NSA Hands out Cookies

Weren't we always told not to take things from strangers? What if strangers slipped candies into our pockets and we later ate them? Well, The National Security Agency sorta did just that the AP reports. Apparently, the NSA website has been sticking cookies which don't expire until 2035 [three years before Google's cookie expires!] on the harddrives of visitors of their website.

In a 2003 memorandum, the Office of Management and Budget at the White House prohibited federal agencies from using persistent cookies - those that are not automatically deleted right away - unless there is a "compelling need."

A senior official must sign off on any such use, and an agency that uses them must disclose and detail their use in its privacy policy.

Peter Swire, a Clinton administration official who had drafted an earlier version of the cookie guidelines, said that clear notice was a must, and that "vague assertions of national security, such as exist in the N.S.A. policy, are not sufficient."

Daniel Brandt, a privacy activist who discovered the N.S.A. cookies, said mistakes happen, "but in any case, it's illegal."

Now, I await the war on Daniel Brandt, aka the Cookie Monster.