Battle Over Data Mining Bush administration officials are opposing an effort in Congress under the Patriot Act to force the government to disclose its use of data-mining techniques in tracking suspects in terrorism cases.

But according to a 2004 General Accounting Office report, the Bush administration and the Pentagon continued to rely heavily on data-mining techniques.

Such "community of interest" record gathering is part of a data-mining technique intelligence officials call link analysis, believed to have been used by other intelligence agencies such as the National Security Agency.

If everybody's medical records were put into what Dr. Strangelove called "a chigentic gomplex of gombuters," wouldn't it be possible to use data-mining techniques to tease out patterns that would add immeasurably to the health of the public?

He has asserted that the Able Danger unit, whose work relied on computer-driven data-mining techniques, sought to call their superiors' attention to Mr. Atta and three other future hijackers in the summer of 2000.

DATA mining is becoming more sophisticated in government, politics and many industries, says Stephen Brobst, chief technology officer of the Teradata division of the NCR Corporation and an expert on data-mining techniques.

Bush administration officials are opposing an effort in Congress under the antiterrorism law known as the USA Patriot Act to force the government to disclose its use of data-mining techniques in tracking suspects in terrorism cases.

Rick's suggestion that computerizing our health records might allow us to "use data-mining techniques to tease out patterns that would add immeasurably to the health of the public" is not that far-fetched.

Still, he said, the Police Department's analysts also review foreign newspapers and Web sites, and have begun using sophisticated data-mining techniques to gather information and monitor groups.

Last month Farecast.com, which predicts domestic ticket prices for air travelers, introduced Farecast Deals, a service that uses the site's stock of historical airfare prices and sophisticated data-mining techniques to find bargains it says are "based on science, not marketing."