Taliban may misuse U.s.-built databases

Data may have been used to ID, intimidate Afghans who aided U.S.

BOSTON — Over two decades, the U.S. and allies spent hundreds of millions of dollars building databases for the Afghan people. The stated goal: promote law and order and government accountability and modernize a war-ravaged land.

But in the Taliban’s lightning seizure of power, most of that digital apparatus — including biometrics for verifying identities — apparently fell into Taliban hands. Built with few data-protection safeguards, it risks becoming the high-tech jackboots of a surveillance state. As the Taliban get their governing feet, there is fear it will be used for social control and to punish perceived foes.

Putting such data to work constructively — boosting education, empowering women, battling corruption — requires democratic stability, and these systems were not made for the prospect of defeat.

“It is a terrible irony,” said Frank Pasquale, Brooklyn Law School scholar of surveillance technologies. “It’s a real object lesson in ‘The road to hell is paved with good intentions.’”

Since Kabul fell Aug. 15, indications have emerged that government data may have been used in Taliban efforts to identify and intimidate Afghans who worked with the U.S. forces.

People are getting ominous and threatening calls, texts and Whatsapp messages, said Neesha Suarez, constituent services director for Rep. Seth Moulton, D-mass., an Iraq War vet whose office is trying to help stranded Afghans who worked with the U.S. find a way out.

A 27-year-old U.S. contractor in Kabul told The Associated Press he and co-workers who developed a U.s.-funded database used to manage army and police payrolls got phone calls summoning them to the Defense Ministry. He is in hiding, changing his location daily, he said, asking not to be identified for his safety.

In victory, the Taliban’s leaders say they are not interested in retribution. Restoring global aid and getting foreign-held assets unfrozen are a priority. There are few signs of the draconian restrictions — especially on women — they imposed when they ruled from 1996 to 2001. There are also no indications Afghans who worked with Americans have been systematically persecuted.

Ali Karimi, a University of Pennsylvania scholar, is among Afghans unready to trust the Taliban. He fears the databases will give rigid fundamentalist theocrats, known for killing enemy collaborators, “the same capability as an average U.S. government agency when it comes to surveillance and interception.”

RAHMAT GUL/AP In June, an employee scans the eyes of a woman for biometric data needed to apply for a passport at the passport office in Kabul, Afghanistan.