Government Increasingly Turns to Data Mining
Tuesday, June 27th, 2006 | Justin Bugajski
An interesting article in the Washington Post today.
Industry executives, analysts and watchdog groups say the federal government has significantly increased what it spends to buy personal data from the private sector, along with the software to make sense of it, since the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks. They expect the sums to keep rising far into the future.
The hope is that the technology can help to discern and thwart threats just as businesses have used it for years to predict consumer behavior on buying cosmetics or repaying mortgages, for example.
Companies keep an increasing amount of data about everyone — tracking their buying, travel, bank transactions and bill-paying habits. Data mining uses mathematical formulas to look for patterns in those behaviors. The results could enable the grocery store to send out targeted coupons, or, in theory, help the government decide how likely it may be that someone is linked to terrorist groups.
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