy-preserving 'smart home' that provides open-ended opportunities for reflection on the emotional climate in the home.

The Home Health system, a collaboration with Bill Gaver and Michael Golembewski at the Royal College of Art, London, will be a ubiquitous computing system that monitors a home's emotional climate and provides open-ended feedback about it to users. Everyday household objects are wired with sensors. The resulting sensor data is used to develop a model of the current emotional climate of the people living in the home. Once a day, the user receives a list of suggestions from the system of emotional issues that s/he might wish to consider.

Identity Information Protection Act of 2006

Photo by Xacobe de Toro

The identity information protection act 2006 has been passed by the Californian state senate and given to governor Arnold Schwarzenegger for signing, according to reports.

Identity Information Protection Act (SB 768): Setting the Record Straight, EFF Website

Office of Privacy Protection - California Department of Consumer Affairs