TAXPAYER GROUP BLASTS WHITE HOUSE FOR PRIVACY VIOLATIONS | Citizens Against Government Waste

TAXPAYER GROUP BLASTS WHITE HOUSE FOR PRIVACY VIOLATIONS

Press Release

For Immediate ReleaseContact: Sean Rushton or Aaron Taylor
September 13, 2000(202) 467-5300

 

Washington, DC – In conjunction with Thursday’s White House Conference on Privacy, Thomas Schatz, President of Citizens Against Government Waste (CAGW), on Wednesday issued the following statement:

“Though the ‘era of big government’ is supposedly over according to the Clinton-Gore Administration, what is not over is the era of big government invading your privacy.  In this White House, the new position of Chief Technology Officer could be filled by none other than George Orwell.  The following list makes it clear that big-government snooping is alive and well.”

CAGW’s Top Ten Government

Violations of Privacy

10. The Clinton Administration’s wholesale rifling for political purposes of over 900 FBI files detailing personal information of private citizens.

9. Agents of the Internal Revenue Service illegally searching through the tax records of private citizens without official justification.

8. Unceasing attempts by the Clinton-Gore Administration to obtain and keep every American’s personal medical information in a government database, first as part of the failed 1994 Clinton Health Care plan and more recently with the Clinton-Gore Administration collecting intrusive personally identifiable data on all home health care patients.

7. The U.S. Department of Transportation attempting to make drivers licenses into national ID card by requiring that all states issue new drivers' licenses that use the driver’s social security number.

6. The proposal by some governors and local officials to track every sale made on the Internet to assess taxes.

5. The Clinton-Gore Administration’s attempt to impose the infamous “Know Your Customer” regulations that would require banks to collect personal information about their customers and to

track so-called "unusual" activity.

4. Government World Wide Web sites collecting information on visitors to their sites without disclosing how that information is being used.

3. The Clinton-Gore Office of the “Drug Czar” allowing outside parties to place “cookies” on visitors’ computers and tracking people who visited their site without the visitors’ knowledge.

2. The Clinton-Gore Administration for years opposing efforts to lift the restrictions on the sale of encryption software that allows secure computer communication while Gore spearheaded the effort to require the installation of the infamous "Clipper Chip" in all computers that would allow the government to read encrypted material.

1. The “Carnivore” system which allows the Department of Justice to monitor emails.

CAGW is a nonpartisan, nonprofit, organization dedicated to eliminating waste, fraud, mismanagement and abuse in governmet.