Thursday, March 27, 2014

EFF Statement on Proposals to Overhaul NSA Spying

MARCH 25, 2014 | BY CINDY COHN AND MARK M. JAYCOX

Today we learned that the Obama administration and the House Intelligence Committee are both proposing welcome and seemingly significant changes to the mass telephone records collection program.  Both the Obama administration and the Intelligence Committee suggest that mass collection end with no new data retention requirements for telephone companies. This is good news, but we have not seen the details of either and details, as we have learned, are very important in assessing suggested changes to the NSA’s mass spying. 

But comparing what we know, it appears that the Obama administration's proposal requires significantly more judicial review—not just reviewing procedures but reviewing actual search requests—so it's preferable to the Intelligence Committee’s approach.

Yet a new legislative proposal isn’t necessary here.  There is already a bill ending bulk collection. It's called the USA FREEDOM Act by Judiciary Committee chairs Sen. Patrick Leahy and Rep. Jim Sensenbrenner. It's a giant step forward and better than either approach floated today since it offers more comprehensive reform, although some changes are still needed.  We urge the administration and the Intelligence Committees to support the USA FREEDOM.

Or better still, we urge the Administration to simply decide that it will stop misusing section 215 of the Patriot Act and section 702 of the FISA Amendments Act and Executive Order 12333 and whatever else it is secretly relying on to stop mass spying.  The executive branch does not need congressional approval to stop the spying; nothing Congress has done compels it to engage in bulk collection.  It could simply issue a new Executive Order requiring the NSA to stop.

Also, the Obama administration does not go beyond the telephone records programs, which are important, but are only a relatively small piece of the NSA's surveillance and, by itself won’t stop mass surveillance.  We continue to believe that comprehensive public review is needed through a new Church Committee to ensure that all of the NSA's mass surveillance is brought within the rule of law and the constitution. Given all the various ways that the NSA has overreached, piecemeal change is not enough.

READ MORE on NSA Spying

 

Related Cases:

Jewel v. NSA

First Unitarian Church of Los Angeles v. NSA

No comments:

Post a Comment

Merchandise

Ron Paul America Cloud

Site Credits

Ron Paul America

is voluntarily affiliated with

Liberty Operations Group

______________________________

Site created, maintained and hosted by

Liberty Web Services

Tags

#TurnOnTheTruth 2008 2012 4th amendment 911 ACTION Afghanistan war Agency Aggression Principle al-Qaeda Alan Colmes Alert America America's Fault Americans antigun AR 15 assault weapon Audit Authoritarian bailouts Believe Big Brother big government bill of rights Blame blowback bubbles Bush Campaign for Liberty Career Politician Eric Cantor Central Bank Charity China churches collapse Collectivism Commission committee Compassion Congress Conservative constitution Crash dangerous person Democrat Democrats Donald Trump Donald Trump. Planned Parenthood drones economic Economy Edward Snowden End the Fed European Union Federal Reserve Floyd Bayne floyd bayne for congress force foreign interventionism free market free markets GOP Nominee GOP Presidential Debates Government Great Depression gun control House of Representatives housing bubble HR 1745 I like Ron Paul except on foreign policy If ye love wealth better than liberty IFTTT Individual Individualism Institute Irag Iran Iraq war ISIL ISIS Judge Andrew Napalitano libertarian Liberty Liberty Letters Liberty Report Lost mass Media meltdown metadata Micheal Moore Middle East Mitt Romney nap National Neocons New Ron Paul Ad New York Times Newsletters Newt Gingrich No Non non-interventionism NSA NSA Snooping Obama Overreach overthrow Patriot Act peace Peace and Prosperity politicians Pope Francis President Presidential Presidential Race programs prosperity Race Racist Racist Newsletters Rand Paul Read the Bills Act recessions redistribution of wealth refugee crisis Repeal Obamacare Report Republican Republican Nomination Republican Nominee Republicans Revolution Rick Santorum Rick Santorum Exposed Ron Ron Paul Ron Paul Institute Ron Paul Institute Featured Articles Ron Paul Institute for Peace And Prosperity Ron Paul Institute Peace and Prosperity Articles Ron Paul Next Chapter Media Channel Ron Paul Racist Newsletters ron paul's foreign policy Ronald Reagan ronpaulchannel.com ronpaulinstitute.org Rosa DeLauro russia Samuel Adams Saudi Arabia Second Amendment Security Senate Senator September 11th attacks Show Soviet Spying stimulate Stock Market surveillance Syria tech bubble terrorist The the Fed the poor US US foreign policy Us troops USA Freedom Act Virginia Virginia Republican Primary voluntarism. Liberty Voluntary Warner Warning warrantless wiretaps YouTube