no matter what the facts are DHS equals terrorism in the public mind. Also will any one explain to me how paying off a large balance is a fraud warning? djf
-------- Original Message -------- Subject: Re: [IP] We all have to sacrifice, in the War on Terriers Date: Thu, 02 Mar 2006 20:59:04 -0500 From: Seth Finkelstein <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> To: Dave Farber <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> CC: [email protected], Randall <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> References: <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> > What got him so upset might seem trivial to some people who have learned > to accept small infringements on their freedom as just part of the way > things are in this age of terror-fed paranoia. It's that "everything > changed after 9/11" thing. > > But not Walter. > > They were told, as they moved up the managerial ladder at the call > center, that the amount they had sent in was much larger than their > normal monthly payment. And if the increase hits a certain percentage > higher than that normal payment, Homeland Security has to be notified. > And the money doesn't move until the threat alert is lifted. Let's stop right here, and engage critical facilities. We have a journalist's *paraphrase* of a *second-hand account* of an *unsourced* legal interpretation. I think some skepticism is warranted. Note how the sentence structure implies to the casual reader that Homeland Security must lift the flag, and it's terrorism-related, without actually saying that ("the money doesn't move until the threat alert is lifted"). The reader isn't told that the Homeland Security Department is in charge of credit-card fraud as a function completely apart from terrorism, a fact that was not difficult to find: http://www.dhs.gov/dhspublic/display?theme=79&content=271 Threats & Protection Financial Crimes Credit Card Fraud/Identity Theft "The Secret Service is the primary federal agency tasked with investigating access device fraud and its related activities under Title 18, United States Code, Section 1029." I suggest a far more *likely* series of events is as follows: 1) Sending in payment far in excess of the normal monthly payment will raise a fraud flag, purely as the private, free-market, choice of the credit-card business. 2) Potential fraud is also reported the authorities, perhaps as a matter of law. But I would be very surprised if they make the final call on releasing the money. I suspect these two facts got garbled together, and then throw in "terror-fed paranoia" (in another sense), and we're off knee-jerking about boiling frogs and Orwelling and wolf, wolf, wolf. Would it be asking too much to have some facts before debating how much the US has fallen into a Police State here? -- Seth Finkelstein Consulting Programmer http://sethf.com Infothought blog - http://sethf.com/infothought/blog/ Interview: http://sethf.com/essays/major/greplaw-interview.php ------------------------------------- You are subscribed as [email protected] To manage your subscription, go to http://v2.listbox.com/member/?listname=ip Archives at: http://www.interesting-people.org/archives/interesting-people/
