Friday, January 14, 2005

FBI Rejects Its New Case File Software


By Jonathan Krim
Washington Post Staff Writer


The FBI said yesterday that a nearly $170 million computer system intended to help agents share data about terrorist threats and other criminal cases is seriously deficient and will be largely abandoned before it is launched.

The software, known as Virtual Case File, was supposed to provide a modern database for storing and indexing all case information and entries by agents, enabling them to share files electronically and search easily for links between cases that might not otherwise seem connected.

FBI Director Robert S. Mueller III, right, conferred with Sept. 11 panelist Jamie S. Gorelick last year. "There were problems we did not anticipate," he said about the new computer software yesterday.

Such capability might have enabled agents to more closely link men who later turned out to be involved in the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, according to intelligence reviews conducted after the terrorist strikes.


If they had just listened to Coleen Rowley they could have prevented the attacks.

From Government Computer News: Draft report suggests end for FBI’s case management app

No comments: