Security bill loses ID card, TIPS

House Majority Leader Dick Armey, in his markup of legislation to create a Homeland Security Department, yesterday rejected a national identification card and scrapped a program that would use volunteers in domestic surveillance.

Mr. Armey, chairman of the House Select Committee on Homeland Security, included language in his markup of the legislation to prohibit the Justice Department from initiating the Terrorism Information and Prevention System, also called Operation TIPS.

Mr. Armey's bill also would create a "privacy officer" in the Homeland Security Department, which he said was the first ever established by law in a Cabinet agency. Mr. Armey said this person would "ensure technology research and new regulations from the department respect the civil liberties our citizens enjoy."

[from Privacy Digest]