The BlackBerry Backroom: PIN-to-PIN allows officials to communicate in secret with essentially no paper trail
by Michael C. Bender | September 16th, 2009This story appeared Wednesday on page 1A of the Sept. 16 Palm Beach Post.
A unique, eight-character code buried inside every BlackBerry device is at the center of the latest intersection of technology and politics in Florida.
State lawmakers hand these codes, known as a personal identification numbers, or PINs, to lobbyists so they can exchange messages during hearings. Gov. Charlie Crist’s staff regularly trades PIN messages to stay in touch.
“It’s a faster form of communication,” Florida House Majority Leader Adam Hasner, R-Boca Raton, said of the messages that for years have fallen outside of the state’s public records laws.
Hasner has traded PIN messages from the House floor with lobbyists. He said the messages are usually brief and meaningless: “Need to talk” or “Where can I find you?”
“The idea that things are intentionally being done in secret is overblown,” said Hasner, a devoted BlackBerry user who has an old, worn-out model mounted in his Capitol office. “But I think the issue is worthy of further conversation and potentially addressing it with new policies.”
On Tuesday - just days after Florida Power & Light Co.’s $1.3 billion rate hearing was nearly derailed when state regulators discovered their staff exchanging PIN messages with FPL officials - Attorney General Bill McCollum said the state should seal the cracks in its open government laws.
Tags: Add new tag, Bill McCollum, Blackberry, Florida Power & Light, FPL, PIN, PSC, Public Service Commission, utilities
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September 16th, 2009 at 10:55 am
What b.s…..”faster”?
Blackberry communication is instant.
The PIN thing, which the common voter, knows nothing about…is only useful for deceit.
But these guys make the laws and break the laws and then protect each other.
It sounds like the MOB to me.
But when the Cops are the Crooks, who do you turn to for enforcement?
Beward of Big Govt.
Every great empire was destroyed from withing LEGALLY by its own law makers grown to big and corrupt.
Our Founding Fathers tried to protect us from this.
But Govt. is run entirely by Lawyers now….we are doomed.
September 16th, 2009 at 11:43 am
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September 16th, 2009 at 2:19 pm
[...] more nearly $2 billion hanging in the balance of two utility rate hearings is contributing to the cloud of suspicion engulfing the regulatory panel that will rule on the cases, Public Service Commission Chairman [...]
September 17th, 2009 at 7:45 am
[...] to court (Jacksonville Business News - Local Jacksonville News | Jacksonville Business Journal)The BlackBerry Backroom: PIN-to-PIN allows officials to communicate in secret with essentially no pa… (Post on Politics» News about politics and government in Florida | Post on Politics, a [...]