[Infowarrior] - Security: Is technology saint or sinner?

[Richard Forno]

Original URL: 
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2006/11/27/database_state_analyses/
Security: Is technology saint or sinner?
By Clive Longbottom, Quocirca.com
Published Monday 27th November 2006 10:14 GMT

Analysis The latest problem to be thrown at us, on top of war, global
warming, disease etc, is that we are "sleepwalking into a surveillance
society".

The worry is that, owing to all the data being collected these days, we no
longer have any real privacy.

We are covered by cameras, the "powers that be" have oodles of information
on every one of us, and the private sector has got in on the act with the
likes of loyalty cards.

Yet, the vocal groups (and who knows if these are the minority or the
majority) want it all ways.

They want their privacy, while trying to make sure that all these Johnny
Foreigners don't come over uninvited, that the "man next door" doesn't claim
sickness benefit while on a mountaineering holiday in Tibet and, that when
needed, the emergency services will have everything at their fingertips to
know exactly what drugs can and can't be given to you while you're lying in
the road, and/or have access to high-definition CCTV footage to identify who
it was who kicked seven shades of the proverbial out of you.

I think that we need to look at pragmatism and try to put "privacy" into
context. What do we mean by privacy here?

Do we really think that all of the 13 million CCTV cameras in the UK are
being watched by forces which are just waiting for us to inadvertently drop
a paper hankie on the street?

Do we really believe that hordes of people are sitting in some dusty
basement in Cheltenham reading the email that you sent with that
particularly non-PC joke in it?

Are we worried that we might just get caught after we've mugged some poor
unfortunate?

Could this be it? We're not really bothered about privacy as such, but we're
worried that we might get caught? Speed cameras would seem to be a prime
example of this privacy argument.

There are many groups and individuals whose worries are more pragmatic: the
security, integrity and accuracy of the information being held on us. This
has less to do with privacy, and more to do with reality.

For example, if I'm the person lying in the middle of the road, I do want
the paramedics, police and fire brigade to know that I am allergic to
penicillin, that I have epilepsy, and that I am already on a collection of
prescription drugs for a range of problems.

This knowledge could save my life and, as I am a simple soul, I don't care
who knows all of this. Now, let's say that I was the chief executive of a
major company that is just going through a sensitive acquisition.

My medical records could say that I have only a few months to live. This is
very important for the medical profession to know, but probably not what I'd
want splashed over the financial pages of the papers.

There's also the problem of what the "powers that be" will do with
information. All we have to do is look at the likes of Hoover, Beria,
Trotsky, and Hitler as to what can happen when too much information is given
to someone who is a little on the unstable side.

But, the majority of these despots did their dirty work without technology.
So is it technology that is to blame? Yes, technology means that we can
gather and analyse a lot more information.

Yes, technology means that people thousands of miles away are just like the
risks of having cleaners in the office 50 years ago: if you don't take
careful steps, you're leaving everything available to them. Yes, the black
hats (bad hackers) are cleverer than ever and there are relatively more of
them.

But does this mean that we should ban any database of information held on
us? Does it mean that all information should be kept in isolation from other
information?

If we continue in this way, we'll see more headlines where a child dies
owing to information from one group not being available to another, to
people who should be being tracked being lost due to insufficient data being
available, to the continued billions of pounds being wasted in fraudulent
claiming of benefits, of insurance claims, the booming black market economy
and so on.

ID theft will continue to rise without any means of being able to prove
irrevocably who we are, and that ID can be taken from us.

And for anyone who has had full ID theft occasioned against them, then all
of a sudden, you really wish that you'd backed the implementation of ID
cards, at least in a correct way.

(Please note that I am not backing the government's half-hearted, half-baked
way of providing government-backed false IDs.)

To my mind, it's technology which can help us by ensuring sophisticated
controls over access to data. We can design, say, a DNA database that is
just that: a genetic fingerprint that is held against an identifier.

We could do the same for iris recognition and/or fingerprinting. Three
different databases, none of which actually provides any information against
named people.

To get onto these databases, you have to go through three different groups.
Why? So that any chance of using insiders to create false IDs is minimised.

Any check against these databases would use full auditing. Any access to any
field within the database is time stamped and stamped with an access code
showing which user or body nominally accessed that field.

Security profiles then begin to take over; having verified that the DNA,
iris and/or fingerprint are in each of the databases, what else do we need
to do?

Do we need to be able to carry out another match to ensure that this person
is who they are saying they are? Maybe a PIN or something similar? OK, a
fourth database, maybe within the private sector.

Again, all that this has is the PIN against a unique identifier. We now have
up to four pieces of unique data against four unique identifiers. In comes
database number five: a correlation database of unique identifiers.

If all of these unique identifiers correlate as being from the same person,
we can pretty much assume that we have a match. And at no stage have we had
to go to a database that has any names or other personally identifiable
information held within it.

However, if this is the police, ambulance or fire brigade, they may then
need to go to a different database where such personal information is held.

Again, all fully audited against access type, named ID and, where necessary,
correlated against biometric information of the accessing individual.

For the highest levels of information being held on us, we need the same
sort of approach that we have for nuclear warheads being set off: a dual key
system.

No single person should be able to access every last item about another
without some balance being available.

For me, we have to look at data pragmatism. I want to be able to walk the
streets without too much fear of aggravated assault against me, I want to be
able to see my insurance premiums go down because thieves find it harder to
get away with misdemeanours, I'd like to see my tax go down due to fraud
being eradicated.

This won't happen unless we make the most of technology, but also use
appropriate technology as the controls against inappropriate usage.

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