Many thanks to Drudge Report for spreading the word about my latest article “Feds want to track your DNA like a license plate.”
My discovery of this government plan to develop technology to track -- indeed, detect - individuals and groups based on DNA and other human "biosignatures" is a significant one.
Though this article deviates from U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor's typical topic focus, the potential implications on a global scale make it worthy of a link -- S.P.
Just as details are emerging about a controversial, nationwide vehicle-surveillance database, WND has learned the federal government is planning an even more invasive spy program using “physiological signatures” to track down individuals.
The goal of this research is to detect – as well as analyze and categorize – unique traits the government can exploit to “identify, locate and track specific individuals or groups of people.”
According to the program’s statement of objectives, “The scope of human-centered [intelligence, surveillance and reconnaissance, or ISR] research spans the complete range of human performance starting at the individual molecular, cellular, genomic level.”
A delegation of Egyptian officials and educational leaders are coming to America to observe the operation of science, technology, and mathematics magnet schools—and U.S. taxpayers will foot the entire bill.
“President Obama discussed the importance of education and science and technology in his famous June 2009 Cairo University speech,” the project solicitation emphasizes. “In Egypt, there is an urgent need to improve the quality of science and mathematics education in the pre-university education system.”
The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), which is responsible for this Observational Study Tour (OST), is recruiting potential contractors to coordinate the one-week trip, which is tentatively slated for August or September.
According to a solicitation that USAID uploaded to the Federal Business Opportunities database this past Sunday, international studies conducted in Egypt in 2003 and 2007 indicate “serious weaknesses” in math and science education “both in absolute terms and relative to other Middle Eastern and Arab nations in the region.”
Consequently, U.S. citizens will fund activities such as the OST “that will eventually better prepare [Egyptian] students for careers in the 21st century.”
The selected contractor will be responsible for purchasing international tickets from and back to Egypt, domestic tickets within the U.S, providing other forms of domestic transportation, lodging and meals, securing U.S. visas and arranging visitor fingerprinting at the U.S. Embassy, the provision of interpreter and technical escort services, plus “any other unforeseeable expenses.” The contractor likewise will provide relevant tour materials and hold a series of workshops.
Source document: Solicitation #263-11-000092.
FOR ADDITIONAL COVERAGE OF THE U.S. AGENCY FOR INTERNATIONAL DEVELOPMENT, PLEASE VISIT THE MONITOR'S USAID PAGE.
ALSO SEE THE MONITOR'S EDUCATION PAGE.
A new research project of the U.S. Navy hopes to develop an advanced, autonomous means of gathering and processing data for tactical and battlefield situations. The Autonomous Persistent Tactical Surveillance program of the Office of Naval Research (ONR) will provide about $41.5 million over five years to researchers who submit “white papers” or proposals for innovative projects leading to the potential development of “major advancements” in this area.
“United States (US) Forces are being placed in environments where they are required to function with increased autonomy,” the Navy says in Broad Agency Announcement # 11-023. “The need is stronger than ever to be able to autonomously maintain persistent surveillance of activities and entities over a region of interest on a continuing (24 hrs / 7 days a week) basis, as well as automated tasking of these assets…”
Among the various shortfalls of existing Intelligence, Surveillance, and Reconnaissance capabilities that the BAA identifies include:
There is a lack of sharing knowledge of unfolding events across mission threads.
There is a lack of timely exploitation of useful theater and national sensor data. There are gaps in alerting Forces to danger.
There is a lack of mobile tools for field users to gather information. There is a lack of means for reporting soft biometric data on at-risk individuals or groups engaged in suspicious activity.
Many sensors fail to deliver relevant information to users outside their stovepipes… Sensor data overwhelms the distribution, analysis, storage, and assimilation capabilities.
Proposals are due Sept. 12. ONR anticipates making a decision about awards on or around Oct. 11.
Details of an emerging data-mining and intelligence-analysis program reminiscent of the Pentagon’s controversial Total Information Awareness (TIA) project emerged yesterday, U.S. Trade & Aid Monitor has discovered.
Similar to TIA, which Congress in 2003 de-funded insofar as domestic applications, the Insight Focused Incubator initiative seeks to create a multimedia system that obtains, synthesizes, and analyzes mass volumes of data via the development of an advanced “‘plug and play’ modular architecture” of intelligence, surveillance, and reconnaissance (ISR) technologies.
According to a Special Notice that the Monitor obtained via routine database research, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) issued a call to industry for innovative ideas leading to the creation of such a system.
The Insight program at DARPA’s Information Innovation Office (I2O) became known to the public last September, when it initially met with industry representatives to discuss its vision for the program (solicitation # DARPA-SN-10-70). However, yesterday’s reference to the Insight Focused Incubator moniker appears to take the program to the next level of execution.
“As part of the Insight platform, the Insight program is developing a virtual environment (VE) capability to enable system evaluation using simulated sensor data, augmented with real-world collected data, within a simulated world of various threats, terrains, and terrain features,” the special notice/request for information says.
The key to Insight’s development extends beyond the mere collection of data and the development of virtual threat scenarios; rather, DARPA is looking for innovative ideas for an evolutionary, interoperable system of various ISR components.
From a technical standpoint, the new system that DARPA envisions would possess the ability “to easily add, remove, substitute, and modify software and hardware components” as they become available to the government.
From an operational perspective, the Insight Focused Incubator would lead to the design of a system that integrates, correlates, fuses, and exploits “multi-intelligence data.” This would include, for example, a combination of worldwide sensors and platforms that combine the use of signals intelligence, video and ground moving target indicators (VMTI and GMTI) and even “Behavioral (pattern-of-life) modeling including cultural, social, and insurgency dynamics.”
Other objectives for the system include “data mining across all sources, both real-time and forensic” as well as the creation of “an active sensing process with multiple functions occurring simultaneously.”
DARPA anticipates launching a three-phase structure for Insight Focused Incubator, during which time it would award contracts ranging from $400,000-$800,000 per phase for each contractor selected for the project. The agency did not disclose the total potential funding for the program. Proposals are due June 30.
Assessing the "psychology of traitors" is among the numerous areas of expertise that the Pentagon's Counterintelligence Field Activity (CIFA) unit hopes to instill in its investigators and polygraph examiners. CIFA is soliciting private-sector help in jointly developing advanced training in this and other areas in the so-called "science of the psycho physiological detection of deception (PDD)," according to a planning document that The Peacock Report (TPR) recently located.
CIFA's Defense Academy of Credibility Assessment (DACA) claims that it seeks to raise the bar on its graduate-level, "human screening" training because:
The post 9/11 situation and environments have brought change to our mission. Issues associated with the Global War on Terrorism now mandate that federal polygraph examiners possess a broad knowledge that enables them to conduct all facets of investigations using credibility assessment tools. The topics encompassed by this course will prepare the federal examiner for these missions.
The Psychology of Traitors segment of the training specifically will examine "the motivation and psychological makeup of traitors." In relation to this proposed area of study, the document poses the question, "Can these personality types by predicted and isolated?"
The document, it should be noted, does not define the word "traitor."
In another recent deception-detection front, TPR on April 21 had reported that CIFA/DACA also planned to outsource an overall assessment of existing "rapid human-screening" methods. This contracting action was slated to be a two-phase project involving "a review of existing literature on techniques and technologies, as well as testing of such methods on 'human participants.'"
The U.S. government appears to be gearing up for additional nuclear-powered, space-based operations, as it is now amassing a list of potential contractors capable of providing support for such endeavors. According to a "sources sought" notice that The Peacock Report located through a routine search of the FedBizOpps database, the U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE) is conducting a market survey of firms "capable of providing specialized technical, analytical, advisory and assistance and administrative support services" to DoE's Office of Nuclear Energy. This DoE unit, also known as NE-34, is particularly interested in partnering with companies experienced in the area of "space radioisotope power systems" -- the same kind of nuclear-enabled power source that makes possible the controversial Cassini space probe's continued flight across the solar system.
The Oct. 1997 launch of the Cassini spacecraft had met fierce resistance from opponents who unsuccessfully sought to halt the launch based on their position that the ship's power system -- packed with 72.3 pounds of plutonium -- was a threat to humanity.
The Lockheed Martin Titan IV rocket carrying the craft had a track record of mishaps, including an explosion three years earlier which sent a billion-dollar U.S. spy satellite plummeting into the Pacific Ocean. Although the same class of rocket ultimately catapulted the Cassini probe into outer space without complication, critics claim that NASA had done so after recklessly gambling on the health of the world's inhabitants, all of whom potentially would have been subjected to traces of cancer-causing plutonium.
This most recent nuclear initiative seeks to cull together nationwide experts to assist in the development of new radioisotope systems as well as to provide guidance on terrestrial radioisotope power systems and space reactor power systems. DoE similarly is looking for information from firms capable of providing launch operations and project management assistance as well as nuclear safety analysis services.
DoE expects to award contracts prior to April 1, when work could feasibly commence at multiple vendor sites, according to the document:
"This effort will require travel to various DOE facilities and locations. On-site performance at selected DOE facility will be required. Day to day interaction with NE-34 is a requirement for this contract; the Contractor shall maintain its facility within 40 miles of the NE-34 Germantown [Maryland] Office."
It remains unclear whether this endeavor is related to the Bush Administration's proposal to build a colony on the Moon. That project includes tentative plans to construct a nuclear power plant there, a March 23, 2006 breaking story that TPR was the first to report via the piece New Details of U.S. Moon-Base Project Reveal Nuclear Intentions.
A TPR news brief on Hurricane Katrina-related federal genetic-research has been updated with a new link to the source planning document. Readers whom recently accessed the March 17, 2006 piece, NIH Seeks Post-Katrina Human Test Subjects for Genetic Study encountered a dead link to the government contracting database known as FedBizOpps, which under standard operating procedure routinely archives those documents and changes their links.
Readers are encouraged to write to [email protected] if they encounter such links and need assistance in finding the relocated documents. With your help, TPR can keep those links updated to the best of its ability and can better serve the public interest.