Home » Articles posted by James A Jacobs (Page 276)
Author Archives: James A Jacobs
The White House: Off Limits to Historians?
Meredith Fuchs, the general counsel of the National Security Archive at George Washington University, writes that the Bush administration's hostility towards public access to and preservation of records combined with changes in technology that have transformed the way in which we all communicate are leading to a situation in which "primary sources on the most important decisions and activities in the government may be lost, destroyed, or closed to the public." [emphasis added]
- The White House: Off Limits to Historians? by Meredith Fuchs, Passport: The Newsletter of the Society for Historians of American Foreign Relations (5-1-08), posted at History News Network on Thursday, May 8, 2008.
[O]ver the last seven years there have been a series of moves by the current administration that may ensure that the records of the White House and the federal offices and agencies that work closely with the White House will not be available to historians.Continue reading
Police State 2.0 is ready for export to a neighborhood near you
A new, in-depth story by Naomi Klein examines "Golden Shield," China's prototype for a high-tech police state. She says that China is building its systems with the help of U.S. defense contractors, that the global homeland-security business is bigger than Hollywood and the music industry combined, and that the U.S. Government is mining China's experiences for ideas for its own surveillance programs.
- China's All-Seeing Eye, by Naomi Klein, Rollingstone, May 29, 2008. "Like everything else assembled in China with American parts, Police State 2.0 is ready for export to a neighborhood near you."
Klein says that the United States is providing China's rulers with something even more valuable than surveillance technology: "...the ability to claim that they are just like us. Liu Zhengrong, a senior official dealing with China's Internet policy, has defended Golden Shield and other repressive measures by invoking the Patriot Act and the FBI's massive e-mail-mining operations." And, the Chinese rationalize surveillance of their own citizens the same way many do in the United States: "If you are a law-abiding citizen, you shouldn't be afraid... The criminals are the only ones who should be afraid." (See also: Privacy: "I have nothing to hide" and Privacy and the "Terrorist Surveillance Act.")
Klein notes that human-rights activists say that although the surveillance tools used by China and the U.S. are the same, the political contexts are radically different. "China has a government that uses its high-tech web to imprison and torture peaceful protesters, Tibetan monks and independent-minded journalists." But she also notes that Guantánamo Bay, the erosion of the Fourth Amendment prohibition against illegal searches and seizures, and the fact that the U.S. currently has more people behind bars than China despite a population less than a quarter of its size all mean that "the lines are getting awfully blurry."
What relevance does this have for government information specialists? As we at FGI have pointed out before, when the only "authentic" copy of government information is available from government-controlled computers rather than from privacy-protecting libraries, the freedom to read is eroded and the infrastructure for government spying on what you are reading is enabled. (See also: Will GPO guarantee user privacy? Can it?.)
See also: China's Golden Shield: Corporations and the Development of Surveillance Technology in the People's Republic of China, by Greg Walton, October 2001, Rights & Democracy.
Continue readingA New Website Devoted to Envisioning the Future of Libraries
A New Website Devoted to Envisioning the Future of Libraries, D-Lib Magazine, May/June 2008, Volume 14 Number 5/6. "What is the future of academic and research libraries? A recently launched web site from the Joint Information Systems Committee (JISC) entitled Libraries of the Future (http://www.jisc.ac.uk/librariesofthefuture) addresses that question and others concerning how the libraries of today may evolve to address the needs of future information users." Continue reading
Senators Ask FBI to Explain Flawed ‘National Security Letter’ to Internet Archive
Senators Ask FBI to Explain Flawed 'National Security Letter' to Internet Archive, By Ryan Singel, Wired Blog, May 15, 2008.
A bipartisan group of U.S. senators is asking FBI head Robert Mueller to explain why the feds sought records from the Internet Archive, a digital library, using a controversial administrative subpoena known as a National Security Letter, which is intended for a communications service providers.... Specifically, they asked Mueller if the FBI actually believed that the Internet Archive was an communications service provider. If it were, FBI agents could get subscriber records using an NSL under the auspices of the Electronic Communications Protection Act. But if the Internet Archive is a library, that subpoena would be inapplicable and possibly illegal. That would mean that the NSL should be reported to the Intelligence Oversight Board as a possible violation of law. The senators are asking Mueller if the Internet Archive subpoena actually was reported to the board.Continue reading
NAPA launches collaboration Web site
National Academy of Public Administration (NAPA) has launched The Collaboration Project, "an independent forum of leaders committed to leveraging web 2.0 and the benefits of collaborative technology to solve government's complex problems. Powered by the National Academy of Public Administration, this "wikified" space is designed share ideas, examples and insights on the adoption of Web 2.0 technologies in the field of public governance." See also: NAPA launches collaboration Web site, By Anne Laurent, The Agile Mind blog, NextGov, 05/09/08. "The site is a great example of collaboration, chock-a-block as it is with case studies, a long discourse on government 2.0 by Don Tapscott, Anthony Williams and Dan Herman, authors of Wikinomics: How Mass Collaboration Changes Everything (Portfolio Media, 2006), a blog and plenty more. There’s even a catchy slogan: 'Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what we can do together.'" Continue reading
Latest Comments