PROMISES, PROMISES: Obama keeps some Bush secrets

[bigtree]

04.19.09, 10:15 AM EDT

AP - Despite a pledge to open government, the Obama administration has endorsed a Bush-era decision to keep secret key details of an FBI computer database that allows agents and analysts to search a billion documents with a wealth of personal information about Americans and foreigners.

President Barack Obama's Justice Department quietly told a federal court in Washington last week that it would not second-guess the previous administration's decisions to withhold some information about the bureau's Investigative Data Warehouse.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation, a digital rights advocacy group, had sued under the Freedom of Information Act to get records showing how the FBI protects the privacy of Americans whose personal information winds up in the vast database.

As a result, there is no public list of all the databases the FBI sucks into this computer warehouse; no information on how individuals can correct errors about them in this FBI database; and no public access to assessments the bureau did of the warehouse's impact on Americans' privacy.

"In light of all the fanfare at the highest levels of the administration about a new transparency policy, it's remarkable that not one word of additional material has been released as a result of that new policy," said David Sobel, the foundation's lawyer in the case.

read: http://www.forbes.com/feeds/ap/2009/04/19/ap6308133.html

[Bluebear]

1. "it would not second-guess the previous administration's decisions" - lovely. nt

[Mark Twain Girl]

2. Lovely indeed, eh? nt

[Autumn]

3. Yes it is remarkable n/t

[bigtree]

4. needs more fanfare

[bigtree]

5. .