On a windy Thursday afternoon, we gathered to protest the privacy abuses of the Boston Regional Intelligence Center. It’s one of 85 fusion centers across the country, and we were joined nationally by groups in LA, Oakland, Dallas, Charlotte and DC. Cambridge City Councillor Nadeem Mazen gave a fiery speech describing the waste of resources the fusion center represents; journalist Chris Faraone described an operation of the fusion center where they digitally classified graffiti tags and enabled the arrest of graffiti artists (way to go, strike a blow for freedom!).
We presented a FOIA request to the Boston Fusion Center, but neither the Privacy Officer nor any BRIC representative would descend to communicate with us mortals. It appears that they were far too busy with vitally important meetings all day trying to prevent the next terrorist attack on the Boston Marathon, to meet with members of the public concerned about privacy.