Mitch McConnell Wants To Dump Bogus 'Cybersecurity' Bill Into Defense Authorization

from the surveillance-mess dept

You knew that Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell wasn't going to just leave things alone after his strategy to renew the bulk surveillance provision of the PATRIOT Act failed somewhat miserably. He's now announced that he's going to dump the absolutely terrible CISA bill into the NDAA (National Defense Authorization Act). CISA, as we've discussed, is the latest in a long line of "information sharing" bills, that are really surveillance bills in disguise.

While defenders of these "information sharing" bills insist that they don't open up new surveillance capabilities, as we discussed last week, the latest revelations from the Snowden documents, showing that the NSA uses its Section 702 "upstream" capabilities to monitor for "cybersecurity signatures", reveal that these bills may not grant any new authorities, but would massively expand their ability to do surveillance. That's because it now becomes clear that what the NSA is looking for is more of these "cybersecurity signatures" which it can then use against the "upstream" collection to collect all sorts of information, which is then designated as "incidental" collections that are then free to be searched.

In other words, last week's revelations about the NSA and using upstream for cybersecurity should completely change the debate over cybersecurity bills. But... instead, McConnell is relying on a different story that came out the same day: the hacking of the government's Office of Personnel Management. Of course, even McConnell seems to admit that having the cybersecurity bill in place wouldn't have stopped that (no one has ever shown how these bills would stop a single cybersecurity attack ever), but whatever, "cybersecurity":

“It might or might not deal with every aspect of what apparently happened a few days ago. But Congress is going to act on cybersecurity on this bill in the very near future.”

Actually, it wouldn't have dealt with any aspect of what happened last week. And "acting" on something just because "hacking" seems pretty stupid, but I guess that's how Congress works these days.

There's also some political garbage going on behind the scenes, with McConnell trying to do this in order to get more Democrats to support the NDAA, but it seems like that -- like his PATRIOT Act strategy -- could backfire in a big way.

Filed Under: appropriations, cisa, cybersecurity, defense, mitch mcconnell, ndaa, surveillance

Legislators Strip Funding For Warrantless Use Of Stingrays By FBI, Take Money From The DEA To Buy Bodycams

from the CATCH-AN-IMSI-FUNDRAISER!-TIX-3/$5!! dept

The passage of appropriations bills is a seemingly casual process in which any legislator can attempt to hitch his or her hobbyhorse to it as it makes its way slowly to a vote. (And then to a government shutdown.) "Rob Peter/Pay Paul" amendments are offered for quick floor votes, adding millions to one program while siphoning the equivalent amount from another. Other amendments are simply of the "Rob Peter" variety, in which funding is stripped from programs or activities a legislator doesn't agree with.

Given the recent legislative activity surrounding US surveillance programs and the ongoing exposure of the FBI's tactics and technology, it's somewhat unsurprising that lawmakers are taking a shot at defunding some of the more questionable efforts. Darrell Issa, for example, offered an amendment stating that if the FBI wants to deploy its Stingray devices without a warrant, it will need to hold a bake sale to pay for it.

The amendment prohibits funding for federal law enforcement to conduct non-court-ordered “stingray” operations that collect bulk electronic data from individuals. The amendment was adopted on a voice vote.

This is of some import, although the FBI now claims it gets a warrant before deploying Stingrays. It will probably edge around this defunding by claiming it doesn't use Stingrays to collect data in bulk (sort of true, if used for their intended purpose and with proper minimization) or by pointing at its exemptions to its self-imposed warrant requirements, which are big enough you could fly a single-engine plane bristling with antennas and cameras through them.

In addition to other surveillance-targeting amendments, like defunding of any future NIST/NSA partnerships to backdoor encryption and the FBI/DOJ's use of backdoor surveillance via wiretapping laws, other interesting amendments were proposed and passed.

Rep. Gosar (R-AZ) – The amendment increases funding for the DOJ Office of the Inspector General by $1.7 million, offset by a reduction to the DOJ General Administration – Salaries and Expenses account.

Michael Horowitz -- the Inspector General for the DOJ -- has been battling the FBI and DEA for months now over the release of documents his office has requested. So far, the battle has been futile, but some additional funding will help ensure his office will continue to try to hold the DOJ's agencies accountable for their misconduct and failures. If nothing else, Horowitz has been both dogged and vocal while performing his oversight duties -- something that very obviously hasn't endeared him to the agencies he polices. I see no reason not to give this man, and his office, more funding.

Rep. Castro (D-TX) – The amendment increases the Community Trust Initiative, which provides grants for police body cameras, by $10 million, offset by a reduction to the DEA Salaries and Expenses account.

Body cameras are no panacea, but they're definitely better than taking no action at all. The best part about this is that it forces the DEA to fund a program many law enforcement agencies are hesitant to adopt. The ironic part is that the worst behavior in law enforcement (i.e., abuse of no-knock warrants, asset forfeiture) is tied to the Drug War. True accountability is still little more than a starry-eyed ideal, but taking $10 million from the DEA for this program is definitely a better use of that money.

Rep. Grayson (D-FL) – The amendment prohibits funding to compel a journalist or reporter to testify about information or sources that they regard to be confidential.

This is interesting, especially in light of the DOJ's efforts to compel New York Times journalist James Risen to reveal his sources. There's more to it than just the summation of this amendment, but it's far too much to cover here. (Hint: define "journalist." Once again, the government wants to be able to make that determination, probably on a case-by-case basis.)

Rep. Luetkemeyer (R-MO) – The amendment prohibits funding for DOJ’s “Operation Chokepoint.”

If this sticks, Team America: Morality Police™ will have to hold Bitcoin auctions or whatever if it wishes to keep porn performers and other blacklisted undesirables from availing themselves of bank services.

The attendant downside to these easily-passed amendments is that they can just as easily be deleted before the appropriation bill's final passage, especially if those targeted are able to apply enough pressure to block the bill's package with these intact.

Filed Under: appropriations, bodycams, congress, darrell issa, dea, fbi, stingrays

Why Does Rep. Marsha Blackburn Want To Block You From Having Competitive Broadband?

from the speak-up-now dept

There were rumors yesterday of a few ridiculous and extreme attempts by some in Congress to attach some anti-net neutrality amendments to the big Financial Services and General Government Appropriations Act. And while the most ridiculous proposal failed to appear, instead, it does appear that Rep. Marsha Blackburn is pushing an amendment to block the FCC from preempting laws that ban municipal broadband. The big cable companies have fought municipal broadband for ages because they hate competition. Cable and telco lobbyists have succeeded in getting such laws passed in a number of cities and states, with some politicians directly admitting that the bills were written by those lobbyists. And while there have been some disasters in munibroadband efforts, there have also been some amazing successes, providing truly competitive broadband that also helped force competitors to up their game.

That's why we were happy to see FCC chair Tom Wheeler make it clear that he was willing to use the FCC's powers to preempt laws blocking competitive broadband. This would be a very good use of the FCC's power to encourage real competition and innovation. Blackburn's amendment is all about stopping that, and making sure that your broadband is as expensive as possible, with no real innovation or competition on the way. Blackburn, of course, is also the politician who constantly screams about how terrible it would be to "regulate the internet" when it comes to net neutrality, but seems to have no qualms at all "regulating the internet" when it comes to other things, like SOPA (she was one of its main supporters). She's also claimed that "fair use" and "transparency" are just buzz words and that we need much stricter intellectual property enforcement.

But when it comes to actually making sure you have a competitive broadband market? She's totally against that. You would think, given that she's from Tennessee, that she'd be aware of the massive success of muni fiber over in Chattanooga. It's not her district, but it's not too far away. Perhaps she should take a visit and see if the residents there would support her stomping out competition and fast broadband.

Blackburn's amendment is to be voted on today, so groups like EFF, Public Knowledge and Free Press are urging folks call Congress to oppose Blackburn's latest bad idea.

Filed Under: appropriations, broadband, competition, fcc, fiber, innovation, internet, marsha blackburn, muni-broadband, net neutrality, regulations

Congress Gives NSA-Controlled US Cyber Command More Resources

from the keep-feeding-the-beast dept

Even as there are growing concerns about the NSA, the White House has made it clear that it will not separate the NSA from the US Cyber Command, which is the military's unit that conducts offensive attacks on foreign computing systems. The NSA likes to pretend they're two separate organizations, when they're really one and the same. They're housed in the same place and run by the same guy. And, apparently that's not about to change.

However, Congress has just agreed to funnel a lot more resources to the US Cyber Command, giving Keith Alexander and his soon-to-be-announced successor that much more power to attack computer systems and networks around the globe.

As part of the defense policy bill that just passed Congress, the Pentagon’s many cybersecurity initiatives together secured billions of dollars in funding as well as new resources to help train Cyber Command’s programmers and prepare them to operate on the emerging digital battlefield.

Of course, as the report by Tony Romm notes, this is all being done despite no "rules of engagement" for the US Cyber Command. You would think that before handing over billions, Congress would like to know what the group -- again, controlled by the NSA -- can and cannot do with that money.

Filed Under: appropriations, congress, defense department, keith alexander, nsa, us cyber command

Amash Amendment Narrowly Rejected After Heated (And Partly Ridiculous) Debate

from the lame dept

So, this isn't a huge surprise, but this evening there was a rather fascinating debate in the House in which Congressional Reps debated and then rejected the Amash Amendment to defund the NSA's Section 215 efforts to collect every bit of data about every communication made by Americans. While it sucks that the amendment lost, the vote was very close -- much closer than most people suspected (which explains why the NSA and the White House had flipped out about the amendment even hitting the floor). The debate about the Amash amendment followed one about an amendment from Rep. Pompeo (which is the same as the Rep. Nugent amendment). As we discussed, the Pompeo/Nugent amendment is a red herring pretending to limit the collection of information, but which really just restates the status quote. The Amash amendment was the important one. The debate was fascinating -- seeing a bipartisan group of representatives speak eloquently about protecting our rights and the rights of Americans. However, the defenders of the NSA program really pushed out some crazy claims. Rep. Mike Rogers insisted that the program stopped terrorism -- something that has not yet been shown at all. He also claimed that without spying on all Americans we might have another 9/11.

The worst, by far, were the claims from Rep. Michelle Bachmann, who claimed that the Snowden revelations "helped Islamic jihadists" and that if we don't keep spying on all Americans there will be horrible results... and then immediately lied and claimed that the NSA data collected was "smaller than a phone book" even though others on her side, like Rep. Tom Cotton admitted it was "billions of records." Bachmann's misleading attempt at making a point was because the NSA database doesn't directly include names and addresses, but just phone numbers (and phone calls, locations, people you're calling). What that leaves out is that the NSA can easily connect its database to a phone book and have that information anyway. Or, as Parker Higgins pointed out, if there's less info than a phone book, wouldn't it have been cheaper and easier to just buy the NSA a phone book.

In the end, the Pompeo/Nugent amendment passed by an unfortunately wide margin: 409 to 12. Oddly, the nays were as high as 20 and bounced around up and down for a while, but at the very end of the voting, it looks like a bunch changed their vote. As for the Amash Amendment it wasn't so lopsided. In fact, it was pretty close: 205 voted for the Amash amendment, with 217 against. While the amendment lost, it was pretty damn close, meaning that a very large percentage of Congress appears to be very concerned about NSA bulk collection of data. That bodes well for future reform to limit the NSA.

Filed Under: appropriations, justin amash, michelle bachmann, mike rogers, nsa, nsa surveillance, privacy, section 215, surveillance

Congress Should Support Amash Amendment Just Because White House Statement Is So Insulting

from the don't-take-that-kind-of-crap dept

Last night, we wrote about the pure insanity of the White House's statement against the Amash Amendment, which would pull funding from the NSA for just the "dragnet" surveillance efforts, in which it collects all metadata on all phone calls. Considering that the very author of the Patriot Act insists the law was never meant to allow this kind of collection, Amash's amendment shouldn't be all that controversial. It's literally him bringing the actual law back in line with what many in Congress thought the law already was. For the Obama White House to hit back by claiming that this clear fix to the law "is not the product of an informed, open, or deliberative process" is downright ridiculous and insulting, considering that the decision to reinterpret the law in secret was hardly the product of an "informed, open or deliberative process."

In fact, as Marcy Wheeler points out, this statement is so insulting to Congress, that Congress should vote for the Amash amendment as a response to the White House's claim. As she notes, this seems to be the White House blaming Congress for not being "informed, open or deliberative" in responsing to the administration's own efforts to mislead Congress by keeping them not fully informed, with a secret process, that guaranteed many were kept in the dark. To then flip that around and blame Congress as if it was Congress who wasn't being open is downright insulting:

Hell, if I were a self-respecting member of Congress, I’d support Amash-Conyers even if I weren’t already predisposed to, if only because this is such a crazy bat-shit claim to reason and openness.

The Executive Branch has had 7 years to have an open debate. It chose not to have that open debate. Now that one has been brought to it by Congress, it pretends Congress is the one at fault for the lack of informed or open process.

Of course, Wheeler makes another good point in that same post. The fact that the White House put this statement out, even after the NSA did a full court emergency lobby extravaganza to convince Congress not to support the amendment, at least suggests that the White House is realizing that there might really be enough votes to get this amendment through.

President Obama claimed he "welcomed this debate." He might want to speed up that process, because it's happening and all he's doing is stalling and blaming others. But the debate is happening without him, and he might not like where it ends up.

Filed Under: amendment, appropriations, debate, justin amash, nsa, nsa surveillance, patriot act, section 215, white house

Irony Alert: Obama Opposes Amash Amendment Because It's A 'Blunt Approach' And Not A Product Of 'Open' Process

from the now-they're-just-fucking-with-us,-right? dept

Okay, someone in the White House just feels like giving people who believe in protecting civil liberties a giant middle finger today. As a quick review, the President and the administration have been hiding behind secret court orders with secret interpretations of the Patriot Act and the FISA Amendments Act to use a very blunt instrument: collecting pretty much all digital data around, and keeping the whole thing totally quiet for years. In response, Rep. Justin Amash is seeking to pull funding from one of the key NSA programs -- the one that involved a secret interpretation of Section 215 of the Patriot Act by a secret court to pretend that language that clearly applied to only limited data now meant the NSA could order AT&T, Verizon, Sprint and others to hand over every call record on every phone call. And, this is a program that no one knew about until Ed Snowden leaked it to the Guardian and the Washington Post.

Okay, having reinforced those basic points, check out the giant "screw you guys" the White House just pushed out in the form of a "statement" in response to the Amash Amendment. I'll bold the key guffaw-inducing lines:

In light of the recent unauthorized disclosures, the President has said that he welcomes a debate about how best to simultaneously safeguard both our national security and the privacy of our citizens. The Administration has taken various proactive steps to advance this debate including the President’s meeting with the Privacy and Civil Liberties Oversight Board, his public statements on the disclosed programs, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence’s release of its own public statements, ODNI General Counsel Bob Litt’s speech at Brookings, and ODNI’s decision to declassify and disclose publicly that the Administration filed an application with the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. We look forward to continuing to discuss these critical issues with the American people and the Congress.

However, we oppose the current effort in the House to hastily dismantle one of our Intelligence Community’s counterterrorism tools. This blunt approach is not the product of an informed, open, or deliberative process. We urge the House to reject the Amash Amendment, and instead move forward with an approach that appropriately takes into account the need for a reasoned review of what tools can best secure the nation.

Let me repeat that again: This blunt approach is not the product of an informed, open, or deliberative process. As opposed to the blunt process of collecting all data on everyone which was arrived at via an "informed, open and deliberative process -- known as totally secretly interpreting the plain language of a law in a secret ruling from a secret court to mean something almost entirely different than what the language itself said?

This is a joke, right?

Only someone who really has a sick sense of humor would try to argue that a bill looking to slow down the rampant spying on pretty much all Americans comes from a lack of an "informed, open, or deliberative process" when the process to create that massive surveillance infrastructure was all done in complete darkness.

Filed Under: appropriations, barack obama, debate, irony, justin amash, nsa, nsa surveillance, open, surveillance

NSA's Keith Alexander Calls Emergency Private Briefing To Lobby Against Amash Amendment

from the what-are-you-afraid-of? dept

So we were just writing about the details of the amendment from Rep. Justin Amash, which would limit the NSA's ability to twist the language of Section 215 of the Patriot Act to pretend it means it's okay to collect information on every phone call made. If you want to know just how important this is, all you need to know is that NSA boss, General Keith Alexander, wasted no time in scheduling a last-minute emergency briefing for Congress to tell them not to vote for the Amash Amendment.

NSA head Gen. Keith Alexander scheduled a last-minute, members-only briefing in response to the amendment, according to an invitation distributed to members of Congress this morning and forwarded to HuffPost. "In advance of anticipated action on amendments to the DoD Appropriations bill, Ranking Member C.A. Dutch Ruppersberger of the House Intelligence Committee invites your Member to attend a question and answer session with General Keith B. Alexander of the National Security Agency," reads the invitation.

The invitation warned members that they could not share what they learned with their constituents or others. "The briefing will be held at the Top Secret/SCI level and will be strictly Members-Only," reads the invite.

Of course, the people that Congress is supposed to be representing, the public, don't get the privilege of being able to secure a last minute "briefing" with our elected officials to explain to them why the Amash amendment is important. Instead, we need to rely on things like DefundTheNSA.com or Demand Progress to reach out to our Representatives to let them know that bulk data collection on every American is not acceptable behavior by the NSA.

Filed Under: appropriations, congress, funding, justin amash, keith alexander, lobbying, nsa, nsa surveillance, patriot act, section 215

Homeland Security Threatens Legal Action Against Employees Who Read News About Leaks

from the while-one-politician-looks-to-stop-it dept

We've talked about procedures within the Defense Department to block computers from accessing the website for The Guardian newspaper -- along with similarly short-sighted moves to apply a sledgehammer approach to pretending that public information isn't really public. I've heard from a few people within the Defense Department who defend this approach on basic procedural grounds of trying to "make sure" that classified info remains classified, but the real problem is considering any publicly revealed documents as still classified. As I've said each time this debate comes up, in the business world, the equivalent situation involving trade secrets or non-disclosure agreements almost always are recognized as null and void if the info becomes public through other means.

However, that's not the way the government works. The latest is that Homeland Security sent around a memo warning employees that merely opening up a Washington Post article about some of the leaks might violate their non-disclosure agreement to "protect National Security Information," and it even says that merely clicking on the story might make the reader "subject to any administrative or legal action from the Government." Got that? Working for the government and merely reading the news about things the government is doing might subject you to legal action.

Stunning.

At least someone in Congress realizes the insanity of all of this. Rep. Grayson, who displayed the very same NSA slides that DHS is warning its employees about in Congress itself, has offered up an amendment to the Defense Appropriations Bill, stating that nothing in the defense appropriations should be used to block employees from reading the news on their own time.

None of the funds made available by this Act may be used to restrict the access of members of the Armed Forces to publically available online news media during morale, welfare, and recreation periods.

While this is one way to deal with the problem, I still think you solve a lot more problems with a basic recognition of reality: if classified documents become public, they shouldn't be considered classified any more, because (a) that's stupid and (b) it actually hinders the ability of government employees to be as knowledgeable as everyone else in the world. Also, Grayson's amendment only applies to the members of the armed forces, but not to civilian employees of the Department of Defense, or any employees of Homeland Security, who are subject to the crazy threats above.

Filed Under: alan grayson, appropriations, defense department, homeland security, leaks, news, reading, websites