Kim Zetter reports: Hours after two TSA agents served a civil subpoena on blogger Steven Frischling last week to uncover the anonymous source of a leaked document, an unusual message appeared on the blogger’s Twitter account. “To the gentleman who sent Flying With Fish the TSA Security Directive … Thank You! Can you drop me…
Category: Govt
HHS wants contractor to test privacy of ‘anonymous’ data
Alice Lipowicz reports: Can personal medical data that has been stripped of its identifiers to protect privacy later be used to identify a specific person? That is the question that the Health and Human Services Department is hoping a research contractor can answer. HHS intends to hire a contractor to demonstrate either the “ability or…
DHS releases 2009 Data Mining Report
The Department of Homeland Security has released its 2009 Data Mining Report: This report describes DHS programs, both operational and in development, that involve data mining as defined by the Federal Agency Data Mining Reporting Act of 2007. The report provides the detailed information required by the Act and includes updates on program modifications and…
Obama Orders Overhaul in ‘Top Secret’ Rules
Travis Sanford reports: In a sweeping change to current practice, President Obama has ordered that all federal agencies presume that documents and records they produce will not be considered “classified” unless disclosure reasonably could be expected to compromise national security. Obama also ordered that almost all classified material will be declassified after 25 years. In…