American diplomats were activelyinstructed to seek out detailed biometric information on politicians,bureaucrats and fellow bureaucrats from other countries and globalorganizations.
That's the news according to the latest trove ofdiplomatic cables released to the public by WikiLeaks. Among others,American diplomats attempted to get biometric and other sensitiveidentifying information from leading figures at the United Nations,and countries such as SouthAfrica, the Sudan, Senegal, North Korea, China, Cuba, Egypt, India, Indonesia,Malaysia, and Syria.
The kind of information the StateDepartment was looking for is a marketer's dream. One cable,apparently from Hilary Clinton to embassies inthe Democratic Republic of the Congo, Burundi, Uganda and Tanzania,Clintonaskedfor the followingof“persons related to the African GreatLakes”:
Biographic and biometric data,including health, opinions toward the US, training history,ethnicity (tribal and/or clan), and language skills of key andemerging political, military, intelligence, opposition, ethnic,religious, and business leaders. Data should include email addresses,telephone and fax numbers,fingerprints, facial images, DNA, and iris scans.
That's not the only data thatAmerican embassies were busy trying to dig up. Clinton's wirerequests that diplomatic officers obtain credit card numbers, workschedules and frequent flyer account numbers of persons of interestin addition to business cards, phone numbers, jobtitles and email addresses.
Similar biometric and deep-informationdata gathering was also happening in the Palestinian Authority.Diplomats throughout the Middle Eastwereinstructed tocollect similar information on Fatah and Hamasofficials, including the same biometric data, credit card numbers andfrequent flyer numbers—but with more specific wording than theAfrican cable. The exact wording used by the State Department was“biographical, financial and biometric information on key PA andHamas leaders and representatives, to include the young guard insideGaza, the West Bank and outside.” Diplomats were alsoasked toobtain “details of travel plans such as routes and vehicles used byPalestinian Authority leaders and Hamas members.”
While it is hard to imagine a scenario in which United States diplomats getretinal scans of African and Middle East politicians, some biometricidentifiers are much easier for the State Department to get theirhands on. Fingerprints, DNA and signatures all fall under thebiometric identifier rubric and are all easily obtainable.
Clues to how the State Department obtained biometric data can be found in the Pentagon's recent embrace of biometric identification in Iraqand Afghanistan. The Iraqi government, under the supervision of theAmerican occupation,hascollected fingerprints and retinal scans of nearly every member ofthe Iraqi military, police and prison service--along with everyprisoner and registered gun owner in Iraq for good measure.
Privacygroups feared that the massive cache of identifying materialsconstituted a“hitlist”that was at easy risk of being obtained by terroriststhrough hacking or other unsavory methods.
A biometric database in Iraq was createdout of fingerprints found on enemy weapons and bombs. InAfghanistan, the current government is undertaking a product underAmerican supervision tocreatebiometric identification cards for the entire adult populationusing technology from American firms. The U.S. military currently has biometric information on 800,000 Afghans, whilethe Afghan government's database contains just250,000 records.
Afghan politicians are hopeful that theidentification card can someday be used for banking as well as voterand vehicle registration. Afghanistancurrentlyhas a literary rate of 28.1%and only 12.6% of Afghan women canread.
But the million dollar question remains:how will the U.S. government use biometric information on foreignleaders?
{Photo by Petty Officer 1st ClassChad J. McNeeley}
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