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'Dangerous and Shameful': 42 House Democrats Help GOP Send Trump Spying Bill to Senate
"It was these Democrats' responsibility to stand up against this administration, and they voted to stand down instead," said one campaigner.
Apr 29, 2026
Dozens of Democrats in the Republican-controlled US House of Representatives helped the GOP send a key spying bill to the Senate on Wednesday, earning sharp condemnation from the diverse movement that has called for privacy reforms.
The House voted 235-191 in favor of the bill released last week by Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.), who has been trying for months to get an extension of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to President Donald Trump's desk.
FISA's Section 702 allows the US government to surveil electronic communications of noncitizens located outside the United States to acquire foreign intelligence information, without a warrant. However, Americans' data is also swept up, and civil society, along with some lawmakers from both major parties, has demanded reforms to prevent further abuse by federal agencies.
In the lead-up to the vote, progressives such as Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) warned that "this bill has no meaningful reforms to stop warrantless surveillance, directly undermining the Fourth Amendment" to the US Constitution, which is supposed to protect Americans against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Another "Squad" member, Rep. Rashida Tlaib (D-Mich.), took to the House floor to blast Section 702 as "a dangerous mass surveillance tool" that "has been used to spy on Black Lives Matter protesters, members of Congress, journalists, and more."
However, 42 Democrats—including House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Ranking Member Jim Himes (Conn.)—still joined most House Republicans in advancing the legislation.
In addition to Himes, the Democrats who voted for the bill are Pete Aguilar (Calif.), Ami Bera (Calif.), Sanford Bishop (Ga.), Nikki Budzinski (Ill.), Janelle Bynum (Ore.), Ed Case (Hawaii), Kathy Castor (Fla.), Gil Cisneros (Calif.), Herb Conaway (NJ), Henry Cuellar (Texas), Don Davis (NC), Lois Frankel (Fla.), Laura Gillen (NY), Jared Golden (Maine), Vicente Gonzalez (Texas), Josh Gottheimer (NJ), Josh Harder (Calif.), Chrissy Houlahan (Pa.), Steny Hoyer (Md.), Greg Landsman (Ohio), Susie Lee (Nev.), Kristen McDonald Rivet (Mich.), Jared Moskowitz (Fla.), Frank Mrvan (Ind.), Donald Norcross (NJ), Marie Gluesenkamp Perez (Wash.), Scott Peters (Calif.), Mike Quigley (Ill.), Josh Riley (NY), Brad Schneider (Ill.), Kim Schrier (Wash.), Terri Sewell (Ala.), Eric Sorensen (Ill.), Darren Soto (Fla.), Marilyn Strickland (Wash.), Tom Suozzi (NY), Derek Tran (Calif.), Gabe Vasquez (NM), Marc Veasey (Texas), Debbie Wasserman Schultz (Fla.), and George Whitesides (Calif.).
"It's incredibly disappointing the House approved this measure," said Jake Laperruque, deputy director of the Center for Democracy and Technology's Security and Surveillance Project, in a statement. "This bill is empty calories through and through. It contains no warrant for querying Americans' messages, and no meaningful reforms of any kind. The razor-thin procedural vote this afternoon makes clear that there's an appetite for reform, but House leadership took meaningful reforms off the menu."
"There is nothing in this bill that would have prevented the abuses of FISA 702 we've already seen—snooping on lawmakers, protesters, and campaign donors—and there is nothing that would stop even worse abuses in the future. A vote for this bill was a vote to give the FBI and other intelligence agencies a three-year blank check for surveillance abuse."
Hajar Hammado, senior policy adviser at Demand Progress—which helped convene over 100 artificial intelligence, civil rights, and other progressive groups pressuring Congress to include privacy protections in any renewal bill for the spying power—took aim at the House Democrats who supported the legislation.
"The 42 Democratic votes to advance Speaker Johnson and Donald Trump's surveillance agenda are dangerous and shameful," she declared.
"These Democrats defied their constituents and common sense to undercut meaningful privacy reforms in the House and instead voted to hand over sweeping spy powers to the Trump administration," she stressed. "This means continuing warrantless backdoor searches and allowing an increasing number of federal agencies to exploit the data broker loophole to supercharge AI and fuel mass domestic surveillance."
Hammado said that "their vote today has major consequences, as even 22 Republicans put principles over politics and voted against renewing FISA without warrant protections. It was these Democrats' responsibility to stand up against this administration and they voted to stand down instead."
While stressing that "no administration should have these powers," Free Press Action advocacy director Jenna Ruddock directed attention at "the champions for a clean extension of Section 702 in the Trump administration in particular," including the president's homeland security adviser, Stephen Miller.
"Stephen Miller has advocated against reforms to Section 702, claiming it is critical to his and Trump’s homeland security agenda, even as members of the administration refer to political opponents as 'enemies within,'" she noted. "Today, 42 Democrats joined 192 Republicans to co-sign Donald Trump and Stephen Miller's domestic surveillance agenda, jeopardizing the civil rights and liberties of every person in the United States."
Zeteo News reporter Prem Thakker pointed out that House "Democratic leadership did not whip their members, enabling them to vote with Republicans and give Trump the surveillance powers."
While calling out the House Democrats who backed the bill, campaigners also set their sights on the Senate, where Punchbowl News reporter Anthony Adragna predicted that "it's DOA," or dead on arrival. Republicans have a slim majority in the chamber and, due to its rules, need at least some Democratic support to pass most bills, including this one.
A key issue is the central bank digital currency ban included in the House bill. Senate Majority Leader John Thune (R-SD) told reporters on Wednesday that he may try to pass a 45-day extension instead. After a recent short-term extension, the spying authority is set to expire Thursday night.
"Now the fight moves to the Senate, where privacy champions in both parties are gearing up to try and stop this reckless giveaway to the surveillance state," Hammado said. She urged members of the upper chamber to join "bipartisan reformers" like Sens. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.), Mike Lee (R-Utah), Rand Paul (R-Ky.), and Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) "in voting against any FISA measure that lacks real reforms like a warrant requirement to close the backdoor search and data broker loopholes."
Laperruque similarly said that "we hope senators will stand strong and reject this dangerous proposal."
Ruddock highlighted that "there is bipartisan legislation already introduced in both the House and Senate that would make desperately needed reforms to government surveillance powers."
"The Senate should reject the fake reforms in the current House bill and demand a vote on real reforms to Section 702, including a warrant requirement, and closing the data broker loophole," she said. "Our constitutional rights depend on it."
This article has been updated to include the names of the Democrats who voted for the bill.
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Lawmakers, Civil Society Groups Urge Supreme Court to Block TikTok Ban
"Banning this social media platform would trample on the constitutional rights of over 170 million Americans."
Dec 27, 2024
Update (December 28):
On Friday evening, President-elect Donald Trump filed a brief with the Supreme Court that took no position on whether a ban on TikTok would violate First Amendment rights. Instead, he wrote that he has "consummate deal-making expertise," and as president would be able to "negotiate a resolution to save the platform while addressing the national security concerns expressed by the government."
Trump touted his understanding of social media, noting that he has 14.7 million followers on TikTok. He also said the timing of the impending ban—one day before he takes office–interferes with his "ability to manage the United States’ foreign policy and to pursue a resolution" that will preserve the app in the United States and protect national security.
Earlier:
Ahead of the U.S. Supreme Court's scheduled hearing on social media company TikTok's appeal regarding a ban on the popular platform, three bipartisan lawmakers were among the First Amendment advocates who filed amicus briefs in support of the app on Friday.
Sens. Ed Markey (D-Mass.) and Rand Paul (R-Ky.) were joined by Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif.) in asking the court to grant TikTok an emergency injunction to block the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act from banning the app on January 19 unless the platform's Chinese parent company sells its stake by then.
The law and its ban on TikTok would "deprive millions of Americans of their First Amendment rights," said the lawmakers.
"The TikTok ban does not survive First Amendment scrutiny," Markey, Paul, and Khanna added. "Its principal justification—preventing covert content manipulation by the Chinese government—reflects a desire to control the content on the TikTok platform and in any event could be achieved through a less restrictive alternative."
The law was signed by President Joe Biden in April over the objections of First Amendment advocates, and a federal appeals court upheld the ban earlier this month. The Supreme Court then agreed to hear TikTok's challenge.
The ACLU, the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT), and the Freedom of the Press Foundation were among several civil liberties groups that also filed a amicus brief on Friday, arguing that the government has not presented sufficient evidence that the app, which is used by 170 million Americans, causes "ongoing or imminent harm."
Patrick Toomey, deputy director of the ACLU's National Security Project, said the government's attempt to ban Americans from using TikTok, which some creators use to share commentary on geopolitical events as well as weighing in on pop culture and creating humorous videos, is "extraordinary and unprecedented."
"This social media platform has allowed people around the world to tell their own stories in key moments of social upheaval, war, and natural disaster while reaching immense global audiences," Toomey said.
TikTok, he said, is "a unique forum for expression online—and the connections and community that so many have built there cannot be easily replaced. TikTok creators can't simply transfer their audiences and followers to another app, and TikTok users can't simply reassemble the many voices they've discovered on the platform."
At CDT, Free Expression Project director Kate Ruane said the groups' amicus brief "makes clear that national security interests do not diminish protections afforded by the First Amendment and that courts must impose the same rigorous standards to laws that restrict speech."
"It further argues that the D.C. Circuit misapplied strict scrutiny when it failed to significantly examine the government's vague and nonspecific national security justifications for enacting the statute," said Ruane. "In light of the law's sweeping ban on free expression, the coalition's brief argues that the court should block implementation of the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act."
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Rights Groups Cheer Senate Bill to Curb Warrantless Spying on Americans
The SAFE Act "would make critical reforms to stop persistent abuse" and is "meticulously designed to account for operational needs," said one advocate.
Mar 14, 2024
Just weeks away from the expiration of a U.S. government surveillance power with a history of abuse, a bipartisan group of senators unveiled a reauthorization bill welcomed by rights groups who have long demanded reforms.
Congress and U.S. President Joe Biden last year temporarily extended Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which permits warrantless surveillance targeting noncitizens located outside the United States, to allow for ongoing discussions of possible changes opposed by the intelligence community and its allies on Capitol Hill.
"There is little doubt that Section 702 is a valuable national security tool. However, while only foreigners overseas may be targeted, the program sweeps in massive amounts of Americans' communications, which may be searched without a warrant," Senate Majority Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) noted Thursday.
Durbin, who also chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee, and Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) are leading the Security and Freedom Enhancement (SAFE) Act with support from 11 other senators who have backed reform efforts in response to rampant abuse, particularly by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI).
"The documented abuses under FISA should provoke outrage from anyone who values the Fourth Amendment rights of American citizens," said Lee. "From warrantless searches targeting journalists, political commentators, and campaign donors to monitoring sitting members of Congress, these actions reveal a blatant disregard for individual liberties."
After noting that "even after implementing compliance measures, the FBI still conducted more than 200,000 warrantless searches of Americans' communications in just one year—more than 500 warrantless searches per day," Durbin framed the SAFE Act as "a sensible, bipartisan path forward on reauthorizing Section 702 with meaningful reforms."
With the April 19 sunset of Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act approaching, I'm announcing a bipartisan compromise bill that protects Americans from foreign threats and from warrantless government surveillance. WATCH: https://t.co/3ELLO7O7YN
— Senator Dick Durbin (@SenatorDurbin) March 14, 2024
Specifically, the bill would require agencies to "obtain a FISA Title I order or a warrant before accessing the contents of Americans' communications collected under Section 702—but not before running queries," the sponsors explained. It also includes additional layers of internal supervision for queries involving Americans and would close the data broker loophole, among other provisions.
"Sen. Durbin and Lee have carefully crafted a bipartisan compromise bill," said ACLU senior policy counsel Kia Hamadanchy. "While this legislation does not include every reform civil liberties groups have been pushing for, it does include meaningful changes that will rein in the government's warrantless surveillance of Americans and help ensure that our privacy is protected. The Senate should take up this bill immediately."
Demand Progress policy director Sean Vitka agreed. While also noting that it doesn't have everything rights advocates wanted, he said that "the SAFE Act is a major development in the ongoing fight to rein in warrantless government surveillance of people in the United States."
"We commend Sen. Durbin and Lee for their leadership," Vitka added, stressing that "an overwhelming number of Americans from across the political spectrum want Congress to seize this once-in-a-generation moment and get this done."
Jeramie Scott, senior counsel and director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center's Project on Surveillance Oversight, similarly praised the pair for crafting the bill, which he said "takes a pragmatic, measured approach to reform that draws upon a wide range of proposals" to offer "a clear path forward to reauthorizing Section 702 while ensuring that our rights are protected."
Jake Laperruque, deputy director of the Center for Democracy & Technology's Security and Surveillance Project, also celebrated that the bill "would make critical reforms to stop persistent abuse" and is "meticulously designed to account for operational needs."
"We're just a few weeks away from the expiration of FISA 702—it's time for congressional leadership to stop stalling and allow a vote on these critical reforms," Laperruque declared.
The SAFE Act comes just days after Wired revealed that U.S. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence Chair Mike Turner (R-Ohio) privately tried using peaceful protests at the home of Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) as proof of the need to block long-demanded reforms to Section 702.
Turner notably already faced calls to resign after he announced that his panel had provided members of Congress with "information concerning a serious national security threat," which news outlets reported was that Russia has made progress on a space-based nuclear weapon to target U.S. satellites.
Amid that controversy—which was widely seen as a ploy to force the reauthorization without reforms—House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) abruptly delayed action on Section 702 in February. However, the Republican leader told Politico on Thursday that "the current plan is to run FISA as a standalone the week after Easter."
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Landmark Artificial Intelligence Act in EU Slammed as Rights 'Failure'
One expert said the law "is littered with concessions to industry lobbying, exemptions for the most dangerous uses of AI by law enforcement and migration authorities, and prohibitions... full of loopholes."
Mar 13, 2024
As European Union policymakers on Wednesday lauded the approval of the Artificial Intelligence Act, critics warn the legislation represents a giveaway to corporate interests and falls short in key areas.
Daniel Leufer, a senior policy analyst at the Brussels office of advocacy group Access Now, called the bloc's landmark AI legislation "a failure from a human rights perspective and a victory for industry and police."
Following negotiations to finalize the AI Act in December, the world's first sweeping regulations for the rapidly evolving technology were adopted by members of the European Parliament 523-46 with 49 abstentions. After some final formalities, the law is expected to take effect in May or June, with various provisions entering into force over the next few years.
"Even though adopting the world's first rules on the development and deployment of AI technologies is a milestone, it is disappointing that the E.U. and its 27 member states chose to prioritize the interest of industry and law enforcement agencies over protecting people and their human rights," said Mher Hakobyan, Amnesty International's advocacy adviser on artificial intelligence.
The law applies a "risk-based approach" to AI products and services. As The Associated Press reported Wednesday:
The vast majority of AI systems are expected to be low risk, such as content recommendation systems or spam filters. Companies can choose to follow voluntary requirements and codes of conduct.
High-risk uses of AI, such as in medical devices or critical infrastructure like water or electrical networks, face tougher requirements like using high-quality data and providing clear information to users.
Some AI uses are banned because they're deemed to pose an unacceptable risk, like social scoring systems that govern how people behave, some types of predictive policing, and emotion recognition systems in school and workplaces.
Other banned uses include police scanning faces in public using AI-powered remote "biometric identification" systems, except for serious crimes like kidnapping or terrorism.
While some praised positive commonsense guidelines and protections, Leufer said that "the new AI Act is littered with concessions to industry lobbying, exemptions for the most dangerous uses of AI by law enforcement and migration authorities, and prohibitions so full of loopholes that they don't actually ban some of the most dangerous uses of AI."
Along with also expressing concerns about how the law will impact migrants, refugees, and asylum-seekers, Hakobyan highlighted that "it does not ban the reckless use and export of draconian AI technologies."
Access Now and Amnesty are part of the #ProtectNotSurveil coalition, which released a joint statement warning that the AI Act "sets a dangerous precedent," particularly with its exemptions for law enforcement, migration officials, and national security.
Other members of the coalition include EuroMed Rights, European Digital Rights, and Statewatch, whose executive director, Chris Jones, said in a statement that "the AI Act might be a new law but it fits into a much older story in which E.U. governments and agencies—including Frontex—have violated the rights of migrants and refugees for decades."
Frontex—officially the European Border and Coast Guard Agency—has long faced criticism from human rights groups for failing to protect people entering the bloc, particularly those traveling by sea.
"Implemented along with a swathe of new restrictive asylum and migration laws, the AI Act will lead to the use of digital technologies in new and harmful ways to shore up 'Fortress Europe' and to limit the arrival of vulnerable people seeking safety," Jones warned. "Civil society coalitions across and beyond Europe should work together to mitigate the worst effects of these laws, and continue to towards building societies that prioritize care over surveillance and criminalization."
"It has severe shortcomings from the point of view of fundamental rights and should not be treated as a golden standard for rights-based AI regulation."
Campaigners hope policymakers worldwide now take lessons from this legislative process.
In a Wednesday op-ed, Laura Lazaro Cabrera, counsel and director of Center for Democracy & Technology Europe's Equity and Data Program, argued the law "will become the benchmark for AI regulation globally in what has become a race against the clock as lawmakers grapple with a fast-moving development of a technology with far-reaching impacts on our basic human rights."
After the vote, Lazaro Cabrera stressed that "there's so much at stake in the implementation of the AI Act and so, as the dust settles, we all face the difficult task of unpacking a complex, lengthy, and unprecedented law. Close coordination with experts and civil society will be crucial to ensure that the act's interpretation and application mean that it is effective and consistent with the act's own articulated goals: protecting human rights, democracy, and the rule of law."
European Center for Not-for-Profit Law's Karolina Iwańska responded similarly: "Let's be clear: It has severe shortcomings from the point of view of fundamental rights and should not be treated as a golden standard for rights-based AI regulation. Having said that, we will work on the strongest possible implementation."
Yannis Vardakastanis, president of the European Disability Forum, said in a statement that "the AI Act addresses human rights, but not as comprehensively as we hoped for—we now call on the European Union to close this gap with future initiatives."
Amnesty's Hakobyan emphasized that "countries outside of the E.U. should learn from the bloc's failure to adequately regulate AI technologies and must not succumb to pressures by the technology industry and law enforcement authorities whilst developing regulation. States should instead put in place robust and binding AI legislation which prioritizes people and their rights."
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Privacy Advocates Alarmed as House Resumes Spying Powers Fight
Rights groups are particularly concerned about reporting that parts of the debate could be held in "secret session."
Feb 12, 2024
Privacy rights advocates and experts are sounding the alarm this week as members of the U.S. House of Representatives dive back into a contentious battle over reforming warrantless government surveillance powers that historically have been abused and consider closed-door debate.
House Republicans on Monday unveiled the Reforming Intelligence and Securing America Act and announced that the Committee on Rules will meet Wednesday to discuss the bill, which combines two previously competing proposals focused on Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA).
Section 702—which Congress temporarily extended with an annual defense package in December—only allows warrantless surveillance targeting foreigners located outside the United States, but Americans' data is also collected, and several agencies including the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) have been widely lambasted for misusing it.
"Rushing to pass an anti-reform bill, subject only to very limited (and partially secret) debate, is a flagrant attempt to sidestep the strong, bipartisan movement for surveillance reform."
The new bill "more closely aligns with the original proposal from the House Intelligence Committee over that of its Judiciary competitor, focusing on more reforms at the FBI to address misuse of the powerful spy tool," according to The Hill. "But it does not include Judiciary's hope for a warrant requirement—something deemed a red line for the intelligence community but nonetheless a top priority for privacy advocates in Congress."
The outlet also noted that "the process of bringing the bill to the floor will push the House to return to a previously floated idea from Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) to do a queen-of-the-hill-style debate format that would allow for consideration of amendments—including a potential amendment on a warrant requirement."
Also stressing the divisiveness of the warrant policy, Wired detailed Monday:
Several aides attributed the drawn-out nature of the fight, at least in part, to the relative naivete of the House speaker on national security matters, saying that, with little experience in the area, Johnson had not previously had the opportunity to be captured by the intelligence community—powerful interests accused by congressional staffers of routinely deploying "fear tactics" to defend surveillance operations plagued by regular error and abuse.
Johnson's lack of any intelligence background, staffers say, would have likely increased his dependence on House intelligence staffers, who, while cultivating a sense of awe due to their access to national secrets, routinely behave as ambassadors between the spy agencies and regular congressional staff.
Privacy advocates inside and outside the House continue to emphasize the need for a warrant requirement. They are also concerned about reporting from Politico's Jordain Carney late Sunday that some debate may occur in "secret session."
"Most lawmakers want major reform of Section 702. The Judiciary Committee's reform bill passed out of committee on a 35-2 vote," said Elizabeth Goitein, senior director of the Brennan Center for Justice's Liberty & National Security Program. "Intelligence Committee leaders know they can't win on an even playing field, so they're trying to use secrecy to avoid reform."
"Secret law is anathema to democracies, and making law in secret is the next worst thing. Open debate is a core feature of our democratic system," she continued, noting how uncommon secret sessions are. "House members should unite in opposition to this ploy and demand open debate on surveillance reform."
Responding to Goitein on social media, exiled American whistleblower Edward Snowden declared: "Secrecy and deceit must have no place in the making of American law. This effort to revive disgraced Bush-era practices in order to thwart a *reform bill* is a scandal. A genuine scandal."
Jeramie Scott, senior counsel and director of EPIC's Project on Surveillance Oversight was similarly critical, saying: "Rushing to pass an anti-reform bill, subject only to very limited (and partially secret) debate, is a flagrant attempt to sidestep the strong, bipartisan movement for surveillance reform. The American people deserve better."
Jake Laperruque of the Center for Democracy & Technology's Security and Surveillance Project—who backed the previous House Judiciary Committee bill—cast doubt on the new legislation's prospects given opposition from not only that panel but also the far-right Freedom Caucus, which has scheduled a Tuesday afternoon press conference.
Laperruque said Monday that "I don't think you can say with any certainty" that the bill would get support from a majority of Republicans, who narrowly control the House.
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More Proof of FBI Abuse Sparks Calls for Congress to Stop Warrantless Spying
"Government self-policing will never be an adequate substitute for the Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement," said one expert as U.S. lawmakers consider whether to reauthorize or reform Section 702.
Jul 22, 2023
Privacy advocates renewed calls for swift congressional action to rein in warrantless spying on Americans following the Friday release of documents showing U.S. law enforcement's further misuse of a powerful surveillance tool.
"These disturbing new revelations show how Section 702 surveillance, a spy program the government claims is focused on foreign adversaries, is routinely used against Americans, immigrants, and people who are not accused of any wrongdoing," said Patrick Toomey, deputy director of the ACLU's National Security Project, in a statement.
The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) "continues to break the rules put in place to protect Americans, running illegal searches on public officials, including a U.S. senator, and it's long past time for Congress to step in," he asserted. "As Congress debates reauthorizing Section 702, these opinions make clear why fundamental reforms are urgently needed."
Before the end of this year, members of Congress must decide whether to reauthorize Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), which allows the U.S. government to collect the electronic communications of noncitizens who are believed to be located abroad and have specific types of information.
Americans' data swept up by such activities are supposed to be subject to extra protections, but a pair of redacted Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC) opinions released in May revealed that in 2020 and early 2021, the FBI misused the Section 702 database over 278,000 times—a figure that experts warn is likely an undercount.
That FBI abuse—including searches for information on crime victims, protesters arrested after the 2020 police killing of George Floyd, donors to a congressional candidate, and people suspected of breaching the U.S. Capitol on January 6, 2021—led to internal reforms at the bureau and additional training for the involved analysts.
On Friday, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, in consultation with the U.S. Department of Justice, released another redacted FISC opinion and related materials. The April 11, 2023 opinion addresses modifications to National Security Agency procedures as well as updates regarding FBI compliance.
Despite indications that the FBI's remedial measures after the previous abuse "are having the desired effect," compliance issues persist, the opinion details. "Some violations of the querying standard coincided with failure to follow an FBI policy that requires prior deputy director approval to use 'sensitive query terms'—e.g., identifiers of domestic public officials, domestic political candidates, members of the news media, academics, and religious organizations or persons prominent within them."
Additionally, the document notes, "in June 2022, an analyst conducted four queries of Section 702 information using the last names of a U.S. senator and a state senator" supposedly targeted by a foreign intelligence service. The New York Times reported that "the opinion did not make public the identities of the lawmakers who had been subject to overly broad searches, but the member of Congress was notified, officials told reporters in a background briefing on Friday."
The opinion adds that "on October 25, 2022, a staff operations specialist ran a query using the Social Security number of a state judge who 'had complained to FBI about alleged civil rights violations perpetrated by a municipal chief of police.'" According to the Times, "An official familiar with the matter said it had led to accountability measures but declined to provide further details."
FBI Director Christopher Wray said in a statement Friday that "Section 702 is critical in our fight against foreign adversaries" and the April court opinion "confirms the significant improvement" in the bureau's querying compliance since the reforms.
"We take seriously our role in protecting national security and we take just as seriously our responsibility to be good stewards of our Section 702 authorities," he added. "Compliance is an ongoing endeavor, and we recently announced new additional accountability measures. We will continue to focus on using our Section 702 authorities to protect American lives and keeping our homeland safe, while safeguarding civil rights and liberties."
While Wray wants to work with Congress to continue allowing the FBI access to Section 702 information—and sent a related letter to House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-Calif.) on Friday—civil liberties advocates argue that the recent violations are further evidence of the need for serious reforms.
"One warrantless query for Americans' private communications is one too many, and this opinion shows the government is still conducting hundreds of thousands per year, including thousands in violation of their own lax rules," said Jake Laperruque, deputy director of the Center for Democracy & Technology's Security & Surveillance Project, in a Friday statement.
"These new revelations of misconduct show yet again that lack of oversight invites abuse, and that it's impossible to fix FISA 702 without adding a warrant rule for U.S. person queries," Laperruque added. Elizabeth Goitein, co-director of the Brennan Center for Justice's Liberty and National Security Program at New York University School of Law, agreed in a series of Friday tweets.
"Government self-policing will never be an adequate substitute for the Fourth Amendment's warrant requirement," Goitein said. "The newest FISA Court opinion reaffirms that basic truth and underscores the urgent need for sweeping legislative reforms."
As the Times pointed out:
Privacy-minded lawmakers have long sought to impose greater limits on the program. But in previous cycles when Section 702 was about to lapse, they have been outvoted by hawks and centrists of both parties. This time, however, its liberal critics are joined by a faction of Republicans who have aligned themselves with former President Donald J. Trump's hostility to the "deep state" and see the issue as a chance to impose pain on the FBI.
[...]
Civil liberty and privacy activists have long pushed to require the government, or at least the FBI, to obtain a court warrant before using Americans' identifiers to search the repository of intercepted communications. They see the present odd-bedfellows alliance with the hard-right Republicans as a unique opportunity to achieve that reform.
U.S. Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) noted in a Friday statement that "for years, as government officials have provided misleadingly narrow testimony about who is targeted under Section 702, I have pushed to get the government to come clean."
"The revelation that 702 is used against 'foreign governments and related entities' directly impacts Americans' privacy, as American journalists, businesspeople, students, and others all have legitimate reason to communicate with foreign governments," he said. "The fact they can be swept up in 702 collection further highlights the need for reforms to protect their privacy."
"While I commend the administration for these releases," Wyden added, "it remains the case that information the public needs in advance of 702 reauthorization has been unnecessarily redacted."
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White House Deal for Voluntary AI Safeguards Called 'Great Step' But 'Not Enough'
Advocacy groups and experts are pressuring Congress and federal regulators to "put meaningful, enforceable guardrails in place."
Jul 21, 2023
Amid rising global fears about the dangers of artificial intelligence, campaigners and experts applauded U.S. President Joe Biden's administration on Friday for securing voluntary risk management commitments from seven leading AI companies while also emphasizing the need for much more from lawmakers and regulators.
"I'm very happy to see this modest, but necessary, step on the way to proper governance of AI. It is all voluntary at this stage, yet good to get these norms agreed. Hopefully it is a step on a much longer path," said Toby Ord, a senior research fellow at the U.K.'s University of Oxford and author of The Precipice: Existential Risk and the Future of Humanity.
Rob Reich, a faculty associate director at Stanford University's Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence, tweeted that "this is a big step forward for AI governance," and it is "great to see" Amazon, Anthropic, Google, Inflection, Meta, Microsoft, and OpenAI "coordinating on baseline norms of responsible AI development."
"We need enforceable accountability measures and requirements to roll out AI responsibly and mitigate the risks and potential harms to individuals, including bias and discrimination."
Alexandra Reeve Givens, CEO of the Center for Democracy & Technology (CDT), called the announcement "a welcome step toward promoting trustworthy and secure AI systems."
"Red team testing, information sharing, and transparency around risks are all essential elements of achieving AI safety," Reeve Givens said. "The commitment to develop mechanisms to disclose to users when content is AI-generated offers the potential to reduce fraud and mis- and disinformation."
"These voluntary undertakings are only a first step. We need enforceable accountability measures and requirements to roll out AI responsibly and mitigate the risks and potential harms to individuals, including bias and discrimination," she stressed. "CDT looks forward to continuing to work with the administration and Congress in putting these safeguards in place."
Caitriona Fitzgerald, deputy director at the Electronic Privacy Information Center (EPIC), had a similar response.
"While EPIC appreciates the Biden administration's use of its authorities to place safeguards on the use of artificial intelligence, we both agree that voluntary commitments are not enough when it comes to Big Tech," she said. "Congress and federal regulators must put meaningful, enforceable guardrails in place to ensure the use of AI is fair, transparent, and protects individuals' privacy and civil rights."
Biden brought together leaders from the companies to announce eight commitments that the White House said "underscore three principles that must be fundamental to the future of AI: safety, security, and trust."
As the White House outlined, the firms are pledging to:
- Commit to internal and external red-teaming of models or systems in areas including misuse, societal risks, and national security concerns, such as bio, cyber, and other safety areas;
- Work toward information sharing among companies and governments regarding trust and safety risks, dangerous or emergent capabilities, and attempts to circumvent safeguards;
- Invest in cybersecurity and insider threat safeguards to protect proprietary and unreleased model weights;
- Incent third-party discovery and reporting of issues and vulnerabilities;
- Develop and deploy mechanisms that enable users to understand if audio or visual content is AI-generated, including robust provenance, watermarking, or both, for AI-generated audio or visual content;
- Publicly report model or system capabilities, limitations, and domains of appropriate and inappropriate use, including discussion of societal risks, such as effects on fairness and bias;
- Prioritize research on societal risks posed by AI systems, including on avoiding harmful bias and discrimination, and protecting privacy; and
- Develop and deploy frontier AI systems to help address society’s greatest challenges.
"There is much more work underway," according to a White House fact sheet, which says the "administration is currently developing an executive order and will pursue bipartisan legislation to help America lead the way in responsible innovation."
Brown University computer and data science professor Suresh Venkatasubramania, a former Biden tech adviser who helped co-author the administration's Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights, said in a series of tweets about the Friday agreement that "on process, there's good stuff here," but "on content, it's a bit of a mixed bag."
While recognizing the need for additional action, Venkatasubramania also said that voluntary efforts help show that "adding guardrails in the development of public-facing systems isn't the end of the world or even the end of innovation."
The White House fact sheet says that "as we advance this agenda at home, the administration will work with allies and partners to establish a strong international framework to govern the development and use of AI. It has already consulted on the voluntary commitments with Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, France, Germany, India, Israel, Italy, Japan, Kenya, Mexico, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Nigeria, the Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, the UAE, and the U.K."
Gabriela Zanfir-Fortuna of the Future of Privacy Forum pointed out that the European Union was not listed as a partner.
As Common Dreams reported last month, the European Parliament passed a draft law that would strictly regulate the use of artificial intelligence, and now, members of the legislative body are negotiating a final version with the E.U.'s executive institutions.
The fact sheet adds that "the United States seeks to ensure that these commitments support and complement Japan's leadership of the G7 Hiroshima Process—as a critical forum for developing shared principles for the governance of AI—as well as the United Kingdom's leadership in hosting a Summit on AI Safety, and India's leadership as chair of the Global Partnership on AI."
Noting that portion of the document, Zanfir-Fortuna tweeted: "What is missing from the list? The Council of Europe's ongoing process to adopt an international agreement on AI."
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133 Rights Groups Warn EARN IT Act Threatens Online Privacy and Free Speech
"We support curbing the scourge of child exploitation online. However, EARN IT will instead make it harder for law enforcement to protect children. It will also result in online censorship that will disproportionately impact marginalized communities."
May 02, 2023
As U.S. lawmakers renew efforts to pass a bipartisan bill intended to combat sexual exploitation of children online, 11 dozen advocacy groups argued Tuesday that the federal legislation would actually not only fall short in its mission but also endanger digital privacy and free expression.
U.S. Sens. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.), Marsha Blackburn (R-Tenn.), and Richard Blumenthal (D-Conn.) along with Reps. Ann Wagner (R-Mo.) and Sylvia Garcia (D-Texas) last week reintroduced the Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies (EARN IT) Act.
The EARN IT Act (S. 1207/H.R. 2732) takes aim at Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which states that "no provider or user of an interactive computer service shall be treated as the publisher or speaker of any information provided by another information content provider."
The controversial bill would remove that blanket liability protection for civil or criminal law violations related to online child sexual abuse material (CSAM) and establish a national commission—filled with members of federal agencies, law enforcement, and survivor groups as well as legal and technical experts—to craft voluntary "best practices" for providers.
"EARN IT will jeopardize access to encrypted services, undermining a critical foundation of security, confidentiality, and safety on the internet."
In their Tuesday letter to the Senate Judiciary Committee, 133 groups led by the Center for Democracy & Technology wrote: "We support curbing the scourge of child exploitation online. However, EARN IT will instead make it harder for law enforcement to protect children. It will also result in online censorship that will disproportionately impact marginalized communities."
"In addition, EARN IT will jeopardize access to encrypted services, undermining a critical foundation of security, confidentiality, and safety on the internet," they continued. "Dozens of organizations and experts have repeatedly warned this committee of these risks when this bill has been previously considered, and those same risks remain. We urge you to oppose this bill."
The letter—also signed by Access Now, ACLU, Amnesty International USA, Demand Progress, Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), Fight for the Future, Free Press Action, GLAAD, Human Rights Campaign, PEN America, Public Knowledge, Transgender Law Center, Tor Project, Wikimedia Foundation, and more—lays out the groups' critiques in detail.
"Section 230's liability shield applies to smaller and start-up companies that are interactive computer service providers, not just a handful of large companies like Google and Meta," the letter stresses. "By opening providers up to significantly expanded liability, the bill would make it far riskier for platforms to host user-generated content," which could cause providers to stop hosting such content altogether or engage in "overbroad censorship" that removes constitutionally protected material.
"These wide-ranging removals of online speech will negatively impact diverse communities in particular, including LGBTQ people, whose posts are disproportionately labeled erroneously as sexually explicit," the rights organizations warned, pointing to lessons learned from the anti-trafficking law widely known as SESTA/FOSTA.
SESTA/FOSTA "has forced sex workers—whether voluntarily engaging in sex work or forced into sex trafficking against their will—offline and into harm's way," the groups noted, citing federal research. The law has also "chilled their online expression," and all of "these burdens have fallen most heavily on smaller platforms that either served as allies and created spaces for the LGBTQ and sex worker communities or simply could not withstand the legal risks and compliance costs."
In addition to putting online free expression at risk, the EARN IT Act would disincentivize end-to-end encryption, which "ensures the privacy and security of sensitive communications by making certain that only the sender and receiver can view them," the groups highlighted. "Billions of people worldwide rely on encryption to secure their daily activities online, from web browsing to online banking to communicating with friends and family."
"Everyone who communicates with others on the internet should be able to do so privately. However, this security is especially relied upon by journalists, Congress, the military, domestic violence survivors, union organizers, immigrants, and anyone who seeks to keep their communications secure from malicious hackers," the letter says, emphasizing that abortion patients also rely on the technology, especially since last year's U.S. Supreme Court decision and subsequent state laws restricting reproductive rights.
Though the EARN IT Act is backed by various groups that work to prevent the exploitation of children, the letter makes the case that the bill "risks undermining child abuse prosecutions by transforming providers into agents of the government for purposes of the Fourth Amendment," explaining:
If a state law has the effect of compelling providers to monitor or filter their users' content so it can be turned over to the government for criminal prosecution, the provider becomes an agent of the government, and any CSAM it finds could become the fruit of an unconstitutional warrantless search. In that case, the CSAM would properly be suppressed as evidence in a prosecution and the purveyor of it could go free. At least two state laws—those of Illinois and South Carolina—would have that effect.
Rather than passing Graham and Wagner's bill, the letter asserts, "Congress should instead consider more tailored approaches to deal with the real harms of CSAM online, and it should commit to conducting a full, independent internet impact assessment to identify potential harm likely to result from any internet-related legislation, such as harms to users' freedom of expression and privacy, before the legislation is voted upon."
The rights groups' alarm over the EARN IT Act comes amid debates over other thematically related proposals such as the Kids Online Safety Act (KOSA), which is supported by some advocates for children's rights, health, and privacy but opposed by some signatories to Tuesday's letter, including the ACLU, EFF, and Fight for the Future.
Advocacy groups critical of KOSA, the EARN IT Act, and the STOP CSAM Act—who say that "unfortunately, all three bills have many of the same problems"—plan to hold a press conference about the legislation on Wednesday afternoon with Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.).
This post has been updated to reflect there are 133 coalition members including the Center for Democracy & Technology.
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