taylor@hplabsc.UUCP (06/21/86)
Computers and Society Digest, Number 9
Thursday, January 9th 1986
Topics of discussion in this issue...
Secret Service computers pose dangers
"Mind rape" by computer mail
The Lack of Submissions (an editorial comment)
System interface design and User involvement
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Date: Mon, 6 Jan 86 16:24:17 MST
From: hpcnou!dat (Dave Taylor)
Subject: Secret Service computers pose dangers
[copied from the ACM Computers and Society SIG Bulletin, Summer '83]
(original from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Fort Worth Texas)
1984 Looming Closer
Secret Service computers pose dangers
Don Edwards
Congressman
Chairman of the Civil and Constitutional Rights
Subcommmittee of the House Judiciary Committee
--------------------------------
"Any sound that Winston made, above the level of a very low whisper, would
be picked up by it . . . . There was of course no way of knowing whether
you were being watched at any given moment . . . . you had to live -- did
live, from habit that became instinct -- on the assumption that every sound
you made was overheard and except in darkness, every moment scrutinized."
-- "1984" by George Orwell
In April, the fundamental purpose of the FBI's National Crime
Information Center -- the dissemination of information about convictions,
outstanding warrants and so on -- was shattered with the implementation of
the Secret Service proposal permitting it to enter into its computer the
names and descriptions of persons it believes pose a danger to its
protectees.
The individuals so identified will now be known to every criminal-
justice user of the NCIC computer system -- not just police on the beat but
also probation officers, judges, and others with access to arrest records.
In some states this information will be available for employment and licensing
purposes as well.
The important point to remember is that these men and women have not
been charged with the crime of threatening a Secret Service protectee. Rather
it is a question of suspicion. Through this system the Secret Service hopes
to track the movememtn of people it considers dangerous -- in other words, to
follow them around the United States, using a computer.
What is wrong with this? First, the Crime Information Center's
chief safeguard is breached. The names, descriptions and personal information
about men and women who are not criminals and who are not wanted by the
police are entered into a national, computerized telecommunications system for
federal governmnent surveillance.
Second, it is inevitable that this information will unfairly influence
the fate of individuals on the list who are stopped by police. Can anyone
doubt that a judge, in setting bail or handing down a sentence for even a minor
crime or traffic infraction, will not be influenced by the knowledge that the
person is considered by the Secret Service to be "dangerous"? Or that a
police officer will not decide to arrest the individual once he discovers that
he has located a "dangerous" person?
Third, its usefulness in protecting the president is dubious. The
Secret Service tells Congress that the NCIC will be an important help in
keeping tabs on suspects. I ask the Secret Service: "Which of the six
persons who have assassinated, or attempted to assassinate, a president would
have been thwarted with NCIC use?"
The answer: None -- not John W. Hinckley Jr., not Lee Harvey Oswald
and none of the others. Sarah Jane Moore would have been in the NCIC system
because she had publicly threatened President Gerald R. Ford, but she had been
interviewed by the Secret Service the night before she shot at Ford. The
Secret Service knew where she was, and that no help.
Fourth, and most important, once the precedent is set for
including investigative data on these kinds of people in the NCIC system,
cannot a strong case be made to include other "dangerous" types? How about
a list of all radicals, communists, suspected spies? How about a list of all
mentally ill persons who have ever made any kind of threat to any public
official?
The great danger is not in this modest use by the Secret Service;
that could be controlled by strict regulations or by law. But the basic
rule has been broken. How do we know that tomorrow the Secret Service will
not have 1,000 names, or that the FBI, the Internal Revenue Service or some
other agency will not want to include its favorite lists of suspects? Once
the door has been opene, how many thousands, or millions, will be included?
The most frightening aspect of life in George Orwell's "1984" was
that the government always had you under surveillance, not because you were
a criminal but because you might, today or tomorrow, do or say something
that threatened it. And the government felt threatened by almost everything.
The House Judiciary Committee's subcommittee on civil and
constitutional rights, which I chair, is vitally concerned about the
quite, unannounced, undebated action to put this pervasive government
surveillance system into operation. We have offered equally effective
alternatives to the plan, but the FBI and Secret Service have refused to
consider them. Last month we dtried to delay implementation of the
scheme so that there could be a public debate, but the full Judiciary
Committee turned us down.
The members of the committee did not see in this national,
computerized police telecommunications system the grave dangers of
including unproved file information about Americans who are not
criminals. They saw it only in terms of a means to an end: protecting
the president and others. That end, of course, is so important that
it tends to overwhelm reasoned debate on the subject. But that is
what the public must demand.
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From: Hoffman.es@Xerox.ARPA
Subject: "Mind rape" by computer mail
[from Human-Nets digest, Volume 9, issue 1]
In the October 1985 issue of 'Ms.' magazine, there's a lengthy article
entitled "The Strange Case of the Electronic Lover" by Lindsy Van
Gelder. It's tells how a prominent New York psychiatrist in his early
fifties maintained an on-line identity over CompuServe for more than
two years as a disabled, late-twenties, female neuropsychologist,
developing intimate friendships with scores of electronic
correspondents.
"She" had a detailed contrived life history, announced her marriage
during the course of the fraud, sent gifts to people, and was heavily
into (bisexual) compusex.
As you might imagine, many of "her" victims felt enormously betrayed,
likening the experience to "mind rape". The article has quite a bit
to say about the nature of electronic correspondence in general.
--Rodney Hoffman--
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Date: Thu, 9 Jan 86 10:24:39 MST
From: hpcnou!dat (Dave Taylor)
Subject: The Lack of Submissions (an editorial comment)
In the few months that I've been moderating this group, I've been
impressed with the large readership that it's receiving (over 250
people right now) BUT I'm also quite shocked at the extremely low
level of participation by the readers!
We have people reading this group that work in Human Factors labs
at large companies, professors of philosophy at major universities,
and people that TEACH what we're trying to talk about here - the
impact of technology on society!!
My suspicion is that a lot of people aren't too comfortable using the
computer to create and send messages, and that there's also a concern
about being 'creative' and presenting oneself as 'intelligent' (this
is starting to sound like a legitimate issue for the digest!).
I'd like to allay those fears here. Since the area we're talking about
is rather all-encompassing, it is a sure bet that such diverse things
as 'disclaimers' on computer software and interesting magazine articles
would be of great interest to the reads of the group, especially if the
poster includes some commentary of their own (their reactions etc).
Also, it IS informal, so if you have a question, or disagree with
something that someone posts, or whatever, submit it!
Perhaps the ratio of people who read to people who read & submit is
directly proportional to something else....any guesses? Anyone
know of any research about passive versus active communication by
people and what percentages of the public are 'active communicators'?
Alternatively, maybe this is an intrinsic problem with electronic
communications systems. Certainly, it's rather difficult to compose
a message to a person (let alone large group) sight unseen.
Any thoughts?
More importantly, any submissions???
-- Dave Taylor
The Moderator
ps: An interesting conversation could be started by a professor teaching
a Computers and Society class posting a copy of the syllabus for
comment...
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From: "David England" <hpbbn!unido!comp.lancs.ac.uk!de>
Date: Thu, 9 Jan 86 14:47:37 gmt
Subject: System interface design and User involvement
I think many of the problems that computer users face are due to
inappropriate design methods. People are writing interactive software
using the same techiques as they would for a batch accounts program.
Sure the user gets a say in the functionality of the program but not
the all important human aspects. We need to shift to a user-centered
design method. The designer and end-user need to be involved in a
dialogue during the design phase to establish the users' interface needs.
The term "user" implies not just a specific customer but human interface
aspects in general.
Most interface design is iterative and our method needs to take this
into account. One approach is "incremental design" where the fundamentals
of the product are initially specified and implemented. The product is then
incrementally evolved with user feedback until a satisfactory product is
reached (or the time and money run out !).
We also need some objective evidence that we have produced a better
design. Although we have user involvement users are not human factors
experts any more than software engineers. An interface can be measured in
terms of it's learnability, flexibility, usability and user sastifaction.
Some of these aspects of the user interface may overlap or seem artbtrary
but they can each tell us something about the effectiveness of our design.
Learnability can tell us how long it takes to learn to use a system, how
long users can remember about system use after a break; usability can tell
us if our product is an improvement, do users achieve better results with
less errors than previously ? ; flexibility can tell us if users of
differing abilities and backgrounds have certain probelms with our
product, can the system adapt interactively to these problems?
User centered design can help to produce better interactive systems and
provide designers with useful data and experience in the design of future
systems.
Dave
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