SB 483 is Scheduled!

SB 483 is on the agenda and due to be heard sometime within the next 48 hours.

There are many reasons you should be concerned and the specific language is bad enough, but if you want the bottom line, SB 483 will ultimately allow foreign government access to our records. There is just no solid reason to believe otherwise.

Please, contact your Representatives if you have not yet done so!

Additionally, please see Alert on SB 483 (also a link at the the top of this webpage) for more info.

I wanted to share with you a letter I wrote for House members detailing the most critical problems with SB 483.  Please share it with others as rapidly as possible!

I hope it brings more clarity to the issue and the importance of stopping this bill now.

Thanks!

AxXiom

NOTE: HJR 1003, the Tenth Amendment Resolution is also scheduled for hearing before committee tomorrow at 3pm.

 

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Sample letter on SB 483

 

Dear Representative

I am very concerned about SB 483.

There are several critical issues with this bill, but I will try limiting my remarks to just the most worrisome aspects.

First, this bill proposes to allow direct access to our digital photos and other information through the Department of Public Safety. Further, it allows the DPS Commissioner to grant access to this data at his sole discretion

“Any record required to be maintained by the Department may be released to any other entity free of charge when the release of the record would be for the benefit of the public, as determined by the Commissioner or a designee of the Commissioner”

Here is the problem. Digitized photos may be easily converted easily to biometric code by simple and readily available software. This is one of the reasons that digital photographs are the biometric of choice by Homeland Security, also digital or computerized photos are easy to obtain and sidesteps the problem of getting people to agree to allow their biometrics to be collected. Most people would not know that a photo can be used this way and in some cases (CCTV) may not even know they have been photographed at all. This is one of the core problems with Real ID which was prohibited by the legislature last year.

Then consider that “seamless” sharing of personal data with other states, the private sector, federal agencies and even international bodies is named as THE primary goal of Fusion Centers. http://www.it.ojp.gov/documents/fusion_center_guidelines_law_enforcement.pdf

SB 483 states;

“The Commissioner of Public Safety is authorized to establish procedures and enter into agreements with any other law enforcement agency of this state or political subdivision of this state for the purpose of providing direct electronic access to the photograph or image in computerized format of any person who has been issued a driver license or identification card by the Department of Public Safety.”

 

The language here is qualified by “state” would be more reassuring if it were possible to actually confine digital information to physical space. I have no reason to doubt that the intentions here are good but saying that the information will only be shared with agencies within the state will not make it so. Any information that is digitally transferred cannot be readily confined to any particular space. It is disingenuous to suggest otherwise.

DPS may be completely honorable and scrupulous in sharing only with other state-based agencies but it is impossible to control how those agencies manage that information once they have access to it. It is also impossible to say what hidden agreements exist between those agencies and their affiliates. In addition, this policy completely runs counter to every federal information sharing policy that is available for public review.

Furthermore, Fusion Centers are federally funded and the very purpose for their existence, as evidenced by the documents that describe the core concept of Fusion Centers, is to promote “seamless “information sharing across the board.

Our state driver’s license alone provides an unparalleled, concentrated source of biographical data but as I was examining the Oklahoma DPS website to get a sense of what other records DPS manages I read HB 3115, the OCIVS bill that provides an online system of insurance verification (and more) and found that the OCIVS program strangely exempts itself from public scrutiny in regards to some of the information it handles and the manner it is used, from public record. The rules specifically mention exemption from the Oklahoma Public records Act.

 

See rules 9 and 11;

http://www.dps.state.ok.us/OCIVS/3326.pdf

The Oklahoma Public Records Act says that; “The purpose of this act is to ensure and facilitate the public’s right of access to and review of government records so they may efficiently and intelligently exercise their inherent political power.”

So, while the citizens’ most personal information, (meaning biometrics- a unique numerical representation of our very bodies) is opened to a vast range of agencies, public, private and international, the citizens right to know just what is being done with their information is restricted.

 

Social Security Numbers are not nearly so intimate of an identifier as biometrics and the controversy of using in this manner is still hotly debated today! On this point alone the citizens of this state will rightfully feel betrayed and will want an answer as to why our state legislature would allow their law-abiding constituents to be so exposed.

In the just released testimony regarding the Science and Technology Directorate before the House Subcommittee on Homeland Security “Science and Technology Research and Transitioning Products in to Use” the purpose of digitized image sharing is made clear;

 

Information Sharing/Management

Established and piloted digital image exchange specifications for the NLETS Image Sharing Program (NISP) to enable state and local law enforcement personnel to query and retrieve driver’s license photos across state lines via the NLETS network. DHS S&T partnered with the National Institute of Justice (NIJ) to examine the technical, policy, and privacy challenges of enabling law enforcement personnel to share interstate driver’s license photos for field identification and threat assessment functions. In addition to DHS and NIJ, agencies participating in the interstate photo sharing program include the International Justice and Public Safety Information Sharing Network (NLETS), the American Association of Motor Vehicle Administrators. . .

NLETS-International Members: Those criminal justice agencies under the authority of a foreign government that may be assigned Nlets control terminal responsibilities http://www.nlets.org/ourMembers.aspx

SB 483 will ultimately allow foreign government access to our records. There is just no solid reason to believe otherwise.

The section on “People Screening” from the “Directorate” testimony should put an end to any speculation about what the future holds for Americans’ essential liberties in this “New Era” of information sharing although the system has been described in numerous other policy papers as well, for example the NIEM and the Global Justice Information Initiative or GLOBAL.

The below is from the Fusion Center Guidelines;

Fusion Center Guidelines-Developing and Sharing Information in a New Era

http://www.it.ojp.gov/documents/fusion_center_guidelines_law_enforcement.pdf

Data fusion involves the exchange of information from different sources—including law enforcement, public safety, and the private sector-. . . The fusion process turns this information and intelligence into actionable knowledge. Fusion also allows for relentless reevaluation of existing data in context with new data in order to provide constant updates

 

This is known as” data mining” and previous attempts to implement such a system has been repeatedly struck down, most notably with the halting of John Poindexter’s Total Information Awareness plan and the MATRIX.

Total Information Awareness- http://epic.org/privacy/profiling/tia/

The MATRIX- The Multistate Anti-Terrorism Information Exchange (MATRIX) pilot project leverages proven technology to assist criminal investigations by implementing factual data analysis from existing data sources and integrating disparate data from many types of Web-enabled storage systems. This technology helps to identify, develop, and analyze terrorist activity and other crimes for investigative leads. Information accessible includes criminal history records, driver’s license data, vehicle registration records, and incarceration/corrections records, including digitized photographs, with significant amounts of public data records. This capability will save countless investigative hours and drastically improve the opportunity to successfully resolve investigations. The ultimate goal is to expand this capability to all states.

http://www.privacyinternational.org/article.shtml?cmd%5B347%5D=x-347-205261

If you read about these programs, you will see that the system in being placed today does not vary significantly.

The word “No” doesn’t seem to mean anything to DHS or the lawmakers of this nation anymore and we are tired of having these programs reconstituted and shoved down our throats.

Real ID has been soundly rejected by the majority of states but yet it keeps being forced on the people by either breaking it apart and implementing the elements of it separately as in the case of SB 483 or by simply changing the name and hoping we don’t notice.

From the beginning of these United States, the idea of searching citizens without probable cause and set procedure has been an idea that the American psyche cannot tolerate. The abuse of colonists by British soldiers who would rifle through their belongings at will is credited with being a significant motivator of the Revolutionary War.

These overarching information sharing policies all do exactly the same thing and the only reason it has been permitted to the degree that it has is because a “virtual search” is not as immediately obvious as a physical one. However, the risk involved to the citizen is the same or worse owing to the fact that much of the information being used to profile us may be incorrect and most of us have no idea about it much less the ability to do anything about it.

Here is an example of the work of Fusion Centers that has many American outraged;

http://www.firearmscoalition.org/images/news/miac-militia-2009.pdf

Don’t be surprised if this guide to identifying dangerous extremists and subversives includes you or your family members.

Heavy pressure from Missouri citizens has led to somewhat of a backpedaling on the report but I have been studying these centers and I contend that the MIAC report is exactly the sort of “intelligence” that these centers are expected to produce. There is strong desire on behalf of the US government to perfect the predictive and preemptive aspects of domestic intelligence through application of various “technology” that proposes to calculate a person’s intent before any crime has been attempted.

From the “Directorate’s” testimony;

“The Directorate is developing a variety of technologies and knowledge products that can assist our law enforcement officers in differentiating between law-abiding individuals and those who mean to break our laws or do us harm”

Here is a small sample of the technological wonders in store for us that was highlighted in recent testimony;

“Screening Passengers by Observation Technique (SPOT) program of MobileSPOT technology”

“Future Attribute Screening Technology (FAST) Theory of Malintent “

“a real-time stand-off system to identify behavioral indicators associated with hostile intent and deception in real time”

And state that; “The latest analysis provides statistically significant support that persons demonstrating select behavioral indicators are more likely to possess banned/illegal items.”

And “These behavioral indicators distinguish deceptive from non-deceptive subjects at a statistically significant accuracy rate and are enabling the development of an automated deception detection prototype and training/training simulation materials”

In the words of Supreme Court Justice, Louis Brandeis;

“The makers of the Constitution conferred the most comprehensive of rights and the right most valued by all civilized men—the right to be let alone.”

I hope that the Oklahoma lawmakers will give this bill a closer look and take appropriate action to safeguard the rights of the people of this state.

Thank you for your consideration.

Sincerely,

 

 

 

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