SAIC Proposal: National Security Through Obscurity?

[SteveTX]

Instead of imposing mandatory new legal restrictions on publication of sensitive information, the nation would be better off if scientists, journalists and others adopted an ethic of self-restraint in what they choose to publish, a provocative new paper suggests.

“An abundance of information that could be useful to terrorists is available in the open literature,” wrote analyst Dallas Boyd. But that doesn’t mean it should be censored by law. “A soft consensus seems to have formed that airing this information does not subtract from national security to such an extent as to justify the extraordinary powers that would be required to suppress it.”

...

“Stigmatization of those who recklessly disseminate sensitive information… would be aided by the fact that many such people are unattractive figures whose writings betray their intellectual vanity. The public should be quick to furnish the opprobrium that presently escapes these individuals,” he wrote, without quite naming names. “The need to influence the behavior of scientists is particularly acute.”

Article Here. Brought to You By INGSOC.

[nix]

An alternative to draconian restrictions on speech entails fostering a culture of voluntary restraint, in which citizens refrain from inappropriate revelations out of a sense of civic duty. Its enforcement would depend not on government coercion but on individuals and institutions supplying disapproval of irresponsible discussion.

Dallas Boyd, SAIC, gives new meaning to the phrase "a meeting of the minds", does he not? Perhaps the censorship-by-withholding should have taken place before the broad dissemination of this paper. The requested "cooperation", of course, comes directly from government coercion, as it is propagated by those who are the recipients of federal money, like SAIC itself, to the tune of billions upon ceaseless billions of dollars. Take a tour with Tim Shorrock to the office parks near Dulles that house some of the big names from whence the "cooperation" will stem:

Ah, yes, SAIC, the Big Daddy of privatized intelligence, the company responsible for the failed $5 billion Trailblazer program at the NSA, which was supposed to keep track of the billions of bits of data downloaded by the NSA around the world but totally failed. SAIC, which recently moved its headquarters from San Diego to this building, stands like a private colossus across the whole intelligence industry. Of its 42,000 employees, more than 20,000 hold U.S. government security clearances, making it, with Lockheed Martin, one of the largest private intelligence services in the world.

http://timshorrock.com/?p=710

This wouldn't be SAIC's first stint in the brainwashing biz. But this one is particularly sloppy. Quoting Leo Szilárd as support for the notion that the public shouldn't have had access to the Smyth Report, an unclassified document about the Manhattan Project, is pure science fiction. Szilard, who developed the idea for the nuclear chain reaction, was a passionate proponent of free speech. Boyd's quote of Szilard that claimed that the Report “clearly indicates the road along which any other nations will have to travel” was made because he was supporting the civilian control of atomic energy by "attacking the presumption that the military would be more security conscious."

See Red Cloud at Dawn: Truman, Stalin, and the End of the Atomic Monopoly, Pg. 97.

In other words, it was the military that he mistrusted. And he himself was considered a grave security risk, as he became an outspoken peace activist. And this is just a sample of the disingenuous "evidence" that Boyd presents in support of his dubious and dangerous thesis.

Brought to you by INGSOC, indeed. Maybe SAIC should stick to promoting other alternative communication models. Perhaps a combination of telepathy and taser or something. That sounds like way more fun than this.

[Dermot7]

The proposals recommended in this paper are truly shocking, and the epitome of unenlightened, negative and paranoid thought. The corollary of this type of philosophy is the eventual emergance of total dictatorship, stagnation of scientific progress and advanced thinking, and ever-growing xenophobia and national paranoia. Hopefully not many will agree with this trash.

[PJC]

Originally Posted by Dermot7

The proposals recommended in this paper are truly shocking,
and the epitome of unenlightened, negative and paranoid thought.
The corollary of this type of philosophy is the eventual emergance of
total dictatorship, stagnation of scientific progress and advanced
thinking, ever-growing xenophobia, and national paranoia.
Hopefully not many will agree with this trash.

Hopefully...