Sorry, Public, You're Entirely Blocked From Hearing on Surveillance Program
Groups demand House committee lift 'excessive secrecy' for hearing on surveillance law
Are our elected officials "once again cutting out the public from an important debate over mass surveillance?" as Mark Jaycox and Dave Maass of Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) write?
It appears to be the case, as EFF and two dozen other civil liberties organizations say, because the House Judiciary Committee's upcoming hearing on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) is to be held in a classified format.
That law allows for two surveillance programs: "Upstream" and PRISM--the existence of which was revealed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. Upstream, as Techdirt previously explained, "lets the NSA partner with backbone providers like AT&T and tap their fiber lines at entry/exit points from the country and sniff through all the traffic," while PRISM is a program "in which a list of big internet firms agree to hand over certain information pursuant to a FISA court ruling rubber stamp telling them to hand over that information."
In their letter (pdf) sent Wednesday to committee chairman Rep. Robert Goodlatte (R-Va.) and ranking member John Conyers (D-Mich.), the groups urge the committee to commit to "principles of transparency and justice" by holding an open hearing, and state that section 702 "implicates the privacy rights of millions of people in the U.S. and around the world" including journalists, human rights activists, and criminal defendants.
The letter states that "judicious use of closed sessions" can be used to protect national security, but that for this hearing "it is unnecessary to provide members with an adequate understanding of how the law is currently implemented by the executive branch and whether that exceeds Congress' original intent."
"Doing so for the entirety of the hearing neither fully satisfies the promise to hold hearings nor permits the public debate that this nation deserves. Rather, it continues the excessive secrecy that has contributed to the surveillance abuses we have seen in recent years and to their adverse effects upon both our civil liberties and economic growth," they write.
Other signatories to the letter include the American Library Association, The Constitution Project, the National Security Archive, and Project on Government Oversight.
Urgent. It's never been this bad.
Dear Common Dreams reader, It’s been nearly 30 years since I co-founded Common Dreams with my late wife, Lina Newhouser. We had the radical notion that journalism should serve the public good, not corporate profits. It was clear to us from the outset what it would take to build such a project. No paid advertisements. No corporate sponsors. No millionaire publisher telling us what to think or do. Many people said we wouldn't last a year, but we proved those doubters wrong. Together with a tremendous team of journalists and dedicated staff, we built an independent media outlet free from the constraints of profits and corporate control. Our mission from the outset was simple. To inform. To inspire. To ignite change for the common good. Building Common Dreams was not easy. Our survival was never guaranteed. When you take on the most powerful forces—Wall Street greed, fossil fuel industry destruction, Big Tech lobbyists, and uber-rich oligarchs who have spent billions upon billions rigging the economy and democracy in their favor—the only bulwark you have is supporters who believe in your work. But here’s the urgent message from me today. It’s never been this bad out there. And it’s never been this hard to keep us going. At the very moment Common Dreams is most needed and doing some of its best and most important work, the threats we face are intensifying. Right now, with just three days to go in our Spring Campaign, we're falling short of our make-or-break goal. When everyone does the little they can afford, we are strong. But if that support retreats or dries up, so do we. Can you make a gift right now to make sure Common Dreams not only survives but thrives? There is no backup plan or rainy day fund. There is only you. —Craig Brown, Co-founder |
Are our elected officials "once again cutting out the public from an important debate over mass surveillance?" as Mark Jaycox and Dave Maass of Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) write?
It appears to be the case, as EFF and two dozen other civil liberties organizations say, because the House Judiciary Committee's upcoming hearing on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) is to be held in a classified format.
That law allows for two surveillance programs: "Upstream" and PRISM--the existence of which was revealed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. Upstream, as Techdirt previously explained, "lets the NSA partner with backbone providers like AT&T and tap their fiber lines at entry/exit points from the country and sniff through all the traffic," while PRISM is a program "in which a list of big internet firms agree to hand over certain information pursuant to a FISA court ruling rubber stamp telling them to hand over that information."
In their letter (pdf) sent Wednesday to committee chairman Rep. Robert Goodlatte (R-Va.) and ranking member John Conyers (D-Mich.), the groups urge the committee to commit to "principles of transparency and justice" by holding an open hearing, and state that section 702 "implicates the privacy rights of millions of people in the U.S. and around the world" including journalists, human rights activists, and criminal defendants.
The letter states that "judicious use of closed sessions" can be used to protect national security, but that for this hearing "it is unnecessary to provide members with an adequate understanding of how the law is currently implemented by the executive branch and whether that exceeds Congress' original intent."
"Doing so for the entirety of the hearing neither fully satisfies the promise to hold hearings nor permits the public debate that this nation deserves. Rather, it continues the excessive secrecy that has contributed to the surveillance abuses we have seen in recent years and to their adverse effects upon both our civil liberties and economic growth," they write.
Other signatories to the letter include the American Library Association, The Constitution Project, the National Security Archive, and Project on Government Oversight.
Are our elected officials "once again cutting out the public from an important debate over mass surveillance?" as Mark Jaycox and Dave Maass of Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) write?
It appears to be the case, as EFF and two dozen other civil liberties organizations say, because the House Judiciary Committee's upcoming hearing on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) is to be held in a classified format.
That law allows for two surveillance programs: "Upstream" and PRISM--the existence of which was revealed by NSA whistleblower Edward Snowden. Upstream, as Techdirt previously explained, "lets the NSA partner with backbone providers like AT&T and tap their fiber lines at entry/exit points from the country and sniff through all the traffic," while PRISM is a program "in which a list of big internet firms agree to hand over certain information pursuant to a FISA court ruling rubber stamp telling them to hand over that information."
In their letter (pdf) sent Wednesday to committee chairman Rep. Robert Goodlatte (R-Va.) and ranking member John Conyers (D-Mich.), the groups urge the committee to commit to "principles of transparency and justice" by holding an open hearing, and state that section 702 "implicates the privacy rights of millions of people in the U.S. and around the world" including journalists, human rights activists, and criminal defendants.
The letter states that "judicious use of closed sessions" can be used to protect national security, but that for this hearing "it is unnecessary to provide members with an adequate understanding of how the law is currently implemented by the executive branch and whether that exceeds Congress' original intent."
"Doing so for the entirety of the hearing neither fully satisfies the promise to hold hearings nor permits the public debate that this nation deserves. Rather, it continues the excessive secrecy that has contributed to the surveillance abuses we have seen in recent years and to their adverse effects upon both our civil liberties and economic growth," they write.
Other signatories to the letter include the American Library Association, The Constitution Project, the National Security Archive, and Project on Government Oversight.