Xenon is software to perform

covert Secrecy is the practice of hiding information from certain individuals or groups who do not have the "need to know", perhaps while sharing it with other individuals. That which is kept hidden is known as the secret. Secrecy is often controvers ...

Internet search A search engine is a software system designed to carry out web searches. They search the World Wide Web in a systematic way for particular information specified in a textual web search query. The search results are generally presented in a ...

es and

surveillance Surveillance is the monitoring of behavior, many activities, or information for the purpose of information gathering, influencing, managing or directing. This can include observation from a distance by means of electronic equipment, such as c ...

, presently in use by taxing authorities in at least six nations to investigate the possibilities of

tax evasion Tax evasion is an illegal attempt to defeat the imposition of taxes by individuals, corporations, trusts, and others. Tax evasion often entails the deliberate misrepresentation of the taxpayer's affairs to the tax authorities to reduce the taxp ...

by various revenue producing

web sites A website (also written as a web site) is a collection of web pages and related content that is identified by a common domain name and published on at least one web server. Examples of notable websites are Google, Facebook, Amazon, and Wikipe ...

(

online shop Online shopping is a form of electronic commerce which allows consumers to directly buy goods or services from a seller over the Internet using a web browser or a mobile app. Consumers find a product of interest by visiting the website of the ...

gambling Gambling (also known as betting or gaming) is the wagering of something of value ("the stakes") on a random event with the intent of winning something else of value, where instances of strategy are discounted. Gambling thus requires three el ...

sites, or

pornography Pornography (often shortened to porn or porno) is the portrayal of sexual subject matter for the exclusive purpose of sexual arousal. Primarily intended for adults,

sites) and clients selling goods on

on-line In computer technology and telecommunications, online indicates a state of connectivity and offline indicates a disconnected state. In modern terminology, this usually refers to an Internet connection, but (especially when expressed "on line" or ...

auction An auction is usually a process of buying and selling goods or services by offering them up for bids, taking bids, and then selling the item to the highest bidder or buying the item from the lowest bidder. Some exceptions to this definition ex ...

sites. The software uses time-controlled

web spider A Web crawler, sometimes called a spider or spiderbot and often shortened to crawler, is an Internet bot that systematically browses the World Wide Web and that is typically operated by search engines for the purpose of Web indexing (''web spid ...

s to avoid detection, and likely

countermeasure A countermeasure is a measure or action taken to counter or offset another one. As a general concept, it implies precision and is any technological or tactical solution or system designed to prevent an undesirable outcome in the process. The fi ...

s, by the

webmaster A webmaster is a person responsible for maintaining one or more websites. The title may refer to web architects, web developers, site authors, website administrators, website owners, website coordinators, or website publishers. The duties of ...

s of the targeted

site Site most often refers to: * Archaeological site * Campsite, a place used for overnight stay in an outdoor area * Construction site * Location, a point or an area on the Earth's surface or elsewhere * Website, a set of related web pages, typically ...

. Its use may be legal; but citizen's

right to privacy The right to privacy is an element of various legal traditions that intends to restrain governmental and private actions that threaten the privacy of individuals. Over 150 national constitutions mention the right to privacy. On 10 December 1948 ...

and other

civil liberties Civil liberties are guarantees and freedoms that governments commit not to abridge, either by constitution, legislation, or judicial interpretation, without due process. Though the scope of the term differs between countries, civil liberties may ...

are implicated.

History

Use of Xenon was begun in the Netherlands in 2004, by the Dutch tax authority Belastingdienst. The Amsterdam-based data mining firm Sentient Machine Research, together with the tax authorities of Austria, Canada, Denmark, and the United Kingdom, has since upgraded the system. Sweden's tax authority began using Xenon in 2007.

Civil liberties

Swedish

privacy Privacy (, ) is the ability of an individual or group to seclude themselves or information about themselves, and thereby express themselves selectively. The domain of privacy partially overlaps with security, which can include the concepts of a ...

advocate and IT expert Par Strom, while stating in 2007 that the anticipated use of Xenon by the Swedish tax authority Skatteverket would be legal, has also stated that such use would pose dangers to citizen privacy rights—as did the current use at the time of similar spidering software developed internally by the Swedish government. Canadian Internet law expert Michael Geist has expressed similar privacy concerns.

References

Web crawlers {{Software-stub