more worries over hidden side effects

[Guest guest]

I just read the story below from Wired News. While it does

not mention vaccinations or pharm drugs, I can readily see how

companies may use the Homeland Security Act to hide all sorts of

negative side effects from the public.

 

Alobar

 

 

 

02:00 AM Dec. 02, 2002 PT

 

" The fix is in. " So said Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) of the mammoth

new Homeland Security Act, which was signed into law last week.

 

McCain was upset about an array of goodies that were tacked onto the

bill at the last minute by the House of Representatives. These

included broad liability protections for makers of vaccines, and an

array of other extremely valuable giveaways.

 

In the end, the overwhelming majority of the Senate, including most

Democrats, chose the politically expedient course of supporting the

vast legislation.

 

That said, McCain and other critics were right to be concerned. While

it has some positive aspects, the Homeland Security Act is also full

of worrisome surprises for U.S. citizens concerned about their

freedoms, particularly when combined with last year's USA PATRIOT

Act.

 

Since the events of 9/11, a range of legislation detrimental to

fundamental freedoms and privacy rights has been rammed into law,

without any assurance that our safety will improve as a result.

 

Law enforcement interests pushed through a variety of surveillance

measures, including some unrelated to terrorism, that had long been

rejected as inappropriate in a free society.

 

Important protections related to monitoring and intelligence

gathering, established after serious past abuses, were swept away

with the assurance that this time the government won't abuse its

powers.

 

Among various alarming provisions, the law opens up enormous avenues

for monitoring Internet communications, without even after-the-fact

notifications. Virtually any government agency at any level can

initiate surveillance on flimsy grounds. No subpoenas or court

oversight are required.

 

Not to be left off the gravy train, big business also pushed through

its own grab bag of perks in the new legislation.

 

One of the most egregious and potentially dangerous of these

travesties is the Homeland Security Act's creation of new and very

broad exemptions from the Freedom of Information Act.

 

Businesses now have a new way to evade liability for safety

violations, hazards to consumers and other abuses. They need merely

report the information about their behavior -- even totally

unclassified activities -- to the federal government, and claim it's

related to homeland security. In the parlance of the Homeland

Security Act, they declare the data to be " CII, " or Critical

Infrastructure Information.

 

Instantly, the company filing drops that information into a black

hole of secrecy, hidden from public view. If a government employee

releases any such data without the permission of the company that

submitted it, regardless of its importance to the public, they could

be subject to jail time.

 

That's potentially a major blow to the government's regulation of

corporate misdeeds, since it's often not until such abuses become

publicly known that officials take steps to deal with them properly.

As long as there's cover, the urge to let sleeping dogs lie is strong

indeed.

 

Ironically, the existing statute, the Freedom of Information Act,

already had exceptions for information that truly needed to be kept

private. The new homeland security law goes much farther, creating a

magic rubber stamp that can make a host of problems disappear from

the public radar.

 

The dangers of the new restrictions extend beyond obvious

infrastructure risks related to power, water, manufacturing,

pollution and the like. They could also strike to the heart of the

computer industry and Internet as well.

 

By invoking the exemptions of the Homeland Security Act, software and

computer hardware companies could hide the existence of critical

security flaws or other bugs, claiming (with a familiar refrain) that

letting anyone know about them was just too big a risk.

 

These kinds of cover-ups rarely succeed in the long run. When the bad

guys ultimately find ways to exploit the flaws, the ordinary folks

who are at risk will be the last to know what's going on.

 

In a similar vein, ISPs and telecommunications firms may now avoid

taking responsibility for security flaws in their systems. Just sweep

the problems under the homeland security rug and, with luck, nobody

on the outside will be the wiser.

 

It's been hard enough in the best of times to get companies and

government agencies to admit their mistakes and abuses. Now, thanks

to the Homeland Security Act, we may have more of a reason to fear

those very actions than we do the terrorist threats that the new law

is supposed to address.

 

Lauren Weinstein has been involved with the Internet for decades,

beginning with ARPANET. He is the co-founder of People for Internet

Responsibility, the creator and moderator of the Privacy Forum and an

outspoken commentator on technology and society.

 

http://www.wired.com/news/politics/0,1283,56600,00.html