How VoiceGrid works (SpeechPro-USA)

In case Orwellian surveillance systems like TrapWire weren't creepy enough, we learn today that SpeechPro, a Russian-owned company, has helpfully invented a voice identification tool for law enforcement use called VoiceGrid Nation. American authorities are looking into using the software at 911 call centers and in police precincts. As Slate reports, it's already in place and working out pretty well in some other countries:

The technology has already been deployed across Mexico, where it is being used by law enforcement to collect, store, and search hundreds of thousands of voice-prints. Alexey Khitrov, SpeechPro’s president, told me the company is working with a number of agencies in the United States at a state and federal level. He declined to reveal any names because of nondisclosure and confidentiality agreements. But Khitrov did divulge that various versions of the company’s biometric technology are used in more than 70 countries and that the Americas, Europe, and Asia are its key markets. Not all of its customers are law enforcement agencies, either. SpeechPro also designs voice recognition technology that can be used in call centers to verify the identities of customers. Depending on the size and specifics of the installation, it can cost from tens of thousands up to millions of dollars.

Slate notes that this software is different from the FBI's own efforts at putting wholesale biometric programs in place, though no less scary.

Mr. Khitrov told Slate that SpeechPro is being used for "noble causes." His example of one such noble cause was when the technology helped Mexican authorities track down kidnappers via recorded ransom calls.

A look at SpeechPro’s site reveals a product description or two that privacy activists might find pretty creepy. The blurb for VoiceGrid ID has a particularly dystopic echo, offering a "voice data management solution with unlimited database size" in addition to system architecture that scale all the way up to "national system deployments."

We look forward to a future when products like these have turned the frivolous distractions of texting and iMessaging into acts of civil disobedience.

Tartan Metrics (Screen grab)

Russian news outlet RT.com has been excitedly suggesting that the TrapWire surveillance system marks the advent of an American police state. Now RT is suggesting a fairly direct connection between the shady ex-CIA types behind TrapWire and something called Tartan Metrics.

Tartan certainly uses dense doublespeak to describe itself, stating on its site landing page that it "quantifies key influencers and hidden connections in social networks using mathematical algorithms" for "un-biased output." RT doesn't note that Tartan is so secretive those interested in its services can try them for free over the web, but maybe they have more important information to impart--Tartan expressly mentions using its software and services to analyze Occupy Wall Street and related movements:

Tartan is advertised on their site as a must-have application for the national security sector, politicians and federal law enforcement, and makes a case by claiming that “an amorphous network of anarchist and protest groups,” made up of Occupy Oakland, PBS, Citizen Radio, Crimethinc and others, relies on “influential leaders,” “modern technology” and “illegal tactics” to spread a message of anarchy across America.

“The organizers of Occupy Wall Street and Occupy DC have built Occupy networks through online communication with anarchists actively participating in the movements’ founding,” the executive summary reads. On the chart that accompanies their claim, the group lists several political activism groups and broadcast networks within a ring of alleged anarchy, which also includes an unnamed FBI informant.

RT also reports a Margaret A. Lee registered TrapWire Inc. with the Virginia Commonwealth's State Corporation Commission in March of 2009. Margaret A. Lee appears to also be on the board of Ntrepid Corporation, which produces Tartan.

Simply stated: Ntrepid links TrapWire and Tartan, and the latter may be actively investigating the Occupy movement.

While there are clear documented links between these shadowy outfits, it's hard to separate fact from frenzied theorizing and assumptions made from tenuous links.

So for now just know basically that someone may always watching and analyzing whatever you do online and in public. That's creepy enough.