Personal data should be vigorously protected, but police need access to the information that can help them solve and stop crimes.
That was the central theme in U.S. Sen. Bob Corker’s keynote address at the opening ceremony of the Regional Organized Crime Information Center’s 24th annual Homicide Conference at the Chattanooga Convention Center on Monday morning.
Citing his recent conversations with China’s President Xi Jinping and Apple CEO Tim Cook, Corker told a room of more than 400 law enforcement officers from 14 states that they are “his heroes” while speaking to them on cyberattacks and intellectual theft.
“That whole issue, to me, has got to resolve itself in a way that allows you to do your job,” Corker said. “As the world changes, more and more people are using electronic information and relying upon that.”
The chairman of the Senate’s Committee on Foreign Relations, Corker is an advocate of the National Security Agency and an outspoken critic of the agency’s former contractor Edward Snowden, who came to fame for publicizing proprietary information about the NSA that caused Americans to question government mass- surveillance techniques.
Corker cited the recent cybertheft of information from more than 21 million former and current government employees from the Office of Personnel Management, which came to light this summer as a national instance of the challenges police may be dealing with on a local level.
“Many of you have been involved in the military, many of you have been involved in intelligence in the past, and all of you know that’s just what governments do to each other, right?,” Corker said. “I could go further, but I won’t in this setting.
“But the fact is, what matters most is what’s happening at the individual level. That’s absolute theft. You can steal people’s personal property. Ya’ll are dealing with it at all kinds of levels, and more and more [frequently].”
Corker cited recently implemented laws that allow the wiretapping of human trafficking suspects as a step in the right direction for law enforcement.
The homicide conference continues today and Wednesday, with local, state and federal law enforcement personnel in town from as far away as Texas and Maryland for training and networking. Chattanooga last hosted the event in 2011.
Training topics include interview techniques, DNA and forensic evidence, managing challenging suspects, threat assessments, domestic extremists and violence with the mentally ill.
Only the opening ceremony, which also featured a speech from U.S. Rep Chuck Fleischmann, was open to media.
“We are a great nation, we are a great people,” Fleischmann said, “and we need you all to do the job that you continue to do to keep us safe.”
Chattanooga Mayor Andy Berke, Hamilton County Mayor Jim Coppinger and Hamilton County Sheriff Jim Hammond also were on hand to welcome attendees to Chattanooga.
“My only request,” Hammond joked, “is that you please stay out of my jail while you’re here.”
Contact staff writer David Cobb at dcobb@timesfreepress.com or 423-757-6249.