November 14, 2005 | ChoicePoint Intelligence Agency?

The FBI and the Defense Department have long subscribed to private commercial data broker ChoicePoint, for use in investigations.

But since 2002, the agencies have also been relying on ChoicePoint's data to fuel data mining operations in one of the least understood post 9/11 operations, known as the Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force, according to Shane Harris of the National Journal.

The article, which relies on heavily redacted documents acquired through an open government request, raises questions about whether the Privacy Act -- which largely prevents secret databases on American citizens -- means anything if the government can simply outsource that data collection to a company like ChoicePoint (best known now for selling information on 145,000 citizens to identity theft scammers).

To help the government track suspected terrorists and spies who may be visiting or residing in this country, the FBI and the Defense Department for the past three years have been paying a Georgia-based company for access to its vast databases that contain billions of personal records about nearly every person -- citizens and noncitizens alike -- in the United States.

[...]

A set of contract documents, obtained under the Freedom of Information Act, and which the government sought to withhold for almost two years, reveals details not previously reported about ChoicePoint's work for the FBI's Foreign Terrorist Tracking Task Force, called FTTTF or "F tre F." This task force was set up soon after the 9/11 attacks to assist law enforcement and intelligence agencies in locating foreign terrorists and their supporters in the United States. Because the task force can't maintain records on U.S. persons without opening an official investigation, it relies on ChoicePoint to augment the intelligence that the government collects through legal channels.

[...]

But the documents indicate that ChoicePoint may have gone beyond simply offering its commercially available products to the government. In 2003, ChoicePoint agreed to provide access to an "exclusive" system used to help identify terrorism suspects. Although much of the description of the system has been redacted from the documents -- on the grounds that it would reveal law enforcement tactics and operations -- the portions that were released indicate that ChoicePoint's work involves continuously tracking a "subject of interest" and notifying the government when new information has surfaced on that person.

After a string of redacted text about this exclusive service, the document states, "When this new information is added and identified as relevant new data for a subject of interest, the FTTTF will receive electronic notification.... Additional information beyond the identity and address data can be provided to the FTTTF with a subpoena." In releasing the contract documents, the government said it could not elaborate on the system, because doing so "could certainly assist ... terrorists in circumventing detection." The government also redacted the dollar amount of the contracts, making it harder to assess costs and scope.

According to an outside expert on ChoicePoint who reviewed the documents for National Journal, the exclusive service looks like something ChoicePoint built specifically for federal agencies, and the arrangement raises questions about whether the company is effectively becoming an arm of the federal government.

"The language [of the contract], and ChoicePoint making their full system available to the government and [performing] custom-tailored searches for the government, show a high degree of cooperation," says Chris Hoofnagle, a researcher with the Electronic Privacy Information Center, who has obtained ChoicePoint contracts and corporate documents through other legal filings.

Full ChoicePoint/FBI story here.

Posted by Ryan Singel at November 14, 2005 10:03 AM

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I appreciate all the notes you've been sending me telling me about "FBI, Pentagon pay for access to trove of public records." I'd love to have something insightful to add to this, but I don't. Ryan Singel has a bit... [Read More]

Tracked on November 16, 2005 09:38 AM