Colorado counterterrorism officials used the 9/11 anniversary to launch an Internet system that lets ordinary people electronically report “suspicious activity” – ferreting out possible terrorist bombers or plotters in their midst.
“One person can make a difference in thwarting terrorism,” State Patrol Chief Mark Tostel said Monday in unveiling the system.
Civil-liberties leaders immediately denounced the move as deeply destructive.
The system lets anybody with Internet access send a report and photos (via www.ciac.co.gov) documenting anything that strikes them as suspicious.
Officials said suspicious activity may include “unusual requests for information,” “unusual interest in high-risk or symbolic targets,” “unusual purchases or thefts,” “suspicious or unattended packages,” “suspicious persons who appear out of place” or people acquiring weapons, uniforms or fraudulent identification.
A report sent through the system would ping the e-mail of a law enforcement staffer at an intelligence relay station, the Colorado Information Analysis Center, located in Centennial in a secure building looped into federal computer networks.
Multi-agency teams in this “fusion” center, with access to classified data, then would review the report, perhaps running license-plate or other personal- data checks, and could notify the FBI.
About 300 tips about possible terrorism-related activity in Colorado, fielded at the center over the past 18 months, were deemed significant enough to forward to the FBI, state officials said. The new electronic system is designed to increase the flow of information that could be used to stop terrorism.
It’s unclear what happens to names, locations and other information sent to the FBI. Everybody who sends in a tip will get a response, officials said.
Coloradans could abuse the system “to undermine their neighbors or their enemies,” said State Patrol Sgt. Jack Cowart, a former Air Force intelligence officer who manages the center. But that risk already exists with the rise of phone-oriented systems that let Coloradans report “road rage” and crime, Cowart said.
“This is just one more. … We need information from the public to keep the public safe,” Cowart said.
A counterterrorism telephone hotline (720-852-6705) already draws up to 20 tips a week to the fusion center. Surveillance crews sometimes contact police dispatchers, who can send officers to check out people or places, said State Patrol Capt. Brenda Leffler, commander at the center.
“I hate it,” said Cathryn Hazouri, executive director of the American Civil Liberties Union in Colorado. “This is encouraging people to spy on one another.”
It moves modern America in the direction of communist societies of the Soviet Union and China, “where people were encouraged to turn in their family members, or their neighbors, if they believed those people were not toeing the government line,” Hazouri said.
“Be careful. Be aware that you could ruin people’s reputations, ruin their ability to go on an airplane,” Hazouri said. “There are so many things that grow out of this kind of program.
“It’s almost as though they are trying to tell people that they need to be afraid. Very afraid. Afraid of people they know, and especially of people they don’t know.”
