WASHINGTON, Nov. 17 (UPI) -- The U.S. Department of Homeland Security's inspector general will probe a new data-mining program the agency is developing.
The probe into the department's $40 million Analysis, Dissemination, Visualization, Insight and Semantic Enhancement, or ADVISE, program was one of the investigations the inspector general promised in his annual plan this week.
ADVISE, the brain child of the department's science and technology division, is "designed to extract relationships and correlations from large amounts of data to produce actionable intelligence on terrorists," says the inspector general's report. "A prototype is currently available to analysts in (homeland security's) Intelligence and Analysis (division) using departmental and other data, including some on U.S. citizens," it adds.
The 94-page report also says the inspector general will examine the department's multi-billion dollar plan for a "virtual border" using cameras, sensors and UAVs; its commitment to hire thousands of new border patrol agents; the Federal Emergency Management Agency's disaster housing program of cash help for home repairs and temporary accommodation; and a series of information sharing initiatives.
