Fwd: Mining for kids: Children can’t “opt out” of Pentagon recruitment database

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Mining for kids: Children can't " opt out " of Pentagon recruitment database

 

By Kathryn Casa | Vermont Guardian

 

posted January 17, 2006

 

Parents cannot remove their children's names from a Pentagon database that

includes highly personal information used to attract military recruits, the

Vermont Guardian has learned.

 

The Pentagon has spent more than $70.5 million on market research, national

advertising, website development, and management of the Joint Advertising

Market Research and Studies (JAMRS) database — a storehouse of questionable

legality that includes the names and personal details of more than 30

million U.S. children and young people between the ages of 16 and 23.

 

The database is separate from information collected from schools that

receive federal education money. The No Child Left Behind Act requires

schools to report the names, addresses, and phone numbers of secondary

school students to recruiters, but the law also specifies that parents or

guardians may write a letter to the school asking that their children's

names not be released.

 

However, many parents have reported being surprised that their children are

contacted anyway, according to a San Francisco-based coalition called Leave

My Child Alone (LMCA).

 

" We hear from a lot of parents who have often felt quite isolated about it

all and haven't been aware that this is happening all over the country, "

said the group's spokeswoman, Felicity Crush.

 

Parents must contact the Pentagon directly to ask that their children's

information not be released to recruiters, but the data is not removed from

the JAMRS database, according to Lt. Col. Ellen Krenke, a Pentagon

spokeswoman.

 

Instead, the information is moved to a suppression file, where it is

continuously updated with new data from private and government sources and

still made available to recruiters, Krenke said. It's necessary to keep the

information in the suppression file so the Pentagon can make sure it's not

being released, she said.

 

Krenke said the database is compiled using information from state motor

vehicles departments, the Selective Service, and data-mining firms that

collect and organize information from private companies. In addition to

names, addresses, Social Security numbers, and phone numbers, the database

may include cell phone numbers, e-mail addresses, grade-point averages,

ethnicity, and subjects of interest.

 

She said the Pentagon spends about $500,000 annually to purchase the data

from private companies, and has paid more than $70 million since 2002 to

Mullen Advertising — a Massachusetts firm whose clients include General

Motors, Hooked on Phonics, XM Satellite Radio, and 3Com — to target

recruiters' messages toward teens and young adults.

 

The Boston Business Journal reported in October that the Pentagon had spent

a total of $206 million on the JAMRS program to date, and could spend

another $137 million over the next two years.

 

Invasion of privacy?

 

The JAMRS program " provides the services with contact information on

millions of prospective recruits annually … Beyond list management services,

DM outreach initiatives include targeted fulfillment pieces directed at

influencers, " according to the program's password-protected website.

 

In real terms, what that rhetoric looks like at the other end can stack up

to harassment, said Crush. " Kids have been relentlessly harassed, " she said,

" things like persistent phone calls — and you can't remove your phone

numbers from their list because it's the government; people being called on

numbers that have been listed as private, or for emergency only; kids under

17 called at home, night after night, and not being given a realistic

picture about life in the military, particularly during a time of war. "

 

Her organization contends that the Pentagon's conduct is illegal under the

federal Privacy Act, which requires notification and public comment whenever

new data is being compiled on individuals by any branch of government.

 

The Pentagon maintains it has provided that notice, posted in the Federal

Register on May 23, but LMCA and other JAMRS critics point out that because

new data is being collected daily, JAMRS is failing to fulfill the

notification requirements of the Privacy Act.

 

Last fall, 100 privacy and civil rights groups sent a letter to Defense

Secretary Donald Rumsfeld urging him to dismantle the database. " The Privacy

Act requires that agencies publish in the federal register upon

establishment or revision a notice of the existence and character of the

system of records " 30 days before the publication of information, they

noted. " The maintenance of a system of records without meeting the notice

requirements is a criminal violation of the Privacy Act. "

 

But Barry Steinhardt, director of the ACLU's Technology and Liberty Project

in New York, said protection offered by the Privacy Act — the 1974 statute

aimed at reducing the government's collection of personal data on U.S.

citizens — might be overestimated. " The federal Privacy Act is to some

extent an over-hyped statute, " said Steinhardt. " It is largely a statute

that requires notice; it doesn't give you any substantive rights. "

 

Questions from Congress

 

Vermont Sen. Patrick Leahy, D-VT, said he had grave concerns about the

legality of the database. " I think this is absolutely wrong, " he told the

Vermont Guardian. " You have the law, and then you have an administration

that says we don't like the law so let's find another way of doing it. "

 

" When my kids were in school I would have been really angry if this had

happened, " said Leahy, whose youngest son enlisted in the Marines. " I would

have been absolutely ripped if they would have gone into his high school or

other records to contact him this way; I know nothing that allows it. "

 

" Data mining and proliferation of using databases are all concerns because

it represents an administration that does not believe in checks and

balances, " said Leahy. " Can you imagine our country if a Joseph McCarthy or

J. Edgar Hoover has the electronic power these guys have today? "

 

Discomfort over the database extends to other members of Congress. Seven

senators, including New York's Hillary Rodham Clinton and Wisconsin's Russ

Feingold, both Democrats, sent a letter to Rumsfeld on June 24 asking him to

" immediately cease creation of this database. "

 

" This personal information, which would be obtained from schools as well as

from commercial data brokers, state drivers' license records, and other

sources, could then be used to formulate and execute a targeted 'marketing'

campaign to identify and recruit individuals based on these personal

factors, " they noted.

 

In his July 11 response, Undersecretary of Defense David Chu said the

database was an important component in the nation's volunteer military — one

that enables the United States to avoid a draft.

 

" The department collects basic information on youth in response to a

congressional mandate in 1982 that noted 'it is essential that the Secretary

of Defense obtain and compile directory information pertaining to students

enrolled in secondary schools throughout the United States' to support

recruiting for the all-volunteer force and avoid conscription, " he wrote to

the senators.

 

Chu said the central database was designed to save the Pentagon money. " In

the past, the data were compiled by each of the services independently. In

order to achieve significant cost savings, the data are now purchased by the

department, housed centrally, and sent out to the services. The services use

these data to provide information and marketing materials to potential

recruits. "

 

Leahy scoffed at such reasoning. " This is coming from a Pentagon that tells

us they don't have money to pay for body armor for our troops over in Iraq, "

he said.

 

Chu also said the Pentagon had no intention of using the information for

purposes other than targeted recruitment.

 

But according to the privacy group, BeNow, the direct marketing company

chosen by the Pentagon to compile the data, is owned by the credit reporting

company Equifax and does not have a privacy policy, " nor has it troubled

itself to enlist in a privacy seal program regarding the handling of

information collected for this purpose. "

 

The Pentagon proposes a wide range of " blanket routine uses " that allow an

agency to disclose personal information to others without the individual's

consent or knowledge, the groups wrote in their letter to Rumsfeld. " The

list of 14 DOD 'blanket routine uses' include: disclosures to

law-enforcement; state and local tax authorities; employment queries from

other agencies; and disclosure of records to foreign authorities. Although

individuals can opt out of recruitment solicitations, they cannot opt out of

this enormous database. "

 

In a separate statement, the Electronic Privacy Information Center said both

the Privacy Act and the DOD's own internal regulations require the agency to

collect information directly from citizens when possible.

 

" The main commercial vendors that sell students' data, American Student List

and Student Marketing Group, were both pursued recently by consumer

protection authorities for setting up front groups that tricked students

into revealing their personal information, " according to the center.

 

What to do

 

The Leave My Child Alone coalition is urging the Pentagon to add an 800

number and online opt-out links to its websites. The group concedes,

however, that given reports of massive security breaches at data firms, the

fact that the information remains on file " hardly grants parents peace of

mind. "

 

One California lawmaker is sponsoring state legislation that would require

high schools to include opt-out information on the emergency forms that

parents must fill out annually for school records. In one California school

district that implemented such a policy, the number of families choosing to

opt out went from 16 percent to 63 percent, Crush said.

 

Meanwhile, asked what parents could do about the Pentagon database, the

ACLU's Steinhardt said, " This is as much a political issue as anything else;

it's an issue to be decided in the Congress. A state like Vermont could take

it up. It's a perfect issue for a town meeting … calling on your senators to

pass some legislation. "

 

Information and action

 

Parents seeking to determine whether information about their children is

contained in the JAMRS database system should address typewritten inquiries

to:

The Department of Defense

c/o JAMRS, Direct Marketing Program Officer

Defense Human Resources Activity

4040 N. Fairfax Drive, Suite 200

Arlington, VA 22203-1613

Requests should contain the child's full name, date of birth, current

address, and telephone number. Do not include a Social Security number.

 

To ask that your child's name be added to the suppression files of the

database, send a typewritten request to:

Joint Advertising and Marketing Research

& Studies Office (JAMRS)

Attention: Opt Out

4040 North Fairfax Drive, Ste. 200

Arlington, VA 22203-1613

Include the child's full name, street address, date of birth, and telephone

number. Do not include a Social Security number.

 

For more information: www.leavemychildalone.org, www.jamrs.org/.

 

Vermont Guardian staffer Shay Totten contributed to this report.