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Feb. 8, 2013
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Jewish World Review
April 5, 2012/ 13 Nissan, 5772
From tracking al-Qaeda to tracking the wayward spouse
By
Dana Milbank
JewishWorldReview.com |
You can find just about anything at the annual homeland security expo: X-ray machines, infrared cameras, a police cruiser with heat-sensing capability, a hovering “gyroplane” — and a GPS device that can spy on your spouse.
The salesman for Blackline GPS Corp., maker of “professional grade covert tracking” equipment, explained that his devices, in the shape of a legal envelope ($700) or an electric razor ($300), can be tucked behind seat cushions, under floor mats or into backpacks. “We’re getting more requests from husbands and wives,” he explained. “I’ve seen guys throw it in their wives’ car and cover it with a hat. It keeps honest people honest.” That, in one convenient package, is what has become of the homeland security effort. What began as a well-intentioned campaign to harden targets and protect the nation from terrorists has metastasized into a sprawling and diffuse enterprise that has little to do with terrorists and a lot to do with government and employers spying on the citizenry — and citizens spying on each other. The GovSec expo this week at Washington’s convention center reflects the shift. Billed as “the premier government security event,” it began after the 9/11 attacks, its organizers told me, with vendors hawking security barriers, razor wire and the like. Now the 2,500 conventioneers can visit the booth of a vendor called ECM Universe, which specializes in monitoring Twitter. Its “social media surveillance” package helps universities monitor online activity for evidence of bullying, among other things, ECM’s Scott Raimist told me Tuesday. Two weeks ago, the company helped authorities in Fort Lupton, Colo., identify a man who was tweeting such menacing things as “kill people” and “burn [expletive] school.” Said Raimist: “He fit the profile of a pyromaniac.” So is the man behind bars? Well, no, Raimist admitted. “He’s outside their jurisdiction. He’s still tweeting.” In fact, the man hasn’t been accused of a crime — but that didn’t matter: His full name was projected on a display screen at the GovSec expo as an example of how technology can catch bad guys.
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Federal homeland security spending tripled in the years after Sept. 11, and recent cuts have been modest compared with reductions to other parts of the budget. States and private industry, too, have spent billions of dollars. But that money is going further and further afield. Government agencies and corporations are, for example, buying “Pocket Hound” cellphone detectors, which indicate who is carrying a mobile phone (among the suggested uses: schools and airports). A competitor, Cellbusters, can locate where a cellphone is inside a building or whether someone in your conference room is violating a company’s no-cellphone policy. Catch many terrorists with this technology? “Not so much,” Cellbusters’ Derek Forde admitted. Neither is Fulcrum Biometrics likely to apprehend al-Qaeda operatives with its ID system using fingerprint, face, iris, palm and voice identification. Recommended uses include voter registration and “civil ID,” said Fulcrum’s Kathleen Erickson. Also, gym memberships: “You can use it in guest management, like a loyalty program.” One product enables employers to require construction workers and others at remote sites to clock in with their fingerprints. “Can I scan you?” Erickson asked me. She waved a scanner at my convention badge, and with a “boing” sound my registration information was transferred to her. There are, of course, legitimate uses for all such gizmos, as there are for gun vaults, portable bunkers and military gear. But Big Brother’s display space at the expo is expanding.
Emergency Vehicles Inc. can convert a Honda Odyssey minivan into a “covert surveillance platform” with heat-detecting cameras. “They can focus in on a person and follow that person wherever they go,” explained salesman Michael Cox. A company called Telmate sells a kiosk that records and photographs prison inmates during conversation, games or religious services. Hunt Engineeringenables agencies and businesses to scan driver’s licenses or passports and run background checks before admitting visitors. Gamber Johnson is offering a GPS-enabled laptop dock that allows a company to map an employee’s travel for a month. Nearby, International Surveillance Technology is selling hidden cameras and audio recorders in alarm clocks, iPod docks, water coolers and suitcases. Among government security agencies, “there’s nobody who isn’t buying this,” said chief executive Donald DiFrisco. “Imagine: hookers in a hotel room with a clock radio.” That’s the homeland security mission creep: from Osama bin Laden to hookers in hotels.
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Previously:
• 03/26/12 My pet Mitt
• 03/22/12 Mitt Romney's latest gaffe may be etched in history
• 03/20/12 Supreme Court conceives of life after death
• 03/15/12 Conservative for Obama: The British PM as campaign prop
• 03/14/12 In Section 60, a silent search for meaning
• 03/13/12 Super Friends, unite
• 03/12/12 It's time to believe: Romney's a winner
• 03/07/12 Settling in to Washington's ways
• 03/06/12 AIPAC beats the drums of war
• 03/05/12 Did Republicans forget the women's vote?
• 02/29/12 Mitt Romney's acceptance speech, in (mostly) his own words
• 02/28/12 Common ground becomes a great divide
• 02/27/12 An expert witness for the GOP gender gap
• 02/21/12 Where Romney shines
• 02/15/12 A Republican death wish?
• 02/14/12Obama's budget games
• 02/13/12 Are GOPers playing right into Obama's hands?
• 02/08/12 Obama pumps the compressor of Joe Hudy's Extreme Marshmallow Cannon
• 02/07/12 Abramoff's atonement
• 02/01/12 Why we in the media just love Newt
• 01/31/12 The end of the road for Newt Gingrich?
• 01/25/12 Gingrich is Obama's best surrogate
• 01/24/12 Tim Pawlenty, Mitt Romney's attack dog
• 01/16/12 Mitt Romney's Al Gore problem
• 01/12/12 Kamikaze Gingrich, on the loose in South Carolina
• 01/11/12 Journalists' campaign trail secrets revealed
• 01/10/12 Mitt Romney's money problem
• 01/09/12 Newtonian exceptionalism
• 01/05/12 Mitt Romney out of control
• 01/04/12 Indecision 2012: In Iowa and the GOP
• 01/03/12 Rick Santorum's curious closing argument
• 12/28/11 A few cracks in my crystal ball
• 12/23/11 A few cracks in my crystal ball
• 12/20/11 Strange brews and views?
• 12/19/11 Cellphone ban would be a distraction
• 12/15/11 Harry Reid, Mitch McConnell and the Malfunction Minuet
• 12/14/11 The presidential auction of 2012
• 12/12/11 Newt's tactics comes back to haunt him
• 12/06/11 Can an anthem save Occupy non-movement?
• 12/05/11 The winner of the GOP campaign: Washington
• 11/30/11 Barney the bully: Congressman Frank's other legacy
• 11/23/11 Jon Kyl's search-and-destroy mission
• 11/21/11 Pay to play, brought to you by Washington
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• 11/16/11 Why Newt Gingrich won't last
• 11/08/11 The 2012 campaign gets seedier
• 11/06/11 A Machiavellian model for Obama
• 11/03/11 The Herman Cain crack-up
• 11/01/11 Cain can --- he will survive
• 10/27/11 Stuntmen of the supercommittee
• 10/26/11 Democrats on the sidelines
• 10/24/11 Rick Perry's birther Parade
• 10/24/11 The birthers eat their own
• 10/19/11 The GOP's middle man
• 10/17/11 The waiting for nothing Congress
• 10/12/11 Sparsely occupied D.C.: Why the movement hasn't caught on
• 10/10/11 Can Obama strike an alliance with Occupy Wall Street?
• 10/06/11 Chris Christie, such a presidential tease
• 10/05/11 Obama and his foot soldiers go toe to toe
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• 09/26/11 Republicans? Mr. Nice Guys?
• 09/22/11 Why Ron Paul is winning the GOP primary
• 09/21/11 I am a job creator who creates no jobs
• 09/20/11 Obama launches a revolution
• 09/19/11 Dems for Romney?
• 09/14/11 ‘Supercommittee’? More than stupor committee
• 09/07/11 Mitt Romney finds his (corporate) voice
• 09/01/11 The infallible Dick Cheney
• 08/31/11 This liberal says Perry is the ultimate conservative candidate
• 08/29/11 Wanted: More bite from Obama the Great Nibbler
• 08/10/11 How Rep. Austin Scott betrayed his Tea Party roots
• 08/09/11 The most powerful man on Earth?
• 08/08/11 The FAA shutdown and the new rules of Washington
• 08/04/11 Lt. Col. Allen West fires a round at the Tea Party
• 08/03/11 Government on autopilot
• 08/02/11 Dems mourn debt deal like death
• 07/27/11 Life imitates sport
• 07/26/11 Obama and Boehner take on Washington
• 07/21/11 Why Americans are angry at Congress
• 07/20/11 The new party of Reagan
• 07/18/11 Rob Portman, the boring Midwesterner who could bring sanity to the debt debate
• 07/13/11 John Boehner's bind
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• 07/01/11 President Puts Up His Dukes, As He Ought To
• 06/28/11 Rod Blagojevich verdict: All shook up
• 06/27/11 Progressives voice their anger at Obama
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• 05/24/11 Pawlenty bends his truth-telling
• 05/20/11 Default deniers say it's all a hoax
• 05/18/11: Gingrich gives voice to moderation
• 05/17/11: Donald Trump and the House of Horrors
• 05/16/11: The medical mystery of Mitt Romney
• 05/12/11: The body impolitic: Schock photos should tempt lawmakers to cover up
• 05/10/11: Muskets in hand, tea party blasts House Republicans
• 05/09/11: The GOP debate: America -- and the party -- needs the grown-ups
• 05/05/11: Mitch Daniels, an alternative to scary
• 05/03/11: Obama's victory lap
• 05/02/11: How the journalist prom got out of control
• 04/28/11: Obama's birther day: Why did he lower himself by appearing in the briefing room?
• 04/27/11: Obama, lost in thought
• 04/24/11: Andrew Breitbart and the rifts on the right
• 04/22/11: Ten Commandments for 2012
• 04/21/11: Obama likes Facebook. Facebook likes Obama.
• 04/18/11: Without Nancy Pelosi, Obama is adrift
• 04/15/11: If progressives ran the world
• 04/14/11: Faith in political apostasy
• 04/13/11: One man's revolution is another's political expediency
• 04/11/11: Shutdown theatrics
• 04/06/11: Paul Ryan's irresponsible budget
• 04/05/11: Robots in Congress? Yes, we replicant!
• 04/04/11: Robert Gibbs, Facebook and the White House corporate placement service
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© 2011, Washington Post Writers Group
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