The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is planning to upgrade and expand its criminal justice database, the National Crime Information Center (NCIC) database. The FBI, together with a Congressional subcommittee headed by Don Edwards (D-California), maintain that the present NCIC database is vulnerable and has an unacceptably high error rate.
As we’ll see in later chapters, computer database errors are widespread and problematic. That the United States’ premier law enforcement agency even acknowledges that it has an error rate that it considers unacceptable is alarming.
In pursuit of upgrading and expanding the NCIC system, the FBI awarded a multimillion-dollar contract to McLean, Virginia-based Mitre Corp. The contractor was engaged to design a new system that would allow “in-depth statistical analysis, rule-based search algorithms, increased data integrity, and detection of system abuses,” according to the FBI.
Congress, the Computer Professionals for Social Responsibility (CPSR), and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) all voiced concern over the proposed system.
ACLU representatives claim that the FBI originally wanted to link the NCIC database with other national databases. This interconnection of information systems was cut from the new proposal for cost reasons, not because the FBI was concerned about civil liberties, said the ACLU.
In addition, the ACLU and CPSR are concerned about two file sections within the present NCIC database that contain no public information. The concern arises because there is no way to verify the accuracy of the suspicions that comprise the information stored there.
