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EFF's Cindy Cohn Talks About Patriot Act II
digidave writes "Techfocus.org has an interview with EFF's Legal Director Cindy Cohn, where she talks about the Domestic Security Enhancement Act, or 'Patriot Act II'. She talks about what the act is, how it might infringe on your freedoms, where it does right and how ordinary people can make a difference."
Techfocus recently conducted an interview with Cindy Cohn, Legal Director of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, focusing on the impending debate and strong possibility of enactment of the Domestic Security Enhancement Act, or 'Patriot Act II.'
Cindy Cohn has worked intensively on issues relating to online privacy and security, one notable case being her work on the U.S. v. Sklyarov case, which found Russian programmer Dmitry Sklyarov jailed in the US after speaking on security lapses in Adobe's eBook format. Ultimately cleared of wrongdoing, the programmer and his employer (Elcomsoft) are prime examples of where the EFF and Cohn are making a difference. Other notable work includes Bernstein v. Dept. of Justice, a successful case which tested the legality of encryption exportation - and validated the premise that source code is protected under the First Amendment.
Note: Based on the nature of the interview, we have provided the a reference list for readers, which translates the acronym to the actual name. You can view the list in a smaller pop-up window by clicking here
"Under the current draft of the Domestic Security Enhancement Act (DSEA), the Freedom of Information Act is curtailed, allowing the federal government to restrict more documentation of government activities and actions. What are some examples of situations where having the Freedom of Information Act has helped the public?"
It's hard to know where to begin with this one. I think about it in reverse -- what would happen if we didn't have access to what the government is doing? FOIA creates a default rule of accountability that keeps the otherwise secretive government bureaucracy on its toes. It's impossible to be scientific about it, but I believe the fact that sooner or later a decision made will end up on CBS news, TechFocus or even Slashdot probably prevents more stupid and improper actions than all the regulatory laws and policies put together. Sunshine is the best disinfectant.
For specific examples, recently I've heard excerpts from the tapes of Nixon during the Watergate period, which I believe were released after a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. But the best evidence for folks concerned about online issues is the FOIA gallery. David Sobel and his colleagues have done amazing work over the years using FOIA. Just in the past year they've unearthed information about a Transportation Security Administration model for profiling passengers, mistakes in use of both the Carnivore e-mail surveillance system and the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and the government's purchase of information about people from Choicepoint (.pdf), the private profiling service. And that's just this year.
Expanded search warrant powers
"As currently written, the DSEA would make it possible for investigators to attain a search warrant usable anywhere within the country, if the subject is allegedly involved in computer 'hacking.' Currently this is limited to violent offenses - what computer hacking events have the current restrictions failed to curtail, and what sort of precedent would this set by equating computer hacking with violent crime?"
View legal reference window
This provision continues one of the most egregious problems in the original USAPA -- the fact that it ranges far beyond issues related to terrorism and instead appears to be just a law-enforcement wish list. There has been no indication that computer trespass played any role in the 9/11 attacks, or any other act of international terrorism. Yet both USAPA and DSEA (which I call USAPA II) continue the relentless march to increase the scope of the law, to increase the penalties and to reduce the checks and balances against misuse of the law.
But to answer your question, I'm not aware of any situations in which the requirement that search warrants under the federal computer trespass statute (called the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act or CFAA) be obtained in the same way as all other search warrants has frustrated a law enfo
I can't help but begin this post with a cynical remark (sorry, but I've had a bad week...) You don't need masses for a job that one man can do... Lee Harvey Oswald thought he was a patriot, too. And the man who murdered Pim Fortyn (a right-wing populist politician from Netherlands; I don't support that kind of politicians, by the way) said he did it for the sake of the country...
Now, what I really wanted to say was, that Josef Goebbels would be proud of the Bush administration's rhetorics. I mean, calling a law that just invites people to be unpatriotic "The Patriot Act"... Another thing that's just impressive was how in the news today, someone from the Pentagon or US government talked about how the Iraqis may have destroyed all their weapons of mass destruction before the war had begun, and he made it sound as if it had been something unspeakable and unheard of ("how dare they?" was the message)...
Please think about it a bit before modding me down. Then my karma at least served some purpose.
Hell is not other people; it is yourself. - Ludwig Wittgenstein
Would-be totalitarian regimes pretty much always redefine "patriotism" as "doing whatever the government tells you to do and singing its praises" -- and its opposite, "treason," as "voicing any opinion contrary to the will of the government." Thus we have the USA-PATRIOT Act, and Fox News (AKA the US Government Ministry of Information) labeling protestors "traitors." This is the first step; the next n-2 steps are to be found in any book on the history of Germany, Russia, or China. Step n involves lots of barbed wire and mass graves.
No, we're not there yet, or I wouldn't be able to say what I'm saying. But in not so many years, we could be, and anyone who thinks I'm overreacting is desperately naive.
The correlation between ignorance of statistics and using "correlation is not causation" as an argument is close to 1.
Read more here.
If you live in the US, please think about how your government tramples on every idea of freedom, peace and democracy and then adds insult to injury by trying to convince you that, indeed you enjoy the freedom to say and do whatever you want.
A democratic regime would never have its president utter the words "with us or against us".
Mother is the best bet and don't let Satan draw you too fast.
Sadly as much as a despise our "elected" president the economy isn't truly his fault, it was sliding before he took office and is now simply taking the blame for that.
HOWEVER, he is to blame for getting us involved in a war for oil (which his family's fortune is based on) to ATTEMPT to help the economy and raise his popularity. I think it's sad that he would do something like this to take the attention off the economy but it's been done throughout the history of our country, and for those who actually think that this war is to "help" the people of Iraq. I'd like to point out a little incident in Cambodia where a little known dictator killed nearly 7 million of his own people and was hardly noticed until it was far too late. Why was there no major intrusion to stop these atrocities? Cambodia isn't bordering any allies of ours who would benefit from kicking him out, and there was no MONEY to be gained. This war is about saving face and making gas cheaper.
I don't want to sound antipatriotic, I love my country and on occasion I think we even do a few right things in the global society. But it's getting downright scary to think that we can exert this much force anywhere on the globe and have little worry of political retribution from a foreign power, and that this power is threatening our own freedoms. Every year countless laws are added to the books across the country and yet almost none are repealed. We're slowly putting ourselves into a police state. Much of what the government is now trying to regulate and patrol (information/communication) in the interests of "SECURITY" is only going to put the public in a position of fear of even discussing disentous remarks. It scares me that I see these things happening and yet there's little to be done about it because voters are entirely too apathetic to actually look at the issues and get out and fix these problems.
In short GO AMERICA, get rid of the government
support the free state project http://freestatproject.org
Personally, I like this one:
"To announce that there must be no criticism of the president, or that we are to stand by the president, right or wrong, is not only unpatriotic and servile, but is morally treasonable to the American public." -Theodore Roosevelt
To the knee-jerk dumbasses: He's a Republican, not a 'crat.
Any sufficiently advanced influence is indistinguishable from control.
If there's no regime change in November 2004, I'm going to put my plans in action for leaving the country. There are better places to live, and if you're young enough and skilled/educated, you can jump through their immigration hoops and get a passport. You know, like what a whole lot of Germans did in the 30s.
IAAL