An Arsticle by Ken Fisher reviews a recent talk given by Donald Kerr, principal deputy director of National Intelligence, who is second in command to Director of National Intelligence Mike McConnell.
In a recent speech, Kerr fumbled around with privacy and related concepts, concluding in Ken’s (and an AP reporter’s) opinion that he’s trying to redefine privacy in somewhat Orwellian ways.
Here’s the meat of what Kerr said:
Too often, privacy has been equated with anonymity; and it’s an idea that is deeply rooted in American culture. The Long [sic] Ranger wore a mask but Tonto didn’t seem to need one even though he did the dirty work for free. You’d think he would probably need one even more. But in our interconnected and wireless world, anonymity – or the appearance of anonymity – is quickly becoming a thing of the past. Anonymity results from a lack of identifying features. Nowadays, when so much correlated data is collected and available – and I’m just talking about profiles on MySpace, Facebook, YouTube here – the set of identifiable features has grown beyond where most of us can comprehend. We need to move beyond the construct that equates anonymity with privacy and focus more on how we can protect essential privacy in this interconnected environment. Protecting anonymity isn’t a fight that can be won. Anyone that’s typed in their name on Google understands that. Instead, privacy, I would offer, is a system of laws, rules, and customs with an infrastructure of Inspectors General, oversight committees, and privacy boards on which our intelligence community commitment is based and measured. And it is that framework that we need to grow and nourish and adjust as our cultures change. * * * Our job now is to engage in a productive debate, which focuses on privacy as a component of appropriate levels of security and public safety.
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