Report: police sharing intelligence on activists with gas industry

http://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/2014/10/08/report-police-sharing-intelligence-on-activists-with-gas-industry/

by hackuser • 12 years ago

98 9 12 years ago

stateimpact.npr.org

ihsw• 12 years ago

Eh, this isn't isolated to the gas industry. The whole premise of CISPA is the sharing of intelligence in a bidirectional manner. Hell, Intelligence Sharing is part of the name!

Cooperation between LEOs and the gas industry is neither new nor unique.

Now, that said, employing public resources (personnel and otherwise) for wild goose chases is my main concern. I won't get into an argument about civil liberties, but there is a very large amount of resources devoted to investigations that lead no where and pointless harassment of peaceful individuals.

Police sharing intelligence implies that police were wasting time investigating peaceful individuals, and as such this enables private industry to otherwise penalize such individuals.

Furthermore, imagine, for a moment, an environment where protesting increased your car insurance. This happened transparently and automatically, and you have no recourse. Your rates just suddenly went up for an unexplained reason. And you didn't even use your car before, during, or after protesting.

This is what frightens me, because it's plausible. The public sector now acts as an information broker -- a steady stream of data about you is flowing towards private networks, and you have no recourse to defend yourself.

Natsu• 12 years ago

They would appear to be investigating the source of some pipe bombs, although it seems to be an open question where these come from:

There have been instances of hazardous materials– including pipe bombs– being found near gas drilling sites, but the incidents have not been linked publicly to environmental activists.

jack-r-abbit• 12 years ago

the incidents have not been linked publicly to environmental activists

It doesn't mean there isn't something to investigate. Or that the public knows everything the police do.

hackuser• 12 years ago

They have a history of harassing peaceful protestors. The link near the end of the article is to an instance where they clearly harassed innocent environmental activists, to the point where the Governor apologized and fired the contractors involved.

Actually, that link seems broken; the story is here: http://stateimpact.npr.org/pennsylvania/2015/01/22/anti-dril...

pkinsky• 12 years ago

Eh, this isn't isolated to the gas industry. The whole premise of CISPA is the sharing of intelligence in a bidirectional manner. Hell, Intelligence Sharing is part of the name!

I remember the news about CISPA making it sound like it was only about bidirectional data sharing with corporate targets of foreign advanced persistent threats. I'm guessing that was wildly optimistic?

kevan• 12 years ago

"When you have a hammer, everything starts to look like a nail."

transfire• 12 years ago

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Guru Meditation:

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bronson• 12 years ago

I get that too. Here's the cache: http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:d8CrZiI...

canvia• 12 years ago

One perspective on fracking: http://www.publicintegrity.org/2014/02/18/14235/drilling-rav...

Report: police sharing intelligence on activists with gas industry

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