I'm not quite rendered speechless, but I am absolutely gobsmacked. I do not love bureaucracy at the best of times. This is not the best of times.

I'm a regular user of the Sun Java Forums. Sun has generally managed the forums with absent minded complacency or minor incompetence, but this is a new low. On trying to login yesterday, I was presented with an "Access Denied" message. Not especially alarming; Sun have broken the accounts before now. I wrote the usual irritable email to the proffered address, created another temporary account to use in the interim, and carried on.

Today I received this incredible response (my emphasis added):

Dear Dave,

This manual review is necessary because your name and/or address may be similar to those of a party on the DRPL**, or your company or organization name resembles an entity on the DRPL.

** The DRPL is a compilation of several lists of denied or restricted entities or parties published by various U.S. Government agencies, which include but are not limited to the Bureau of Industry and Security's Denial List, the Treasury Department's Specially Designated Nationals List, and the State Department's Statutorily Debarred Parties.

Please be assured that Sun makes no value judgment about why your entitlement screening will require a manual review. Comparing online entitlement data against the DRPL is a common process for technology companies. Although the primary focus of DRPL screening is international trade, the U.S. government expects us to subject domestic orders, domestic software downloads, domestic requests for service etc. to such screening.

The vast majority of manual reviews are triggered by possible matches that are false positives. Our objective is to ensure that our DRPL screening logic achieves the right balance between supporting the U.S. Government's security objectives and avoiding any unnecessary anxiety for our customers. Consequently, we will be monitoring the level of possible matches on an ongoing basis, to determine whether our DRPL screening logic needs to be modified.

You will receive a response shortly from Customer Care after this manual review has been completed. In the meantime, if you have any questions, please send them to cwp-exp-alert@sun.com and include your full legal name, your complete physical address, your e-mail address, and a primary phone number. If you are associated with a company or organization, please include its full legal name, defining any acronyms.

Best regards,

Adriana Zia Z.
Sun Customer Support

This is just extraordinary. The things that I think are wrong with this:

• My details don't match (even roughly) anything on those lists.
• What is the point of a process where the "vast majority ... are triggered by ... false positives."
• What sort of scurrilous character who was a "true positive" would then present their real contact details when asked?
• It's a discussion forum, not the bloody Manhattan Project
• You only need a login if you're asking (or in my case answering) questions - the data is all externally visible.
• I've been a member since 1999. Suddenly there's a problem?
• It's not exactly difficult to create an account when your primary one has been suspended.

It's evidently the "Dave" they don't like, as my new account got kicked as soon as I tried to change the screen name from "DMinter" to "Dave Minter". Gosh, that's really secure.

The whole thing is a fine example of security theatre. I was planning to attend Java One later this year. If this is the sort of thing I can expect as a customer of the US, maybe I'll give it a miss.

I like America, and I like Americans. But I don't like bureaucrats, and it looks like the land of the free is falling to them.