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DNA Blueprints Guide The Construction Of Specific Human Structures
Chad Mirkin discusses using DNA to build a three-dimensional structure out of gold, likening the process to building a house. Starting with basic materials such as bricks, wood, siding, stone and shingles, a construction team can build many different types of houses out of the same building blocks.
The article includes an audio recording of the full interview. Photo courtesy of the UCSD School of Medicine.
| TSPR Confirms NSA Data Collection |
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| Government - The States | |||
| TS-Si News Service | |||
| Thursday, 08 June 2006 11:14 | |||
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Broad-based NSA Surveillance Reveals Cultural Connections Of LGBT Citizens
 Washington, D.C., USA. The TS Policy Review (TSPR) has learned that the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) organizes data collected from its surveillance activities to reveal the civic and cultural associations of its targets, including the Lesbian Gay Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) community.
Knowledgeable sources close to the agency tell TSPR that such associations are included in the target profile for each individual put under surveillance and, when obtainable, includes their sexual orientation, their participation in LGBT civic activities, and their associates.
Confirmed to TSPR by three separate sources with direct knowledge of the program, experts believe the data analysis is a direct outgrowth of NSA's changing role within the intelligence community and pressure from Bush administration officials for more detailed reports on NSA's data, analysis processes and outcomes. The NSA declined to confirm details of this story prior to publication.
The NSA approach resembles "six degrees of separation", a theory that anyone on earth is connected to any other person through an acquaintance chain with no more than five intermediaries. Since the number of acquaintances grows exponentially with the number of links, only a small number of links is required before a becomes the entire population of humans on our planet.
Previously acknowledged Government practices involve the identification of a prime target, examining that individual's associates, the associates of the second individual, and so forth.
Understanding the connections that might exist involves building profiles for each individual and mapping their common interests. It could be a hobby, but it might be whether an one or individuals in a chain of acquaintanceship is a member of the GLBT community.
There are no confirmed reports of the White House initiating the investigation of a particular GLBT individual. In certain cases, sources said, administration officials have requested reports on people and patterns already in the databases maintained by the Department of Defense, NSA and other agencies. Since the profiles were originally set up to include sexual orientation and participation in LGBT civic activities, it is considered a simple matter to run queries that include LGBT affiliation.
The NSA's responsibilities are based on Executive Order 12333 (4 December 1981), executed by President Reagan. The order covers the responsibilities of the NSA and its Central Security Service (NSA/CSS).
The original Executive Order assumed the NSA/CSS were organized for two national missions: (1) Information Assurance for U.S. national security infrastructures, and (2) foreign signals intelligence (SIGINT) for the collection and processing of foreign intelligence.
Originally, the NSA adhered to standards established by the Director of Central Intelligence (advised by the National Foreign Intelligence Board). However, congressional reorganization and executive policies have led to some confusion over NSA's activities.
 The Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN) announced on June 6 that the NSA stated it will "neither confirm nor deny the existence or non-existence" of information that may have been obtained through agency surveillance of the LGBT community.The NSA sent the letter to counsel for the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network (SLDN), who had sought the information through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request.
 William B. Black, Jr., NSA's Deputy Director, said in a letter that "any substantive response to [the original] request would tend to confirm or deny specific activities."The NSA letter, and other materials related to SLDN's FOIA request and lawsuit, including a press release, are available online at www.sldn.org. The SLDN has not indicated whether it will appeal the NSA's response.
The Secretary of the U.S. Department of Defense (DoD), Donald Rumsfeld, had previously spoken for his agency by saying DoD surveillance is "no big deal." The DoD admitted in January 2006 it had "inappropriately" conducted surveillance at several universities on student protestors. The Pentagon will release additional surveillance materials (so-called government TALON reports) at a later date. Copyright © Transsexual Symposium, Inc. (TS-Si) All rights reserved. TS-Si content is licensed to the public under provisions of a Creative Commons license for Open Source publishing, described in the TS Policy Review (TSPR) FAQs. Please direct all email inquiries to the
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or call 703-644-2545.
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| Last Updated on Monday, 27 August 2007 16:16 |
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