Claria, spyware vendor, on Homeland Security privacy advisory board.

Hopefully this is really more of a hire-the-bad-guys-to-help-the-good-guys kind of thing but I severely doubt it. Seems that the Department of Homeland Security has made an executive from Claria, formerly Gator, to a committee on protecting privacy. The article also has an excellent content-free defense of the inclusion from chief privacy officer Nuala O’Connor Kelly.

In the past, Claria’s pop-up ad software has riled some users who claimed it was annoying, installed without permission, and not easy to delete. Publishers also were irked about pop-up ads for a rival’s product appearing next to their own Web sites. Catalog retailer L.L. Bean sued Gator for alleged trademark infringement.