Post by pannonia on Sept 15, 2017 14:57:11 GMT
Can someone post some examples when a data-dragnet/data-mining ever has successfully lead to the IDing of a perpetrator?
Here are some negative examples:
- German BKA and secret-service used a massive data-mining approach in the late 70s/early 80s to find members of the left-wing terrorist Baader-Meinhoff RAF Gang. Tens of thousands of man hours were invested in gathering data and cross referencing. A complete failure. Though many were apprehended thanks to old-school police work such as undercover agents and media exposure of composites, no valuable input was gained from the dragnet. Part of the terrorist group still remains at large today.
- The FBI used extensive data mining techniques to narrow the suspect database in the search for the Unabomber. Ted Kaczynski was eliminated on the basis that he was too young to fit the geographical movement profile. "Who could have known he entered Harvard when he was just 16" is a line I remember one FBI agent being quoted.
- The Terman study in the 1920s tried to identify high IQ school children in California who were though to later become the 'elite' of the nation, such as future nobel prize winners. It tested and analyzed the IQs of tens of thousands of kids and selected about 1,450 of the most gifted and followed through their life. To the disappointment of the researchers, the lifes of many of the kids selected turned out quite mediocre. The most shocking takeaway: The psychologists interviewed two kids who would later actually do win the Nobel Prize. But both were dismissed by researchers on grounds of being 'not intelligent enough' or 'lacking ambition'.