September 28, 2005 | More on O'Connor Kelly's Departure

SSN pal (I hope she knows this) Sarah Lai Stirland over at National Journal's Technology Daily, gets the first in-print story on the resignation of Homeland Security's top privacy official.

O'Connor Kelly became the chief privacy officer in mid-April 2003. During her tenure, she created a functional office that was supposed to ensure that all new department technologies and processes used for security purposes complied with the nation's many federal privacy laws. She was a high-profile figure who often spoke publicly about the role of her office.

Her tenure also was marked by several controversial incidents, some of which sparked criticism from privacy advocates and certain members of Congress. Though she and members of her office often have said they tried to consider privacy laws before designing new technologies and processes, parts of the department often came under fire for violating their own policies.

This year, for example, the pre-screening system for airline passengers run by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA) violated its own policy of not using information about passengers collected by commercial data brokers. Four Alaskans are suing TSA because they want to know how the agency used the information collected about them.

Her announcement sparked mixed responses from privacy advocates.

Bill Scannell, a long-time privacy advocate and activist who is a spokesman for the Alaskans, said he had "great hopes" that her office would prevent anti-privacy initiatives planned by the department, "but I haven't seen that. I'm sure there were battles that were fought inside that we never heard about ... [but] her role has been pretty much reduced to flak absorption for [department] screw-ups, and TSA in particular."

Jim Harper, the Cato Institute's director of information policy studies, who serves on Homeland Security's privacy advisory committee, characterized O'Connor Kelly's tenure as "better than expected." He noted that she was not popular within the department after she issued a report criticizing it for secretly accepting passenger information from the airline JetBlue.

Read it here.

Meanwhile, the ACLU and the Democrats are taking this opportunity to make the case that the privacy office needs more power, such as the ability to subpoena documents from agencies rather than just asking nicely for them, and needs to report directly to Congress, not to the head of Homeland Security.

The House's Homeland Security Committee's Ranking Member Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS) had this to say in a press release:

I commend Nuala O’Connor Kelly for her dedication as an advocate and friend of privacy, despite the limitations placed on her by the bureaucracy of the Department of Homeland Security and the Administration. She deserved a great deal more independence and access to information as Chief Privacy Officer than she was given. I hope the Department reevaluates its lack of commitment to privacy so that we don’t have the privacy violations of Secure Flight and CAPPS II, which cost the federal government millions of dollars. I wish Ms. O’Connor Kelly the best of luck and thank her for her service to the nation.

The ACLU sent this:

"O'Connor Kelly has done a commendable job as Homeland Security's first Chief Privacy Officer considering the limited independence of the job as it was created by Congress," said Barry Steinhardt, Director of the ACLU's Technology and Liberty Project. "But even as strong a privacy officer as O'Connor Kelly could only do so much with the powers that she was given..."

The ACLU praised O'Connor Kelly for keeping open the door at Homeland Security for privacy groups, as well as for investigating several glaring privacy breaches that have taken place in the department in the past several years. But the civil liberties group also noted that she lacked the true independence a real privacy officer must have.[...]

"Congress must give the DHS privacy office more teeth so it can serve as a true check and balance in an agency with enormous powers over many areas of Americans' lives," said ACLU Legislative Counsel Tim Sparapani. "In particular, Congress should pass the POWER Act," added Sparapani, referring to legislation proposed in Congress by Rep. Bennie G. Thompson (D-MS) that would significantly enhance the powers of the DHS privacy officer.

Sparapani also cautioned that Homeland Security must not use O'Connor Kelly's departure as an occasion to weaken the position, or leave it vacant for an extended period of time.

"We understand that a truly vigorous and independent privacy officer can be inconvenient for government officials over the short term," said Sparapani. "But over the long run, vigorous checks and balances will strengthen the Department of Homeland Security by inspiring greater public confidence in DHS programs..."

Posted by Ryan Singel at September 28, 2005 04:57 PM

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