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United States Government Privacy Technology

House Lawmakers Demand End To Warrantless Collection of Americans' Data (techcrunch.com) 111

Posted by BeauHD from the right-to-privacy dept.
Two House lawmakers are pushing an amendment that would effectively defund a massive data collection program run by the National Security Agency unless the government promises to not intentionally collect data of Americans. TechCrunch reports: The bipartisan amendment -- just 15 lines in length -- would compel the government to not knowingly collect communications -- like emails, messages and browsing data -- on Americans without a warrant. Reps. Justin Amash (R-MI, 3rd) and Zoe Lofgren (D-CA, 19th) have already garnered the support from some of the largest civil liberties and rights groups, including the ACLU, the EFF, FreedomWorks, New America and the Sunlight Foundation.

Under the current statute, the NSA can use its Section 702 powers to collect and store the communications of foreign targets located outside the U.S. by tapping into the fiber cables owned and run by U.S. telecom giants. But this massive data collection effort also inadvertently vacuums up Americans' data, who are typically protected from unwarranted searches under the Fourth Amendment. The government has consistently denied to release the number of how many Americans are caught up in the NSA's data collection. For the 2018 calendar year, the government said it made more than 9,600 warrantless searches of Americans' communications, up 28% year-over-year.
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House Lawmakers Demand End To Warrantless Collection of Americans' Data More

House Lawmakers Demand End To Warrantless Collection of Americans' Data

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  • The House? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Cue to GOP lawmakers shutting down the amendment because it's somehow socialist.

    • Cue to another bigot. Political bigot. ITS BIPARTISAN.

      The bipartisan amendment -- just 15 lines in length -- would compel the government to not knowingly collect communications -- like emails, messages and browsing data -- on Americans without a warrant. Reps. Justin Amash (R-MI, 3rd) and Zoe Lofgren (D-CA, 19th) have already garnered the support from some of the largest civil liberties and rights groups, including the ACLU, the EFF, FreedomWorks, New America and the Sunlight Foundation.
    • Not likely to happen. Due to the FISA abuse in the spying on the Trump campaign, Republicans are slowly moving, if they haven't already, to Rand Paul's side of things on this issue

  • Can track all calls except telemarketers (Score:3, Interesting)

    by edi_guy ( 2225738 ) on Tuesday June 18, 2019 @06:35PM (#58785038)

    It's great how we have the technology to track and record meta-data about pretty much all American's calls, texts, emails, and surfing. But it's still beyond the government to stop illegal telemarketing calls. Is there a political party out there which can handle nuts and bolts of governing a society as well as the big picture constitutional issues?

    • Re:Can track all calls except telemarketers (Score:5, Insightful)

      by SirAstral ( 1349985 ) on Tuesday June 18, 2019 @06:44PM (#58785076)

      They are not interested in putting telemarketers in jail. Just people that threaten their authority.

    • Re: (Score:2, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward

      How the conversation really went:

      Congress>
              You have to stop breaking the law.
      NSA>
              Nope.
      Congress>
              Well alright then.

      Seriously, who tries to persuade the government to pinky-promise to follow the laws of the land? They don't have to and they won't, so there's no point asking and even less point telling them to. Nice grandstanding though.

    • > .Is there a political party out there which can handle nuts and bolts of governing a society as well as the big picture constitutional issues?

      Speaking of Constitutional issues, there is a government entity that more or less successfully handles:

      Fire protection
      Health department
      Schools
      Roads
      Utilities, in many cases
      Courts
      Drivers license
      Zoning
      Building inspections
      Parks
      etc

      The Constitution says the federal government is only allowed to do certain listed things. Everything else is Constitutionally reserved to y

      • Agreed, very valid point. And its a shame that we as a populace spend most of our mental energy worrying about national politics, watching news about national politics, watching Youtube about national politics, comedy shows about...get the idea. Instead of showing up once a month at that boring-arse city council meeting or school board, etc. Counting myself in this as well.

        Mid-year resolution: attend at least three local government functions in the remaining months of 2019.

        • And its a shame that we as a populace spend most of our mental energy worrying about national politics

          I've been saying this for years on Slashdot, especially w.r.t. thinks like the so called and ever-morphing "Net Neutrality" (it is ever-morphing because it defies the economics of networks, which is that the sending network pays the receiving network, or else it all falls apart in abuse), but I keep getting modded down, presumably by Californians, who perhaps long ago gave up on their own politicians representing them.

      • Yes, but one Tomahawk missile spending can only fund one classroom's K-8 education, and where's the fireball in that?

    • no they're all bought and paid for already

    • Is there a political party out there which can handle nuts and bolts of governing a society as well as the big picture constitutional issues?

      There are two real political parties. And yes, between those two, one is both better at nuts and bolts governing and at not violating the constitution.

  • So what? The government will just buy the data from someone else. Besides, our government has lied to us so many times there's no point in thinking you can trust it.
  • I'm trying to decide if it is better that the NSA collects data on Americans just like the rest of us citizens of the world, or not. This is a serious question. From the non-American's point of view, maybe it's better that the data on Americans is collected because then the Americans will have a reason to care about what is done by their government with this data, and at least hypothetically have the power to curtail the excesses. It's not like any Americans take the position that this kind of data collec

  • pointless because of five eyes (Score:4, Insightful)

    by caviare ( 830421 ) on Tuesday June 18, 2019 @06:56PM (#58785140)

    You will work with the Brits or one of your other five eyes partners to make sure they all have access to this tech.
    Then if you want to spy on Americans, you'll ask the Brits or one of the others to do it for you. And vice versa.

    • Re: (Score:1)

      by Anonymous Coward
      Stop calling it five eyes, it's Six Eyes based on Snowden's release of docs about Israel.

  • We promise we won't!!! (Score:2, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward

    Really, We promise we won't!!! [imgflip.com]

  • This is being done wrong. Again.
    China and Russia are collecting this same data. By restricting the west, but not denying access to the others, will ONLY make it easier for them.
    THe bill needs to read that if the data is clear text, then the gov can collect all it wants. It is in PUBLIC.
    OTOH, if it is encrypted, sent encrypted, stored encrypted, basically, sealed like an envelope, THEN the gov needs a warrant .

    This needs to be put DIRECTLY in the bill so that everybody on the net understands that if t

  • " unless the government promises to not intentionally collect data of Americans "

    If you listen carefully, you can almost hear the laughter coming out of a certain data center in Utah . . . . .

  • but will it be enforced ? (Score:4, Interesting)

    by cats-paw ( 34890 ) on Wednesday June 19, 2019 @12:07AM (#58786202) Homepage

    The reason these agencies do this shit is because:

    1 always ask for forgiveness instead of permission
    2 we don't seem to be interested in enforcing laws, unless it's against people who can't defend themselves

    so the question is, are we going to enforce this or is the head of the NSA, CIA, et al, just going to get in front of congress and lie about it, AGAIN.
    And AGAIN, nothing will happen to them.
    Remember the head of the CIA is an agent that had allowed torture on her watch and then destroyed evidence of it, and she was made head of the CIA.
    This kind of starts from the top rot has a very corrosive effect on society, and it's getting much worse. I don't know how you get people with integrity and a conscience into places of authority, but we need them more than ever.

  • So we European, "Rest-of-World" friends are lesser people, should have our warrantless data collection continued to be going on my the US?

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