The Government very quietly axed 2 projects designed to preserve the privacy of Americans while at the same time, it very publicly protects innocent citizens by restricting Pentagon data-gathering research.
The Government is now also quietly funding research into high-powered computer data-mining technology to be used with terror-fighting tools without any privacy protection for the public. The protection software is ready but "just sits there unused".
The project was originally conceived by Iran-Contra figure, Adm. John Poindexter, and has now been given new life by the Bush administration as data-mining tools for the fight against terrorism.
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