DPS plans to spend millions in taxpayer dollars on a controversial software, used first as part of Governor Abbott’s border crackdown, to “disrupt potential domestic terrorism.”

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.world/post/19105714

In June, the Texas Department of Public Safety (DPS) signed an acquisition plan for a 5-year, nearly $5.3 million contract for a controversial surveillance tool called Tangles from tech firm PenLink, according to records obtained by the Texas Observer through a public information request. The deal is nearly twice as large as the company’s $2.7 million two-year contract with the federal Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

Tangles is an artificial intelligence-powered web platform that scrapes information from the open, deep, and dark web. Tangles’ premier add-on feature, WebLoc, is controversial among digital privacy advocates. Any client who purchases access to WebLoc can track different mobile devices’ movements in a specific, virtual area selected by the user, through a capability called “geofencing.” Users of software like Tangles can do this without a search warrant or subpoena. (In a high-profile ruling, the Fifth Circuit recently held that police cannot compel companies like Google to hand over data obtained through geofencing.) Device-tracking services rely on location pings and other personal data pulled from smartphones, usually via in-app advertisers. Surveillance tech companies then buy this information from data brokers and sell access to it as part of their products.

WebLoc can even be used to access a device’s mobile ad ID, a string of numbers and letters that acts as a unique identifier for mobile devices in the ad marketing ecosystem, according to a US Office of Naval Intelligence procurement notice.

Wolfie Christl, a public interest researcher and digital rights activist based in Vienna, Austria, argues that data collected for a specific purpose, such as navigation or dating apps, should not be used by different parties for unrelated reasons. “It’s a disaster,” Christl told the Observer. “It’s the largest possible imaginable decontextualization of data. … This cannot be how our future digital society looks like.”

Archived at https://web.archive.org/web/20240827115133/https://www.texasobserver.org/texas-dps-surveillance-tangle-cobwebs/

  • @[email protected]
    23•4 months ago

    Don’t worry, Ken Paxton has promised to wield these authoritarian powers “responsibly.”

    /s

  • @[email protected]
    12•4 months ago

    Aw cool, the little tracking device I carry around in my purse everywhere I go just got more features.

    As a trans Texan I can’t help but wonder when the ads on my phone will be used to track me down.

    • Zombie-Mantis
      3•4 months ago

      They just recently changed a rule so that if anyone in the state requests a change of gender for their ID they’ll be rejected and have their name put on a list.

      Here’s a Texas Tribune article on the matter.

  • @BrianTheeBiscuiteer
    10•4 months ago

    In its acquisition plan, DPS states that Intelligence and Counterterrorism division personnel need the tool to “identify and disrupt potential domestic terrorism and other mass casualty threats.”

    I predict this won’t stop the next mass shooting and Abbott is too much of a windbag to not brag about it. Also “domestic terrorism” is absolutely code for socialist, communist, or anti-Zionist.

    • @RestrictedAccount
      3•4 months ago

      As of yesterday, it seems he’s political enemies are the terrorists he is targeting.

    • Zombie-Mantis
      3•4 months ago

      Don’t forget those “groomers” who are “indoctrinating” our children into “gender ideology,” also known as “Queer people freely existing in public, safe from violent discrimination.”