Steve Watson
Infowars.net
Tuesday, Jan 15, 2008
A vast intelligence program is to establish a global biometric database known as "Server in the Sky" that will collate and provide an " International Information Consortium" with access to the biometric measurements and personal information of citizens of the US, UK, Australia, Canada and New Zealand in the name of fighting the "war on terror".
As reported by the London Guardian, he plan is being formulated by the FBI with the cooperation of the home offices and law enforcement agencies of American allies.
Biometric measurements, irises or palm prints as well as fingerprints, and other personal information are likely to be exchanged across the network.
The FBI told the Guardian: "Server in the Sky is an FBI initiative designed to foster the advanced search and exchange of biometric information on a global scale. While it is currently in the concept and design stages, once complete it will provide a technical forum for member nations to submit biometric search requests to other nations. It will maintain a core holding of the world’s ‘worst of the worst’ individuals. Any identifications of these people will be sent as a priority message to the requesting nation."
Of course as well as holding the information of the world’s ‘worst of the worst’, the database will also eventually hold the records of every other citizen who has ever traveled in and out of the member states, or has ever been arrested with or without charge.
Britain’s National Policing Improvement Agency has been the lead body for the FBI project because it is responsible for IDENT1, the UK database holding 7m sets of fingerprints and other biometric details used by police forces to search for matches from scenes of crimes. Many of the prints are either from a person with no criminal record, or have yet to be matched to a named individual.
Any non national now entering the US must provide an Iris scan and ten fingerprints. This week has also seen Britain enact legislation ensuring that anyone applying for a visa from 133 countries covering three quarters of the world’s population now has their fingerprints checked against UK databases.
Police in Britain also hold vastly more DNA samples than any other country in the Western world, and many are from people who have never committed a crime. More than three million samples have been added to the national DNA database - more than 5 per cent of the population, and this is rising exponentially.
We have previously noted that the vast array of databases currently being employed by intelligence agencies, government and law enforcement agencies worldwide were designed to be linked together in a system which will tie in the management and control of all facets of life for citizens to one central hub.
The Guardian report on "Server in the Sky" further notes
IDENT1 was built by the computer technology arm of the US defence company Northrop Grumman. In future it is expected to hold palm prints, facial images and video sequences. A company spokeswoman confirmed that Northrop Grumman had spoken to the FBI about Server in the Sky. "It can run independently but if existing systems are connected up to it then the intelligence agencies would have to approve," she said.
The component systems have been designed by the military industrial complex to strengthen and perpetuate its own existence.
The news of the global database network dovetails with announcement that US National Intelligence Director Mike McConnell is drawing up plans for cyberspace spying that would make the current debate on warrantless wiretaps look like a "walk in the park".
The plan would mean giving the government the authority to examine the content of any e-mail, file transfer or Web search.
Last month it was revealed that another military spy agency, the NSA has increasing control over SSL, now called Transport Layer Security, the cryptographic protocol that provides secure communications on the internet for web browsing, e-mail, instant messaging, and other data transfers.
In other words the agency is capable of intercepting and reading your emails and instant messages in real time.
At the same time a lawyer for an AT&T engineer went public with claims that "within two weeks of taking office, the Bush administration was planning a comprehensive effort of spying on Americans’ phone usage.” That is BEFORE 9/11, before the nation was embroiled in the freedom stripping exercise commonly known as the "war on terror" had even begun.
This swell of surveillance activity was also enhanced with news that Department of Homeland security is forging ahead and finalizing plans to use a network of spy satellites for domestic surveillance. The DHS plans to create a new department branch called the National Applications Office to oversee the program and be responsible for providing images from the satellites to non military law enforcement agencies.
After 9/11 the work of 16 different intelligence agencies, including the CIA and the giant National Security Agency, which eavesdrops on international communications, as well as the Energy Department and the Drug Enforcement Administration was centralized under the office of the Director of National Intelligence.
Over decades we have witnessed the evolution of Government surveillance programs and information databases targeting citizens. We are now witnessing the centralization of this vast control grid Panopticon beyond our own borders."
