Reply #25: As to what I read, that the congressionially outlawed TIA lives on-- [View All]

[chill_wind]

NSA spy program hinges on state-of-the-art technology

January 20, 2006
By Shane Harris, National Journal
(...)

When Congress eliminated funding for most of Poindexter's projects, a number of them (the exact number is classified) were transferred to intelligence agencies. Armour and others associated with TIA would not disclose the names of those agencies, but a former Army intelligence analyst also involved in data mining and counter-terrorism confirms that TIA tools were transferred to other agencies, where work on them continues to this day.

Asked whether data-mining programs, such as NIMD, that the NSA may still be pursuing would be useful for analyzing large amounts of phone and e-mail traffic, Armour said, "Absolutely. That's, in fact, what the interest is." The former No. 2 official in Poindexter's office, Robert Popp, said that he and his colleagues wanted to know whether intercepted phone calls and e-mail would help find terrorists but not ensnare innocent people. "We didn't know," Popp said. "That was the hypothesis. That was the question that Poindexter and I wanted to do research on, to be better able to understand."

The similarities between TIA and the NSA's current data-mining operations were enough to prompt one senior lawmaker to signal his discomfort in a letter to Vice President Cheney. Sen. Jay Rockefeller IV, D-W.Va., the vice chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, was briefed by Cheney, Hayden, and then-Director of Central Intelligence George Tenet in July 2003.

"As I reflected on the meeting today," Rockefeller wrote, "John Poindexter's TIA project sprung to mind, exacerbating my concern regarding the direction the administration is moving with regard to security, technology, and surveillance."

(...)

much more:
http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0106/012006nj1.htm

see also

Controversial counter-terror program lives on
By Shane Harris, National Journal
February 23, 2006

A controversial counter-terrorism program, which lawmakers halted more than two years ago amid outcries from privacy advocates, was stopped in name only and has quietly continued within the intelligence agency now fending off charges that it has violated the privacy of U.S. citizens.

Research under the Defense Department's Total Information Awareness program -- which developed technologies to predict terrorist attacks by mining government databases and the personal records of people in the United States -- was moved from the Pentagon's research-and-development agency to another group, which builds technologies primarily for the National Security Agency, according to documents obtained by National Journal and to intelligence sources familiar with the move.

full article: http://www.govexec.com/dailyfed/0206/022306sh1.htm