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Federal Government Plans to Greatly Expand DNA Database

// January 21st, 2007 // Security & Privacy

Included in a bill signed last year by President Bush reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act was a provision allowing the federal government to greatly expand the federal DNA database.

Language commonly used in promoting it’s use include “crime fighting database”, “fighting terrorism”, and “catching immigration violators”. The “with-us-or-against-us” mentality among some in law enforcement will inevitably paint those raising their voices in protest as “pro-crime”, “pro-terrorism”, and “pro-illegal-immigration”. The nuances of privacy and the potential abuse of this information are lost on them.

Efforts to include DNA in criminal records has momentum and isn’t likely to wane, but close oversight of the collection, storage, and use of DNA is critical.

From the article: “Caroline Fredrickson, director of the American Civil Liberties Union’s Washington office, say such mass seizures of DNA violate privacy and do little to improve law enforcement.”

The public rarely recognizes how the privacy violations of those they consider bad people (e.g., “criminals”) chip away at privacy for all of us. It is often done against the backdrop of something no rational, half-thinking person can argue against, such as “fighting crime”. Fear language is used to silence and marginalize critics, and too often the “authorities” succeed in achieving their narrow goal — such as building heavily armed and rarely-used SWAT programs or chasing the ghosts of the drug trade — without the benefit of public discourse reflecting on the downsides.

In this case, the “downsides”, like so much other law enforcement pork projects, are wasted dollars on security theater and a massive invasion of personal privacy with little effort spent to ensure that the program will protect the privacy of not only the innocents but the accused as well.