"Special Population Cognizant" guidelines

To Whom It May Concern:

This is a request under the Freedom of Information Act. I hereby request the following records:

Guidelines and training manuals regarding the use of the FBI's "Special Population Cognizant" repositories.

SPC databases are acknowledged in previously-released documents pertaining to FBI's NGI system. [1][2]

I also request that, if appropriate, fees be waived as I believe this request is in the public interest. The requested documents will be made available to the general public free of charge as part of the public information service at MuckRock.com, processed by a representative of the news media/press and is made in the process of news gathering and not for commercial usage.

In the event that fees cannot be waived, I would be grateful if you would inform me of the total charges in advance of fulfilling my request. I would prefer the request filled electronically, by e-mail attachment if available or CD-ROM if not.

Thank you in advance for your anticipated cooperation in this matter. I look forward to receiving your response to this request within 20 business days, as the statute requires.

Sincerely,

Joshua Kopstein

[1]https://www.fbibiospecs.org/docs/EBTSv8.0_APBcomment_draft_20070306.pdf

[2]https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/fbi-plans-have-52-million-photos-its-ngi-face-recognition-database-next-year

To Whom It May Concern,

I am appealing the FBI's response to this FOIA request for "Guidelines and training manuals regarding the use of the FBI's 'Special Population Cognizant' repositories."

"Special Population Cognizant" (SPC) files and repositories are referenced in several publicly available Bureau documents. For example, a 2006 CJIS document on "ELECTRONIC BIOMETRIC TRANSMISSION SPECIFICATION (EBTS)"[1] describes SPC repositories as consisting of ten-print and latent images shared with other federal agencies, stating: "To provide the framework for multimodal biometric searches in the future, these files are now referred to as Special Population Cognizant Files, which reflects the nature of the subjects they contain."

It follows that the "special" nature of the subjects added to these repositories is taken into account, and therefore there must be guidelines, training manuals or internal policy documents specifying the criteria for individuals to be added to a SPC repository.

I understand that national security exemptions may prevent the release of documents that fit the parameters of this request. Should any document be withheld in full, I ask that you list the number of pages withheld and cite the specific statute preventing release. Similarly, I would ask that any redactions be clearly marked and notated in each instance with the relevant statute exempting disclosure.

Thank you,

Joshua Kopstein

[1] https://www.fbibiospecs.org/docs/EBTSv8.0_APBcomment_draft_20070306.pdf
[2] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/fbi-plans-have-52-million-photos-its-ngi-face-recognition-database-next-year

To Whom It May Concern,

I wanted to follow up as I have not received a response to my September 11, 2014 appeal on my FOIA request, originally filed July 28, 2014, requesting the following documents:

Guidelines, training manuals and policy documents regarding the use of the FBI's 'Special Population Cognizant' repositories.

"Special Population Cognizant" (SPC) files and repositories are referenced in several publicly available Bureau documents. For example, a 2006 CJIS document on "ELECTRONIC BIOMETRIC TRANSMISSION SPECIFICATION (EBTS)"[1] describes SPC repositories as consisting of ten-print and latent images shared with other federal agencies, stating: "To provide the framework for multimodal biometric searches in the future, these files are now referred to as Special Population Cognizant Files, which reflects the nature of the subjects they contain."

It follows that the "special" nature of the subjects added to these repositories is taken into account, and therefore there must be guidelines, training manuals or internal policy documents specifying the criteria for individuals to be added to a SPC repository.

I understand that national security exemptions may prevent the release of documents that fit the parameters of this request. Should any document be withheld in full, I ask that you list the number of pages withheld and cite the specific statute preventing release. Similarly, I would ask that any redactions be clearly marked and notated in each instance with the relevant statute exempting disclosure.

Thank you,

Joshua Kopstein

[1] https://www.fbibiospecs.org/docs/EBTSv8.0_APBcomment_draft_20070306.pdf
[2] https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2014/04/fbi-plans-have-52-million-photos-its-ngi-face-recognition-database-next-year