Senate Rejects All CISA Amendments Designed To Protect Privacy, Reiterating That It's A Surveillance Bill

from the the-exclamation-point dept

In case you weren't already convinced that CISA is a surveillance bill masquerading as a cybersecurity bill, today the Senate rejected four separate amendments to the bill that attempted to better protect the privacy of Americans. Senator Wyden had an amendment to require the removal of personal information before information could be shared, which was voted down 55 to 41. Senator Heller had an amendment that was basically a backstop against the Wyden amendment, saying that if the Wyden amendment didn't pass, Homeland Security would be responsible for removing such personal information. That amendment also failed by a 49 to 47 vote. Senator Leahy had an amendment that would have removed FOIA exemptions in the bill (making it much less transparent how CISA was used). That amendment was voted down 59 to 37. Senator Franken then had an amendment that would have "tightened" the definition of cybersecurity threats, so that the shared information needed to be "reasonably likely" to cause damage, as opposed to the current "may" cause damage. And (you guess it, because you're good at this), it was also voted down by a 60 to 35 vote.

Meanwhile, Marcy Wheeler notes that the revised version of the bill by Senators Burr and Feinstein, which claimed to incorporate greater transparency requirements proposed by Senator Tester, actually takes away a lot of transparency and actually makes it more difficult for Congress to learn whether or not CISA is being used for domestic surveillance:

That Burr and DiFi watered down Tester’s measures so much makes two things clear. First, they don’t want to count some of the things that will be most important to count to see whether corporations and agencies are abusing this bill. They don’t want to count measures that will reveal if this bill does harm.

Most importantly, though, they want to keep this information from Congress. This information would almost certainly not show up to us in unclassified form, it would just be shared with some members of Congress (and on the House side, just be shared with the Intelligence Committee unless someone asks nicely for it).

But Richard Burr and Dianne Feinstein want to ensure that Congress doesn’t get that information. Which would suggest they know the information would reveal things Congress might not approve of.

Once again, these kinds of actions really only make sense if CISA is being used to justify warrantless domestic surveillance. Which once again raises the question of why Congress is willing to move forward with such a surveillance bill. We just went through a whole process showing that the public is not comfortable with secret laws and secret interpretations that lead to surveillance. Why would they immediately push for a new secret law that expands surveillance and reject any and all attempts at protecting the privacy of the American public or any sort of transparency and accountability in how the bill is used?

The bill is positioned as a cybersecurity bill, but good luck finding a single computer security expert who actually thinks the bill is either useful or necessary. I've been trying and so far I can't find any.

Filed Under: al franken, cisa, dean heller, dianne feinstein, pat leahy, privacy, richard burr, ron wyden, senate, surveillance, transparency

Senators Introduce Bill To End Secret Law That Enabled NSA Surveillance

from the good-for-them dept

A bipartisan group of eight Senators have now introduced a bill to end the secret interpretation of the law which enabled the NSA, via the rubber-stamping FISA Court, to claim that the FISA Amendments Act enabled them to sweep up basically all phone call data on everyone.

The measure, coming amid daily revelations about the extent to which the National Security Agency is monitoring communications by Americans, would require the Attorney General to declassify significant Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) opinions. The senators say the move would allow Americans to know how broad of a legal authority the government is claiming to spy on Americans under the Patriot Act and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).

“Americans deserve to know how much information about their private communications the government believes it’s allowed to take under the law,” explains Oregon Senator Jeff Merkley, a Democrat who has been an outspoken advocate for congressional oversight of surveillance programs. “There is plenty of room to have this debate without compromising our surveillance sources or methods or tipping our hand to our enemies. We can’t have a serious debate about how much surveillance of Americans’s communications should be permitted without ending secret law.”

The bill will be put forth by Merkley, but co-sponsored by Senators Patrick Leahy, Dean Heller, Mark Begich, Al Franken, Jon Tester and Ron Wyden. Leahy, being the chair of the Judiciary Committee, is important, suggesting that this bill isn't automatically dead in the water. During the FISA Amendments Act fight at the end of 2012, Leahy was one of only a few Senators (along with Merkley and Wyden) who pushed back on just doing a straight reauthorization. In fact, it sounds like this bill will be similar to the one that Merkley pushed as an amendment to the renewal of the FISA Amendments Act last year, which got shot down -- but did score 37 votes in the Senate. Perhaps with Leahy's support, and all the news going on, it can get a few more votes.

And, in case you're wondering, yes, Congress can order the executive branch to declassify anything it wants, though obviously it needs to pass the law (and get past any potential veto). Declassifying how the FISC has interpreted the law should not be controversial. As we've been pointing out for years, under no circumstances would it make sense to claim that the official interpretation of what's legal and illegal should be classified. Yes, certain techniques or methods might need to remain classified, but the law must be public. Hopefully, others in Congress will finally recognize that basic fact.

Filed Under: al franken, dean heller, fisa amendments act, fisc, jeff merkley, john tester, mark begich, nsa, patrick leahy, ron wyden, secret law, senate, surveillance