In a dramatic middle-of-the-night stand off, a bipartisan set of lawmakers pushing for true reform and privacy protections for Americans bought us some more time to fight! They are holding out for, at a minimum, the requirement of an actual probable cause warrant for FBI access to information collected under the mass spying program known as 702.
A reauthorization with virtually no changes was defeated because a core group of lawmakers held strong; they know that people are hungry for real reform that protects the privacy of our communications. We now have a 10-day extension to continue to push Congress to pass a real reform bill.
The Lawmakers rallied late Thursday night to reject a proposed amendment that made gestures at privacy protections, but it would not have improved on the status quo and would have reauthorized Section 702 for five more years to boot.
TELL congress: 702 Needs Reform
Section 702 is rife with problems, loopholes, and compliance issues that need fixing. The National Security Agency collects full conversations being conducted by and with targets overseas – including by and with Americans in the U.S. – and stores them in massive databases. The NSA then allows other agencies, including the Federal Bureau of Investigation, to access untold amounts of that information. In turn, the FBI takes a “finders keepers” approach to this data: they reason that since it's already collected under one law, it’s OK for them to see it.
Under current practice, the FBI can query and even read the U.S. side of that communication without a warrant. What’s more, victims of this surveillance won’t even know and have very few ways of finding out that their communications have been surveilled. EFF and other civil liberties advocates have been trying for years to know when data collected through Section 702 is used as evidence against them.
Reforming Section 702 is even more urgent because of revelations hinted at by Senator Ron Wyden’s public statements concerning a “secret interpretation” of the law that enables surveillance of Americans, and a public “Dear Colleague” letter he sent to fellow Senators about FBI abuse of Section 702.
That’s right—the way the government conducts mass surveillance is so secret and unaccountable even the way they interpret the law is classified.
“In many cases these will be law-abiding Americans having perfectly legitimate, often sensitive, conversations,” Wyden wrote. “These Americans could include journalists, foreign aid workers, people with family members overseas - even women trying to get abortion medication from an overseas provider. Congress has an obligation to protect our country from foreign threats and protect the rights of these and other Americans.”
We have 10 days to make it clear to Congress: 702 needs real reforms. Not a blanket reauthorization. Not lip service to change. Real reform.
TELL congress: 702 Needs Reform
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